ARLINGTON, Texas — In the eighth inning, with the Diamondbacks up 4–1 over the Rangers, Arizona general manager Mike Hazen made a prediction.
D-Backs left fielder Lourdes Gurriel, Jr. was at the plate with a runner on first and no outs. A three-run lead was nice, but on the heels of their agonizing blown save in Game 1, it certainly wasn’t enough to feel comfortable. Arizona was going to do whatever it could to build the lead. So Hazen turned to assistant general manager Amiel Sawdaye and shared what he was thinking: Gurriel’s going to lay down a sacrifice bunt.
“He goes, ‘Why would he bunt? When was the last time he ever bunted?’” Hazen recalls with a grin. “I was like, I have no idea. But all we do is bunt now. And so I think he’s going to bunt.”
Both executives were right. Sawdaye was right to ask why anyone should expect a bunt there from Gurriel—an above-average hitter who had singled and been intentionally walked in his last two plate appearances. Arizona was in a good spot and making headway into Texas’s bullpen. That made a curious bunt situation for the majority of modern hitters, and certainly for Gurriel, whose bunting record was so hazy as to be a mystery to his own front office. (For the record, the answer to the question about the last time he bunted was May 28, 2021–one of just three sac bunts in six years for him in MLB.) Sawdaye was correct about the statistical merits of the bunt. But his boss was correct about the vibes.
Gurriel did indeed lay down a sac bunt. It advanced the runner, who eventually scored, and the Diamondbacks romped to a 9–1 win over the Rangers. The World Series now heads to Phoenix split at one game apiece. And it does so with a reminder: Small ball isn’t dead just yet.
The D-Backs had three sacrifice bunts on Saturday. (Two of the three runners who advanced went on to score.) It was only the fifth World Series game since 1960 in which a team sac bunted three or more times. This is part of the Diamondbacks’ offensive modus operandi; the club very comfortably led the league in sacrifice hitting this year. That doesn’t take much nowadays—Arizona could lead baseball with just 36 sac bunts in their 162 regular season games. But on the game’s biggest stage, where the margins are slimmest, they have leaned on sacrificing more. They now have four sac bunts in their first two World Series games.
“In an era of launch angle and slug, to see a club that’s able to put the ball on the ground and do some small ball and win baseball games, it’s pretty refreshing, I think, for us,” says D-Backs bench coach Jeff Banister. “It may not be what the fans want to see all the time. But it’s how we play baseball.”
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The Diamondbacks did not win on Saturday because of their sacrifice bunts. They won because Arizona starter Merrill Kelly pitched the game of his life. They won because Ketel Marte extended his record postseason hitting streak and because Tommy Pham went 4-for-4. They won because Texas’s staff could not buy a strikeout. Yet the bunts stood out all the same. That’s partially because it’s so out of step with modern trends: Arizona sac bunted more just in Game 2 than every team did in the last three World Series combined. And it’s partially because it’s … working. The Diamondbacks’ lineup was not built for power. Their .408 slugging percentage was below league average. They hit fewer home runs than the hapless Oakland Athletics. But they have speed and pitching and, well, just watch them bunt their way through the World Series.
“It’s kind of who we are,” Hazen says. “I don’t think we’re going to line up and just bash home runs against other teams. We’ve got to find ways to win games. We’ve got to find ways to score … We’re not going to hit a lot of home runs. So making singles count, turning them into runs, is important.”
The first sac bunt of the night came from Evan Longoria. Asked in the clubhouse afterward if he could even remember the last time he tried a sacrifice like that, “I have absolutely no idea,” he said. (It was in 2014 and, until Saturday, had been Longoria’s one and only sac bunt in a 15-year professional career.) The veteran third baseman did not have a sign from manager Torey Lovullo. There had been no specific discussion with him about bunting. “It wasn’t something that I had even thought about doing before the game,” Longoria said. But when he came to the plate in the bottom of the third inning of a scoreless game with one on and none out, with the left side of the infield playing deep, Longoria figured he might as well improvise. So he tried laying down his first sac bunt in nearly a decade. It worked.
“That was more of a veteran move,” Banister says. “The biggest part is the trust in our players and what we’ve seen from them and their decision-making.”
That decision-making is not always the most analytically sound. (There’s a reason sac bunts have gone so far out of fashion.) But the D-Backs are doing their best to get the most from what they have. The front office knows that every out is valuable this late in October. It also trusts its manager and players with an understanding of what it means for this lineup to play to its strengths.
“You don’t necessarily draw it up that way—to bunt what feels like every single time we get a guy on first base,” Hazen says. “But it’s worked for us. So I get why we do it.”
The general manager had not expected the bunt from Longoria. “I was like, wait, Longo’s bunting now, too?” The next one made a little more sense—No. 9 hitter Geraldo Perdomo became the first player ever to have consecutive World Series games with a stolen base and a sac bunt. (Of all the feats that could happen for the first time in 2023!) And by the third sac bunt, Hazen was making predictions and being proven right, just along for the small-ball ride.
“It’s a party,” Hazen says. “I don’t know what to tell you. Everybody wants a piece of it.”
