An extremely common amateur baseball defensive miscue

I don't know how many times I see this play. It happens almost every game that I see. It's egregious and yet it seems like it never gets addressed.

Here's the play.

Runner on 1st. Single to the outfield. Runner goes from 1st to 3rd. The outfielder, thinking he has a cannon, attempts to throw the runner out. He air mails the cutoff. Actually, there may not even be a cutoff. The shortstop often times doesn't even know exactly where he should go for this play. The batter advances to 2nd on the play.

It drives me crazy on so many levels.

Outfielders in high school baseball do not throw runners out. They simply lack the arm strength and arm accuracy to do it. Every now and again you see one do it but more often than not they don't know how or lack the skill to record an out. They would be better served to simply field the ball and toss it into second base to at least keep the double play or force in order.

The importance of this can't be overstated. Preventing long throws in amateur baseball is very important. Keeping runners at 1st rather than 2nd can be difference enough in stopping big innings.

Furthermore, if in fact, there is a cutoff man the throw needs to at least give the impression that it can be cut. This could be a major deterrent in the batter/runner advancing to 3B. At some amateur levels you can't even fake a cut. This is deemed obstruction by the defense. This takes away one major advantage that the defense can employ with the throw.

Why did I bring this up? Because often times the shortstop prevents the batter from taking 2nd base by faking or "dekeing" the batter/runner. If the shortstop can't do this, it might not even be worth attempting to throw to 3B.

Watch professional baseball or college baseball and you see defensive players in the proper position. This is the first step in preventing the offense from taking extra bases.