Bunting when down 7-0 in the 9th. The nerve!

Dozier is so confident in the fact Sisco has committed a grave offence against baseball that he is certain Baltimore’s veterans will give him a stern talk and maybe send him to his room without a cookie.

Twins outfielder Eddie Rosario said of the bunt: “Nobody liked that. No, no, no. That’s not a good play.”

And the pitcher himself managed to say he didn’t care but also that it was bad for the sport in the space of two sentences.

“I don’t care if he’s bunting,” said Berrios. “I just know it’s not good for baseball in that situation. That’s it.”I dare say that he DOES care.

So many things are strange about this. The affront seems to be that Sisco was doing something other than just taking his hacks. In that situation in a seven-run game, the unwritten rules apparently state, batters are simply supposed to go through the motions, to swing away and get themselves out nice and quick so everyone can get on a plane sooner.

Sisco, by beating the shift, was being altogether too clever.

But if it was wrong to bunt against a shift when down by seven, wouldn’t it be just as wrong for the team that is leading by seven to be using a defensive shift? The Twins were up big and only needed a couple of outs. Did they really need to deploy advanced defensive strategies?

They didn’t, but as any number of baseball oldtimers will tell you, it’s the one sport that has no clock. There is no comeback that is impossible and so if a team normally sets up in a shift against a pull hitter in the first inning, they might as well do it in the ninth. The mere fact the Twins were still treating this like a normal at-bat says everything: The game wasn’t over yet.

Which was exactly how Sisco approached it. His bunt effectively started a last-ditch rally, even if it ended up fizzling.

Why would opponents take offence at such things? It’s another mystery of that rule book that isn’t actually a book, where it is OK to crush a defenceless fielder with a takeout slide and where bat flips and home run trots are to be quickly followed by a fastball to the ribs.

Truly, more batters should bunt against the shift in all situations. As teams use it routinely now, the best way to combat it would be to bunt enough to give the manager second thoughts about shifting. It’s almost like many hitters feel the bunt against the shift is beneath them. As though it is an unwritten rule.