A's Lucas Erceg Flips Ball to First--Between His Legs
Oakland A's reliever Lucas Erceg grew up in the area and attended games at the Coliseum as a kid. A core memory for him is a grand slam that Mark Ellis hit against the Angels in 2008. When looking up that game log, it was also funny to see A's new first base coach Bobby Crosby in the lineup that day.
Before the season began, I jokingly asked if he'd grabbed a first base glove to go take grounders with Crosby, which led to a discussion about conditioning. Erceg was selected in the second round of the 2016 Draft as a third baseman, before converting to a relief pitcher in 2021. While taking ground balls is not part of the conditioning process for pitchers these days, Erceg thinks that the exercise could provide some benefit.
"Strictly speaking from a benefit as part of our conditioning or our agility work as pitchers I think it would be a great benefit to take ground balls and put ourselves in unnatural positions and be athletic. I think that's why I kind of have some success moving down the mound. Maybe I throw as hard as I do because I was constantly putting myself in unassuming athletic positions that kind of forced my body to be efficient in inefficient ways."
On Sunday, the right-hander took a ball off the foot that the batter, Jesse Winker, hit at 95.7 miles per hour, causing the ball to ricochet towards first. It had a .470 expected batting average based on the launch angle and exit velocity, but what those stats don't account for was that a former third baseman was on the mound.
Erceg took off after the ball, reached down, and just rolled the ball to first baseman Ryan Noda, losing his glove in the process.
When you take into account Erceg's mindset about conditioning, his familiarity with putting his body into unnatural positions, and being efficient in inefficient ways, this play makes a lot more sense and really makes it feel as though there aren't that many other pitchers that could have recorded the out at first there.
Winker ended up going 6-for-12 in the series, and that's without this play going his way. You could see him throw his hands in the air a little bit at the end there in a "what the heck was that?" gesture, too. In the long run, the Nationals outfielder may be ok with the result given that he is a fan of the history of the Coliseum and the greats that have played on that field. This at-bat being his last in Oakland may just feel fitting.