Some big leaguers just don't think the game through

Note to all Little League coaches and various youth baseball mentors…

Do not let your kids watch big leaguers on TV.

Just seeing the very best athletes run around in front of 30,000 fans will scar their young minds, and you might never be able to teach them the game properly.

I mean, it’s only May, and already we could put together a lowlight reel of major leaguers doing strange things that…

Well…

They’re doing things that seem to prove they have no clue how to play the game.

If nothing else, some of these antics show that a lot of these millionaires weren’t listening to their own Little League coaches.

I once asked longtime baseball manager and executive Whitey Herzog if the sport was better now than a few generations in the past.

“The athletes and the physical skills are much, much better,” Herzog responded, “but they don’t play the game as well.

“Not many modern-day players really understand baseball, so the guys who do think it through can take advantage of everybody else.”

CUE THE case of Mariners second baseman Dee Gordon, who definitely could have played for Herzog.

Gordon always knows what’s going on around him, which is why he suddenly screamed at third baseman Ryon Healy to let an easy pop fly struck by the Angels’ Justin Bour drop to the dirt.

There was only one out at the time, and Dee had spotted the disappointed Bour not bothering to run out of the batter’s box.

Healy admitted he didn’t know what was going on, either, but once the ball landed, Gordon yelled, “Throw it to second.”

Healy obeyed, and the M’s turned an easy double play.

But the story gets better.

“Even if Bour was running,” Gordon said, “it was better to let the ball drop. I was thinking we’d rather have Bour on first than Brian Goodwin, who’s a lot faster.

“It was a bonus that Bour didn’t run and we got both outs.”

Gordon HAS been paying attention to all the little things that can give you an advantage during nine (or more) innings of baseball.

Over a long season, that pays off.

IT’S LIKELY the dumbest play of the 2019 season is already on tape for young players to view.

And gasp.

Here was the situation: In a game between Cleveland and Baltimore, the Indians led 9-7 and had the bases loaded with one out in the eighth inning.

The Orioles couldn’t afford to let that deficit grow any deeper, so they played the infield halfway in — close enough for a play at the plate, but just far enough back to turn a double play on a ball hit sharply and right at someone.

The Tribe’s Jason Kipnis obliged, hitting a crisp one-hopper directly to second baseman Hanser Alberto.

It was the dream scenario for the O’s, who might have turned a double play — or at least had an easy force out at the plate.

Instead, without committing an error, Baltimore got no outs and allowed two runs to score.

And you ask: How?

Alberto, for whatever reason, didn’t throw for a force anywhere. He decided to chase Francisco Lindor, the runner on first, into a rundown (as the runner scored easily from third).

BUT THEN Alberto stopped, without actually tagging Lindor, and threw to first — but just too late to get the hustling Kipnis.

Now…

First baseman Chris Davis ALSO decided a rundown would be fun and began chugging after Lindor.

Before he could catch or trap Lindor, Davis heard someone yell that Leonys Martin, the original runner on second, had rounded third.

Martin obviously realized by then that the Orioles were actually the Bad News Bears, and he was flying toward the plate.

Davis finally turned and threw home.

Too late.

This is the kind of stuff you see in T-ball, where little tykes just keep running — while some other tykes are fetching the ball and heaving it to the wrong place.

That play would have hilarious if the Orioles were all 7 years old, and not a major league baseball team.

Sadly, that won’t be the only goofy play made this season by guys making a lot of money — yet remain clueless about what they’re doing.

Remember Justin Bour, the Angels batter who didn’t run out that pop fly?

Bour also has been tagged out after wandering off second base on a play where he was called safe.

Now do you understand why we should keep young eyes away from the big leagues?

Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns for The Press appear on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Steve also contributes the “Zags Tracker” package on Gonzaga basketball once monthly during the offseason.

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