- Written by Tyler Wolfe
I wanted to take a slightly different direction and share my thoughts on infield defensive positioning, especially in today’s game of limited shifting. For my friends here for hitting, I will still tie it back into the swing at the end.
Shifting has been around the game for almost its entirety. Go read Ted Williams’ book if you get a chance, opposing teams ran the 5 man infield against him and he still batted over .400 while still just trying to pull the ball, not hit against it. An interesting note since we see it all the time where people will question why a hitter doesn’t just put it in play and hit it over there.
1. It’s much easier said than done when a guy is throwing 95+ at you with multiple shapes, and 2. it takes away from a hitter’s ability to be as productive as possible. This thought/idea often forces most guys to slow down when trying to accomplish it. Every hitter is different, some will actually make less contact when they slow down because their path and movement in the box suffer, while others may be even better this way.
But enough of the difficulty of the task (just needed to get that off my chest), let’s get into my thoughts and beliefs on infield positioning.
I’ve been able to oversee the infielders and their positioning at one point during my coaching career and that year we were one of top teams in minor league baseball in outs efficiency on ground balls in the infield.
It was a great year for growth for myself and I believe for the infielders we had. We talked through positioning nearly everyday and even made a couple adjustments for some guys to where they played. Biggest thing for me, however, was letting the guys have freedom to move if they saw something. All I asked out of them was to have a legitimate reason why they moved off of that spot when I would ask.
Here are the things I want to talk about:
- Where should our basic positioning be?
- Positioning changes based off of the infielders skill set/strengths
- What’s more important, the pitchers spray or the hitters spray?
- Understanding and reading the swing to adjust position
Where should our basic positioning be?
My thoughts on this, which are similar to what the data has told us: take away the pull-side 5-6 or 3-4 hole and take away the middle. These are the two primary focuses. We will give up the pull-side line and leave the oppo corner guy to cover whatever he can the other way. This is a very basic and simple starting strategy for positioning infielders.
Where are hitters generally trying to stay with the baseball? Through the middle of the field! One interesting thing to look at is the average launch angle by direction. In 2024 the average LA was:
- Pull-side: 4.7 degrees
- Center: 13 degrees
- Oppo: 28.6 degrees
Under 10 degrees is considered a ground ball, 10–25 degrees is a line drive, and 25-50 degrees is considered a fly ball per Statcast data.
So, the average ball to the pull-side is a ground ball, and the average ball middle is a low line drive, and balls the other way are, on average, fly balls. So if we’re talking basic positioning we should position for a ground ball if they pull it, and play for balls in the air more to the opposite field. This makes sense as we gain a deeper understanding of bat paths, which I’ll discuss later.
I would use each specific hitter spray chart to help adjust guys. (There are some examples from Baseball Savant in the pitcher vs hitter charts section below). I would always have 1-2 specific locations for each hitter (middle,6-hole, pull line) that I would tell them I only want a ball through that hole if it’s hit hard – I would use 100+mph as my number. For a right handed hitter, the 6-hole was usually the specific location we wanted to prevent. As far as the actual positioning for a righty, the third baseman sets his position, usually 5-7 steps off the line (much farther than most people will set their pull-side corner guy). Then the shortstop can set his position off of that in a spot where on a medium-hard hit ball, they are just barely crossing over that middle ground between them. Then the other middle guy will get as close to the bag up the middle where he can still see around the pitcher. This positioning however, is where I noticed the biggest differences in many players I noticed early on in the year even though they were all told the same thing.
Positioning changes based off of the infielders skill set/strengths
I had multiple guys who had an opportunity to play shortstop, all of them wanted to play in different locations even with the same cards/sprays. For example, with a right handed hitter some would play more straight up to where I thought I wanted them to play, one wanted to play much more in the hole, and one wanted to play much more up the middle. The more I got to watch and know them I began to understand why. The guys that played more in the middle had about an equal amount of range to either side and average arm strengths, the one that played up the middle was extremely good at going to his backhand side and he had good arm strength, and that was his favorite play to make. The one that played more in the 6-hole had very good arm strength but was not as confident with his footwork/ability to get to/around that ball to set up a good throw.
This was a big eye opener for me and a great place for conversations with them about both our positioning and our training. We would use video to show exactly where they play and pair it with charts like these below to help adjust. I’ve gone back to my own career as well – I realized I played way too far up the middle because my one tool was arm strength, and I loved the backhand play so I unconsciously played too much to the middle which led to me likely getting beat a few more times than I should have been in the 6-hole, one of the most prevalent ground ball spots on the field with a right handed hitter up. We used this data/awareness to help lead the training for each guy, as well as talk about the position adjustments we should make.
What’s more important, the pitchers spray or the hitters spray?
This is something I always had a constant battle with and I am still undecided at times. One thing I believe for certain though: I don’t think a pitcher should change their plan to hitters based on where the infield is at, they should just throw what and where they want regardless of positioning behind them. (Don’t forget, this is a blog of my opinions and how I helped to position infielders so I may be completely wrong about all of it but it worked well that year).
To help back up my reasoning a bit let’s look at the data I was able to collect looking at batted ball directions relative to inner half/outer half pitches. I sorted the data to players with at least 50 at-bats in 2024. Let’s start with pitches on the inner half: Hitters pull this pitch 48% of the time, hit it to the middle 31% of the time, and just 21% of the time the other way. When switching over to the outer half, hitters pull it 36% of the time, hit it to the middle 37% of the time, and hit it the other way only 27% of the time.
Even on the outer half, those pitches are hit less than a third of the time to the opposite field. This is the reason that I don’t believe pitchers should change their plan to account for the positioning behind them and why we should position more to the hitter’s sprays than to the pitcher’s spray charts. Examples of hitters charts from Baseball Savant are below along with a couple pitcher ones as well.
I did always carry copies of our pitcher spray charts so I had an idea of where guys tended to hit balls off of them. In the infield it definitely appeared to line up well. In the outfield however, from just my basic observation it may be a little different. Another reason why I would play to hitters sprays is because hitters often tend not to be able to adjust their swing path as much as we as hitting coaches wish they could.
Understanding and reading the swing to adjust position
Spray trends often seemed to align with the swing philosophies of different organizations. This is always one of my favorite things to see. It was often easy to tell by looking at the hitters charts which organizations had philosophies that were likely more ‘stay low up the middle’, and which organizations seemed to be more ‘pull and get the ball in the air’ organizations (Even though the data tells us backside air happens far more often).
I have gained a very good understanding of the swing path through Blast Motion and it has helped me recognize what type of results happen because of it. We rotate when we swing, so the farther out front we make contact, the more the swing path naturally works toward the pull side. This happens because of our rotational movement and the finite length of our arms and limbs. And hitting is all timing so usually hitters are out front multiple times a game considering they are generally trying to time up the fastest pitch and they are thrown that pitch less than half the time.
When looking at the path versus the launch angle data from before I think that the attack angle of the swing has the largest effect on this. Blast Motion definition of Attack Angle: Attack Angle is the angle of the bat’s path, at impact, relative to horizontal. A positive value indicates swinging up, and a negative value indicates swinging down. The swing will always start above the zone (our hands and barrel start above it) and so the path has to work down to start. We see this if we monitor the attack angle throughout the swing (blast does this with their 3D image of the swing which you can see on my youtube page here: Attack Angle and VBA Visual). Every hitter levels out at some point but this is what I believe in why we end up seeing the different launch angles by direction.
If a hitter is able to make contact extremely deep in the zone they tend to be above it leading to the few GB’s we see the other way (most guys tend not to be able to make contact this deep). But then as they get slightly farther forward, but still deep in the contact zone (probably around their midline), they reach the bottom apex of the swing where the path starts to level out, meaning they are usually below the baseball at this point leading to hitting the bottom of the ball if this is where contact occurs. They are often below the baseball here because the goal is to make contact father out front.
Usually the bat is also behind the hands here if looking from a top down view meaning the direction is more towards the opposite field. This of course would cause this high launch angle average we see to the opposite field because they are likely below the baseball at this point in the swing arc.
As contact gets slightly farther forward we see more low line drives to the middle and more squared up balls due to the path/attack angle starting to work uphill. Then as we get farther out front with contact we see the bat start working up, usually above the ball at some point leading many swings with the barrel working up above the baseball often hitting the top of the ball leading to more ground balls to the pull-side. An example of these points of contact can be found here: Contact Point vs Attack Angle.
So ultimately, the path and contact point (timing) play the biggest role in the direction and launch angle of the baseballs. I do believe understanding this about the swing can help both us as coaches, and also players to anticipate what may happen. Our players need to be able to recognize both the swings, and also how hitters seem to be timing up our pitcher in order to anticipate and adjust.
Extra Piece: Using Positioning to Adjust a Hitters Approach
We used this particular shift against a right handed hitter who had demolished us the first series and a half we had played him. Yes, I do believe demolished is the right word for what he did. He had an OPS of over 1.600 against us to this point and we could not seem to get him out. He was a very heavy ground ball hitter, nearly 50%, but seemed to always find a hole, usually up the middle from the SS, and mostly due to our inability to put 3 guys on the left side of the infield.
So what did we do: we adjusted drastically to see if we could change his approach. We took our 3rd baseman – slightly less range than our SS, and put him on the other side of the shortstop slightly up the middle and then left the SS in the 6-hole. The second baseman remained in his same position, just on his side of second base. So we gave this hitter the entire 3rd baseman’s side of the field practically begging him to try to pull a ground-ball double down the line. To me, this result would be far better than him hitting another homerun and could also make him more susceptible to chasing as well if he tried to hit it there.
Fortunately, the shift paid off during the five at-bats in which we implemented it. He struck out three times on breaking balls away, flew out to left, and grounded out up the middle. However, we only used this shift with nobody on base, and in the at-bats where we didn’t apply it, he still managed to hit a homerun.
I can’t say for certain whether the shift changed his approach, but it seemed to have an effect—both he and his dugout kept glancing at the unusual alignment between pitches. While the sample size is extremely small, the strategy worked in this instance against a hitter we had struggled to contain. This highlights an important takeaway: sometimes, using unconventional defensive alignments can disrupt a hitter’s rhythm and approach. It’s worth considering as an option when faced with a similar situation in the future.
Concluding thoughts
Infield positioning/defense is just a part of limiting baserunners, but pitching ultimately plays the biggest factor in getting outs. There are a few good articles out there on this. But these are my thoughts when looking at an infield and at how we can prevent those few extra balls through the infield over the course of a 140+ game season. I will always admit that this is my belief and I could be completely wrong, but I did see a lot of success with it that year. I do believe it also helped both myself and the infielders I had better understand their strengths/biases.
One of my favorite sayings that I’ve heard multiple times from Brant Brown which makes me rethink the battle of the pitcher & defense versus the hitter: ‘Baseball is the only sport where the defense starts with the ball.’ Go ahead and think about that one for a little bit.
