The complicated relationship between pitchers and popups

With two outs and two on in the second inning of a scoreless second game of last year’s American League Championship Series, a popup sailed skyward.

Had pitcher Luis Severino adhered to tradition, to baseball dogma, he would have deferred to his defense, capitulated specifically to his catcher and let this precious potential out in a postseason game fall safely into the glove of an expert after being called off.

Instead, the Yankees right-hander jogged off the mound, extended his gloved hand above his head, and -- awkwardly but effectively -- made the catch himself.

With that, he had ended the inning but broken an unwritten rule that pitchers aren’t supposed to field pop flies.

“To me,” Severino said later, “that [unwritten rule] is stupid.”

Quite a bold statement from Severino. Baseball blasphemy, some would say.

Apparently, though, he’s not alone in that assertion, because the rate of pitchers catching popups is popping.

In recent days, we’ve seen the likes of the Nationals’ MacKenzie Gore, the Mets’ David Peterson and the D-backs’ Andrew Chafin not just putting themselves in position to make the play but actually sprinting off the mound like men possessed while waving off those who are traditionally entrusted to pull the popups in.

We saw this last postseason, too. Severino was actually one of four pitchers to catch a popup during the 2022 playoffs -- a new postseason record! (All four were in the League Division Series or later, so the record was not a product of the expanded format.)

As of this writing, we are on pace for 71 popups caught by pitchers this year. Last year, there were 66. The average in the first 23 full seasons of the 30-team era had been 58.7.

This is happening, by the way, even as the rate of infield popups in 2023 is just 9.4% -- the second-lowest since 2002, when FanGraphs’ popup data is first available.

Is this a revolution right under our noses (or, more accurately, under those popups)? Or just a statistical fluke?

Um, probably the latter, honestly.

But we can at least entertain the notion that, in the time since MLB instituted the universal designated hitter on a full-time basis, pitchers are taking charge on more popups because -- bereft of the opportunity to hit -- it is a way for them to show off their non-pitching athleticism.

Or maybe more pitchers have just decided it is, as Severino said, “stupid” for them to not catch a popup that is easily in play for them.

Take it from Blue Jays starter José Berríos.

“I’ve been able to play this game since I was 2 years old,” Berríos said. “I was a shortstop, a second baseman, an outfielder. I had a good ability to catch the ball. So now I'm a pitcher, but I still have that feeling, that passion to play the sport. So as soon as I throw that pitch, I convert myself to a position player.”

Berríos was pleased to learn he is second among active pitchers in popups caught, with seven. He vowed to catch and surpass the active leader -- wily veteran Johnny Cueto (eight), who has more than 1,000 innings on him.

“I remember [in Single-A] in 2013, there was a popup to the visitors’ dugout, to the foul side, and the catcher couldn’t find the ball,” Berríos said. “So I ran and laid out for it and made the play. After it was done, the pitching coach came to me and said, ‘Hey, don’t do that again.’ I said, ‘Why? We are playing baseball.’ I understand they’re trying to take care of me and don’t want me to get hurt. But that’s in my blood. I can’t stop that.”

It is a bit incongruous that, in a sport in which every out is precious, a professional athlete wearing a glove is not expected to make what generally qualifies as an easy play.

Well, OK, sure, sometimes pitchers trying to make defensive plays end up with more than they bargained for, such as when the Cubs’ Drew Smyly lost his perfect-game bid in the eighth inning in ghastly fashion.

But generally speaking, pitchers are capable. Instead, the job is left to other fielders who often have to hustle farther to get in position to make the play, sometimes even climbing the mound while looking up to track the ball.

“For infielders, it’s tough to run and then they don’t know where the mound is,” Severino said. “So sometimes they trip or something can happen.”

Still, the tradition persists, mostly as a means of pitcher preservation.

“I would rather my corner guys get in there and catch the ball,” Mariners infield coach Perry Hill said.

That hasn’t stopped Hill, who has coached at the Major League level for more than 30 years, from preparing pitchers for the possibility of catching very particular popups.

“We did it during the shift, because you get two strikes on certain left-handed hitters, and the third baseman is actually playing shortstop in the hole,” Hill explained. “So those foul balls around by the coach's box, the pitcher has to get those.”

With the most extreme defensive shifts restricted this year, Hill has felt no need to work on that play anymore (even though there are certainly still many instances in which the third baseman is far from the bag). And generally speaking, teams don’t devote precious practice time to this matter.

Pitchers’ fielding practice, or PFP, is an annual rite of Spring Training. But PFP does not typically include PFP -- Pop Fly Protocol.

“There’s never five minutes in Spring Training to work on popups with pitchers,” Blue Jays third base and infield coach Luis Rivera said. “They just work on ground balls, covering first and stuff like that, but never popups. But while you’re watching those guys take ground balls, you can tell right away who has good hands and who doesn't and then the infielders know which guys can handle it.”

Sometimes they feel they have to handle it. Like last season, when the Phillies’ Zack Wheeler induced a popup to the third-base side from the Rangers’ Brad Miller. Wheeler came off the mound, looked quickly to his right and didn’t immediately see third baseman Alec Bohm hustling toward the ball, so he took charge.

“It’s just funny, more than anything, when it happens,” Wheeler said. “You come back to the dugout and say, ‘Hey, Bohm, were you over there sleeping?’”

Don’t sleep on what might be an emerging trend in MLB: More pitchers taking charge on popups. Because if it can happen four times in a single postseason, it can happen anytime.

And if pitchers keep making the play, well, maybe this tradition -- what some would call “stupid” -- will be called off.