Because they never happen anymore. Tell me the last time you saw one.

Blah blah blah launch angle blah blah spin rate blah blah blah tell me I'm wrong.

I just saw one the other night

I can't remember if it was the Mariners/Yankees or mayve Red Sox/Jays

AgRyan04 said:

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I just saw one the other night

I can't remember if it was the Mariners/Yankees or mayve Red Sox/Jays

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I say you imagined it, good sir. Else you were watching a very old game on MLBVault.

Fuzzy Dunlop said:

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goinjukin said:

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Because they never happen anymore. Tell me the last time you saw one.

Blah blah blah launch angle blah blah spin rate blah blah blah tell me I'm wrong.

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I see the Rangers do it almost daily. Tell me you don't watch much baseball without telling me you don't watch much baseball.

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I watch a ton of baseball but I don't watch the Rangers. I did just scroll through their last two games (8/12 and 8/11) and of the 108 outs zero were popouts to the catcher. Because it doesn't happen anymore. If you have evidence I'll gladly eat crow. The burden of proof is on you, good sir.

jah003 said:

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"Anyone here watch ESPN Classic? Yeah, I did, I saw baseball game on there. The guy hit a foul ball. ****ing classic, man!"
-Mitch Hedberg

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Damn straight.

A slight tangent but similar observation. Many years ago Texas had a closer named Dale Mahorcic and I recall a game where he was trying to finish off Wade Boggs at Fenway for the last out and the save. I swear Boggs fouled off a dozen nasty pitches before finally doubling off the monster, scoring two and winning the game.

Hitters are terrible these days.

Of all the odd plays to yearn for this has got to be the weirdest.

Statistically, popping the ball up is the worst thing a hitter can do. The expected BA on any sort of pop up is pretty close to zero and it provides no opportunity for any runners to advance. I'd rather a guy swing and miss trying to drive the ball than pop up trying to protect.

tylhair said:

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The premise is so uninteresting and so incorrect. Really great internet forum stuff. Classic even.

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Incorrect? Apparently so and I'm flabbergasted. Crow eaten. I watch the Cardinals almost exclusively and I thought that maybe they're just the outliers but apparently they've done it 23 times this season per BaseballSavant. I'm perplexed. Maybe I've just dozed off each time it happened.

Uninteresting? How dare you, sir? What else is the internet for?

AggieEP said:

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Of all the odd plays to yearn for this has got to be the weirdest.

Statistically, popping the ball up is the worst thing a hitter can do. The expected BA on any sort of pop up is pretty close to zero and it provides no opportunity for any runners to advance. I'd rather a guy swing and miss trying to drive the ball than pop up trying to protect.

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Who said anything about yearning? I was just incorrectly pointing out what I thought was a statistical oddity.

The Sun said:

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Per Baseball Savant...

There have been 551 pop-ups to catcher in 2026.
From 2021 through today there have been 4066 pop-ups to catcher for an average of 707 per year.

For S&Gs I checked 2012, the first year BS has...699 pop-outs to catcher.

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So based on these numbers, and number of games (estimated) to this point in 2026, about 1 in every 3 games. So potentially 5 total per day, assuming all 30 teams playing and 15 games per day.

You'll never guess what just happened in the Astros game.

There probably were more overall foul pop-ups overall, not just to the catcher, prior to the wave of new stadiums that started with Camden Yards. A lot of the older stadiums, especially the dual-purpose ones, had huge amounts of foul ground. The newer, baseball-only stadiums reduced the foul ground in favor of moving seats closer to the foul lines.

I remember both Candlestick and the Oakland Colosseum having enormous foul territories.

Yankees just had one for the first out in their game

Phils/Marlins had one tonight, too.

It actually happened twice in Monday's Cardinals-Reds game. I am now of the opinion that it happens too often and frankly I'm sick of them.

Ive seen this over and over since this was posted ... Delete the thread

Never once have I attended or watched a game and thought, man I hope I see a pop out to the catcher today.

Mark one down for the Rangers tonight.

_lefraud_ said:

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Never once have I attended or watched a game and thought, man I hope I see a pop out to the catcher today.

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I've never had that thought either, but I wouldn't mind if the opposing team had 27 of them every night.