Creating a Maze Instead Of a Labyrinth

Do you know the difference between a maze and a labyrinth? You might say they are the same thing, but you are wrong. A maze can take you in multiple different directions before reaching your intended destination. A labyrinth has only a single, non-branching path, which leads to the center. A labyrinth is suppose to be an easy to follow path to the center.

I bring this up because The Colonel and I had an interesting conversation about how MLB managers create mazes instead of labyrinth's. It's almost like they want to create more work for themselves and the players.

"Bochy is especially bad," says the Colonel. "He creates a maze's filled with booby traps, dead ends, and the occasional Lion to eat the young."

The Colonel of course is talking about Bochy's tendency to read too much into lefty vs lefty match ups and righty vs righty match ups. We talked a little about this on Monday, but have never really gotten into a full conversation about this particular topic.

"I hate it," says a annoyed Colonel. "I'm a believer you put your best players in the lineup everyday no matter what their "splits" are."

The maze Bochy has created in quite a few people's mind is the fact Bochy platoons Brett Pill and Brandon Belt. There has been a tug-a-war between Giants fans all season about who they would like to see start. Pill or Belt?

KNBR listeners clamor for Pill and his RBI's (or as well jokingly call them Rib Eyes) and his lucky-right-down-the-middle-of-plate home runs off of Clayton Kershaw. The other half is on McCovey Chronicles and other Giants blog writers clamor for Belt and his higher on base percentage. The Colonel clamors that neither are platooned for each other and Belt starts everyday.

"Bochy creates mazes with his lineups with all these lefty can't hit lefties match up nonsense," says the Colonel. "If Bochy ever looked at Baseball Reference he would see Belt is better than the righty Pill against left handed pitchers.

Instead he creates these elaborate but unnecessary mazes that serve no purpose but drive the pitchers insane because of a lack of run support."

That gets us back to the whole maze vs labyrinth argument. If you are a manager would you rather go down a path of least resistance but still a difficult path (labyrinth) or would you like to go down a path filled with booby traps and dead ends (maze)? The choice should be obvious.

"I would hope everyone says labyrinth unless you're a fan of corn mazes," says the Colonel.