Shift work

In case you are wondering, the exaggerated defensive shifts that for a while become so ridiculously popular with managers in today’s game make their debut 79 years ago today as Cleveland player-manager Lou Boudreau rolls out the strategy in the second game of a doubleheader at Boston’s Fenway Park.

Boudreau’s goal is to stop the Red Sox’s magnificent Ted Williams, who in the first game of that doubleheader goes 4-for-5 with three home runs eight runs batted in.

Williams – seen here two days later against Bob Feller and that shifty Cleveland defense – goes 1-for-2 against the shift for the first time with a double, pair of walks and a groundout to Boudreau playing on the right-field side of second base in the Red Sox’s 6-4 victory before a Sunday afternoon crowd of 31,581 at Fenway Park.

Historians note that Williams goes 2-for-5 two days later against Feller with a pair of groundouts into the shift in a game Cleveland wins 6-3 in another game at Fenway before a crowd of 33,142.

Boudreau says he is just fine with Williams hitting the ball the other way to beat the shift.

“If he wants to cross us up and bunt or hit to left, that will be all right with me,” Boudreau tells the Cleveland News. “Any time that guy settles for two bases, he’s doing you a favor.”