AI-captured transcript of Bunting 1011H, Lecture, 8th JAN 2025
Detailing the optimal strategy for real good bunts
Get it down.
If you’re going to bunt, you’ve got to get it down.
If you don’t get it down then the guys in the dugout are going to be like, “My word, our brother and baseball companion made a fool of himself out there in the batters box with his sheer inability to square up and contact the baseball lightly such that it trickles down the third or first base line and now the shame and dishonor he displayed on the field of play surely reflects poorly not only on us, his teammates, but team ownership as well and each and every fan in attendance subjected to that unhinged and embarrassing display of incompetence. Our sponsors deserve recompense.”
I played ball for a long time, you know. Years. Once I mastered the bunt I turned to all the other kids on the Mustang practice field and said, “Gotta lay it down you nerds” before flipping my bat, mixing every soda, and calling 911 from payphone.
There was nothing left to accomplish after that.
The Bunt, as all of us in the Academy of Bunting Sciences are aware, is the most rational of all pursuits. Economics is, I suppose, a fine endeavor with some important ramifications for everyday life, health, safety, and global geopolitical stability, but the Bunt? Sublime.
In order to avoid the chiding of teammates, opponents, and all members of civilized society, let us further our pursuit of the bunt beyond the simple maxim “Get it down.”
Consider the grass
I’ll wait.
Have you considered the grass?
Excellent.
In 1911 groundskeeper Horace Shetland of the Boston Junior Rustlers stated,
“Grass—when with a tapered smooth edge on the infield side and a rough, thick edge on the side of foul ground—is postulated to add to the possibility of a bunted ball remaining in fair territory. Let it be suggested that attentive groundskeeping may be the best friend of a crafty speedster who fashions himself a bunt-layer.”
For many years the Academy of Bunting Sciences attempted research to verify this claim. We were unable to do so. Additionally, I am legally unable to further discuss this topic. If not for The Great War perhaps Mr. Shetland would have resolved the matter himself.
May there be a team somewhere in these great United States and Canada willing to test the edges of the rulebook this year? I’m not saying that unexpected differences in grass length for a well-defined range up the basepaths might yield positive outcomes. Truly, I am not. What I may legally state is that I wish the Academy of Bunting Sciences had the legal privilege to find out through empirical and ethics-board-approved research, but the Academy of Bunting Sciences availed itself of this right subject to Academy of Bunting Sciences v. State of Florida, 2024¹.
Now, please open your fifth edition of Bunting Through the Ages to page 369. There is time to analyze one more aspect of the humble bunt.
Consider
The
Wind
wind consideration
Wind has no impact on a bunted baseball.
——Mister Henri?
Never speak in my class without raising your hand first.
——Sure. Anyway, what do you think about dingers?
Never speak.
——It’s just that some of the other students and I were talking and why would you bunt if you could just hit a home run instead? I mean, that scores a run every time. Like, guaranteed. Why wouldn’t you just hit a dang bomb you know?
Your final exam has been rescheduled to tomorrow. Just yours.
——What?
Page 369 goes on to describe other atmospheric factors that can be discarded. For all intents and purposes we can assume a spherical bunt, that is the main thing to remember.
——Mister Henri?
I don’t understand.
——Can we please close the windows? It’s snowing again today.
Absolutely. Any of you could have gotten up at any time and closed the windows. I opened them before you arrived to conduct an experiment on free will.
——??? (sound of closing windows)
What can that teach us about the bunt? I expect fifteen single-spaced pages in my inbox by five-thirty this afternoon.
1. Academy of Bunting Sciences v. State of Florida, 671 F.3d 289 (10th Cir. 2024). https://openjurist.org/671/f3d/289/academy-of-bunting-science-v-state-of-florida/index.php