Nobody ever said managing a Major League Baseball team was easy, you only need to look at the struggles of Dave Martinez with the Washington Nationals last season. But some managers will unnecessarily handicap themselves just because “everyone else does it.”
Case and point is the reluctance to use catchers as pinch hitters late in games. Managers will save their catcher just in case the guy out there gets hurt so they don’t have to throw someone who isn’t natural behind the plate out there.
But in reality, it’s tough to recall the last time the Nationals, or any team for that matter actually needed their emergency catcher to catch.