This weekend I had the opportunity to see a very well-executed short game in action. Unfortunately it was while my own daughter was pitching, but give credit where it’s due. The opposing team did what many of us practice but either don’t try or don’t execute as well. Here are the essentials.

With a runner on first, the batter showed bunt. Pretty standard offense, right? The defense charged the bunt aggressively, and the batter pulled the bat back and proceeded to push the bunt right past the pitcher and the first baseman. By the time the ball was recovered the runner was on third and the batter was on first.

This team did it not once, but twice. It wasn’t really a bad defense, it was just very heads-up offense. The lesson in this is if you see the defense charging the bunt like there’s no tomorrow there may be an opportunity to wind up with more than a runner on second and one out. If your hitter can push bunt, or pull the bat back and slap it through, you could finish the play with no outs and two on — maybe even a first and third situation. One pitch later you’re likely to have two runners in scoring position — and a defense that’s a little freaked out on top of it. Your odds of scoring have risen considerably over the standard runner on second and one out.