Opinion: Aggressive Mistakes
Much has been made of Jose Reyes getting thrown out at third on Luis Castillo‘s sacrifice bunt in yesterday’s ballgame. However, if you saw the play — with a full view of the field — you would 
have seen that Reyes took off for the bag because no one was covering it. For him to be thrown out, the Nationals had to execute perfectly, which they did. Bad idea? Probably. But, at least it was an aggressive mistake.
In contrast, consider the David Wright fly ball dropped by Austin Kearns in the third inning. There were two outs at the time, and Luis Castillo on first. Castillo jogged to second, continued jogging to third, then started running when the ball fell to the ground. At the same time, Wright was watching the ball in the air while jogging slowly to first. After the game, Willie Randolph said he didn’t think Castillo would have scored had he been running full speed, but that’s not the point. The point is, both Wright and Castillo should have been hustling, and they weren’t. Randolph had a chance right there to set a new tone for the season by benching both players immediately. After all, if Wright and Castillo aren’t hustling, why should anyone else?
I’d much rather see players make aggressive mistakes while trying to do too much, than see them lose opportunities due to a lack of hustle.
