Last night’s Dodgers game was the last of the season. The guest manager was current active Dodger player Juan Uribe and Clayton Kershaw, the current #1 starting pitcher, was the pitching coach. I haven’t been watching baseball that long or that often, but is this a normal thing? Do teams every year or so like to do this? Other than for fun, why would they do this, especially for a team heading into the playoffs? You’d think they’d take the last game of the season where it didn’t matter anymore in terms of a win or loss and play around with the lineup, change things up, just to get perhaps that tiny bit of extra benefit from playing an unusual style or lineup
I’ve watched basketball a lot more and I don’t remember something like this ever even being considered, even if the team’s playing its last game of the season and they’re not making the playoffs. Is it just because basketball is so much harder and baseball managers have, I think, the reputation that they have the least effect on a game of all the major sports?