Seeking a rhythm to rock better bunts, Victor Scott II studied the classics: Cardinals Extra

BOSTON — To improve his rhythm and find just the right bunt to rock the ball to sleep along the line, Cardinals outfielder Victor Scott II got a pen and some paper and studied the classics.

“Rod Carew was good up the lines,” Scott said this weekend at Fenway Park. “How he brought over his bat, from his hitting stance and into the bunt. The cadence he had was so rhythmic. I worked on that. Especially the rhythm he had with his feet. He would sway back and forth, and his bat would come over so smoothly.”

Scott mimicked Carew’s move into a bunt, beaming with respect as he did.

“It was really smooth,” Scott said. “He wouldn’t give it away.”

At the spark of the Cardinals’ bonanza inning that carried them to a runaway win last week against one of Carew’s former clubs, the Angels, were two kick-starter bunts. Scott dropped one that snoozed along the third base line, and shortstop Masyn Winn followed with a bunt single. They loaded the bases for what became a five-run burst and a 12-5 victory.

Dismissed or diminished in use during this power-ball era, the bunt is back (to back) — at least for Scott, who spent time studying gifted practitioners to unlock that part of his game.

“That was fun baseball right there,” Scott said of the bunt pairing. “That becomes very exciting very fast.”

As part of his offseason deep dive in many elements of baseball, Scott loaded up video from YouTube of Ichiro Suzuki, Brett Butler, Willie McGee and Carew. When it came to bunting, he spent several days watching Suzuki but focused a lot on Butler and Carew.

In a paperback-sized journal he keeps with him, Scott wrote down descriptions of their bunt approaches. He wanted to see their cadence, how they moved their feet, how they guided the bunt, how they left the batter’s box — all of it. Then he would write out the different drills he could do to practice those same actions. Every day, he’d set a 10-minute timer on his phone and bunt for 10 minutes.

He set up cones to mark the baselines, and he’d get busy dropping bunts.

With his speed, the upside was obvious.

“What you have to understand is a bunt in fair territory has an outcome of like .461 batting average,” hitting coach Brant Brown said. “So if they’re giving it to you, that’s kind of one of those moments where you take the hit. No hitter every goes home (angry) about 2 for 4 with two singles.”

Brown has a saying for his bunters.

“It’s like real estate,” he explained. “Location, location, location.”

And for Scott, that location begins with how he charges toward the pitch.

Willing to use the bunt to take a hit since he sharpened his fundamentals in college, Scott sometimes gets into his run before he drops the bunt. He will start the race for first base and that pulls his head and body away from delivering a clean tap on the pitch. What Scott and the Cardinals want him to do is plow toward the pitcher, put the bunt in the best location and then — dash. Or as Brown called: “Bunt it. Then run.”

Against the Angels, Scott attempted a bunt but broke toward first before making contact and mishit the pitch. He spent time earlier in the day going through the routine of bunting against a pitching machine, and he credits watching the greats on YouTube and the practice for helping him identify misses and make quick corrections. That’s exactly what he did in that game, adjusted and took the hit when it was offered to start the five-run inning. Pull it off enough and opponents will adapt and other seams in the defense might open.

“He’s done a better job of using the whole field, and he can slap it through that sixth hole — so if he draws them in with the bunt that opens a lot more base hit opportunities for him,” manager Oliver Marmol said. “And a base hit means a double.”

With a stolen base, a bunt means scoring position.

And a few more will give Scott, a songwriter in addition to a center fielder, the chance to use the rhythm he learned from the classics to inspire rhymes. He tested out a few last week, saying he “bunted that with a pillow,” that the “bunt was Tempur-pedic” and that the bunt “got a full eight hours of sleep.”

“Hopefully all of my bunts are Tempur-pedic,” Scott added Saturday.

Graceffo recalled

In need of insurance if one of the games Sunday went sideways on the starter or lingered into extra innings, the Cardinals promoted right-hander Gordon Graceffo from Class AAA Memphis. Graceffo had been scheduled to pitch Saturday for the Redbirds, so he arrived in Boston without any restrictions on his availability.

In his only Class AAA Memphis start of the season, Graceffo allowed four runs and needed 56 pitches to get through 2 1/3 innings. He struck out five in a March 30 game vs. the Reds’ top minor-league affiliate.

The Red Sox promoted one of their top prospects, right-hander Hunter Dobbins. An appearance would be Dobbins’ major league debut.

The home team can choose if the 27th player is eligible for both of the doubleheader games or only the second one, and the Red Sox chose both.

Chills, etc.

With a first pitch temperature of 47 degrees Sunday afternoon, the first game of the doubleheader was the coldest for a game between the Red Sox and Cardinals regardless of ballpark. The four previous times a game started between the teams with a temperature less than 50 degrees was at Fenway Park for World Series games in October 2004 and 2013.

• Lars Nootbaar reached base in 18 of his first 35 plate appearances, and that was the most in the Cardinals’ first seven games of a season since Jim Edmonds reached base 20 times in 2000 and Mark McGwire reached base 21 times in 1998.
• In his first start of the season, Tekoah Roby, a standout pitching prospect in spring, struck out five and pitched four scoreless innings Saturday for Class AA Springfield (Missouri).