[uruguru]

I've seen this happen before and it seems off to me.

In the latest case, my RP Tom Burgmeier (sac bunt rating: 36) had thrown a couple of innings in relief and came up to bat in the 8th inning with a runner on 1st with no outs.

So the AI manager pinch-hit Lou Piniella for him (sac bunt rating: 32) and bunted the guy over the 2B.

Piniella did not stay in the game, but was repaced by RP Fred Norman (sac bunt rating: 27).

It seems confusing to me. If the AI wanted to bunt the runner over, it would have made more sense to let Burgmeier lay down the bunt instead of wasting a position player in a tie game that could very well go to extra innings (and did).

Even the previous game's starter had a sac bunt rating of 39 and could have been used. However, I understand that the game generally won't use pitchers as pinch-hitters unless they are marked as two-way players, but why not as pinch-bunters?

I'm just curious as to everyone's thoughts on this and if anyone can actually search historical data to see if pinch-bunting was actually a thing back in the day when teams bunted.