Last year, teams employed a defensive shift one-third of the time, stacking one side of the infield with most or all of their infielders. It has become a trending strategy in recent years, causing batting averages to plummet. To counteract this and give offenses a boost, Major League Baseball banned radical defensive shifts this year, requiring infielders to stay within the infield dirt, with two positioned on each side of second base. That would be the end of the end of the defensive shift.
Or so we thought. If you have watched Royals games over the first two weeks, you may have noticed that the reports of the shift’s demise were premature.