Cubs' Javy Baez makes perfect behind-the-back tag on stolen-base attempt

Everyone knows that the foremost particulars of playing big-league baseball are extremely difficult. It takes an outrageous amount of talent and natural ability to pitch a baseball 95 miles per hour with any accuracy, and perhaps just as much to hit that 95-mph pitch. But we probably sleep on all the smaller feats necessary in big-league baseball, both in terms of the physical skills and the mental acuity necessary to enact them.

All of which is to say: Let us now gawk at this freaking tag Javier Baez made to catch a would-be basestealer in the Cubs’ 3-2 win over the Giants in 13 innings on Sunday:

The play came with no outs in the top of the 12th — a huge spot, needless to say. If runner Gorkys Hernandez gets to second base successfully, he would have had a better than 60% chance of scoring a run to put the Giants ahead. Catcher Willson Contreras’ throw pulled Baez away from second base and appeared to be tailing toward the first-base side, so merely catching it and stopping Hernandez from taking an extra base represented a decent play by Major League standards and an excellent one by all normal human measures.

But then Baez had the presence of mind — probably just by well-honed instinct — to know that Hernandez would be sliding right behind his glove, allowing him to slap the runner with a behind-the-back tag. The Cubs had only a 41.8% chance of winning the game with Hernandez on first and no outs in the 12th. By both erasing the baserunner and securing the out, Baez increased the Cubs’ chances of winning by 13.9%. And obviously the Giants’ odds would have looked much more favorable had Hernandez beat the tag.