As expected, the idea that Dale Sveum is kind of thinking about maybe, possibly considering the idea of potentially occasionally batting Alfonso Soriano in the lead-off spot has sparked the kind of panic that one usually associates with one of the Airplane! movies.
Of course, the level-headed media that is famous for never over-reacting to things like they're the ones spending thousands of dollars per year to sit 400 feet away from homeplate while eating homemade bologna sandwiches is happy to fan the flames of irrational hatred of Soriano. Yesterday, shortly after the article ran that indicated Sveum had CLEARLY LOST HIS MIND mentioned the possibility, Dave Kaplan tweeted out:
I do not believe for one second that Soriano will lead off EVER again in a regular season game. No chance. Sveum is aware of his history
— David Kaplan (@thekapman) March 2, 2012
This seemed to be tweeted out with a feeling like Kap is trying desperately to get people to look away from a horrible plane crash while simultaneously breathlessly calling attention to it.
And what history? By all accounts (including Kaplan's), Soriano is a hard worker and he is a good teammate. What a terrible history!
So this obviously isn't a situation where the guy's character should be getting called into question. So it must be performance, right? We all know that Soriano's bat isn't what it used to be. But Sveum isn't suggesting bumping Rickey Henderson or Tim Raines out of the lead-off spot to hand it to Soriano. He's talking about maybe thinking about conceptualizing situations where he may ponder using Soriano instead of David DeJesus.
The horror.
But here's the thing about Soriano's history that Kaplan insists Sveum is keenly aware of: Soriano has always batted better in the lead-off spot than elsewhere in the lineup. Here are his career numbers:
| I | Split | G | PA | AB | R | H | 2B | 3B | HR | RBI | BB | SO | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Batting 1st | 771 | 3630 | 3341 | 573 | 961 | 221 | 13 | 197 | 457 | 224 | 742 | .288 | .338 | .538 | .877 | |
| Batting 2nd | 13 | 40 | 40 | 2 | 5 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 9 | .125 | .125 | .200 | .325 | |
| Batting 3rd | 155 | 700 | 642 | 88 | 167 | 25 | 5 | 29 | 92 | 39 | 142 | .260 | .310 | .450 | .760 | |
| Batting 4th | 15 | 62 | 56 | 5 | 11 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 18 | .196 | .258 | .339 | .597 | |
| Batting 5th | 185 | 776 | 716 | 109 | 185 | 46 | 2 | 39 | 133 | 44 | 141 | .258 | .309 | .492 | .801 | |
| Batting 6th | 205 | 798 | 737 | 86 | 195 | 54 | 4 | 36 | 113 | 53 | 183 | .265 | .315 | .495 | .810 | |
| Batting 7th | 93 | 349 | 329 | 40 | 86 | 21 | 1 | 17 | 61 | 16 | 72 | .261 | .299 | .486 | .785 | |
| Batting 8th | 63 | 236 | 222 | 34 | 67 | 15 | 0 | 5 | 24 | 7 | 45 | .302 | .332 | .437 | .769 | |
| Batting 9th | 106 | 325 | 299 | 41 | 73 | 14 | 3 | 15 | 43 | 22 | 71 | .244 | .293 | .462 | .755 |
No other spot in the batting order is even close to the production in the lead-off spot. He has always said he is most comfortable leading off and low and behold, he actually performs better when he is leading off.
But couldn't that be a function of him batting in non-leadoff spots the last 2 years and being crappy at it because he got moved down when Lou realized that Soriano was now a crappy hitter? Maybe. I'm not arguing that a move to the lead-off spot will suddenly cure Soriano's ills at the plate. He might very well still suck. He probably will still suck. But there are the numbers showing that he might be least likely to suck in the lead-off spot than any other spot in the lineup.
But let's look at how he does leading off an inning over his career. So even if he wasn't slotted into the leadoff spot in the lineup, the "feel" of leading off would occur every time he batted lead-off in an inning.
These aren't nearly as conclusive, but they show he has had more success than not while leading off an inning. It also shows that people who claimed that Soriano sucked in 2009 and 2010 regardless of batting position were on to something. But look at last year. There he is rebounding to a .982 OPS when leading off an inning. That is pretty damn good. Now, of course it is a small sample size. Again, I am not claiming that Soriano leading off is the answer to the Cubs' offensive woes. I am simply looking for reasons why we can't unilaterally declare it to be the most insane idea since trying to invade Russia during the winter.
All I'm saying is that it's worth a shot to see if it works.
Let's say you had to travel 500 miles and you look around and you see one rollerskate, a unicycle, and a neighbor's car that you know has been sitting in the driveway for three years without moving. Wouldn't you at least try the car first? Why would you automatically dismiss the car and start trying to pedal 500 miles on a unicycle simply because you just KNEW the car wouldn't work?
Theo just got here. Sveum just got here. They probably know as much about why Soriano isn't hitting as you would know about why your neighbors' car hasn't moved. Maybe your neighbor doesn't know shit about getting a perfectly good car to work right because he doesn't know all that was missing was a sparkplug. Maybe the mechanic just told your neighbor that it was a lazy overpaid Latino car that never starts until it the miles don't matter anymore. It's unlikely, but you'd still try the car, right? The car is the only option that has any prayer at all of getting you to your destination, so you give it a shot. It's not like you get any further away if the car doesn't work like you suspected.
The Cubs don't have any Leer jets at their disposal, so that lazy car is pretty much their only hope of coming anywhere close to reaching their destination. Not giving it a shot would be the batshit crazy option.
Comments
I guess the other thing to consider is that if they’re still trying to dump Soriano, giving him the most plate appearances in a spot where he’s shown he’s had success before is probably the best way to drive up what trade value he might have left. My philosophy for anything the Cubs do this season on the MLB level is pretty much “whatever” as long as they have a long term plan to make the MLB team suck less next year and beyond. So I’m all for them giving Soriano a few games at leadoff this spring to see what happens; I’m thinking they see how he does in the early going and then use that to determine whether it’s worth it to give him that spot on Opening Day, even though spring training stats probably don’t mean jack.
Rice CubeQuote Reply
Sori has his best career numbers when there are no outs. He also has done better with the bases empty than any other base state. He has a career .970 OPS when leading off a game. This doesn’t prove anything, of course, especially without knowing the population distribution and doing regression. However, for whatever reason (or coincidence), Alfonso batting leadoff worked, even though his overall batting line suggested he would have been a better fit for lower in the lineup.
ACTQuote Reply
LaHair and Castro are the only players I expect to be above-average hitters (maybe Soto–he’s unpredictable). Give those guys good lineup spots. The rest I don’t care about. Use a random number generator.
ACTQuote Reply
Personally, I’m not as horrfied by the idea of letting Sori lead off as a lot of the Cubs weorld sems to be, but I don’t really get the point of trying it either.
Soriano is projected to have a pretty OK wOBA, at least for the team that is the 2012 Cubs. His projected OBP is pretty bad, but he somewhat makes up for it by having some power left for a decent SLG. This pretty obviously suggests a number #2, #3 or #4 hitter, but by no means a lead off hitter.
The whole idea of him (or anyone else) performing differently in different line up spots, well, I just don’t buy it. His career numbers mean nothing, because he batted mostly lead off in his best years. Data from different line up sopts within one season are usually just as useless due to sample size.
DamageControlFreakQuote Reply
DamageControlFreak wrote:
But it harms nothing to try. The stats may be completely useless, but they are trying to figure out what to do with him and here is a bunch of information that seems to suggest that he COULD perform better under certain circumstances.
We make a big deal about splits in facing lefties and righties, but now that there are splits that are significant due to lineup spots, we dismiss it out of hand because we don’t buy it? That’s stupid. It harms nothing to try. We have no obvious good option.
Aisle424Quote Reply
If Soriano leads off, it should be against lefties and that’s it. As far as hitting cleanup goes…eh. As someone pointed out yesterday, Soriano is a shitty hitter but so is the rest of the team. I don’t find it unreasonable that he could be one of the best 4-5 hitters on the roster against a lefty.
BerseliusQuote Reply
The other thing with Soriano was that the main reason he was hitting leadoff in the first place was because he had speed. He doesn’t anymore.
BerseliusQuote Reply
http://www.isthereacubsgametoday.com/ —> False
fang2415Quote Reply
“trying desperately to get people to look away from a horrible plane crash while simultaneously breathlessly calling attention to it.”
Isn’t that what this post was?
Also; Joe Montana had his greatest success while playing the position of Quarterback. Therefore I propose Joe Montana should play Quarterback in the NFL next year.
Vance LawQuote Reply
Theo Epstein was interviewed by the Tribune and said something about how the bar scene might be hurting the Cubs’ chances of winning:
http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/03/04/theo-epstein-chicago-bar-scene-has-been-an-impediment-to-the-cubs-in-winning/
Rice CubeQuote Reply
Vance Law wrote:
If he was inexplicably on an NFL roster and getting paid $19 million no matter what, then I would probably agree with you.
Aisle424Quote Reply
@ Rice Cube:
Eh, mainly because of day games. I’m pretty sure the bars in NYC are open as late as those in Chicago.
Suburban kidQuote Reply
@ Rice Cube:
I like the reply to the comment on how the Yankees played primarily day games until the 1960s and they did just fine:
(dying laughing)
GBTSQuote Reply
@ Suburban kid:
I think that was Reedz’ point, it was less the boozing and more of the hangover effect with less recovery time before games.
Rice CubeQuote Reply
Soriano is one of the top 5 hitters as ACT pointed out and The Book clearly shows that those guys should bat in the top 5 spots. It doesn’t much matter which 5. There is an optimum lineup order, but it won’t make significant difference. Vs lefties I’d be OK with Soriano leading off, but like berselius said, I don’t think he should hit higher than 7th against righties.
mb21Quote Reply
As far as I’m concerned, I won’t care about any lineup order as long as the pitcher isn’t batting higher than 8th. If Sveum puts the pitcher 1st then I’m going to complain endlessly. That’s not going to happen so I really don’t care what the lineup order is.
mb21Quote Reply
@ mb21:
Agreed, but the beat writers stuck in Arizona in the winter lack the imagination to generate story ideas about anything other than lineups five weeks before lineups matter.
Suburban kidQuote Reply
“Who’s going to leadoff”
“who’s going to bat cleanup”
That’s all these hacks can think of to ask the new manager.
Suburban kidQuote Reply
I seriously think Theo has instituted an unofficial “if you do talk to the beat writers, just fuck with them” policy in the organization.
GBTSQuote Reply
@ mb21:
This team is trying to win ballgames, mb, and everyone knows you win ballgames with a grinder at the top.
GBTSQuote Reply
Either way, it should be interesting to see how the use Soriano, since they can’t tell him to walk. They should only play him on days when he’s going to hit a homerun.
joshQuote Reply
ACT wrote:
MishQuote Reply
GBTS wrote:
MishQuote Reply
@ mb21:
Hey now, a fully-optimized Cubs batting order might win 72 games instead of 70. Marginal wins!
MishQuote Reply
The things is, even if Soriano suddenly discovers the fountain of youth and reproduces his 2006 season the Cubs aren’t going to the playoffs. If he suddenly becomes Adam Dunn/Koyie Hill useless, the Cubs are not going to go to the playoffs. That’s why I don’t understand why people are that concerned about where he hits in the lineup. Maybe it helps and makes the season less painful. Maybe it doesn’t and the Cubs suck anyway.
What’s funny is that it is probably the same people bitching that Lou WASN’T DOING ANYTHING when they were losing games in 2010 that are complaining about Soriano getting a shot in the lead-off slot.
Aisle424Quote Reply
(dying laughing) @ Mish. He’s on fire.
mb21Quote Reply
Aisle424 wrote:
This certainly isn’t true of all who are complaining about the lineup the Cubs will use this year so I hope people don’t take it that way. However, a majority of the fans that do care about this shit simply think they’re more qualified to write a lineup than any manager in the game. lineups are complained about by all fans. It’s just one of those things. I’ve done my fair share too so I can’t sit here and say that I’m above that because I’m not. But as you said, this team isn’t going anywhere. While I think the best players should play, I just don’t care where they play or where they hit.
mb21Quote Reply
(dying laughing)
http://firebrandal.com/2012/03/02/making-sense-of-intolerant-remarks-the-luke-scott-edition/
mb21Quote Reply
@ GBTS:
The Cubs need to get a new catering service then.
BerseliusQuote Reply
mb21 wrote:
^
|
|
Mish
BerseliusQuote Reply
@ Mish:
So, Sveum comes out of retirement and bats leadoff? I’d like to see that.
ACTQuote Reply
@ Berselius:
If Mish is Pippen, who’s Jordan?
Rice CubeQuote Reply
@ Rice Cube:
Batman
BerseliusQuote Reply
@ Berselius:
More like this:
mb21Quote Reply
Suburban kid wrote:
That said, has anyone got the lineup for today’s game yet? (dying laughing)
Suburban kidQuote Reply
@ Suburban kid:
I think Soriano is batting leadoff
mb21Quote Reply
Soriano LF, Stewart 3B, Castro SS, LaHair 1B, Byrd CF, DeJesus RF, Baker DH, Barney 2B, Castillo C,Lopez P
mb21Quote Reply
I like it.
Suburban kidQuote Reply
@ Suburban kid:
Best lineup in the NL
mb21Quote Reply
mb21 wrote:
Aisle424Quote Reply
This game on athletics tv?
bubblesdachimpQuote Reply
@ bubblesdachimp:
Just internet radio – mlb.com
BerseliusQuote Reply
Luke Scott, racist piece of shit:
I’m not a racist, I just call the dark skinned player an animal and a savage and throw bananas at him. DIAF, Luke.
More here: http://www.kingmyno.com/2011/04/luke-scott-please-stop-talking.html
Mercurial OutfielderQuote Reply
I have a game thread set to post at 1:30. So new shit @ 1:30 (dying laughing)
mb21Quote Reply
There’s no racism in baseball. It’s just completely okay to throw bananas at a dark-skinned Latino player in a MLB clubhouse.
Mercurial OutfielderQuote Reply
http://muskat.mlblogs.com/2012/03/04/34-emphasis-is-at-bats-for-soriano/
They’re just making sure Soriano gets his plate appearances. Leading off in spring training is just a means to that end.
Rice CubeQuote Reply
@ Mercurial Outfielder:
I like how somehow being a patriot makes it all better. Who gives a fuck? I would never consider myself a patriot and I do love this country. I’ll also point out the many things that are wrong with it. Most of these can be easily fixed, but Congress (left and right) don’t really give a shit about that.
I don’t really now if birthers are racist or not, but I do know those that spend even a moment’s time considering the idea are dumbasses.
mb21Quote Reply
@ Mercurial Outfielder:
What surprises me is that Pie wouldn’t just kick the living shit out Scott. Maybe Scott carries a shotgun or rifle in his truck at all times.
mb21Quote Reply
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-17249596
mb21Quote Reply
Berselius wrote:
I’m just going to assume that’s supposed to be an erect penis.
GBTSQuote Reply
@ mb21:
It’s especially surprising considering Pie was rushed to the majors and is immature.
GBTSQuote Reply
@ GBTS:
He was also most likely drunk at the time Scott told him this and he lacks the quality of a person with good character. Scott was really messing with fire on this one.
mb21Quote Reply
Bubbles is excited for baseball
bubblesdachimpQuote Reply
Aisle424 wrote:
The difference is, that refty/ligthy splits are statistically proven to exist. It’s not proven that anyone bats better in the #1 spot than somewhere else.
And I think it MIGHT hurt, because if you try tinkering with the batting order based on some voodoo, you lose time to try more proven measures like… em…
DamageControlFreakQuote Reply
An Unobstructed View on Luke Scott: http://obstructedview.net/unobstructed-views/luke-scott-is-racist.html
mb21Quote Reply
@ DamageControlFreak:
The split itself more than likely doesn’t exist, but if Soriano really does prefer batting leadoff there could be an effect. For most people there is not, but it’s quite clear Soriano much prefers batting leadoff. While I wouldn’t try it, I don’t think it’s a horrible idea to see if he can hit better in the leadoff spot than we’d expect from him. The question is, would that improvement make him more deserving of hitting leadoff? I don’t know. Vs lefties I don’t care if he hits leadoff. I don’t think there would be enough improvement (if any) vs righties to justify leading off.
mb21Quote Reply
new shit: http://obstructedview.net/games/spring-training-game-1-as-cubs.html
mb21Quote Reply
Looks like the mlb.com feed is getting wgn
BerseliusQuote Reply