Lead off hitter-what about platoon at second?

by Fortune favors the brave(s) on Apr 30, 2008 12:00 PM EDT

The Braves need a better idea at lead off. KJ is a good player but is not a traditional lead off hitter. Yunel would be better like Ramirez in FLA but if that is unlikely how about platooning Prada and Johnson at second? Blanco has proved he can hit up here and we are back to the platoon in left, why not second. Johnson OBP is not good enough for a lead off hitter. Prada can hit and I keep hearing "he has nothing left to prove in the minors" give him a shot against lefties and let's see if it works like left field. I realize it is still Apr. but against lefties which we seem to get a ton of, we are not hitting at all.

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Really?

KJ’s OBP was .375 last year, and it is above .350 against RH and LH pitchers for his career. You’re telling me that is not good enough for a leadoff hitter?

by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 30, 2008 12:50 PM EDT 0 recs

Just did a quick...

...number crunch, and KJ had a ~.370 OBP while batting leadoff last year. I’ll take that any day of the week from my #1 table setter.

by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 30, 2008 1:20 PM EDT up 0 recs

Interesting...

...crunched his remaining ABs from last year when he hit either 2, 7, 8, or PH (he did very poor as a PH), and it looks like his OBP from outside the 1 hole was around .435.

What do you think?

by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 30, 2008 1:26 PM EDT up 0 recs

Huh...

...he also hit from the 3, 5, and 6 hole a couple of times in the above stats. Crazy.

by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 30, 2008 1:28 PM EDT up 0 recs

Joe Simpson's comment last night ...

Need a higher OBP from your lead off hitter than .323, by the way I am talking about this year and Ramirez with the Marlin’s is .408. Simpson said and I agree, a lead off hitter should be .400 OBP. No need to be nasty, just my opinion.

by Fortune favors the brave(s) on Apr 30, 2008 2:12 PM EDT up 0 recs

Again...really?

You know how many players in the entire league had an OBP over .400 last year? 18. And not a single one of them was a leadoff hitter…in order: Big Papi, Helton, Magglio, Pujols, Posada, Chipper, A-Rod, Wright, C. Pena, Thome, Utley, Cust, Holliday, Guerrero, M-Cab, Lee, Tex, and Burrell. Even your precious H-Ram’s was only .011 higher than KJ.

It’s super that Hanley is getting on base at a .408 clip in 116 PAs this season, but thats an insanely small sample size. Also, Hanley’s don’t grow on trees…I’d love to have one, but we dont. Maybe we should put Escobar in the leadoff spot (.386 OBP in 451 PAs for his career), but he himself has a smaller sample size than KJ. Prado’s is even worse (.342 in 152 PAs for his career).

So, you and Joe are both incorrect. The last leadoff hitter to have an OBP of above .400 and qualify with enough PAs was Ichiro back in 2004.

And lastly…you answered your own comment…it’s only April! If KJ is still sporting a .323 OBP in July then we can revive this conversation.

by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 30, 2008 2:46 PM EDT up 0 recs

One more thing...

...Hanley’s BABIP (Batting Average of Balls In Play) is sitting at .364! The ML average is about .290. I won’t say it’s impossible for him to sustain that rate, since he did have a BABIP of .355 all last year (unreal), but if that ever does start to drop you’re going to see a noticeable dip in his OBP also. He’s walked in 8% or less of his PAs for two straight years.

Kelly’s BABIP is currently sitting at .246, which shows that he’s been pretty damn unlucky (been saying that word alot around here) with some of his hits. Just yesterday he roped a ball that was right at Nick Johnson…if that is 3 feet to Nick’s left it’s a double down the line. Just so you know…KJ’s walk rate was 13.4% last year.

by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 30, 2008 3:22 PM EDT up 0 recs

wtf

Is this really happening? Jose Reyes is universally regarded as the prototypical leadoff hitter. Did you know Kelly had a higher OBP, and a higher career one than Reyes?

Your breath smells like shit from all that talking out your ass that you’ve been doing.

by bigjoe on Apr 30, 2008 12:55 PM EDT 0 recs

Haha...

...so uncalled for.

by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 30, 2008 1:11 PM EDT up 0 recs

Platoon

He does bring up a valid point in that it may be beneficial for THIS YEAR’S team for KJ to platoon against lefties. However, it would hinder his long-term development if he’s not given a chance to perform against southpaws. I personally think I’ve seen him put together some good strokes on L-on-L matchups. There are times he looks outclassed, but I think he’ll get there.

And yeah dude, it’s April. Don’t worry too much about how Kelly’s doing; he’ll bump it back up.

by jc25 on Apr 30, 2008 4:35 PM EDT up 0 recs