Soriano as leadoff.

[Guest]

Bizarro meph is weird.

[killthegoat06]

Wow. I said yes, but I am surprised at how lopsided it is.

[CubmanPi]

There is one obvious answer. It begins with a 'Y'.

/high lob...

 

 

"Your mom?"

 

 

/couldn't resist

[Mephistopheles]

Bizarro Meph? I'm not Sephiroth. I don't have a bizzaro form.

[Tracer Bullet]

generally i'd say no. but the fact is soriano is obviously more comfortable hitting #1, for whatever reason, and the statistics back that up. plus, he's been arguably the best cubs offensive player, and he's getting the most at-bats.

 

are solo home runs really a bad thing anyways?

 

Actually a couple weeks ago, when we last had the "Soriano shouldn't be leading off" debate, Jon had some great posts that showed that the stats don't prove anything about whether he should lead off. He's been very up and down throughout his career.

 

i thought the stats showed that, except for one season, his numbers as a leadoff hitter were significantly better than the other spots in the batting order.

 

maybe you're right though.

2001 I don't have figures for

No, you're right. 2002 he didn't have enough at-bats in any other slot to really count (I'm counting 35 AB's as a decent sample).

2003 he was much better at leadoff than at 3rd

2004 he was much better at leadoff than batting 3rd or 5th

2005 he was best at 5th, then leadoff, then 4th

2006 he was much better at leadoff than batting 4th

2007 he doesn't have enough of a sample (although he has 28 AB's and was almost 400 points lower at the 3 spot than leadoff, so he would have to be unbelievable at the 3 spot later in the year to possibly catch leadoff).

 

Add to that from 2002-2007, Soriano has had 4 years above an 850 OPS, and 2 years below. The 4 years he had an 850 or above were all batting leadoff primarily, and the 2 years he didn't he batted primarily lower in the order. There are possible other explanations for this (something else in Texas may have caused it, since there isn't a year where Soriano batted leadoff in Texas), but the fact that Texas is a great hitters park and Soriano was batting around great hitters lessens the chance that it was another factor.

 

I don't have time to find the posts, but Jon displayed the stats in a neat little fashion. Made it pretty clear that if you really look at them, they don't "prove" anything and they probably don't even suggest that he's better in the lead off role.

 

Regardless, I don't believe that the psych effect of leading off makes him a better hitter.

[Amazing_Grace]

We have plenty of statistical evidence to show Soriano hits much better in the leadoff spot over the course of his career. There's no obvious or logical reason why he should be better at leadoff, but he is. Whether it's all in Soriano's head, or whether there's some cosmic gift to hitting leadoff that he possesses, or whether he has to hit leadoff as part of the terms with his deal with the devil is irrelevant. The best indicator of future performance is past performance, and he hits best in the leadoff position.

 

And really who else are we going to put there? Theriot has slumped. Fontenot probably will slump. Lee is our best hitter period. Ramirez has hit as many HR as Soriano. The only other halfway decent choice would be DeRosa, the only other player with an OBP over .350. DeRosa would be OK, but he hits for decent power as well, and moving him up and Soriano down wouldn't make a huge difference even assuming Soriano continued to hit just as well in another spot.

[Mephistopheles]

so?

 

more RBI/PA from lower in the lineup... duh the cubs need his bat there. i dont know what you are smoking, son.

[wolf stansson]

Can't argue with facts, guys.

[Careless]

88% of the people who responded to this poll believe clutch exists, interesting.

And yes, if you believe position in the batting order makes a difference in production, you believe clutch exists. You've conceded that mental state affects production.

There's no way that all baseball players have exactly the same mentality in all situations, and if they don't and they don't perform the same given all mentalities, then clutch exists.

remember:

it doesn't have to be big (larger than STD or even close)

pitchers can be clutch too (I know many "there is no clutch" people on this board believed in "closer mentality" after latroy)

it doesn't have to be widespread: ballplayers don't progress through amateur and minors by being clutch, they do it through consistent production.

again, if a player's mental state can ever affect his production, then clutch exists. What remains to be determined is the FAR more substantial task of figuring out how big a deal it is, or if it's even significantly bigger than background effects.

[Tracer Bullet]

Can't argue with facts, guys.

 

Which are?