2019-06-23: Reds (DeSclafani) at Brewers (Woodruff) [Brewers win, 7-5 -- Every starting position player gets a hit in big offensive day]

[Eye Black]

 

 

Brandon Woodruff: Batter (Reds) vs Pitching Stats

 

Anthony DeSclafani: Batter (Brewers) vs Pitching Stats

[folly412]

 

Looks great. Imagine this lineup with Hiura and getting Cain going and whoa.

[Eye Black]

Jesús Aguilar is out of the lineup again as probably expected, but he has had some success against DeSclafani in the past (4-for-11, HR). When you only have 25 rosters spots and no DH it is extremely difficult to justify carrying a 1B only bench bat. They are going to have some tough decisions to make in the near future regarding Aguilar.

 

Overall, I like the lineup shuffle. [sarcasm]Hopefully Woodruff’s bat protecting Shaw can help him get going.[/sarcasm]

[OldHeidelberg]

Jesús Aguilar is out of the lineup again as probably expected, but he is had some success against DeSclafani in the past (4-for-11, HR). When you only have 25 rosters spots and no DH it is extremely difficult to justify carrying a 1B only bench bat. They are going to have some tough decisions to make in the near future regarding Aguilar.

 

Overall, I like the lineup shuffle. [sarcasm]Hopefully Woodruff’s bat protecting Shaw can help him get going.[/sarcasm]

 

I am not sure that should be blue. Woodruff had a couple of really nice Sundays in a row a few weeks ago, hopefully he can give us another stellar 8 inning stint. Be really nice to get the split and get pointed back in the right direction with hopefully Hiura up tomorrow.

[TURBO]

Anytime we have to hit Arcia 6th for an extended period of time (more than one day) that is bothersome.

 

Braun hitting clean-up is also bothersome. I am assuming this is happening only because Cain is not in the line-up.

 

Shaw in this line-up is becoming nothing but sad, for the fans, and for himself. Do us all a favor and send him to AAA to get right....please.

 

Jesus is an afterthought. I can see him getting cut at or right after the all star break. He serves no purpose.

 

Why not have Woodruff hit 6th.....not kidding.

 

I'm not fully against the pitcher hitting 8th, but it backfired yesterday with a runner on third after a rally, and Chacin came to the plate and whiffed to end the inning. I'd like to see some kind of stats that actually prove one way or another that the pitcher hitting 8th is a good thing. Like I said, I'm not for or against it. I don't know enough information to have an opinion, however, having Woodruuf hit higher than 9th is A-OK with me when looking at the line-ups we are throwing out there.

[AKCheesehead]

Jesús Aguilar is out of the lineup again as probably expected, but he is had some success against DeSclafani in the past (4-for-11, HR). When you only have 25 rosters spots and no DH it is extremely difficult to justify carrying a 1B only bench bat. They are going to have some tough decisions to make in the near future regarding Aguilar.

 

Overall, I like the lineup shuffle. [sarcasm]Hopefully Woodruff’s bat protecting Shaw can help him get going.[/sarcasm]

 

I am not sure that should be blue. Woodruff had a couple of really nice Sundays in a row a few weeks ago, hopefully he can give us another stellar 8 inning stint. Be really nice to get the split and get pointed back in the right direction with hopefully Hiura up tomorrow.

 

I would have only put the "help him get going" part in blue, myself.

[OldHeidelberg]

Yeah maybe I misread and the joke wasn't that a pitcher would protect him. We are almost midway through the season and Woodruff is still slashing .364/.383/.867 and he hasn't even hit any dingers yet. bWAR has him at 1.7 for pitching but 2.3 overall.

 

I found this link for best hitting seasons by pitchers, not many modern guys on the list. Gallardo had 4 HR's and an .837 OPS in 2010, Woody has a shot to top that.

 

https://www.mlb.com/news/best-hitting-seasons-by-pitchers-c271448556

[markedman5]

Houser gets the start Weds

[Eye Black]

Yeah maybe I misread and the joke wasn't that a pitcher would protect him. We are almost midway through the season and Woodruff is still slashing .364/.383/.867 and he hasn't even hit any dingers yet. bWAR has him at 1.7 for pitching but 2.3 overall. [/url]

The “joke” probably wasn’t that funny in hindsight, but it certainly wasn’t meant as a dismissal of Woodruff’s hitting ability. I want Shaw to turn it around as much as anyone, but watching him right now it’s hard not to get the feeling his swing timing and vision are just a total mess.

[PinaMadness]

Anytime we have to hit Arcia 6th for an extended period of time (more than one day) that is bothersome.

 

Braun hitting clean-up is also bothersome. I am assuming this is happening only because Cain is not in the line-up.

 

Shaw in this line-up is becoming nothing but sad, for the fans, and for himself. Do us all a favor and send him to AAA to get right....please.

 

Jesus is an afterthought. I can see him getting cut at or right after the all star break. He serves no purpose.

Why not have Woodruff hit 6th.....not kidding.

 

I'm not fully against the pitcher hitting 8th, but it backfired yesterday with a runner on third after a rally, and Chacin came to the plate and whiffed to end the inning. I'd like to see some kind of stats that actually prove one way or another that the pitcher hitting 8th is a good thing. Like I said, I'm not for or against it. I don't know enough information to have an opinion, however, having Woodruuf hit higher than 9th is A-OK with me when looking at the line-ups we are throwing out there.

I've been beating this dead horse for a while, but Aguilar was the perfect candidate to trade during the offseason while his stock was still high enough to justify said trade. He is never going to repeat what he did the first half of last season ever again.

[Lathund]

I'm not fully against the pitcher hitting 8th, but it backfired yesterday with a runner on third after a rally, and Chacin came to the plate and whiffed to end the inning. I'd like to see some kind of stats that actually prove one way or another that the pitcher hitting 8th is a good thing. Like I said, I'm not for or against it. I don't know enough information to have an opinion, however, having Woodruuf hit higher than 9th is A-OK with me when looking at the line-ups we are throwing out there.

 

"The Book: Playing The Percentages In Baseball" is a very good introduction to Sabermetrics that mainly focuses on the things that have already gained fairly widespread acceptance. Concepts regarding platooning, sacrifice bunting, base stealing, "clutch", hot/cold streaks, statistical concepts regarding sample sizes and such. And it does a good job presenting the case for the sabermetric lineup construction.

 

But assuming you don't want to read a whole book, this is one of the earlier works presenting the lineup analysis. There are batting order calculators out there as well, which allow you to input the AVG/OBP/SLG of 9 players and it'll tell you the lineup that, given those parameters and assuming that everyone would hit the same in every spot, would score the most runs.

 

What becomes abundantly clear is that lineup contruction matters a lot less than people think. Even actively trying to create the worst lineup possible would "only" cost you something like 0.2 runs per game. The difference between the traditional lineup and the optimal lineup is like 1/10th of that. But hey, even if it's a tiny edge it's better doing it than not doing it, right?

 

Anyway, the most consistent thing from these analysis is that your best overall hitter, who would usually hit #3 in a traditional lineup, should be in the #2 spot. And that generally, the pitcher batting 8th scores more runs for your team. But we're talking less than 1 run per game. It may be more depending on who that #9 hitter is, and who the #1 and #2 hitters are , i.e it's probably more beneficial with Yelich #2 than if he was #4, and same with Grandal leading off vs if it was (the good versions of) Eric Sogard or LoCain leading off, but it may also be less when factoring in that batting him 8th results in 2-3 additional agonizing early pinch hitting decisions per year.

 

What's not shown in the above links though, is that the bigger gap between the hitting ablity of your #8 and #9 hitters, the more you benefit from putting the better one 9th. So Woodruff is probably the one pitcher who should bat 8th, while the others should bat 9th. Or rather if you believe Woodruff is genuinely the 127 wRC+ hitter he's been so far (I don't; he's an excellent hitter for a pitcher, but a .600 BABIP isn't sustainable even for him....) you should treat him as anyone else and slot him where a LH high-avg but low power hitter would be.

 

TL;DR I spent all this time and energy writing this only to convey that it may, or may not, be ever so slightly better (to the tune of <1 run per season) having the pitcher bat 8th. And lineups in general matter very little, except that I applaud CC for consistently hitting Yelich exactly where he should be hitting and not deviating.

[PinaMadness]

If this were Cincinnati we'd be in a rain delay.

[pacopete4]

If this were Cincinnati we'd be in a rain delay.

 

84 and sunny in Cincy

[PinaMadness]

Good morning, good afternoon and sit your (butt) down, Dietrich.

[PinaMadness]

If this were Cincinnati we'd be in a rain delay.

 

84 and sunny in Cincy

That never stopped the Cubs.

[PinaMadness]

If you don't like seeing balls being put in play, this is the game for you.

[Eye Black]

Have to give Moose credit, that was a nice DP turn for a player who has started just 38 games at 2B throughout his major league career.

[stoutdude04]

Braun. Woof.

 

On pace for 27 ks. That's fun!

[yfinn6]

Haven't been able to watch a game in over a week (not that that's been a bad thing) so watching this team strike out in every AB so far has been.. interesting.

[PinaMadness]

Our hitters should think about not starting their at bats 0-2.

[yourout]

Did they switch in a defective bunch of bats?

[brooks_quichenick]

Quite the hapless start at the plate

[markedman5]

Descalfini has got good stuff.

[HarveysWBs]

I’ll say this for the Reds: their team is still trash even after what must have been a soul-crushing, scorched-earth rebuild, but they have some arms now, so that’s cool.

[yourout]

Got the El grande zone today.

 

Or Molto grande if you prefer Italian.