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By Brooks The Great · Posted
It's fine, but I would personally prefer having Cowser and Adley taking tons of pitches back-to-back before Gunnar further punishes the opposing starting pitcher with high exit velo barrels. -
By Brooks The Great · Posted
I was going to say pretty much the same thing about Cowser in my post, but left out my thoughts to keep the post more Gunnar-centric. But I totally agree that Cowser fits the best as this team's leadoff hitter, especially since Holliday doesn't look like he's going to make an impact offensively as early as most of us thought heading into the season. Going back to last season, I've said Cowser has the best mix of patience, hit tool, power, and speed to be a great leadoff hitter. The strikeouts are most likely always going to be high with him, but he has .380-.400+ OBP makeup, and having someone like that hitting leadoff with Adley and Gunnar hitting directly behind Cowser is going to set things up for an elite offense which is much more dynamic and less one-dimensional than the what we've seen up until this point. Cowser Adley Gunnar Westburg O'Hearn Santander Mountcastle Is an ideal top 7 against RHP for right now, with Kjerstad (replacing Hays) and Mayo (essentially replacing Mateo and bumping Westburg to 2B) making the lineup legitimately scary within the next couple months. Mullins and Hays need to be phased out, with Santander and Mountcastle not far behind if those two continue struggling and not reaching base enough to justify hitting in the middle of the order. -
A lot of teams (likely driven by analytics) are putting their best overall hitter at 2 (like the Yankees batting Soto 2, and the Dodgers batting Shohei 2) to maximize ABs while guaranteeing that a high-OBP guy is batting in front of him to give him opportunities with men on base. That's probably what we want. It seems logical considering how thoroughly debunked small-ball in the first inning has been. Rutschman at 3 is fine. -
Realistically I think Adley as the leadoff guy is the best lineup for us but if he has trouble batting leadoff in half the games because he can't get his catcher's gear off fast enough then I get it. Cowser has continued to be incredibly patient, and if Adley can't be our leadoff guy then Cowser is probably our next best option. Of course Cowser also hits a lot of bombs, so it'd be interesting if he goes on another heater. If Cowser gets off the schneid then Cowser leadoff and Gunnar at 2 could be incredibly potent. I don't think Cowser is actually playing that badly, he's just been running into some bad luck. And he's starting to wake up a little bit anyway.
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By Brooks The Great · Posted
Agreed, appreciate the stats. Gunnar isn't a leadoff hitter - he's a prototypical #3 hitter or cleanup hitter. Hyde writes poor lineups, and Gunnar hitting leadoff has been one of the consistent problems with the offense this season. Gunnar hitting mostly solo shots is both a consequence and reflection of this offense's flaws - the O's have too many low-OBP hitters in the lineup (hitting in less-than-optimal spots for the most part) and are too reliant on solo homers to generate runs. At least Hyde has started hitting Westburg leadoff against LHP, which is progress, but Hyde is way too stubborn and too slow to make the correct adjustments. He's very similar to Buck Showalter in that respect. Anyway, I look forward to Hyde waking up and moving Gunnar down to #3/#4 against RHP.
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