A Look At The Current Batting Order

Clint Hurdle has elected to continue with the Opening Day line-up for the second game of the season, despite the Pirates offense struggling in the season opener with Cubs right-hander Jeff Samardzija on the mound. While much of the focus centered around Gaby Sanchez’s presence ahead of Travis Snider, I believe that Hurdle’s line-up is really the bigger issue.

The main reason why I am looking at the batting order is due to Hurdle’s comments prior to Monday’s game. As I noted in my post after the game, I’m sure that I’m not the only one that was surprised to see the Garrett Jones hitting second due to his performance against right-handed pitching experiment continuing into the regular season. With Hurdle citing Jones’ OPS as the reason behind the decision – stating that he’s “trying to find the best combination to get men on base in front of Andrew [McCutchen], and stretch out the lineup, top to bottom” – he failed to mention his lead-off hitter as well as differentiating between OPS and on-base percentage.

Starling Marte is a speedy guy, however he’s not suited for the lead-off spot (at least right now). His low walk rate will likely prevent an above average on-base percentage. Placing Marte at the top of the order, especially against right-handed pitching, is really contradictory to attempting to “find the best combination to get men on base in front of Andrew [McCutchen]”.

Now onto Jones. His .888 OPS when facing right-handed pitching in 2012 was boosted by his slugging percentage. The fact is, Hurdle’s second best on-base threat (after Andrew McCutchen) against right-handed pitchers is currently batting sixth in the order:

2012:

	PA	BB%	OBP	SLG	wOBA
Andrew McCutchen	522	10.2%	.381	.518	.385
Neil Walker	392	8.7%	.352	.472	.356
Pedro Alvarez	434	10.6%	.334	.499	.353
Garrett Jones	434	6.5%	.332	.556	.374
Jose Tabata	281	7.5%	.312	.339	.291
Travis Snider	151	10.6%	.305	.290	.270
Russell Martin	336	8.9%	.290	.352	.287
Starling Marte	132	3.0%	.277	.350	.275
Gaby Sanchez	215	5.6%	.251	.315	.250
Clint Barmes	383	1.8%	.243	.308	.240

Since 2010:

	PA	BB%	OBP	SLG	wOBA
Andrew McCutchen	1525	11.2%	.365	.458	.359
Neil Walker	1229	8.3%	.346	.452	.347
Garrett Jones	1268	9.1%	.335	.488	.354
Jose Tabata	904	7.2%	.334	.368	.314
Pedro Alvarez	914	10.0%	.321	.453	.335
Russell Martin	968	9.9%	.318	.370	.307
Gaby Sanchez	1201	8.6%	.313	.395	.312
Travis Snider	568	8.1%	.309	.404	.312
Clint Barmes	1039	5.1%	.278	.346	.274
Starling Marte	136	3.7%	.276	.341	.272

Walker's OBP was 20 points higher than Jones' in 2012. He's better suited for the top of the order, with Jones batting behind both Walker and McCutchen. Some argue that the batting order matters very little, although this is dependent to the personnel involved. The gap between the most and least optimized line-ups is generally quite small, according to Baseball Between The Numbers it amounts to 26 runs over the course of a season (worth around 2.5 wins, which could turn out to be useful later in the year – especially to a GM appearing to be fighting for his job). Hurdle’s line-ups essentially match the standard line-ups as described by Scott McKinney for Beyond The Box Score when he looked at a sabermetric guide to management:

	Standard	Optimized
1	Speedy guy	One of the three best hitters (high OBP)
2	Good bat handler	One of the three best hitters
3	Best hitter	5th best hitter
4	Best power hitter	One of the three best hitters (high SLG)
5	Second best (contact) hitter	4th best hitter
6	Best remaining power hitter	6th best hitter
7	7th best hitter	7th best hitter
8	8th best hitter	Pitcher
9	9th best hitter	8th best hitter

The Pirates could take the optimized batting order a step further by having one line-up for when the club faces a right-hander and one for when a left-handed pitcher is on the mound. As can be seen above, hitting Walker sixth isn’t supported by his career numbers and should hit in either of the top two spots when facing right-handers (depending on McCutchen’s spot in the order); however against left-handed pitching the batting order could look very different:

Since 2010:

	PA	BB%	OBP	SLG	wOBA
Andrew McCutchen	483	12.0%	.413	.579	.421
Gaby Sanchez	433	12.5%	.387	.480	.377
Starling Marte	50	8.0%	.360	.682	.423
Jose Tabata	294	10.9%	.347	.384	.326
Clint Barmes	383	10.4%	.342	.370	.313
Russell Martin	384	14.3%	.341	.418	.335
Neil Walker	436	7.6%	.325	.363	.303
Pedro Alvarez	324	8.3%	.281	.353	.281
Travis Snider	139	2.2%	.252	.422	.290
Garrett Jones	383	5.0%	.240	.331	.251

Andrew McCutchen again tops the group in terms of on-base percentage; however the platoon splits show that a separate batting order against left-handed pitching could be beneficial. While potential platoons (Jones/Sanchez, Snider/Tabata) should carry the caution that some players do struggle in a part time role, everyday players like Alvarez, Martin and Barmes have been expectedly stronger against opposite-handed pitching and the switch-hitting Walker has been a better hitter against righties. The downside to two separate line-ups would come later in close games; when the club reaches bullpens later in the games then the batting order would not suit the relievers.

An optimized batting order is something that should probably not be expected; nonetheless the set-up against right-handed starters should have Neil Walker hitting towards the top of the order. It will be interesting to see if there will be much of a difference in the batting order when the Pirates face Travis Wood, a left-handed starting pitcher, in the third game of the season given that the numbers support Clint Hurdle juggling the line-up to take the platoon advantage (as well as the personnel in some cases). Hurdle’s line-ups seem to be frequently debated, with Gaby Sanchez picking up plate appearances against right-handers Travis Snider situation receiving the most attention early this season (at least on twitter); however batting order so far this season does raise some questions - especially after Hurdle's statistical justification to bat Garrett Jones second.