All that was missing in the three game set between the Giants and Mets were laser-shooting robotic killing machines roaming at will around the Mets’ Citi Field. All three of these road games had the look of an out of control Ridley Scott film (the ones where the studio gives him too much money): high tech chaos, frightening visions of futuristic anarchy, and an alarming lack of any real authority in the land.

Now…   let’s play ball!

Before I get sidetracked, let’s briefly discuss the new Mets baseball stadium, Citi Field. Completed in 2009, Citi Field is located in Flushing, which I‘m guessing is the city’s historic plumbing district. The new stadium is remarkable in ways you really don't want things like stadiums, meat, and medical procedures to be remarkable.

In the 1960s, 70s, and 80s, ugly muti-storied concrete bunkers were used in most American cities for Major League baseball and Aerosmith concerts. Then, starting in 1992 with the wonderful Camden Yards in Baltimore, baseball-only cathedrals began replacing the old concrete cereal bowls, bringing players and fans back to the architectural roots of the game. Often, the new ballparks were seamlessly grafted into the urban landscape, one more beautiful brick building on a city boulevard full of brick buildings. Inexplicably, the designers of Citi Park (apparently budget cuts forced the use of the less expensive “i”) decided to do the exact opposite with the new Mets stadium.

Here’s what they did: located the $610 million Mets ball yard in the middle of a sea of parking lots. Really. No integration with the local Queens neighborhood, just an edifice completely surrounded by acres of concrete. Don’t get me wrong, the edifice itself is pretty nice, with its front façade replica of old Ebbets Field and the soaring Jackie Robinson Rotunda entry area. But, just about the time you’re remembering that Ebbets Field was the Dodgers’ ballpark, and just as you finally get past the endless nightmare of parking lots, you come face to face with the worst urban blight possible— blocks of cheesy car repair shops, used car lots, and oily junkyards.
As I said…. let’s, uh, play ball.

On the field, the Met's front office has brilliantly reflected the surrounding neighborhood by allowing environment-threatening amounts of garbage to blow all around the infield and outfield during games. Throughout the Sunday May 9th game with the Giants, the scene was ridiculous— food wrappers, plastic bags, cups, napkins, and newspapers everywhere. It was embarrassing watching the players on both teams trying to catch used cheeseburger wrappers and stuff them in their back pockets. Citi Dumpster Park, yo.

Back to the game. Wind blown fly balls dropping everywhere like fresh pigeon poo; the hurricane-like weather worse than the nastiest windy day at Candlestick Park; pitchers walking batters like they had base-on-balls incentive clauses in their contracts; and umpires Paul Schrieber, Rob Drake, Hunter Wendelstedt, and Angel Hernandez making more bad calls than Morgan Stanley. Oh, and throw in the soothing sounds of jet planes constantly landing at nearby La Guardia Airport and the scene is complete.

For the Giants, leaving New York City was the end of a bad dream, but it's the beginning of their next big test in the race for the National League West: five games with the surprising San Diego Padres in the next eight days. The Padres swept a three game series from the Giants in San Diego in late April; if the Padres truly aren’t for real, now is the time to prove it.

Baseball headlines from newspapers around the Nation:  

PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES LEGENDARY PITCHER ROBIN ROBERTS DIES AT 83
Lack of Pitch Counts in the 1950s Finally Catches Up to Hall of Fame Hurler

ALEX RODRIGUEZ WALKS ACROSS FAMILY DINNER TABLE TO GET SALT
Parents Upset Yankee Third Baseman Didn’t Follow Revered Tradition of Walking Around Table

SF GIANTS AGREE TO HIRE BARRY BONDS TO COACHING POSITION
Bonds Will Become a “Roving Instructor”, Allowing the Former Home Run King to Coach Players While Continuing to Stay One Step Ahead of Federal Authorities

PHILADELPHIA POLICE ASKS U.S. PERMISSION TO USE GUANTANAMO FACILITY TO HOUSE UNRULY PHILLIES FANS
City of Brotherly Love Taxpayers Will Save Money By Avoiding Costly Trials, Due Process

COLORADO ROCKIES TO MAKE FURTHER CHANGES IN BASEBALL STORAGE AT MILE HIGH STADIUM
Balls Will First Be Held In Sub Zero Freezers, Then Prepared With a Simple Mint Sauce and Truffle Glaze Prior to Each Game

The San Francisco Giants have placed shortstop Edgar Renteria on the 15 day disabled list with a right groin injury. To replace him, the team called up Ryan Rohlinger from Triple A Fresno. Rohlinger is hitting .333, with a .442 OBP, and .948 OPS. He has primarily been a third baseman, but has recently been playing some shortstop for Fresno.

The Giants also optioned outfielder Eugenio Velez to Triple A Fresno and brought up veteran reliever Denny Bautista. Since 2004, Bautista has played for the Baltimore Orioles, Kansas City, the Colorado Rockies, and the Detroit Tigers. Bautista was 1-1, with a 2.19 ERA and a 0.89 WHIP at Fresno. Velez has had a number of defensive problems in the outfield, and was batting .186 with the Giants. 

Due to the lack of days off in their upcoming schedule, the Giants will again use Todd Wellemeyer as a fifth starter, and needed Bautista to fill the long reliever role.

The Giants went to 11 pitchers several weeks ago when the schedule allowed Wellemeyer to go to the bullpen, and reliever Waldis Joaquin was sent down to Fresno to get more work. Giant starters have routinely pitched in to the 7th and 8th inning so far in 2010, and Joaquin was simply not getting enough innings. Bautista brings the Giants back up to 12 pitchers on the 25 man roster.

Giants Manager Bruce Bochy has told SF Chronicle sports writer Henry Schulman that even when second baseman Freddie Sanchez returns to the line-up in several weeks, hot hitting Juan Uribe will remain in the everyday line-up. That will mean a lot of juggling between Sanchez, Uribe, Pablo Sandoval, and Renteria (when he returns). It will also likely mean that second baseman Matt Downs and/or Rohlinger will be heading back to Fresno when Freddie Sanchez returns.

The San Francisco Giants' three game sweep of the Florida Marlins at the start of their six game mini-road trip to Florida and New York was an object lesson in the difference between playing Major League baseball and Major League baseball statistics.

Not in terms of the tedious civil war between the baseball establishment Neanderthals, who think that on base percentage is a stat of evil likely created by the Communist Party in the 1950s, and the sabermeticulous stat-wonks, who will mathematically prove that a walk can be more valuable than a two run homer in certain situations.

No, the Florida series showed that analyzing exactly what happens in baseball games takes an understanding of the crazy mystery of on-field player performance, as well as the ability to dissect revelatory statistical data.

For example, here are the bullpen lines for the just completed Giants/Marlins series. Not a big difference in a three game set:

But here are the bullpen records for the series:

As far as starting pitching, Florida’s three starters gave up seven earned runs in the series and went 0-2 with a 3.64 ERA; Giant starters gave up six earned runs and went 2-0 and posted a 2.57 ERA.

Now here’s where the numbers become part of the inner-game colonoscopy: Florida starters pitched 17.1 innings, SF starters pitched 21 innings— a 3.2 innings difference (or an average 1.22 innings each game). But while Florida starters threw 247 pitches in the three games, Giants pitchers threw 319 pitches; throughout the series, Giants starters were doing a better job of dominating and staying in control of the defense longer.

But in this series, it is the offensive numbers that tell the tale. The Giants scored 18 runs in the three games, an average of 6.0 runs per game; Florida scored a total of 11 runs, an average of 3.7 runs per game. Counting the just completed series, here’s a look at the Giants and the Marlins offensive numbers:

Total 2010 runs scored:           
SFG  126 runs in 27 games – 4.67 runs per game.
FLA   134 runs in 28 games – 4.78 runs per game.
The current 2010 Major League average of runs scored per game is 4.52.

So far in 2010, the Giants are not only scoring more runs per game than the MLB average, they are far exceeding their absolutely dismal 2009 run production.

SF Giants total 2009 runs scored:            
657 runs in 162 games – 4.06 runs per game; 26th out of 30 MLB teams.

At their current rate of 4.67 runs per game, the Giants project to score 757 runs in 2010, 100 more runs than 2009; that would put them about 15th of 30 MLB teams.

So what did we learn from the three game series with the Florida Marlins?

1. So far, the Giants offense is scoring runs at a significantly higher rate than the past two years, and the Florida series provided a good mini-example of that. But given the limited improvement in their offense from last year, it is unrealistic to expect Giants hitters will continue to score runs at the current rate, and we should see a decline in run production over the next several months. The question is, how quickly will management respond when this happens, and what will be their response?

2. Giants pitching continues to be the best in baseball. Out of the 30 MLB teams, San Francisco has the best runs allowed per game average (3.00). St. Louis is second at 3.04 and Tampa Bay is third at 3.15. The Pittsburgh Pirates are last in the Majors with 6.63 runs allowed per game.

Sounds great, except that in 2009, Giants pitchers finished first in the Majors (tied with the Dodgers) with 3.77 runs allowed per game. And as we know, their outstanding pitching was hung out to dry by an inadequate offense which resulted in an 88-74 record and third place in the NL West.

3.  Yes, it is possible that Nate Schierholtz is having his breakout year: .381 AVG/.458 OBP/.587 SLG in 63 at bats. But there’s a problem. 

Manager Bruce Bochy told reporters after the Florida sweep he will not move Schierholtz out of the #8 slot in the line-up because he doesn’t want to mess with his right fielder’s “comfort zone”. Yikes! If the Giants were a progressive team like Tampa, the Yankees, or Colorado, Schierholtz would be immediately moved up to the number four or five slot. The idea is to create more runs, not treat Major League players like little leaguers, or believe you can somehow “jinx” a player’s talent if he bats 5th in the line-up instead of 8th.

That's not old school, that's going full metal medieval...    Where is Nostradamus when you really need him?

The Giants and the Rockies play each other 18 times during the 2010 season, and their first meeting is tonight in San Francisco’s AT&T Park. While we certainly pay homage to the Commissioner's party line that every game is important (kind of the way every vote in Chicago is so important it gets counted several times), but we know the games between Colorado and San Francisco are the most critical contests of the year for both clubs.
      
The single, most significant obstacle in the way of the Giants winning the NL West is the Colorado Rockies. Each time they beat the Rockies, the Giants stride a whole game in the standings on that significant obstacle. Baseball hype aside, full game jumps in the standings against your toughest opponent are like gold, whether it’s April 30th, June 15th or August 1st.

But let’s take a moment to step into the wayback machine and recall what was being said about the National League West before this season started.

Fat-cat baseball pundits, sitting in their overstuffed leather chairs, sipping 300 year old scotch, watching the Food Channel on their 120 inch plasma TVs, and nibbling rare albino beef from Uzbekistan, all agreed on one thing last March: the Colorado Rockies would easily win the National League West in 2010.

The reasoning went something like this: the Los Angeles Dodgers, last year’s number one team, are in disarray. Their historical pitching dominance has disappeared faster than Joe DiMaggio when the waiter brought the check. Besides, Dodger owner Frank McCourt is going through a mega-messy divorce, and apparently the wife has asked for a huge cash settlement and a player to be named later. That‘s not good.

The Rockies, who finished second with 92 victories in the NL West in 2009, are stronger than last year (so the theory goes) because they have good pitching for the first time since that law was repealed banning the Rockies from having good pitching. And they have a very strong lineup, with shortstop Troy Tulowitzki, outfielder Carlos Gonzalez, and first baseman Todd Helton leading the offense. But the Rockies took a major hit when a starting pitcher they were counting on, Jeff Francis, went out until mid-May with a shoulder strain just when the team’s young phenom hurler Ulbaldo Jimenez is having his breakout year. So the Rockies will end April either at one game above, or one game under, .500— way too early to panic, but certainly not too early to start taking contractor bids to build a panic room.

As far as Arizona, with the possible exception of Justin Upton (and he’s hitting .214), we’ve waited a number of years for those young Diamondback players to blossom, and so far all we’re seeing is a lot of extra ice plant along Interstate 10.

The San Diego Padres are...   what's the word for it that doesn't involve any unfortunate hygienic terms? Oh yes...   rebuilding.

Which leaves the San Francisco Giants. The Giants have the best starting staff and best bullpen in baseball, and maybe just enough hitting to back them up. (We have discussed why “just enough” may not be enough, and what to do about that, elsewhere in The Cove.) Great pitching can overwhelm opposing teams in a way that great hitting cannot, and that's what's for dinner each and every time you face the San Francisco Giants.

This is the obstacle facing the Rockies, and it’s a tough one.

The Giants must make the decision to permanently promote star prospect Buster Posey to the 25 man big league roster. Posey gives every indication he can contribute something the Giants have desperately needed for two years: an increase in runs scored.   

When the San Francisco Giants broke Spring Training camp in March 2010, and the final 25 man squad was selected, Giants management temporarily forgot that increasing the number of runs scored was their primary mission this season. That’s why Mark DeRosa was signed to a two year $12 million contract, that’s why the Giants tried to get first baseman Adam LaRoche and settled for Aubrey Huff at $3 million for one year.

But the Giants front office sent super hitting prospect Posey to Triple A Fresno and kept the underachieving Travis Ishikawa, who has a slick glove at first base but has demonstrated throughout his two years with the Giants he is not a Major League level hitter.

In 2009, Ishikawa hit .261 with 39 RBIs, a .329 OBP and 89 strikeouts in 326 at bats; in Spring Training this year, Ishikawa hit .250 in 16 games with a .263 OBP and 12 strikeouts. He is currently batting .200 after 10 at bats with 2 strikeouts. Between 2009 and 2010 to date, the Giants have invested 336 Major League at bats in Ishikawa with consistently negative results. Negative because a run starved team like the Giants cannot afford to squander hundreds of at bats on a corner player who cannot contribute to the offense.

Catcher/first baseman Buster Posey hit .315 in Spring Training, and is currently hitting .353 with a .438 OBP at Triple A Fresno. Posey is rated by ScoutingBook.com as the 11th best prospect in all of baseball. Of the ten players ahead of him, two are playing in the big leagues— slugger Jason Heyward for Atlanta and fireballer Neftali Feliz for Texas— and the number one pick, Stephen Strasburg, will likely be brought into the Nationals starting rotation by June 1st.

Bringing Posey up certainly presents a number of serious roster problems for the Giants. A shortstop in his 2006 freshman year at Florida State, Posey was moved to catcher as a sophomore and did play some first base during Spring Training. It is inescapable that he will catch, play first base, or sub at both positions.

Normally, Posey would simply replace the Giants current back-up catcher, Eli Whiteside. But Whiteside has been invaluable working as the primary receiver for fourth starter Jonathan Sanchez. Last year, Whiteside called Sanchez’s no hitter, and this year the Whiteside/Sanchez partnership has produce a one hitter against the Padres and Sanchez’s current pitching line: 2-1, 1.85 ERA, 1.11 WHIP, and 33 strikeouts in 24.1 innings.

The other problem is that starting catcher Bengie Molina and starting first baseman Aubrey Huff were signed to play full time at their positions because they can produce runs. So unless the Giants make a significant roster move, when Posey is brought up he will be taking at bats from Huff or Molina (although Molina is rested one or two days a week).

There is little doubt that, 1) the Giants have to immediately commit to Buster Posey; and, 2) Posey is worth the Giants not only thinking outside the box, but tossing the box under the nearest bus. That means either making several trades or recasting several positions in the field. Now, not next year, is the time to start reshaping this team to feature Posey. 

The first move: Posey should immediately replace Travis Ishikawa on the roster. Second, the Giants should seriously consider playing Aubrey Huff in the outfield several games a week, which will mean rearranging the current outfield. The team will have to decide if that means moving Mark DeRosa to the infield, or trading some combination of John Bowker/Nate Schierholtz/Eugenio Velez.

And here's the famous bottom line: does the team want at bats for Posey, or for John Bowker/Nate Schierholtz/Eugenio Velez? That should be an easy question to answer.

A revised line-up with Mark DeRosa, Pablo Sandoval, Aubrey Huff, Buster Posey, and Bengie Molina all getting close to maximum at bats would provide potent support for the Giants’ starting pitching. And that could translate into not only making the 2010 playoffs, but the possibility of going very deep in the playoffs.

San Francisco Giant pitcher Tim Lincecum’s fourth start of the 2010 season did not go well.

Throughout the Friday April 23, 2010 home game against the tough St. Louis Cardinals, Lincecum struggled to locate two of his four pitches, the fast ball and curve ball. He walked three batters (he previously walked a total of three hitters in the 20 innings of his first three starts). His ERA went from 0.90 to 1.00 because he allowed an earned run. He threw 120 pitches in 7 innings— the average number of pitches in his first three starts was 104 pitches. Somehow, Lincecum managed to match his 2010 strikeouts per game average with eight knock-outs.

Oh, and he won the game. Lincecum is now 4-0 with a 0.93 WHIP.

On the NBC Bay Area post game show after the Giants 4-1 victory, Giants broadcaster Mike Krukow provided extraordinary insight into the dynamics of how a great pitcher manages a game when he doesn’t have his best stuff. Krukow pointed out that Lincecum’s curve and fastball were out of sync and not working for him; but the very fact these pitches were not locating properly still oddly set up his change-up and slider and made them effective against Cardinal hitters. That’s a fascinating observation, and it takes our understanding of just how smart and talented Lincecum is to a kind of fourth dimension of analysis that only applies to the elite pitchers in the game.

Watching Lincecum pitch against St. Louis last night was like observing a single-minded scientist tinkering away in the lab. Lincecum kept working to make his pitches, and he kept trying to find the point of release and rhythm that would locate them across the plate; but the fast ball and curve refused to cooperate right up until he finished seven innings of six hit ball. And got the win.

This game was a master class on how to pitch great when you're not throwing great.
                                                                       ______________________

Additional kudos: reliever Sergio Romo (1 inning, no runs, no walks, 1 strike out— Albert Pujols swinging), and closer Brian Wilson (1 inning, no runs, no walks, 3 strike-outs). Although the Giants beat their average runs scored per game during the previous four games (1.21) by scoring two earned runs (and 4 total runs) last night, the team's hitting crisis continues.

San Francisco Giants 5th starter Todd Wellemeyer has made three starts in 2010. Here is Wellemeyer's current line through 4/22/10:

In an amazing coincidence, April 27, 2010 is one of the fifty-two dates on which the famous 16th century prognosticator Nostradamus predicted the world would end. Although Nostradamus only mentions Todd Wellemeyer three times in his books, he mentions Bruce Bochy 147 times!

The Giants lost their last four games: 2-1 vs the Dodgers, and 3-2, 1-0, and 5-2 versus the Padres. And, yes, you counted correctly-- San Francisco  has scored 5 runs in the last 37 innings; that's 1.21 runs per game. The good news is it beats the team's 2009 average of 1.20 runs per game.

Tuesday's loss to San Diego was certainly ugly: Jonathan Sanchez and Sergio Romo combined to pitch a one hitter with 11 strikeouts. Sanchez lost 1-0, and after the game Tom Shane called Romo to tell him that he does not have a friend in the diamond business.

SF Chronicle sports writer Henry Schulman reported the Elias Sports Bureau found that, since 1900, the last time the Giants lost a 1 hitter in a regulation ballgame was on September 22, 1917 against the Pittsburgh Pirates. Jamie Moyer got the win.

I don't want to say San Francisco isn't getting any respect, but for the upcoming series with the Giants, innovative St. Louis Cardinals Manager Tony La Russa told ESPN that he plans to rest his offense and bat his pitchers third, fourth, and fifth in the Cards lineup each game. St. Louis pitching coach Dave Duncan will start game 1 Friday, and game 3 Sunday.

Next: "The Hurt Locker" musical, featuring Green Day and Larry King as Nostradamus.

The traditional MLB batting lineup has always been imagined as a linear list consisting of players with set offensive attributes. This linear list is viewed as continually starting and stopping, from lead-off to 9th then back again. Roles have been historically assigned to each spot on the linear lineup list which are supposed to define the offense; the lead-off man has a good on base percentage and is fast, the number four hitter has the most power, the worst hitter bats ninth, and so on. But as research refines tradition, there is little about the performace aspects of Major League Baseball that has been unexamined by a generation of baseball scientists who have also redefined the boundries of research.

The baseball establishment often tries to marginalize this serious work by dismissing it as the irrevelent mathematical ramblings of stat wonks who don’t appreciate the “real” game. But during the past ten years, a number of stubbornly conventional baseball organizations have found themselves left behind and desperately trying to catch the sabermetric train after it has left the station.

Baseball social politics aside, let me emphasize that the goal of all this hitting lineup analysis is to answer a question: can a team restructure its hitting lineup to create more runs scored. To put more runners on base when your best hitters come up to the plate, to develop more offensive opportunities during a game, to maximize offensive situations that develop during a game, and basically to put crooked numbers up on the scoreboard.

The instant the first pitch of a baseball game is tossed, the batting lineup, rather than being the repeating linear list we are familiar with, actually becomes a potentially unending circular directory (though almost always terminated in the 9th inning). As the cliché goes, unlike any other major sport, baseball doesn’t have a clock, which means it ends only when one team offensively outscores the other and holds the lead. Given the circular directory, finding the correct location and orientation for the most accomplished hitters is logically best served by having them centered in the circular directory, and separated from out producing batters.  

A Mobius strip has the mathematical property of being non-orientable, meaning there is no starting point or stopping point, only one side, and only one boundary. The analogy to a baseball batting order is that, once the game has begun, there is no lead-off batter and no number 9 batter; there is only a continually looping directory of players.

In a condensed summary of the Mobius strip theory, the three best hitters on a team bat 1-3 in the order, with the “best” hitter batting second; the 8th and 9th batters in the line-up would be the next two best hitters on the team. The players who contribute the least to the offense, typically the pitcher and players known more for their extraordinary defensive skills, are separated from the 1-3 hitters equally from either end of the lineup. 

Here’s how the 2010 San Francisco Giants lineup looks using conventionally accepted linear batting order criteria (please ignore currently injured players, and players whose talent does not perfectly match the specific slot criteria):
 
1. Aaron Rowand - CF  High OBP, fast runner, moves around bases well.  
2. Freddie Sanchez - 2B  Contact hitter, moves lead-off batter into scoring position, can bunt well.
3. Pablo Sandoval - 3B  Best all around hitter on the team, high BA, high OBP, on base for cleanup hitter. 
4. Aubrey Huff - 1B  Cleanup hitter; best pure power hitter, RBI leader.  
5. Mark DeRosa - LF  Second best power hitter, "protects"  #4 batter, second RBI leader.
6. Bengie Molina - C  Extra base hit power, RBI producer.  
7. John Bowker - RF  More likely to create outs, lineup spot for defensive standouts.  
8. Edgar Renteria - SS  Contact hitter, possibly on base for top of the order, second spot in lineup for defensive players. 
9. pitcher - P  National League pitcher slot; often American League "second lead-off" man.

And here’s how the same 2010 Giants lineup would look in a Mobius batting order configuration:
 
1. Mark DeRosa - LF  Second or third best pure hitter on the team. 
2. Pablo Sandoval - 3B  Best hitter on the team (the #3 batter in a linear lineup).
3. Aubrey Huff - 1B  Second or third best hitter on the team.
4. Bengie Molina - C  First of two players with extra base hit potential, lower OBP and BA.       
5. Aaron Rowand - CF  Extra base hit potential, lower OBP and BA.
6. John Bowker - RF  Second most likey to create outs in the continuing directory of batters.
7. pitcher - P  Most likely to create outs in the continuing directory of batters.
8. Edgar Renteria - SS  Good OBP, fourth or fifth best hitter on the team. 
9. Freddie Sanchez - 2B  Good OBP, fourth or fifth best hitter on the team.

Not only do the statistically best hitters, placed the 1-3  in the order, receive the most at-bats, the best hitter on the team (batting #2) has the three lineup positions in front of him filled by two of the next three best hitters on the team.

Each ballgame “artificially” starts with the #1 hitter at the plate, in this case Mark DeRosa. But, after the pitcher’s #7 spot is passed the first time around in the order, the lineup becomes the continuing directory of a Mobius strip, with the three best hitters up more often, and two quality hitters batting in front of those three players for the rest of the game.

The Mobuis theory puts the hitters most likely to create outs as far away from the top three hitters in the lineup as possible throughout the entire game.

Several sidebar issues. First, “moneyball” considerations of player on-base percentages, making contact with the ball, and scoring runs without pounding out 45 home runs, etc. are as workable as any other definition of what a preferred hitter might be. Each general manager and manager determines the criteria of what constitutes a “good hitter”; so primary placement in a Mobuis lineup can include such considerations as which players are the best contact hitters, which hitters take a lot of pitches, and which players are most adept at moving around the bases. The manager still has the primary responsibility to put the right players in whatever lineup configuration is used.
 
Second, to the extent that pinch hitters are often used in National League games in the late innings to replace the pitcher, and pinch hitters are likely to be accomplished batters, their at-bats would only further support the overall effect of a Mobius configuration.

Obviously, player talent level is relative for each team; the object here is to look at the concept, not at individual player names. Having Alex Rodriguez playing third base rather than Pedro Feliz will obviously make a difference, but each team has to work with the personnel it has (and I mean no disrespect to Houston third baseman Pedro Feliz, who has, by the way, a World Series ring).

Having proposed the Mobius lineup theory, it is important to note that serious professional sabermetricians (who know more on Tuesday than I do all year) have conducted countless scenarios which consist of placing different categories of hitters in different slots in the batting order to see how run production might be affected. So far, although no agreed upon “perfect” lineup has emerged, a great deal of interesting and valuable information has been developed. Some amount of this research runs contrary to the Mobius theory; for example, some scenarios show batting the pitcher 8th in the order can increase runs scored, while batting the pitcher 7th does not.

As the corners of baseball’s sabermetric universe continue to be explored, the every day batting lineup will always be a focal point of discussion and theory. Which is the first step in challenging unexamined and conventionally less productive ways of doing business.

Currently one National League baseball team, the Pittsburgh Pirates, is batting their pitchers eighth in the batting order. In past years, St. Louis Cardinal Manager Tony La Russa batted his pitchers in the eight spot, but so far in 2010 La Russa has reverted to the more traditional pitcher-batting-9th. In the conservative world of baseball ownership and management an experiment like this is the equivalent of going from analogue to digital, or cutting rare steak from your diet and adding more fiber. And if there’s one thing baseball’s establishment needs, it’s a lot more fiber.

This fascinating subject is on the table only because La Russa, a respected and innovative manager, first batted his pitcher in the eight slot in 1998, his third year as manager of the St. Louis Cardinals. In the tradtion of only Nixon can go to China, only La Russa could dare shake up tradition and tinker with baseball’s conventional batting order. It was difficult for the traditionalistas to come down hard on La Russa because his resume is impeccable: through the 2009 season he is second in baseball history, behind Connie Mack, in the number of games managed with 4,769; and he’s taken teams to five World Series, winning two.

Pirates Manager John Russell started the 2010 season batting his pitcher eighth in the Buc's lineup, and there’s renewed interest in the analysis that’s been done to determine the value of a position player batting ninth in the National League. La Russa has noted that his tenure as an American League manager convinced him that the “second lead-off” man batting ninth provided more opportunities for his number 3 and 4 batters to drive in runs. In St. Louis, La Russa has an definite interest in providing baseball’s best overall hitter, Albert Pujols, with as many runners on base as possible whenever his turn at bat comes up.

Typically, the MLB establishment was out buying a corndog at the concession stands when this issue first came up, leaving the baseball saber and statistical community  to crunch the numbers and properly analyze the phenomenon. And, as usual, they came through. Specifically, “The Book: Playing the Percentages in Baseball”, by Tom Tango, Mitchel Lichtman, and Andrew Dolphin; David Pinto at beyondtheboxscore.com; Cyril Morong at cyrilmorong.com, and a number of other great reseachers have thoroughly examined the impact of batting a position player 9th in the batting order (among many other batting order scenarios). Also, for a good overview on the subject, check out Sky Andrecheck’s April 8, 2010 piece at Sports Illustrated.com.

The hard research seems to point to a modest advantage for National League teams batting their pitcher 8th: an increase from 4.50 runs per game to 4.59 runs per game, about 14.5 runs a year, which results in maybe two additional wins a year. Although I don’t know many managers or general managers who would scoff at two additional wins in a season, a number of those same front office hardheads distain virutally any innovation that’s foreign to their baseball experience.

But not Pirate Manager John Russell. Twenty-five years ago, author Peter Palmer’s classic research (“The Hidden Game of Baseball”) determined that a team’s best hitter, rather than bating third in the order, should bat second. So Bucs centerfielder Andrew McCutchen, considered their best overall hitter, is batting second in the Pirate’s line-up. Tony La Russa may have opened the door, but Buc’s Manager John Russell is taking it to the next level.

Although the Pirates have started the 2010 season with a 7-5 record, no one expects these experiments will result in the instant turnaround of a damaged franchise. But right now, the Pittsburgh Pirates organization is boldly going into the sabermetric universe where no team has gone before, and it will be fascinating to watch what happens.
See Part 2: The Mobius Strip Lineup Theory.
May 1, 2010 note: Cardinals Manager Tony LaRussa once again started to bat his pitchers 8th in the batting order in late April 2010.