1
Ichiro was never a leadoff guy in Japan. He just hits leadoff here because of the 200 hits goal.
Moving him to 2 would still give him a great shot at 200 hits, if he plays well, and we could see him swing the bat with an open right side once in a while.
.............
In addition to the "enthusiasm" angle in the original article here, it was later discovered that Ichiro led the league in highlight defensive plays against him. There is such a thing as a bad-luck BABIP. That's going to have SOME effect in a bounce-back.