NEWZ or NOIZ? Ask Robby
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Brent Stecker has made a habit out of publishing good reads, Mariners-wise, and I enjoyed this one tho'ly. In it, Robinson Cano talks about contending, what it takes to go to war big-time, against dreadful opponents who put the foil on and expect you to do the same .... Robby's point starts with this:
“I always say this: for you to win, you have to have a real leadoff and a second-hole hitter,” Cano told Danny, Dave and Moore, bringing up Seattle’s leadoff man Dee Gordon and No. 2 hitter Jean Segura. “You got Dee and you got Segura, a guy who can go gap to gap. … When I was in New York, I remember until we got Johnny Damon we didn’t win the World Series. (Then) you got a leadoff, you got a guy that knows what he has to do, taking pitches, see pitches for the guys behind so we get a better idea.”
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Very nice! If the pressure starts for real with the very first hitter, a 200-hit guy, then you get to see the enemy pitcher's guess what.... best game he's got.
You bring in two 200-hit guys, you've got the other 7 guys in the dugout watching the other starting pitching do battle ---- > the same way he's going to battle them with men on base in the 4th inning. Such is the concept, anyway.
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BJOL would start with a "study" of all teams who had 200-hit players at the top, or 4-WAR players, or something, and see how they did. I don't have the tools for that. Lacking such tools, I can assure you that --- > they did better than teams who lacked such weapons.
;- )
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Just for fun, now, just chatting baseball, Dr. D's mind starts racing to the World Series teams that had vicious weapons already in the #1 and #2 holes as you started the game:
1976 Big Red Machine. Pete Rose hit .323 and scored 130 (!) runs. Ken Griffey Sr. benefitting I'll bet you from synergy!, hit .336 with a .401 OBP and scored 111 runs.
Last year's Astros. George Springer led off and racked up a 144 OPS+; Josh Reddick hit .314/.363/.484 and you wanna bet that was synergy too, with Jose Altuve lurking at #3? (Reddick's lifetime slash line is .264/.323/.439.)
2009 Yankees, the team Robby is talking about. Johnny Damon going .282/.365/.489 with 107 runs, Robby going #2 I guess at .320/.352/.520, and a bunch of guys like Jeter, ARod, Godzilla, Posada etc behind them.
1990 Bash Brothers. Any team with Rickey has half its 1-2 punch already; Rickey went for his usual 189 OPS+ (!) and 65 SB's; Dave Henderson hit .271/.331/.467 for a 126 OPS+, which in that lineup was easily good enough to set up for McGwire, Canseco, Carney Lansford, Harold Baines, Steinbach, et al.
The 2001 Mariners had Ichiro (.350/.381/.457 and the MVP) usuallly followed by Mark McLemore and his angry, chip-on-the-shoulder 115 OPS+. Per Robinson Cano's theorem, this allowed Bret Boone, Edgar Martinez and John Olerud to organize their thoughts against whatever the pitcher was going to to that day.
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I do LIKE the idea Robby throws out, that pressure from the immediate 1-2 slots can create synergy especially if you've got some moscle to back it up later in the order. I dunno how sabe it is, but I like it.
And I dunno how sabe you wanna measure Dee Gordon and Jean "Sudden" Segura as 1-2 hitters compared to the rest of the league, but the guess here is that they don't fare badly.