The Lineup

People are always wondering why I harp so much on the lineup and batting order. The simple answer is that it is the key to winning games. It is one of the little things that go unnoticed. It is certainly a weakness in Lou Piniella's game and a weakness in Jim Hendry's planning. Hendry may be willing to spend money on free agents, but it is pretty clear that as the years have passed, he has no clear plan on building a team that can win consistently, and it is increasingly clear that in general the Cubs front office has no idea what such a team really looks like. A similar failing has afflicted Cubs managers, who generally speaking have a very limited idea of how a good lineup and batting order should be constructed.

Now some of a team's success is just luck. I have no doubt, for example, that had Ramirez not been hurt the last two seasons, the Cubs would have been much more of a force in the NL Central. That being said, however, there are certain misconceptions the Cubs manifest almost all the time, and these failures have more to do with the team's consistent shortcomings than fans ordinarily realize. A good analysis of statistics could help them here, but some of the stuff is just so basic it is hard to understand why they don't get it.

One of the more obvious issues the Cubs have is an almost total lack of understanding of what the leadoff hitter is supposed to do. Leadoff hitters get on base, work the count, run the bases well, and score runs. If they have speed and steal bases, that is nice, but they need to get on base before they can do any of those things. In the Piniella era, we have had Soriano for 2 1/2 years. Soriano hit home runs, never walked or took pitches, and never ran the bases well. Before he came to the Cubs, there was a time when he stole bases, but since his arrival, he was never a base-stealing threat, and actually he was hardly ever on base anyway. We then went into the Theriot era. Theriot also never walked or worked the count. He was not a particularly intelligent baserunner and when he did steal, he was often thrown out. We are now in the Colvin era. There is a good chance Lou will succeed in ruining this guy by the way he has handled him.

I like Colvin. He is a potentially excellent player. He does not now have the experience and knowledge of the strike zone to hit first. His frustrations in the leadoff spot are going to lead to bad habits at the plate. Why they do not drop him down in the order and in the process break up the string of essentially similar RH hitters is anybody's guess. Why they stuck with Soriano and Theriot is a similar question. They do it because they are stupid and, in the case of Piniella, stubborn as well. The only reason Colvin is playing everyday is because Piniella was embarrassed by Steve Stone calling him out for his mishandling of the outfield logjam and essentially telling him to play Colvin in RF everyday at the expense of Fukudome. Piniella initially rejected the idea for all the wrong reasons and then followed Stone's advice out of spite. Batting Colvin leadoff not only hurts the team, but it considerably retards his development as a ballplayer. Why the Cubs are doing this is anybody's guess, but it makes no sense. When they brought up Castro, they played him everyday and protected him for a while by batting him lower in the order while he learned the pitchers and the strike zone. Why they haven't treated Colvin the same way is a bit of a mystery unless the real idea is to prove to everyone that Lou was right in not playing him regularly and that he really isn't all that great. In any case, if you look down the Cubs roster, they probably do not have a true leadoff hitter. Throwing out guys like Soto who is having a great year from an on-base point-of-view and other guys like Lee and Ramirez who historically have good OBA largely because they are power-hitters that teams pitch around, the only really decent OBA guys they have are Fukudome and Castro.

The second perennial flaw in Cubs thinking is that they overvalue power and home-run hitting and they especially overvalue RH power based, I suppose, on the mistaken belief that the wind always blows out to left in the summer. Even if this were the case and even if weather data did not consistently demonstrate this surmise to be untrue, having a bunch of HR hitters in the lineup does not automatically insure success and frequently it leads to failure, especially in the big games. Whitey Herzog was fond of saying that speed never slumps. He could have said the same thing about pitching and defense. The truth is that nobody hits the best pitchers with any consistency and you face the best pitchers in the post-season. What it does do, though, is put fans in the stands. Witness the Andre Dawson and Sammy Sosa eras, when the Cubs by and large drew big crowds to watch inferior teams. The Cubs are now a major market team whose fans expect them to contend every year, so they ought to be beyond this kind of thinking.

The last of the flawed mindsets I want to mention is that the Cubs undervalue defense and just fundamental good baseball instincts. Making a good play in the infield or catching a difficult chance in the outfield, making an intelligent throw even if an out is not recorded or even stopping a wild pitch is just as important as hitting a home run or an extra-base hit. Just having the speed or baseball instincts to play, for example, in a large park, makes a big difference. The Cubs got killed by the Rockies last weekend in Denver, but even watching the games on TV you could see their outfield defense was overmatched. The Rockies outfielders made catch after catch of hard-hit balls that the Cubs didn't come anywhere near. The Cubs outfield looked lost out there. Granted, Soriano always looks lost because he actually is lost, but Colvin, despite his speed, failed to get a jump on several balls and misjudged others hit over his head, balls the Rockies outfielders usually caught. Byrd played pretty well, but he did not have the speed to go back on several long hits.

Friday's game against the Reds perfectly illustrates some of my points. Fukudome in RF made one really nice catch of a potential gapper. There were no outs, but that play over the long haul is worth at least half-a-run and maybe more if he doesn't get it and it leads to a big inning. Colvin in LF made a throw to home plate on the play the Reds scored their third run. The runner was a third of the way down the line when the throw was made and it went over the cutoff man's head, allowing the hitter to advance to 2B. Now it made no difference, but it might have cost the Cubs a run. These things add up, along with all the other botched plays and over the course of a season, I would argue that teams that give away outs or fail to take away hits lose more often than teams that don't hit a lot of home runs.

Now these things cannot be fixed right now, but as to Friday's lineup, I think it is the best lineup the Cubs can field right now against RH pitching both offensively and defensively. They did not score runs for sure, but they left nine runners on base and they might have scored with a couple of breaks. What has often been remarked is the Cubs tend to mount rallies with the bottom of the order and they put together innings that build scoring chances too often from that part of the order. That is not an accident. Unlike other teams they bat their most patient hitters lower down and because they don't have the same level of confidence in these guys, they mix them up more in terms of lefties and righties and batting styles. The problem, of course, is that when this works, they are on base for the top of the order or the middle of the order which does not deliver.

So if this lineup was so great, or at least the best they could muster, how come they got shut out? First off, Colvin led off. He was an automatic out in this position. Castro was OK batting second, but he had an unproductive game. Next comes the real trouble, Lee, Ramirez, Byrd. These guys are the same hitter, aggressive RH power hitters. You need to break them up with LH hitters or guys with a different mindset or style, like Soto. The 9th inning was a perfect example of this. Lee led off and struck out on ball four. Ramirez got on. Byrd struck out on a bad pitch. Fukudome walked, leaving the game in the hands of DeWitt who made the final out. The Reds closer did not vary his approach to the big three one bit, nor did he throw them strikes, yet he got two outs in short order when by rights the bases should have been loaded for Fukudome.

Things might be better if the Cubs had a LH hitting 1B, but that will have to wait until next year when they will either sign a free agent or move Colvin to the position. Right now, Fukudome should lead off when he plays, which should be in a platoon with Soriano. Castro should bat second, but Lee needs to drop in the order way down. Byrd, Soto, and Ramirez should be the middle three, followed by Colvin, Lee, and DeWitt.