Quote:
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut
I know that's always a concern of Dan and Al but I think it's wildly overblown.
Cardinals pitchers executed 33 successful sacrifice bunts last year. Now lets make some assumptions that are slanted 'your' way here and assume that they were successful 80% of the time (far more than average, but again - assumptions in your favor). That's 41 total bunt attempts. Now let's also say that with Molina there they'd only be successful, I dunno, 20% of the time. So we'll say 10 bunts are successful instead of 33.
So that's 23 times a runner has made it over a base ahead of Carpenter/Fowler. Let's assume they're ALL with nobody out so you get 2 shots at getting that runner in and we'll say both hitters are .285 hitters - again, wildly overstating things.
That's about 11 'additional' times Wong scores over Molina given those extremely slanted assumptions. More realistically we're probably talking 7-8.
Now offset that by the number of runs that Wong can score from the 7 hole on a double by Molina due to his speed (and Molina's a nice doubles hitter when he's right). Or the number of times he can go from 1st to 3rd due to a Molina single and then score off a pitcher sac fly or some kind of safety/suicide squeeze; something that is unlikely to happen if the roles are reversed. Or the fact that Wong could still run from the 7 hole knowing that if he's thrown out, he hasn't sabotaged the inning by getting thrown out ahead of the pitcher so he can steal an additional run or two that way.
Additionally, each spot in the batting order is about 15-20 additional PAs and I'd rather see Wong get those. Finally, there's the advantage of further spreading your lefties. If you have Wong batting 8, a manager goes to his lefty, gets Wong out, doesn't care about picking off the opposing pitcher and leaves the lefty in to face Carpenter so you face a tactical disadvantage as well.
Ultimately I think Wong is the better offensive player and his versatility ahead of Molina's bat control is worth a fair amount of offense. I think it more than offsets the handful of runs that you may lose by having a more difficult bunt play.
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This is fair, but I think you also need to consider the difference in batter profiles:
Molina puts a lot of balls in play. With the way the lineup is set-up in front of him and given his superior ISO to Wong, you're giving him more chances to drive in runs. While Molina is on the wrong side of the aging curve and Wong is on the right side, you also have to account for what is it that drove the difference in their offensive production. As a hitter, Wong was 3.7 runs above average (removing baserunning). In comparison, Molina was about 4.5 runs below average. So, where did those 8 runs come from?
Wong had the highest BABIP of his career by a significant margin despite little increase in his hard hit %, and a LD% that was lower than his career norms, which points to a lot of that being driven by luck. In contrast, Molina's BABIP was the lowest he'd had since 2010 despite a significant increase in his hard hit percentage (36.4%, previous career high 31.7%) with his LD% being within half a point of his career norms. Now, some of that lower BABIP is due to an increase in his flyball percentage.
Finally, Wong was 10 points below average against LHP and 12 points above average against RHP last year. Matt Carpenter was 15 points below average against LHP and 34 points above league against RHP. Fowler was league average when turned around and 28 points better than average when hitting lefty. Wong isn't Matt Adams against LHP. I think you're fine to leave him in
If you remove the underlying noise, you get two different kinds of players whose offensive skillsets end up creating a roughly similar number of runs:
1) A lead-footed free swinger with tremendous plate coverage who has better superior power
2) A fleet-footed player who walks slightly more and strikes out slightly less than average who doesn't have a lot of pop in his bat.
Given what the Cardinals have in the first six slots in the lineup, I'd rather have Molina driving the ball into the gaps or putting one over the fence occasionally. Overall, I think you make a compelling argument. I just happen to disagree given the above information.