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2017 projected lineup thread
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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Feb 17, 2017 12:01:55 GMT -5
Would like to see everyone's opinion on this. The Sox are going to look a lot different in 2017 with no Ortiz in the lineup. I want to see where some people would want to where they would want to put some players through most of the lineups throughout the year. This is mine-
Vs RHP: 1) Pedrioa 2B 2) Benintendi LF 3) Mookie RF 4) Xander SS 5) JBJ CF 6) Hanley DH 7) Pablo 3B 8) Moreland 1B 9) Leon/Vasquez C
Vs LHP: 1) Pedrioa 2B 2) Benintendi LF 3) Mookie RF 4) Xander SS 5) Hanley 1B 6) Chris Young DH 7) JBJ CF 8) Pablo 3B 9) Leon/Vasquez C
-Farrell has hinted at keeping Pedrioa in the leadoff spot this year. This will at least cut the double plays by maybe a 1/3 or 1/4 of the time because his first at bat of the game comes with no one ever on base. -Farrell also hinted that Benintendi might end up being the number 2 hitter on this team, which is absolutely the right call. -JBJ might be as high as the number 5 spot in the lineup against RHP, and to me that would also be a good call. -Mookie by definition is a 3 hole hitter and should be kept there until further notice. -Leon and Vasquez are clearly the worst hitters in any lineup and shouldn't ever bat higher than 9th. -Moreland is the 8th best hitter in this lineup based off the season he just had.
To me, Xander is the 4th best hitter on this team. That's why I want him cleaning up. Hanley had a great year last year but I have more faith in Xander driving in runs, and that's what a cleanup hitter is supposed to do. I would have no problem switching their order in the lineup if Xander goes cold and Hanley gets hot however. The same goes for JBJ and Pablo. If JBJ goes cold, he should switch with Pablo in the lineup to take pressure off a little bit.
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Post by brendan98 on Feb 17, 2017 12:52:02 GMT -5
I think I’d go with the following:
VS RHP 1 Pedroia 2 Benintendi 3 Betts 4 Bradley 5 Ramirez 6 Xander 7 Moreland 8 Sandoval/Holt 9 Leon/Vazquez/Swihart
VS LHP 1 Pedroia 2 Xander 3 Betts 4 Hanley 5 Young 6 Leon 7 Bradley 8 Benintendi 9 Holt/Sandoval
I like Pedroia in the leadoff spot. In the 2 spot Benintendi could be a good fit, would bat Xander 2 vs LHP to start the season, at least until we see Benintendi have success against lefties in the big leagues. Mookie in the 3 hole. Bradley had a .900+ OPS vs RHP last year so he bats cleanup vs righties, Hanley vs lefties. Hanley bats 5th vs RHP, Young vs LHP. I’m not in love with batting Xander 6 vs RHP but this is where the numbers say he goes, Leon murdered LHP last year, he bats here if his numbers are even close to last years vs lefties. 7 spot - Moreland vs RHP, Bradley vs LHP. 8 spot - Sandoval/Holt vs RHP, Benintendi vs LHP 9 One of the catchers vs RHP, Sandoval/Holt vs LHP
I’m guessing Benintendi will produce against LHP, maybe right out of the gate, if and when he does maybe you leave him in the 2 spot, move Xander down and the lineup gets deeper.
Speaking of Xander, can he take another step forward, he’s gotten better each of the last 2 years, if that trend continues I not sure where he hits in the lineup, hopefully we will find out.
It would be nice to see Bradley improve vs LHP, if not Young could take some of his at-bats, especially if a certain RHH proved to be MLB ready soon …. Sam Travis has always hit LHP, if Bradley and/or Benintendi struggle against lefties, Young could play in the OF, with Hanley and Travis at 1B/DH.
It will be interesting to see how 3B and C play out, I hope Sandoval can be a good player for the Sox, I’ll give him credit for showing up to camp maybe in the best shape of his life, and I’ll just say that I hope I’m wrong about him, because my gut (no pun intended) tells me that he won’t be the 3B with the most AB’s on the Red Sox this year. Like 3B, I think you will need a crystal ball to try to figure out who will be the primary C over the course of the season, I’m hopeful Swihart will emerge as that guy at some point.
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Post by gatorgreenwell on Feb 17, 2017 13:18:33 GMT -5
Would like to see everyone's opinion on this. The Sox are going to look a lot different in 2017 with no Ortiz in the lineup. I want to see where some people would want to where they would want to put some players through most of the lineups throughout the year. This is mine- Vs RHP: 1) Pedrioa 2B 2) Benintendi LF 3) Mookie RF 4) Xander SS 5) JBJ CF 6) Hanley DH 7) Pablo 3B 8) Moreland 1B 9) Leon/Vasquez C Vs LHP: 1) Pedrioa 2B 2) Benintendi LF 3) Mookie RF 4) Xander SS 5) Hanley 1B 6) Chris Young DH 7) JBJ CF 8) Pablo 3B 9) Leon/Vasquez C -Farrell has hinted at keeping Pedrioa in the leadoff spot this year. This will at least cut the double plays by maybe a 1/3 or 1/4 of the time because his first at bat of the game comes with no one ever on base. -Farrell also hinted that Benintendi might end up being the number 2 hitter on this team, which is absolutely the right call. -JBJ might be as high as the number 5 spot in the lineup against RHP, and to me that would also be a good call. -Mookie by definition is a 3 hole hitter and should be kept there until further notice. -Leon and Vasquez are clearly the worst hitters in any lineup and shouldn't ever bat higher than 9th. -Moreland is the 8th best hitter in this lineup based off the season he just had. To me, Xander is the 4th best hitter on this team. That's why I want him cleaning up. Hanley had a great year last year but I have more faith in Xander driving in runs, and that's what a cleanup hitter is supposed to do. I would have no problem switching their order in the lineup if Xander goes cold and Hanley gets hot however. The same goes for JBJ and Pablo. If JBJ goes cold, he should switch with Pablo in the lineup to take pressure off a little bit. Who's ahead of him besides Betts? I would entertain Pedroia maybe, but it's close. I'm not ready to say Benni is better. If X didn't have a terrible second half and especially bad August (not sure what happened there...) he'd have been over .300 again. Still racks up a ton of hits and sees a lot of pitches as well. He seems pretty perfect as a 1-2 hitter. As odd as it might sound. I might go...
Against RHP X Benni Betts Pedey jbj hanley pablo moreland C
and
Against LHP Pedey X Betts Hanley Benni Young JBJ Pablo C
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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Feb 17, 2017 13:30:43 GMT -5
I don't want Pedrioa batting anywhere but leadoff. This protects him from hitting into too many double plays. He has to be there everytime he's in the lineup.
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Post by gatorgreenwell on Feb 17, 2017 13:35:16 GMT -5
I don't know the #s...but is he that prone to double plays? Moreso than others? I think he's generally good with guys on base, which is why I have him clean up against RHP.
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Post by borisman on Feb 17, 2017 13:37:41 GMT -5
2B: Pedroia LF: Beni RF: Betts 1B: Rizzo SS: Xander DH: Hanley 3B: Pablo CF: JBJ C: Leon/Swihart
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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Feb 17, 2017 13:41:32 GMT -5
I think I’d go with the following: VS RHP 1 Pedroia 2 Benintendi 3 Betts 4 Bradley 5 Ramirez 6 Xander 7 Moreland 8 Sandoval/Holt 9 Leon/Vazquez/Swihart VS LHP 1 Pedroia 2 Xander 3 Betts 4 Hanley 5 Young 6 Leon 7 Bradley 8 Benintendi 9 Holt/Sandoval I like Pedroia in the leadoff spot. In the 2 spot Benintendi could be a good fit, would bat Xander 2 vs LHP to start the season, at least until we see Benintendi have success against lefties in the big leagues. Mookie in the 3 hole. Bradley had a .900+ OPS vs RHP last year so he bats cleanup vs righties, Hanley vs lefties. Hanley bats 5th vs RHP, Young vs LHP. I’m not in love with batting Xander 6 vs RHP but this is where the numbers say he goes, Leon murdered LHP last year, he bats here if his numbers are even close to last years vs lefties. 7 spot - Moreland vs RHP, Bradley vs LHP. 8 spot - Sandoval/Holt vs RHP, Benintendi vs LHP 9 One of the catchers vs RHP, Sandoval/Holt vs LHP I’m guessing Benintendi will produce against LHP, maybe right out of the gate, if and when he does maybe you leave him in the 2 spot, move Xander down and the lineup gets deeper. Speaking of Xander, can he take another step forward, he’s gotten better each of the last 2 years, if that trend continues I not sure where he hits in the lineup, hopefully we will find out. It would be nice to see Bradley improve vs LHP, if not Young could take some of his at-bats, especially if a certain RHH proved to be MLB ready soon …. Sam Travis has always hit LHP, if Bradley and/or Benintendi struggle against lefties, Young could play in the OF, with Hanley and Travis at 1B/DH. It will be interesting to see how 3B and C play out, I hope Sandoval can be a good player for the Sox, I’ll give him credit for showing up to camp maybe in the best shape of his life, and I’ll just say that I hope I’m wrong about him, because my gut (no pun intended) tells me that he won’t be the 3B with the most AB’s on the Red Sox this year. Like 3B, I think you will need a crystal ball to try to figure out who will be the primary C over the course of the season, I’m hopeful Swihart will emerge as that guy at some point. Your lineup is also a strong possibility. I'm not sure if Farrell will ever hit JBJ in the cleanup spot though. I think you'd see Hanley cleaning up and JBJ hitting 5th in that scenario. I could see Leon ahead of Holt/Sandoval at third against LHP, but not much higher, even with the good splits against LHP. I'm also hopeful about Swihart, because the catching position could look like a pitchers spot in the order at times this year. I definitely could see Sam Travis up by June or July and fill the role that Youkilis had in 2004 with that team (filling in, coming off the bench and platooning). I could also see Farrell dropping down Benintendi against lefties and sticking Xander there. I think Benintendi can hang in fine with LHP, so I wouldn't agree with the move if he did do it. I really want to see the Sox experiment with Xander cleaning up, so hopefully he does that at some point.
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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Feb 17, 2017 13:44:05 GMT -5
I don't know the #s...but is he that prone to double plays? Moreso than others? I think he's generally good with guys on base, which is why I have him clean up against RHP. I think Pedrioa was one of the league leaders in double plays before Farrell made him leadoff. It was a huge problem with him last year. His speed has declined some, so he's less able to beat out ground balls and break up double plays running to first.
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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Feb 17, 2017 13:45:15 GMT -5
2B: Pedroia LF: Beni RF: Betts 1B: Rizzo SS: Xander DH: Hanley 3B: Pablo CF: JBJ C: Leon/Swihart Haha yeah I don't think Theo is giving up Rizzo anytime soon. Although he would fit into this lineup perfectly. Funny though. Lol
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Post by gatorgreenwell on Feb 17, 2017 13:50:42 GMT -5
I don't know the #s...but is he that prone to double plays? Moreso than others? I think he's generally good with guys on base, which is why I have him clean up against RHP. I think Pedrioa was one of the league leaders in double plays before Farrell made him leadoff. It was a huge problem with him last year. His speed has declined some, so he's less able to beat out ground balls and break up double plays running to first. I realize he's not as fast as he used to be, but he's still not exactly slow. Is this a consistent issue, or possibly just a flukey thing that happened last yr?
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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Feb 17, 2017 14:34:15 GMT -5
I think Pedrioa was one of the league leaders in double plays before Farrell made him leadoff. It was a huge problem with him last year. His speed has declined some, so he's less able to beat out ground balls and break up double plays running to first. I realize he's not as fast as he used to be, but he's still not exactly slow. Is this a consistent issue, or possibly just a flukey thing that happened last yr? I'm not sure if it was a huge problem in the past but with his speed declining, it's a problem to look out for. He's still a really good hitter and I trust him with runners on base, but I just would rather reduce the risk of those game rally killing double plays.
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Post by mattpicard on Feb 17, 2017 15:34:04 GMT -5
Vs. RHP:
2B Pedroia (R) RF Betts (R) LF Benintendi (L) DH Ramirez (R) 3B Sandoval (L/S) SS Bogaerts (R) CF Bradley (L) 1B Moreland (L) C Leon/Vazquez (S/R)
Vs. LHP:
2B Pedroia (R) RF Betts (R) SS Bogaerts (R) 1B Ramirez (R) DH Young (R) LF Benintendi (L) C Leon/Vazquez (S/R) CF Bradley (L) 3B Rutledge/Holt (R/L)
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Post by dmaineah on Feb 17, 2017 15:49:54 GMT -5
I think to start the season they go with;
VS RHP VS LHP
Pedroia Panda Holt Betts Hanley Bogaerts JBJ Mooreland Young Benintendi Vazquez/Leon
Eventually settling on;
VS RHP VS LHP
Pedroia JBJ Betts Benintendi Hanley Bogaerts Panda Young Mooreland Holt Vazquez/Leon
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Post by rookie13 on Feb 17, 2017 16:22:59 GMT -5
Vs. RHP: 2B Pedroia (R) RF Betts (R) LF Benintendi (L) DH Ramirez (R) 3B Sandoval (L/S) SS Bogaerts (R) CF Bradley (L) 1B Moreland (L) C Leon/Vazquez (S/R) Vs. LHP: 2B Pedroia (R) RF Betts (R) SS Bogaerts (R) 1B Ramirez (R) DH Young (R) LF Benintendi (L) C Leon/Vazquez (S/R) CF Bradley (L) 3B Rutledge/Holt (R/L) Almost exactly what I would do, but I would switch Xander and Mookie in the LHP lineup.
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Post by James Dunne on Feb 17, 2017 18:26:31 GMT -5
Pedroia has always maintained low strikeout rates, and 49% of the balls he put in play were grounders last season - a high number that's right around where he's been since 2013. He's also managed to maintain OBPs that are excellent. That's pretty much the exact profile you want from a leadoff man. The idea that the leadoff man needs to be fast is kind of silly - if you have your power hitters up two through five or whatever, you don't need someone racing home on a homer. Pedroia's baserunning has been gradually declining but not to the point where it comes anything near outweighing his on-base skills.
I think Betts is an ideal #2 hitter, but there's also a comfort factor there - the difference between him hitting second and third is almost negligible, provided the #2 hitter is someone good. So basically I put him at whichever of those two spots he prefers.
One nice thing in the RHP-facing lineup is that it's not totally necessary to split Moreland up from the other switch-hitters because I don't see a lot of hesitation in pinch-hitting for him.
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Post by Coreno on Feb 17, 2017 18:56:20 GMT -5
I agree that Moreland should be seeing as few LHP as possible, but if that becomes a common ritual, who is the guy on this roster that finishes those games at 1B?
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Post by doctorduck21 on Feb 17, 2017 20:12:08 GMT -5
Vs RHP
1. Pedroia 2B 2. Benintendi LF 3. Betts RF 4. Bradley Jr CF 5. Ramirez DH 6. Bogaerts SS 7. Sandoval 3B 8. Moreland 1B 9. Leon/Vazquez C
Vs LHP
1. Pedroia 2B 2. Bogaerts SS 3. Betts RF 4. Ramirez 1B 5. Bradley Jr CF 6. Young DH 7. Benintendi LF 8. Sandoval/Holt? 3B 9. Leon/Vazquez C
I think those are how I would put it together. Not feeling great about third even if Pablo bounces back. If Benintendi shows he can handle major league lefties fine, I'd bump him up to #2 and move Xander to #4 with every one else moving down one
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Post by thursty on Feb 17, 2017 21:19:01 GMT -5
It's been well-established that your best baserunner should bat leadoff, ceteris paribus. That is Betts (who has been the best baserunner in baseball 2015-16 by a lot). However, OBP skills are preeminent (which at least so far Betts has been less-than-elite at).
Pedroia is among the worst baserunners in baseball over 2015-16 (24th worst among all 131 qualified), but his OBP is 20th in that span. Although he's not an ideal leadoff hitter, on this team he should hit leadoff.
The 3 most important spot are 1, 4, 2. Obviously Mookie has to be in one of those 3 (if he gets his OBP up to around 380, which really shouldn't be a problem, I'd have to consider moving him back to leadoff)
The one position you shouldn't hit Mookie is 3rd - he's too good for that
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Post by James Dunne on Feb 17, 2017 23:46:18 GMT -5
Betts is the team's best slugger, so batting him leadoff seems a waste, especially on a team with Pedroia who has a high-OBP/low-SLG profile. Beyond that, the difference between second, third, and fourth in the lineup is statistically negligible as long as all of those hitters are good. Less than 1/2 a win per season.
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Post by rizdog on Feb 17, 2017 23:49:50 GMT -5
Vs. RHP Pedroia Benintendi Betts Ramirez Bradley/Sandoval (based on who's hot) Bogaerts Sandoval/Bradley Moreland Leon/Vazquez
Vs. LHP Pedroia Bogaerts Betts Ramirez Young Benintendi Sandoval Leon/Vazquez Bradley
I would switch it to Benni in the 2 hole with Xander 5th and Young 6th if Benni hits lefties early in the season like I think he can.
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Post by tookme55 on Feb 18, 2017 9:01:59 GMT -5
I think you'll see Sam Travis at some point.....he's perceived as our future at 1B.
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Post by m1keyboots on Feb 18, 2017 9:54:41 GMT -5
To me HanRam has to be hitting cleanup 90% of the time unless he slumps or they put mooks/pedey there
RHP
Pedey Beni Mookie Hanley Xander JBJ Moreland Sandoval Leon/Swihart
LHP
Pedey Beni Mookie Hanley Xander Young JBJ Sandoval Vasquez/Leon
If Beni struggles I don't think it would be terrible to bump Xander up to the 2 spot and Beni deep in the lineup, but he shouldn't be platooned a la Naquin.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 18, 2017 10:23:17 GMT -5
I think you'll see Sam Travis at some point.....he's perceived as our future at 1B. Red Sox will sign Eric Hosmer next offseason to be future 1B. Good defense, left handed...makes a lot of sense.
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Post by jmei on Feb 18, 2017 11:27:46 GMT -5
Lineup questions really turn on who you think the best hitters on the team are. Betts is probably first in line there, but after him, you have a big grouping of players who project to hit similarly. I'd probably have Hanley second, but after that, guys like Bogaerts and Pedroia and Bradley and Benintendi are all in the mix to be next in line.
ADD: the other hard part is that, versus RHP, four of their best six hitters are righties, but all three of the worst (Sandoval, Leon, Moreland) are lefties or switch hitters, which makes adhering to any R/L alternation difficult.
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Post by ccheetham0930 on Feb 18, 2017 11:29:59 GMT -5
VS RHP 1 Pedroia 2B 2 Beni LF 3 Mookie RF 4 Hanley DH 5 Xander SS 6 JBJ CF 7 Pablo 3B 8 Moreland 1B 9 Leon C
VS LHP 1 Pedroia 2B 2 Beni LF 3 Mookie RF 4 Hanley 1B 5 Xander SS 6 JBJ CF 7 Pablo 3B 8 Young DH 9 Leon C
I can see Xander and Hanley switching in the lineup depending on who can capitalize on some run scoring opportunities. I love Pedroia at leadoff and it should stay that way most of the season. Beni may not start that high in the lineup but if he has a good spring there is no reason he shouldn't be leadoff or 2. Mookie needs to be 3 or 4 at all times, obviously.
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