Yostian Leadoff Logic

It's easy to pick-on managers of losing teams and single out certain idiosyncrasies as making a much bigger impact on the team's performance than they actually do. This is admittedly what I'm trying to do here, but Ned's insistence on batting Chris Getz in the leadoff spot has made the team worse and, by Yost's own admission, doesn't make sense. Let's take a look at how Ned justifies his constantly evolving and shifting logic on who the team's leadoff hitter should be:

Ned on Mike Aviles:

“When I looked at it, I thought, ‘OK, as good of a hitter as Mike is, I don’t really have any leadoff candidates outside of (Chris) Getz — because Getzie has some speed and can steal some bases.’ But Mike has more offensive capabilities.”

This was coming out of spring training and as it turns out might have been the second most intelligent thing Yost goes on to say all year regarding leadoff hitters. It was these types of comments that gave me hope in Yost's ability to be a good manager and not put people like Getz in the leadoff spot just because of the age old baseball wisdom that leadoff hitters have to be slap-hitting speedsters. Ned would obviously abandon this logic, even though it still stands true to this day that Mike Aviles IS a better hitter than Chris Getz. 

Ned on Gordon:

“I’d rather have him further down the lineup,” Yost admitted, “but I want to have guys who get on base at the top of the lineup…

“It doesn’t make any sense having a .290 or .300 on-base guy leadoff.”

Pure Genius! Ned moving Alex Gordon to the leadoff spot was by far and away the most intelligent managerial decision he's made as a KC Royal. He wanted a guy who got on base to hit first, he wanted one of the better hitters on the team to hit the most often. It was smart. It was going well. And then....

Ned on taking Gordon out of the leadoff spot:

"There’s no magic cure, no magic elixir, that’s going to fix everything,” Yost said. “But this changes it around and gives it a bit of a different look. We’ll just see if we can freshen it up a little bit. It’s been stale lately.”

This is where Ned takes a turn for the worse. The stale line-up shuffle logic??? It's time-honored managerial strategy 101. The problem is there wasn't a problem. If it ain't broke, just break it. The Gordon leadoff move was going along swimmingly, it just happened to coincide with a Hosmer slump, an even bigger Jeff Francouer slump, sending Mike Aviles down thus ending the effective Getz-Aviles platoon and taking one of the team's best hitters out of the line-up (Wilson Betemit). But no, Yost wouldn't see that, instead he would just ramble off something about how to "freshen up" a line up and thus give-up on his previous logic which led him to his best decision in hitting Godon leadoff.

Ned on Melky:

“Melky is as clutch of a hitter as we’ve got,” Yost said. “That’s what you look at late in the game when the top of the order comes up. You’re trying to get your best hitters to the top of your order and let them produce.”
 
This was the (brief) result of the Gordon switch which again contained some well founded logic and wasn't bad because it moved-up Hosmer to #2 and placed Gordon and Butler in the middle instead of the streaky Frenchy. Though you can sense his logic starting to falter here as he talks about "clutch hitting" from the leadoff spot and implies that it must have been Gordon's lack of clutch hitting which led to the "stale" line-up. This line-up lasted five games, the Royals went 2-3 and nothing bad really happend. Then the Royals head to San Diego and the National League rules, Getz is riding a modest hot-streak, and Ned Yost loses his mind. His answer to not having Billy Butler in the line-up is to move Chris Getz to the #2 spot??? The Royals lose all three games and Yost decides to move Getz to the leadoff spot on July 1, 2011... 

Ned on Getzie:

“He’s hot right now,” manager Ned Yost said.

Forget everything I said before, Getzie is HOT, HOT, HOT. He's the leadoff solution. What I said about having your best hitters and on-base guys, scratch that here is my new theory...

"You spread 'em out more," Yost said. "I want speed and athleticism at the top and I want guys that can at least have a chance to produce down at the bottom and keep it going."

What does this mean? Producers at the bottom and athletes at the top? Chris Getz can't produce, so you might as well lead him off and make sure he hits more often because he is fast? Nope, it turns out that Chris Getz IS a producer and Ned wants that all important BA with runners in scoring position at the top... 

“You look every year, and the leaders in RBIs are basically the same. The leaders in home runs will basically be the same. Batting average, the same thing. Year in, year out. But runners in scoring position changes every stinkin’ year.”

This is said in reference to Getzie's uncanny ability to hit with runners in scoring position. You can tell Ned is confused here, he has gone past the point of no return and is just saying things for the sake of it. Here is an interesting stat which might, just maybe, be slightly more applicable to your leadoff hitter. Chris Getz when hittting first:

Split          G GS  PA  AB   BA  OBP  SLG  OPS
Batting 1st   26 26 119 101 .168 .252 .208 .460

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 7/9/2011.

Things like this are surely symptomatic of a losing team and in no way would a change lead to a winning team, but Ned went from logical, to genius, and finally has reverted back to the rantings of an illogical, stubborn, typical baseball manager. This is not what we need from Ned. It's obviously not helping the team to have YOUR WORST hitter batting leadoff just because he runs fast. I don't know what's next for the Royals at the leadoff spot but anything is better than Chris Getz.