That's what Brauny thinks, he had our projected lineup on the Premium board yesterday. And Richard Zane said he saw him leadoff in a scrimmage where he recently spent the full day with Earley (that's a good article). I thought it might be something to kick around while we wait.

For a long time analytics have said that your best hitter should lead off but just recently it seems to be catching on. Judge and Ohtani have done pretty good leading off. In Ohtani's case, really a lot better than pretty good.

How about LaViolette leading off? Seems kind of funny at first, but I hope it happens.

No idea if it will be Jace or not but the concept is pretty interesting.

Any idea as to why the leadoff being your best hitter is analytically sound? I'll take the WHAT (analytics says so) on face value but any idea WHY? I can think of a few: pitcher might not be in a groove, pressure to start the game, etc., but it seems like there is an equal and opposite reason not to do it: hitter gets to see a few pitches from others at bats, pressure on the leadoff hitter just like on the pitcher, etc.

Any ideas?

I think it'll be Jace or Gravin

First pitch lead off homerun agains the sips Friday night in Austin. You heard it here first

I would have no problem with Jace(or any other player in our insanely elite lineup, to be honest) leading off. Earley knows what he's doing.

I'd like to see Gavin leading off followed by Jace.

In Japanese leagues the best hitter always leads off

It's just math. Through a full season your leadoff guy is going to get the list AB's. With the current game being about home runs and little else, it makes sense to get JL and GG the most opportunities to hit bombs.

I can't remember if it was in the Brauny post, but somewhere in the past couple of days I read that Jace is the fastest player on the team this year which I didn't realize. He's going to be a very rich young man soon.

Brauny also projects Schott to bat 7th. It's really pretty crazy to have a hitter that good to be 7th in the lineup.

TheCrew14 said:

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I'd rather see Grahovac lead off and be protected by Jace. Gavin seemed to struggled a bit without protection with Montgomery out and Jace hobbled in the CWS.

Anyway you go about it, the best 2 hitters need to bat 1/2 in this lineup.

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Agreed


(also, to add to the big league names the Phils do this with Schwarber.....and LaRussa did it with McGwire - thats the first time I remember it happening)