Fire Gardy

Gardenhire has said some dumb, contradictory things in his day, but his comments this spring about the CF/leadoff battle seem to stand out.

“Sometimes with young hitters, people say they’re not ready to be a
leadoff hitter — his on-base percentage, whatever,” Gardenhire said,
“but sometimes with young hitters it’s better to get them 500-550
at-bats rather than worry about that on-base percentage, and just let
them play.”

That’s fine … except that getting on base in front of the middle of the order is perhaps the most important thing about being a leadoff hitter. So it doesn’t exactly fall into “whatever” territory. And you don’t use the leadoff spot in the major leagues to develop young, inexperienced hitters. You use it to set the table and generate runs. Young hitters can develop at the major league level in the 7-9 spots, and move up to the higher-pressure, higher-demands leadoff spot once they’ve gained some valuable experience (and, ideally, proven themselves).

Also, I’d like to know when he developed this attitude toward giving promising young hitters consistent at bats in order to develop them properly, and why he continues to refuse to do it with Kubel.

Given that OBP is so important for the leadoff hitter, and that none of the potential center fielders — though fast — have shown any consistent ability to get on base, I’ve been pushing for the possibility of putting Mauer at the top of an unconventional lineup. Basically moving everyone up a slot, giving 50-70 more at bats to each of your best hitters, creating the potential to score more runs and win more games But would Gardenhire be willing to take any kind of risk with the lineup?

“Sometimes you just have to go against the grain a little bit, and
obviously this year we’ll probably end up going against the grain with
a leadoff guy,” Gardenhire said. “The one thing you won’t want to miss
is that first at-bat. We don’t know what’s going to happen with it, and
I’m sure no one else will either.”

Well, he claims he wants to be risky. But his “risk” is to put an inexperienced young hitter at the top of the order; worse, one who has never even had a good OBP in the minor leagues (I can make that statement without even knowing which of the young CFers will get the job — which is pathetic).

While he may think this a risk, it seems much more likely that it’s just stupid. And while he thinks he’s going to make the first at bat of the game exciting, I’d say he’s just being foolhardy.

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