It’s been something
There were many iterations of the lineup in spring training as the team prepared for the season. Once that season started, Rob Thomson thought he had it worked out where the leadoff hitter would change depending on the handedness of the pitcher, Kyle Schwarber up top against righties, Trea Turner against lefties.
Then came the Bryson Stott experiment. So far, since April 11, the leadoff hitter has been either Turner or Stott, again depending on the handedness of the pitcher. The whole idea was to get protection for Bryce Harper by getting Schwarber to hit behind him. However, since that date, Harper has hit .217/.343/.410, which isn’t all that wonderful. Schwarber has hit .216/.389/.446, a bit lower than his hot start, but the power that he has hit with has also produced more in the RBI department. For their parts, Turner (.308/.370/.352) and Stott (.273/.337/.390) have been alright since the switch.
The main thing, the record of the team, hasn’t really been all that different than before: 8-5 before the switch, 11-10 after. So when it comes to the main two components of the idea to juggle the lineup, protecting Harper and winning games, the jury is still out.
Which brings us to our question of the day: do you like the lineup as it has been lately? As I showed, there are good and bad to the moves, but it is still just a small amount of games. It’s hard to make any kind of hard determination based on only 21 games, so it’s likely the experiment continues.