Why Carlos Santana Shouldn’t Hit Leadoff

Indians Manager Terry Francona made some waves recently when he suggested he was considering the possibility of using Carlos Santana to bat lead-off in the team’s lineup. Admittedly, Francona knows a lot more about baseball than I do and probably has what he feels are good reasons for such a consideration, however, I think this is a bad idea.
Santana spent most of the 2015 season as the cleanup hitter mostly by default because there weren’t any other candidates who could have done better. With that said, I thought he would have been served better elsewhere in the lineup. Ideally, I think he’s a better fit in the fifth or sixth spot in the lineup or perhaps even as low as seventh.
Yes, Santana does get on base and had 113 walks to lead the league in 2014 and had 108 walks in 2015 with a .357 OBP in 666 plate appearances in 154 games last year. Those certainly look like good numbers.
Keep in mind, as a former catcher Santana isn’t a fast runner, perhaps considered to be pretty slow when compared to the average player. He did have 11 steals in 2015, but to me that’s really an inconsequential statistic because it’s not a really true measure of his speed. Would anyone really want Santana to try to steal a base when the game is on the line? Maybe if you have a two or three run lead in the fourth inning, but in a critical situation, he’s staying put. That’s why his steal total is inconsequential.
Santana scored 72 runs in 2015 and 68 in 2014. In 2015, he had 19 home runs and in 2014 he had 27 home runs. That means Santana scored just 53 times when he didn’t hit a home run in 2015 and only 41 times in 2014 when he didn’t hit a home run. He also hit 29 doubles in 2015 and 25 doubles in 2014, yet he’s not crossing the plate very often and that’s not to be overlooked when someone walks more than 100 times per year.
He ranked fifth in MLB in 2015 in walks trailing only Joey Votto (143), Bryce Harper (124), Paul Goldschmidt (118) and Jose Bautista (110). When comparing the top 25 hitters in walks, Santana ranks 22nd out of these top 25 in walks with 72 runs scored ahead of only Joc Pederson who 7th in walks drawing 92 walks and scoring 67 runs, Miguel Cabrera who was tied for 15th in walks drawing 77 and scoring 64 runs, and Joe Mauer who was 25th in walks drawing 67 walks and scoring 69 runs.
A BaseballReference.com statistic called Runs Better Than Average measures the number of runs a player is better than a league average player. Santana was a -12 in Runs Better Than Average in 2015, and in 2014, he was a +4 in this category and in 2013, Santana was +16. Not a good trend.
Santana isn’t especially great at scoring from second base when a batter hits a single. For his career, Santana has scored 52 times out of 98 times or 53 percent of the times when he was on second base and the hitter got a single. To compare, Jason Kipnis scored 70 percent of the times when he was on second base and the batter hit a single in 2015. This is important because Kipnis hit 43 doubles in 2015, whereas Santana hit 29 doubles and the odds of Kipnis getting one hit from double and then scoring on a single are much greater than Santana.
What I’m trying to point out is Kipnis has a much greater ability to use his speed and power to score a run without the benefit of two hits or a sacrifice bunt or a “productive out” via a ground ball or deep fly ball.
It’s possible that Santana, and all the glory of his walks, might need a combined two or even three hits/walks from his teammates to come around to score when he gets a base on balls.
Picture a scenario where Santana gets a lead-off walk while facing the Tigers in Detroit. Francisco Lindor gets a single and runners are on first and second as Santana fails to get to third. Kipnis batting third gets a single and Santana fails to score from second and Lindor is prevented from using his speed to go from first to third and instead remains on second base. Bases are loaded with no outs. Cleanup hitter Mike Napoli hits a medium fly ball to left field. Santana can’t score on a sacrifice fly opportunity and no runners advance with one out. The number five hitter comes up and hits into a double play and no runs have scored and the inning is over.
Let’s try this with Kipnis as the lead-off batter. He gets a walk and then Lindor gets a single and Kipnis moves to third. The number three hitter (whoever that might be with Michael Brantley out) gets a single and Kipnis scores and Lindor also moves over to third. Napoli hits a medium fly ball to left field and Lindor scores on the sacrifice fly. Score is 2-0. The number five batter (perhaps Santana) comes to bat and with no one on base so there is no double play in order and just one out. The starting pitcher has to work harder that inning and is behind in the game and the potential remains for more runs. Even if the next two hitters go down in order, the score is still Indians 2-0.
I understand this scenario isn’t necessarily going to happen and certainly could turn out differently. There are parts individually that could occur more often such as failing to score on a sacrifice fly or going first to third etc, but the idea here is to illustrate that the speed of Kipnis and Lindor could be impaired with a guy like Santana clogging up the bases in front of them. It also means the potential to scratch out runs at the beginning of the game drops a bit. When a team that has a lot of offensive shortcomings doesn’t use some of the assets it has such as the speed at the top of the order with Kipnis, Lindor and eventually Brantley, then it makes it that much harder to score.
It’s important to note that Kipnis played well as the team’s lead-off hitter in 2015. He led off the game 121 times and hit .302/.331/.526 and came around to score 35 times in the first inning or just under 30 percent of the time (28.9 percent) for each plate appearance. When he was the lead-off hitter, Kipnis hit .311/.385/.476 for the season in 562 plate appearances. When he batted elsewhere in the lineup, Kipnis hit just 18-for-73 (.247) in 79 plate appearances.
Kipnis seemed to flourish in his role as the team’s leadoff hitter, plus quite simply, he has a higher on-base percentage overall than Santana (.372 to .357). Why mess with that success?
An argument can be made that maybe the Indians can just use Santana at lead-off while Brantley is out and slide Kipnis down to the number three slot in the lineup. I’d rather see someone like Lindor or even Rajai Davis or perhaps Jose Ramirez bat lead-off before Santana if you want to move Kipnis down to the third spot while Brantley is out, even though I’d rather he stay put in the lead-off position. That, however, is an argument for another time.
Simply put, there’s a reason that speedier guys like Kipnis have traditionally led off baseball games and that’s because it is easier to get them across the plate.