Why does Cooper move Pence all over the batting order instead of giving him a consistent spot in the order? I have seen him bat leadoff, 2nd, 5th, 6th and maybe 7th. It just does not make sense to me.
First of all, Pence was only batting 2nd at the start of the season because Kazuo Matsui was out.
With Michael Bourn in the lineup, Coop didn't want Pence batting 1st. While he's had Pence bat 1st maybe once or twice... it was just a one-off thing during lineups that were not very usual.... with bench players getting a start, basically.
The main constant is that he's leaving Pence at RF, a more natural position (even back with Corpus, in AA, Pence was playing RF mostly, not CF), because Coop doesn't want to distract Hunter with defensive moves.
So to our manager, all these hitting changes are not as distracting as moving Hunter around in the outfield defensively would be.
He should be batting 6th consistently IMO, but if Coop wants to sling him back and forth between 6th and 7th depending on whether Loretta, Blum, Wigginton, or Erstad, say... are hot... that's fine, I guess.
to the op, i agree it does not make sense, but remember also that coop is learning as well. he seems like a smart fellow and should figure it out pretty quickly.
pence is not solidly established in the batting order. spots 3/4/5 are set, so pence has been bouncing around the other spots due to injuries and what not. when pence starts to respond, and his hitting has really been coming around lately, he will become a lock in the batting order. he was pencilled in at 6 long before the season started, so i figure he will stay there barring injuries to tejada, berkman or lee. (perish the thought!)
to snakefield and everyone else: bourn and towles have the lowest ba's on the team, right near or below the mendoza line (a.k.a. .200). how about putting them 7 & 8 in the order and putting matsui at 1 and pence at 2? yeah, i know, he strikes out a lot. but still his obp is higher than bourn's and he strikes out less than bourn...just thinkin' out loud...
bassman3: "to snakefield and everyone else: bourn and towles have the lowest ba's on the team, right near or below the mendoza line (a.k.a. .200). how about putting them 7 & 8 in the order and putting matsui at 1 and pence at 2? yeah, i know, he strikes out a lot. but still his obp is higher than bourn's and he strikes out less than bourn...just thinkin' out loud..."
That leaves Wigginton/Blum/Loretta batting 6th, though.... with the exception of Blum batting 6th a few times this year, Cooper hasn't shown a willingness to have those guys bat 6th, so... a minor tweak to your Matsui-Pence-BLT-Wigginton-Bourn-To wles lineup, methinks, may be in order.
BLT, BTW, I have to give credit to a pair of ladies at the Saturday night Astros game, who had a "Killer B(erkman) L(ee) T(ejada)" sign that the FSN guys definitely noticed and appreciated. While adding the Killer to link it to our past traditions is... nice and all, I think just plain "BLT" is a great name for our 3-4-5 sluggers, personally, so I shall be using it from now on to refer to them. Heh...
Oh, and the Killer B's are now Backe, Bourn, and Berkman alone. That part kinda gets to me... so BLT shall be the new Killer B's. :::nods:::
