Chicago Cubs: The pluses and minuses of Kris Bryant batting leadoff

Chicago Cubs manager David Ross says third baseman Kris Bryant will be hitting leadoff in 2020. Let’s analyze whether or not this is a good move?

The news out of Chicago Cubs camp that manager David Ross intended to bat Kris Bryant first – and that Bryant was cool with that – prompted the kind of debate that only the end of a long, cold winter can fuel.

Was Ross a mad genius? Had he lost his mind? Would moving Bryant to the number one spot fuel a resurgence on Chicago’s North Side, or merely amount to one more futile gesture on the part of a fading team?

Here’s the real question: In these days of launch angle, does anybody actually care who bats leadoff?

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That didn’t use to be a valid question. There was a time not so long ago when major league teams valued the leadoff spot in the batting order; in fact, they viewed it alongside the three and four slots as cornerstones of an effective lineup.

The fundamental question is what you want a top-of-the-order hitter to do? In the modern game, the practical answer isn’t all that different from what managers demand of any other batting order spot: Produce runs.

Historically, though, the demands on the No. 1 slot were more targeted and more varied. Until about 2010, you wanted a leadoff hitter to possess the ability to get himself into scoring position unaided. That skill had three specific and measurable components:

1. On-base average
2. Extra base average
3. Stolen bases

Find the guy who could do those three things in the greatest percentage of his plate appearances and you’ve got your leadoff hitter.

Assessing the facility of Bryant, or any other player, batting first involves measuring him on those three skills. But first, we need some standards of performance, and that requires a trip back to the days when managers actually emphasized leadoff skills.

Chicago Cubs: The pluses and minuses of Kris Bryant batting leadoff

Rickey Henderson sets the standard

The golden era of the leadoff hitter wasn’t all that long ago. In the 1980s, most teams sweated the development of one or more players who excelled at precisely the three leadoff-related skills outlined earlier in this piece.

And nobody did it better, of course, than Hall of Famer Rickey Henderson. That means setting a standard for leadoff performance begins with calculating Henderson’s leadoff score, and using that as an ideal.

From his first  full season in 1980 through 1993, here’s Henderson’s season-by-season “success percentage” for reaching second base unaided:

1980:     .607

1981:     .584

1982:     .654

1983:     .654

1984      .588

1985:     .628

1986:     .573

1987:     .600

1988:     .596

1989:     .586

1990:     .656

1991:     .563

1992:     .594

1993:     .593

Henderson obviously is the gold standard for leadoff hitters. It’s not realistic to ask even a good leadoff hitter to hit .600 on this combined scale. But it’s worth noting that as good as Henderson was, he wasn’t alone. In 1983, Montreal’s Tim Raines‘ on the same scale was .589. The closest modern leadoff comparison to Henderson, Derek Jeter, scored .558 in 1999 and still registered as high as .512 toward the end of his career in 2009.

What we want from a leadoff hitter, then, is a player who – combining on-base average, extra-base average and stolen bases, can score as high up into the .500s as possible.

As noted, modern managers tend to de-emphasize the components of this formula. The World Series contestants, the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, most often used Trea Turner and George Springer in the leadoff spots. Turner’s score on this scale was .522, Springer’s was .506.

Chicago Cubs: The pluses and minuses of Kris Bryant batting leadoff

To Ross, then, the choice of a leadoff hitter boils down to Bryant vs. Rizzo vs. Don’t Worry About It. But selecting either Bryant or Rizzo for leadoff duty robs the Chicago Cubs of their ability in a run-production slot, either third or fourth.

Weighing the costs and benefits of that tradeoff is a true challenge.

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There is a downside to this move for Bryant as well. Batting him leadoff may cut into his run-producing opportunities, especially given the questionable state of the bottom of the Cubs’ likely batting order.

The team’s 7-8-9 hitters, those most likely to be batting ahead of Bryant, are some combination of Ian Happ, Jason Heyward, David Bote, and the pitcher. Their collective .346 on-base average was above the MLB average, but well below the .372 on-base average that would be in front of him if he was batting behind Rizzo and Schwarber.

That diminished run-production potential is not only consequential for the Cubs’ offense, it’s also consequential for the salary demands of a player who will be a free agent in two seasons.

Ross could also consider the Don’t Worry About It option, whose name likely is Ian Happ. In that case, though Ross would be placing a large bet on Happ, who couldn’t win the center field job from Albert Almora last spring, and whose on-base average when he returned to the majors only got to .333.

The bottom line, then, is that Ross has few stellar options in selecting his leadoff hitter,  that Bryant is one of the best of those lackluster options, but that moving him to the leadoff slot does threaten to impact his run-production potential.

On the plus side, the game has de-emphasized the choice of a leadoff hitter to such an extent that we are probably obsessing too much about the question to start with.