Sunday, December 29, 2013

Best Lineup - Texas Rangers


Next up on my look at most efficient lineups is the Texas Rangers.  I used my baseball simulator to run millions of games through various different possible lineup scenarios to see which lineup it spit out as the most likely to win a game vs a RH and LH pitcher.  Each lineup was simulated in 2.5 million games.

Please keep in mind that 2014 Steamer Projections were used as input, so if you don't like some of the results take it up with them.

Previous teams:
AL: Angels
NL: Mets

See the results after the break.



vs RHPvs LHP
1LF-Shin-Soo ChooLF-Shin-Soo Choo
2CF-Leonys MartinSS-Elvis Andrus
33B-Adrian Beltre3B-Adrian Beltre
41B-Prince Fielder1B-Prince Fielder
5RF-Alex RiosRF-Alex Rios
6DH-Mitch MorelandC-Geovany Soto
7C-Geovany Soto2B-Jurickson Profar
82B-Jurickson ProfarCF-Leonys Martin
9SS-Elvis AndrusDH-Michael Choice

Skinny:  The core of the Rangers lineup stays the same vs both RH and LH pitchers with the on base machine of Shin-Soo Choo the obvious choice to lead off.  The simulator likes the next three best hitters, Adrian Beltre, Prince Fielder and Alex Rios hitting 3rd, 4th and 5th respectively.  Mitch Moreland and Geovany Soto may provide slightly more pop than Rios but Rios is the better overall hitter and that makes a difference.  The lineup position that may be a little bit of a surprise is having Leonys Martin batting 2nd against RHP, dropping Elvis Andrus to 9th (2nd leadoff).  Against LHP, Andrus does regain the 2nd spot in the lineup dropping Martin to 8th.  I platooned the DH position between Mitch Moreland (playing against RHP) and Michael Choice (playing against LHP) and the simulator likes Moreland batting 6th but Choice batting 9th in a bit of an RBI role with both Profar and Martin hitting in front of him.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Washington will never bat Beltre 3rd. He will never bat Andrus 9th. Wash is as probable to sac bunt with 2 outs as not. Never forget, Michael Young and $10 million went to Philly to keep Wash from giving about the worst MLB player 670 PAs. That's how bad a manager Washington is.

Xeifrank said...

Yeah, this is just the most efficient lineup given the projection system. There are things that managers will never do, but I am not going to limit myself due to that. :)

Anonymous said...

Geesh, it's just a statistical projection. Very interesting nonetheless. Why don't you go manage your own MLB team to statistical perfection. Oh, that's right, you're not a candidate.