The Fred Lewis Dilemma
It’s the bottom of the 9th inning. The Giants are down, and in need of a hit. Lefty Brian Fuentes of the Rockies is on the mound. Fred Lewis, the Giants’ best hitter this season is due up, and throngs of fans rejoice throughout San Francisco. To much fanfare, Lewis strides up to home plate, ready to win the game, when suddenly, much to the chagrin of every living being, he’s called back by the manager, Bruce Bochy. With the game on the line, the best hitter on the Giants is called back, and Dan “Righty” Ortmeier is sent up to pinch hit.
Bochy avoided a near disaster with this pinch-hit move. By not allowing the lefty Lewis to hit off of the lefty Brian Fuentes, the universe was kept in order: according to the laws that govern our universe, a left-handed hitter is incapable of getting a hit off of a left-handed pitcher. Now I hear rumor that it’s happened a couple times, but I’m skeptical. There’s no way that Fred Lewis, a career .297/.381/.378 against lefties, could possibly have gotten a hit off of the lefty closer. Thank God that crisis was averted, as Dan “Righty” Ortmeier struck out to end the game.
With the Giants facing five straight left-handed starters in the next week, Bruce Bochy has a decision to make about Lewis, who’s had a grand total of 9 PA’s against lefties this season (with 2 hits and 3 BB’s). With Zach Duke on the mound tonight, Bochy has failed the first test, benching Lewis in favor of Dan Ortmeier in left-field. Going by this theory, Freddie Lewis, our best hitter insofar this season, could potentially not start for a whole freakin’ week. Regardless of who’s pitching, it’s simply bad baseball to bench a .320/.402/.524 hitter out of fear of a lefty-lefty matchup.
Benching Lewis in favor of Ort makes absolutely no sense. Ortmeier on the season is hitting .222/.300/.333 against lefties in 18 AB’s. Benching a superior left-handed hitting player in favor of an inferior right-handed hitter is nothing less than shooting yourself in the foot. Now if the fear is of Lewis not hitting lefties well, he’s certainly not going to improve on this weakness by not facing lefties. At the same time, such a fear wouldn’t be of merit, as Lewis actually can hit lefties.
All Bruce Bochy has to do to find this out is to spend a few seconds on Baseball Reference. Watch, I’ll do it right now. In 3.23 seconds, I’ve found out that Frederick DeShaun Lewis is a career .297/.381/.378 against left-handed pitching. That’s really all it takes. I’d do it again, but I can’t spare another 3-4 seconds out of my busy schedule to look up information that a 3 year old could locate.
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6 Responses to “The Fred Lewis Dilemma”
May 8th, 2008 at 8:43 am
THANK YOU.
I have Lewis in fantasy and was trying to figure out why he was sitting down game after game. I suspected it was just idiotic management, nice to see that confirmed.
If I were team ownership I’d put a halt to this. Lewis is the kind of player you could rally a city around. The kind of player the Giants kind of need right now.
May 8th, 2008 at 10:09 pm
I agree that Lewis should be given every opportunity to play full-time right now, and get every at-bat when he’s due up.
But it’s important to note that he’s not going to maintain this torrid pace. Lewis’ BABIP right now is .390, while his eBABIP is .295 (.175 LD% + .120). I think he’ll settle in at a relatively respectable .270-.280, but a rough regression may be coming. That said, Bochy should be squeezing as much as possible out of Lewis while he’s hot.
On a broader note, I think Bochy’s a great guy and a decent off-field manager, but he’s made questionable decision after questionable decision since coming to SF. Pinch-hitting for Lewis, giving high-leverage innings to Keiichi Yabu, essentially wasting bench players for no reason…the list goes on. I’m not calling for Bochy to be axed, but there’s certainly reason to wonder again if the Giants should’ve given Ron Wotus the job after Alou left.
May 10th, 2008 at 7:01 am
well, seeing as how bochy doesn’t have real too much to work with this year you know what i’m sayin, you’d think he’d at least have the sense not to bench his best hitter
ah well
it’s too bad our lil lefty is on the DL
May 15th, 2008 at 9:28 am
Bochy had been ejected from the game you are referring to several innings before for arguing that atrocious balk call against Lincecum, so unless he phoned a request in from the dugout it probably wasn’t him that made the move.
I do agree though, I was sitting a few rows behind home plate and was livid to see Lewis taken out
May 18th, 2008 at 8:38 pm
Bochy makes me wonder. So Far I’m not impressed. He’s slow to the draw, He’s not daring enough and he salivates over older players. Not a good combo on a team thats “rebuilding”. Sabean do something! Oh i forgot Sabes is preparing himself for the playoffs…UGH!
May 18th, 2008 at 8:52 pm
BTW, I’m allowed to gripe. I enjoyed many nights at The ‘Stick. (1st game in 1981:Vida Blue v. Steve Carlton) Lemaster, Milt May, Kuiper,Atlee Hammaker… They were simply terrible for a while and along came Al Rosen, Roger “Grandpa” Craig and the Humm Babies. i.e. Clark 21 y.o. 1b/ Robby Thompson 2b / Jose Uribe ss/ Chris Brown 3b/ Manwaring C/ Mitchell LF/
Need i go on. No Durham, Vizquels, Aurilias, Roberts etc. They went with the young guys. Let them learn on the job in ‘86 and by ‘87 we won the West! and 2 years later we were in the World Series. It can happen again. Let LEWIS PLAY AGAINST LEFTIES! Burris should start, Ortmeier and Bowker should platoon at 1st, Winner take all.Velez should be in right, for now. Humm Baby…
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