Got your back

All sluggers benefit from having protection in their lineup

For a manager, the trick to making out a lineup isn't finding a place for your best hitter, it's finding a decent bat to protect your best hitter so opponents don't walk him three times every night. Manny Ramirez has Shea Hillenbrand behind him in the Red Sox lineup. Bernie Williams keeps teams from completely pitching around Yankees slugger Jason Giambi. (Barry Bonds has Jeff Kent behind him, but it doesn't matter. It would take another Bonds to keep teams from walking Barry as often as they do.) As good as those sluggers are, some of their success is due to the fact that they're not completely naked in the lineup.

Then there are guys like Brian Giles, who must feel as exposed in the Pirates' lineup as a sleepwalker locked out of his house on a cold winter night. Giles, who usually bats third, leads Pittsburgh with 61 RBIs through Thursday. No one else on the team has more than 33. For most of the season, manager Lloyd McClendon has used Aramis Ramirez in the cleanup spot behind Giles. Ramirez had a breakout year in 2001 with 34 home runs, but this season he's batting .218 with just seven homers and 32 RBIs. Any wonder that Giles has been walked 68 times, fourth-most in the National League? Says one advance scout, "With that lineup, there's absolutely no reason you should ever let Giles beat you."

Jim Thome is in a similar situation in Cleveland. The first baseman has 15 more RBIs than the next most-productive Indian, Omar Vizquel (66 to 51). Thome's protection in the lineup? Usually it's third baseman Travis Fryman, who's hitting .226 and has driven in just 39 runs. Thome has 28 home runs, second-most in the AL. He's also walked 68 times, more than anyone in the league except Toronto's Carlos Delgado.

The all-naked team

The MVP Award is misnamed: It's usually given to whomever has the best year for a team that was in the playoff hunt late in the season, not necessarily the guy who was most valuable to his club. Those players -- the ones who carry more than their share of the offensive load -- can often be found on teams at the bottom of the standings. For example, Lance Berkman and Thome won't get many MVP votes unless the Astros and Indians suddenly become contenders, but they deserve recognition for keeping their lineups afloat with little help. Here are the 10 players who have accounted for the largest percentage of their team's runs this year.

All-Naked Team
Player, Team	Runs batted in	Team's total runs	Percentage
1) Lance Berkman, Astros	83	439	18.9
2) Jim Thome, Indians	66	379	17.4
3) Brian Giles, Pirates	61	352	17.3
4) Alex Rodriguez, Rangers	80	464	17.2
5) Shawn Green, Dodgers	69	407	17.0
6) Albert Pujols, Cardinals	69	418	16.5
7) Pat Burrell, Phillies	69	425	16.2
8) Richie Sexson, Brewers	62	385	16.1
9) Vladimir Guerrero, Expos	69	436	15.8
10t) Sammy Sosa, Cubs	61	386	15.8
10t) Fred McGriff, Cubs	61	386	15.8

Gardenhire wants players to police themselves

Twins manager Ron Gardenhire has an idea on how vengeance should be handled after someone is hit by a pitch. "They should stop the game, have the pitcher get a bat and go to the plate and have the hitter go out to the mound and throw at him," he says. "That's why the National League is so much better [than the AL]. Those guys have to go to the plate."

Not a bad thought. In fact, it was the general idea behind Torii Hunter firing the ball back at Indians starter Danys Baez on Wednesday after getting drilled in the ribs. After Hunter's outburst, both benches were warned by plate umpire Ted Barrett. Gardenhire may be able to joke about it now, but during the game he was angry because two of his players had been hit to that point while none of the Indians' had. As far as Gardenhire was concerned, Minnesota had done nothing to deserve a warning that severely curtailed his staff's ability to pitch aggressively inside. Like many managers, Gardenhire is frustrated with the way beanball warnings are handed out by umpires. "I know what they're doing," he said, "but it does some funny things to the game."

The Twins have been warned at least a half-dozen times this season. On one occasion Gardenhire was automatically ejected because one of his pitchers had plunked a batter after a warning. It all makes Gardenhire long for the days when players policed themselves. For example, it was once expected that pitchers would exact revenge when a teammate was hit. That strategy might not fly with modern players, but the current system of umpire warnings isn't working either. It's difficult for pitchers to protect their teammates when warnings have been issued. On the flip side, hitters get frustrated when they feel pitchers are throwing at them with little fear of payback. Before Wednesday, Hunter had been hit in the ribs two other times in the previous two weeks. He shouldn't have fired the ball back at Baez, and he should -- and almost certainly will be -- suspended. But incidents like that are more likely to occur when, as Gardenhire says, players aren't allowed to police themselves.

Sports Illustrated staff writer Stephen Cannella covers the baseball beat for the magazine. Touching Base appears every week on CNNSI.com

 

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