A friend sent me this article today on Soriano leading off. What are we, back to the days of Horace Clarke? Soriano’s strength as a hitter is his power. He has a poor OBA and has only drawn 1 walk this spring through Sunday the 24th. Despite his ability to steal bases, Soriano will be better at driving in runs than scoring them, so should bat farther down in the order. Ninth seems just right for him. With all the on-base potential on this Yankee team, he’ll have lots of RBI opportunities, and when he does get on base, his speed will give the top of the order rbi chances on short hits.
Down’s observations really bother me. From the article:

“Soriano had 94 more strikeouts than walks last season. As
he improves his knowledge of the strike zone, Down said, he will become a better hitter. Though he has only one walk this spring, Soriano has been more selective. He said batting leadoff would give him a chance to see more pitches.
“‘I don’t care about the walks,’ Down said. ‘How many bad pitches has he swung at? If he never walked this season, that would be fine, if he swung at his pitch every at-bat. He’s a good hitter, and you go to the plate not to walk or to take strikes, but to get a pitch to hit.'”

Down should care about the walks. Giambi may draw 100 more walks that Soriano this year. There’s no reason for that. I think this is a bad move, but the team is so good, it probably won’t make a difference. It reminds me of Toronto in 1992 and 1993. Devon White was a poor choice for leadoff on that team, but Cito Gaston wanted to make Devo happy, and the rest were so good it didn’t matter.