How Weeks is killing the Brewers

I don't need to hide it or pretend like I still have hope for him. The sooner the Brewers figure out that Rickie "Dick" Weeks isn't an everyday player, the better equipped they will be to make a serious run at the NL Central. The only ray of hope I have for him is that someday Ned will realize that his current lineup makes zero sense given the way Weeks plays and he'll switch it up. Weeks batting leadoff when Jason Kendall is in essence the "second leadoff" hitter in front of Weeks is absurd. You don't want a free swinger batting .190 to have more RBI opportunites than Braun, Fielder and Hart which is exactly the way this lineup is constructed.

I've heard too much talk about how Weeks' OBP makes him a worthy leadoff and everyday player. I'll admit that a .330 OBP for a guy toiling away around the Medoza line is an impressive spike upward from his average, but it's far from a reason to keep suggesting he's about to "come around." When compared to the rest of the league's leadoff men, here's how Dick Weeks doesn't stack up. (Stats are representative of season to date through games played on Wednesday, April, 30). As you can see, Dick Weeks boasts the 9th worst OBP in the entire league! And it's even worse than just that considering that both Ichiro and Jose Reyes currently have worse OBP's. If anyone reading this actually thinks those two players will finish out the season with a worse OBP than Weeks, then you're probably the same folks that thought J.J. Hardy was going to continue hitting HRs at the pace he set in April 2007 over the entire year. It's worse still when you factor in Crisp of Boston is below him, but Ellsbury often leads off for the Red Sox and his OBP (.396) is well above Weeks as well. Get Weeks out of the leadoff spot and consider sitting him down for an extended period of time. He's done nothing to garner being the everyday 2B at the MLB level. Let him think about it and make him prove he belongs in the lineup. If Weeks wasn't a first round pick, he certainly wouldn't be inked into the starting lineup everyday. He's getting by solely on where he was drafted at this point and all of the vast potential I've heard so much about. He's not the on base machine all the Weeks fans think he is.

Player - Team - Average - OBP
Curtis Granderson - Det - .375 - .531
Rafael Furcal - LAD - .381 - .462
Nate McLouth - Pit - .342 - .425
Fred Lewis - SF - .337 - .419
Chone Figgins - LAA - .313 - .417
David DeJesus - KC - .333 - .404
Grady Sizemore - Clev - .287 - .402
Hanley Ramirez - Fla - .324 - .400
Skip Schumaker - Stl - .317 - .400
Ryan Theriot - ChiC - .323 - .396
Alex Rios - Tor - .306 - .386
Johnny Damon - NYY - .276 - .385
Nick Swisher - ChiS - .226 - .381
Brian Roberts - Bal - .280 - .371
Jayson Werth - Phil - .278 - .370
Kurt Suzuki - Oak - .289 - .367
Brian Giles - SD - .267 - .361
Ian Kinsler - Tex - .300 - .358
Willy Taveras - Col - .272 - .350
Felipe Lopez - Wash - .263 - .337
Chris Young - Ariz - .227 - .336
Rickie Weeks - Mil - .202 - .336
Kelly Johnson - Atl - .241 - .323
Coco Crisp - Bos - .293 - .311
Ichiro Suzuki - Sea - .252 - .310
Kazuo Matsui - Hou - .260 - .309
Jose Reyes - NYM - .250 - .307
Akinori Iwamura - TB - .210 - .300
Corey Patterson - Cin - .214 - .280
Carlos Gomez - Min - .265 - .279