McCaffery: Phillies’ Rob Thomson’s insistence to lead off with Kyle Schwarber is nonsense

PHILADELPHIA — Trea Turner is a former batting champion with speed, great for a leadoff hitter for any team, better for the one Rob Thomson manages.

He is being paid $30 million a year through the next 10 years, or, in pro sports reality, through the next three managers. He had a horrifying midseason slump, but has recovered to the point where he is hitting .310 in August. It’s time to let him loose.

Leading off. That’s his destiny. The question: When?

“I’d like to see him hitting two, more than anything,” Thomson said before a road trip. “But I want to make sure it’s the right day and the right time to do it. I have to talk to Kevin and go into the lab and figure out what we have.”

So he needs Kevin Long, the hitting coach, to tell him what everyone sees and what the Phillies need to see if they want to stop what has become lineup madness. And he needs a second opinion on a lineup that typically includes Kyle Schwarber at the top. And if that’s the second opinion, why not a third? And what so technical is occurring in that lab, anyway, that can twist the realities of baseball?

Whether Thomson prefers to hit Turner first or second is a reasonable managerial choice. Pick one. But to continue to try to prove everyone else wrong by using a player who leads baseball in striking out and is on a pace to steal exactly zero bases as the regular leadoff hitter borders on intelligence-slander. Yet Thomson keeps leading off the one-tool Schwarber as he scrambles to manage $230,000,000 worth of personnel to something better than seventh place in a 15-team league.

In the recent 6-4 homestand that included seven games against the inept Kansas City Royals and Washington Nationals, Schwarber hit .219 and struck out 10 times. In Toronto, he went 0-for-7 with another five third-strikes. Yet everyone else, apparently, has it all wrong.

For about a year, Thomson’s stance has been firm. In outline form, he believes Schwarber’s presence at the top of the lineup at the start of the game provides the Phillies with first-strike capabilities and, with that, can leave an opposing pitcher unnerved. He also has said he wants all of his players to be comfortable, and Schwarber is more comfortable leading off than anywhere else in the order.

Well, it’s a good thing Schwarber is comfortable regularly leading off, because at least that way he is hitting .180. Any other way, he might be down to .179. Asked earlier in the season if there was a batting-average breaking point – .150, .130. .120? – that would necessitate a re-evaluation, Thomson did not budge.

“Seriously, going in I thought his average would go up,” the manager said in June. “And maybe it will over the rest of the year. But I thought it would go up this year for the lack of a shift, for sure.”

It went up from .170 to .180 since then, but not enough to make Mario Mendoza nervous. But give Thomson credit for his self-assuredness.

Schwarber did lead the National League in home runs last season, so there must be a spot for him in the lineup. Fortunately for the Phillies, there is. No disrespect intended, but it’s called the nine hole. There, he would be ideal in the literal role of a designated hitter, which is to allow someone to hit for the pitcher. Drop him in there, let him hit his buck-something and expect that he will strike out 200 times but that he also will unload a home run maybe twice a week. With his splendid eye, he can also challenge for the industry lead in drawing walks, particularly with Turner up next.

That would require, however, Bryce Harper to play first base every day, which he should without the unreasonable urge for the manager to rest even the most gifted of players. Enough with letting Harper DH just to give his muscles a rest. That’s why there is Bengay. With maybe the occasional day of batting-order creativity, Thomson needs to be more worried about winning than Harper’s back, Zack Wheeler’s pitch count, or whether or not Craig Kimbrel has had to work too many days in a row. The man even admitted that he was about to replace his No. 6 pitcher one out from a no-hitter because of some cockamamie nonsense that must have come out of that lab.

The Phillies have made deep investments in starting pitchers and relievers. Thomson needs to give them the best chance to thrive, and that means making sure Schwarber keeps a social distance from a baseball glove. Every inning he is in the outfield and Johan Rojas is not, it’s a disservice to the pitchers.

But Thomson won’t change. He is sold on the faulty logic that the Phillies tend to win more when Schwarber leads off, as if that is the only reason. He’ll even play him in the outfield just to give Harper a break from defense. So brace for more lineup madness and prepare to chant, “We’re No. 4!”

Contact Jack McCaffery at jmccaffery@delcotimes.com