Kansas City Royals slide Bobby Witt Jr. down in lineup, slot Nicky Lopez in leadoff spot
Just because they’re in position to sweep their series doesn’t mean the Kansas City Royals are done tinkering with their batting order.
After Royals manager Mike Matheny moved Nicky Lopez up from the No. 9 spot in the order to the No. 2 spot earlier this week in an effort to “jump-start” the offense, the shuffling continued headed into Thursday’s series finale with the Minnesota Twins.
Lopez will bat leadoff for the first time this season with two-time All-Star Whit Merrifield bumping down from the leadoff spot to the No. 2 hole. Top prospect and rookie Bobby Witt Jr. will bat in the bottom third — No. 7 — for the first time this season.
Witt, who is hitting .128 through 10 games, batted third in the previous lineup reconfiguration. Andrew Benintendi now moves up into that spot in front of Salvador Perez, who is catching for the first time since having a procedure to alleviate the blurred vision he’d been experiencing.
“More than anything, we’re trying to fit where each guy is right now,” Matheny said of the lineup shuffling. “Nicky makes a lot of sense at the top of the order. We’re keeping Benny as close to the top of the order as you can, he’s also getting on base. You have three guys between Nicky, Whit and Benny to get on and allow Salvy to do some damage.
“Part of it is giving Bobby a different look. So it’s all those things combined, and then trying not to back up your left-handed hitters — moving Whit back a little bit. The guys are good. They get it. We’ve got to do what you’ve got to do to try to find out how to let this offense do what it can do.”
Lopez entered the day batting .367 with a .406 on-base percentage through the first 10 games, behind only Benintendi’s .371 batting average and .436 among the regular members of the Royals starting lineup.
Merrifield, a two-time major-league hits leader, entered the day batting .150. The last time he didn’t bat leadoff was the final game of the 2020 season when Alex Gordon batted first in his final career game.
When Merrifield was asked about the conversation with Matheny about moving down in the lineup, Merrifield replied, “He said, ‘You want to hit 2?’ I said, ‘Do you want me to hit 2?’ He said, ‘Yeah.’ I said, ‘OK.’ That was pretty much it.”
Merrifield said batting one slot later will allow him to not have to rush during the switch from the top of the first inning to the bottom of the first. He’ll get a chance to “settle in” a bit before going to the plate. He also said recently had a conversation with starting pitcher Brad Keller about how lineup positioning affects his approach to hitters.
“If a guy is hitting nine or four or six or whatever, does that change the way you pitch to him,” Merrifield recalled asking Keller. “‘No. If a guy can’t hit a slider, I’m going to throw him sliders.’ It’s not like it used to be where if you’re hitting nine, you’re getting more fastballs. It’s not like that anymore. You’re going to get pitched a certain way no matter where you’re at.”
Isbel sent to minors
The Royals announced prior to Thursday’s game that outfielder Kyle Isbel had been optioned to Triple-A Omaha following Wednesday’s game. Right-handed pitcher Ronald Bolaños had been recalled to the major-league roster and will be in the bullpen.
Isbel appeared in just two games with one at-bat so far this season. The Royals schedule has been even more spread out in the first two weeks of the season than originally planned. They’ve had two day games after night games rained out.
“We haven’t engaged our bench like we would normally like to, like we need to,” Matheny said.
He also said that bench players like Edward Olivares, Ryan O’Hearn and Isbel were penciled into the starting lineup for those games that were postponed.
This story was originally published April 21, 2022 at 1:24 PM.
