As Opening Day is today, we thought now would be the perfect time to play manager/GM and build what we think should be the Opening Day lineup card. We all took wildly different approaches and all are improbable considering a certain prospect didn’t break camp with the team.
Four of us put together our lineups and wrote a paragraph explaining them. Let us know how we did.
Haden: Let’s get weird. I understand CJ Abram’s improvements tied into his promotion to the leadoff spot, but I am counting on him to keep that same approach at the bottom of the order. That opens up the leadoff spot for Joey Gallo, who has a higher career and 2023 on-base percentage and saw nearly a pitch more per plate appearance last season. While this arrangement might not be the best defensively, the offense will more than make up for it. If you want to shield Wood against lefties for the first bit of his major league career, Victor Robles (R) will be a more than capable fourth outfielder. One of Ildemaro Vargas (S) or Nasim Nuñez (S) can come in at second base when a southpaw is on the mound. Plus Davey gets to stash a speedy guy at the bottom of the lineup again. The more likely arrangement is moving Abrams to the leadoff spot and flipping Gallo and Thomas, but a man can dream, right?
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to The Nats Report to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.