Originally Posted by
missionhockey21
This offense was never built around Dunn and it's ludicious to even hypothesize that and it gives WAAAAAAYYYY too much credit to this team's management. Unless your idea of building is: "Hmm... Adam really can swing for the fences and get on at a pretty good clip, let's add anti-OBP Corey Patterson to leadoff to be the yang to Adam's ying."
"Oh, Dunn is struggling awful bad this April. Let's stick him lower in the lineup, you know, where his .390 OBP will never be utilized and pitchers will never give him anything decent to hit... that's a slump buster. Adam Dunn has an OPS of over 1.000+ from the two hole? Let's stick Griffey there instead, the BA of .10 higher makes up for his .65 deficit in OBP."
Moving past the "building" comment, it's clear that Dunn is meant to be a core part of this offense... even if the lineup construction or acquisition of players haven't been done to Dunn's benefit. Call me crazy, but leaving a guy like Dunn alone after a .940 OPS season with 40 bombs was a better idea than trying to make him hit for more contact and less strikeouts (thank you Mr. Baker.) But hey, Dunn has a 1 to 1 ratio of strikeouts to walks! Something Baker is doing must be working.