Teixeira: To Bunt Or Not To Bunt

Less Of THIS and more... bunting?

As we all heard on various Yankees blogs and ESPN/MLB Network Mark Teixeira was asked what he could do to improve on his 2011 season, specifically left handed and his answer was simple.... "bunt". As we all know teams have been pulling the shift while Mark bats left handed and have been using it to a great success. What is funny was when I tried to find a picture to post with this post I searched google images and typed in "Mark Teixeira bunting" and I got "did you mean Mark Teixeira batting"? What is most funny about it is that Mark Teixeira has never bunted for a base hit in his career. I have a better idea for Mark Texeira if he wants to beat the left handed shift, because I think that bunting is a terrible idea, and that is to simply STOP BATTING LEFT HANDED.

If you look at the average number of plate appearances with runners on per spot in the order the least number of PA's with runners on is naturally the lead off spot, increasing to the clean up spot where it plateau's. The 5th spot gets less opportunities with runners on then say the 3rd spot in the order, where he batted much of the season last year. It is simple, bat Mark Texeira 5th and have him stop batting left handed. As you can see here, per Baseball Reference, his left handed splits are FAR worse then his right handed splits. We do not need a 20 million dollar player in the heart of the order bunting... money ball loving on base percentage or not. 

Mark Teixeira... DO NOT BUNT.