Thoughts on Lineup Construction

Building a lineup is a complex task. According to The Book, a team's best hitters should bat in the 1, 2 & 4 slots. Innumerable further considerations muddy the waters, but the need to get your best players more at bats indicate the wisdom of The Book's approach. Looking at the Blue Jays projected starters, we can take a rough average of their forecasted wRC+ (drawn from Fangraphs, and averaging Bill James, Marcel & Fan projections), and we find:

Encarnacion (DH): 111
Arencibia (C): 96
Lind (1B): 119
Hill (2B): 104
Bautista (3B): 133
Escobar (SS): 106
Snider (LF): 120
Davis (CF): 101
Rivera (RF): 99

Against right-handed pitchers, there is thus a fairly significant gap between the top three Jays hitters and the rest. Lind, Snider and Bautista are clearly the class of the lineup. Since we generally want to break up left-handed batters, against right-handers, probably the best lineup would look like this:

Snider
Bautista
Encarnacion
Lind
Escobar
Hill
Rivera
Arencibia
Davis

Davis has the speed to hit leadoff, and his OBP is reasonable, but his overall production just doesn't justify hitting him leadoff. While generally the bottom of the order should be filled with hitters in declining order of value, it generally helps to have a leadoff-type hitter in the 9-hole, as they can get on base for the top of the lineup - hence Davis hitting 9th. The 3rd and 5th spots in the order are of roughly equal value, and I've given the 3rd spot to Encarnacion because, despite being slower, he has ground into fewer double plays than Escobar, and will thus kill fewer rallies. Snider, while not a speedster, is a decent enough baserunner.

Against lefties, we have a far more difficult challenge: neither Snider nor Lind hits lefthanders well, although Lind is of greater concern. Regression to the mean suggests that neither will be as poor against lefties as their career numbers indicate; still, neither is among the top three Blue Jays batters against lefthanders. Clearly Encarnacion & Bautista are the best Jays hitters against southpaws; neither is well-suited to hit leadoff. The Jays lack a lefty-masher and Escobar has a reverse career split, so a good case can be made for Rajai Davis to hit leadoff against lefties. Hence:

Davis
Encarnacion
Hill
Bautista
Snider
Rivera
Arencibia
Lind
Escobar

As players establish themselves, rebound, or decline, the lineup may be adjusted over the season, but these lineups are probably near-optimal for the Jays to begin the season.