
INSTANT ANALYST
Despite being the leadoff hitter in 16 of the Giants' first 19 games this season, Willie McGee as of Sunday had not yet scored a run. No other major leaguer in the last 10 years has had that long a streak of starts as a leadoff hitter (in a single season) without scoring. Last year leadoff hitters scored an average of 98 runs per team in the major leagues.
It's not that McGee hasn't been getting on base: At week's end he was hitting .250, with a .299 on-base average, and had been on base 26 times in those 16 games. And it's not as if the Giants haven't been scoring runs: They had averaged 4.3 runs per game. But they had batted .070 (3 for 43) with McGee on base—including an 0-for-15 performance by Will Clark, who hit a league-high .338 with runners on base in '92.
Oh, yeah, in the three games that McGee was not the leadoff hitter, his replacement in the leadoff spot, Darren Lewis, scored once in one game and three times in another. Here is a breakdown of McGee's 26 appearances on the base paths in games when he was the leadoff hitter.
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