Who were the best leadoff men in 2022?

I did a post like this several years ago. My measure then was how many times did a batter put himself in scoring position by 2B, 3B and SB divided by how many outs they made. 

The idea is that it is not just enough to get on base, you need to get into scoring position. But by dividing by outs, it still rewards the guys with a high OBP.

This time I decided to go with extra bases (XB) divided by outs.  To get XBs it is SB + 2B +2*3B. Outs is (AB - H) + CS + GDP. I only need to do GDP once since an out is already part of AB - H. I don't include HRs because it seems like a team would want to bat a big HR hitter lower in the order. All data comes from Babseball Reference.

The table below has the top 10 from last year for guys who had 400+ PAs. The guys in read had 300+ PAs as a leadoff man. Some of the other guys might have batted leadoff, too, but had less than 300 PAs there.

Player	XB	Outs	XB/Outs
Jon Berti	64	283	0.226
Jorge Mateo	74	402	0.184
Michael Harris II	53	300	0.177
Randy Arozarena	79	461	0.171
José Ramírez	74	445	0.166
Tommy Edman	71	437	0.162
Cedric Mullins	74	465	0.159
Bobby Witt	73	460	0.159
Trea Turner	74	470	0.157
J.T. Realmuto	57	373	0.153

 

Berti had 

 

17 2Bs 

3 3Bs 

41 SBs

358 ABs

86 Hits

5 CS

6 GDP

Berti had 258 of his 404 PAs at leadoff last year.

The next table shows the XB/Outs ratio for all the guys with 300+ PAs from the leadoff slot last year. Keep in mind that in this next table their stats are only from when they were in the leadoff slot. This does not include all their PAs last year.

 

Player	XB	Outs	XB/Outs
Cedric Mullins	74	448	0.165
Jose Altuve	57	378	0.151
Steven Kwan	44	294	0.150
Tommy Edman	42	281	0.149
Ronald Acuna Jr.	52	361	0.144
Whit Merrifield	35	243	0.144
Mookie Betts	58	426	0.136
Yandy Diaz	30	224	0.134
Marcus Semien	49	377	0.130
George Springer	44	379	0.116
Christian Yelich	30	260	0.115
Connor Joe	29	256	0.113
Brandon Nimmo	47	429	0.110
Tim Anderson	26	242	0.107
Jurickson Profar	28	275	0.102
César Hernández	25	263	0.095
Luis Arraez	26	274	0.095
Tony Kemp	28	299	0.094
Riley Greene	23	247	0.093
Kyle Schwarber	32	380	0.084
Jonathan India	15	215	0.070
DJ LeMahieu	19	280	0.068

 

I also wanted to incorporate base running.

 

BB Ref has 

 

"Bases taken (BT): Advances on fly balls, passed balls, wild pitches, balks, and defensive indifference."

 

They also have the number of times a runner went one more base than the hit. That includes going to third on a single if you started on 1st base, going home on a single if you started at 2nd base and going home on a double if you started on 1st base. So I added all of those to BT. Then that total got added to the XB from the first table. So there is a second total of extra bases taken which combines what you do as a batter and as a runner

BB Ref also has:

"Outs on Base (OOB): When a runner is put out while making a base running play. Example plays: out advancing on a fly ball, out attempting to reach another base on a hit, doubled off on a line drive, or out attempting to advance on a wild pitch or passed ball. Does not include pickoffs, caught stealing, or force plays."

That got added to the outs from the first table. So there is a second total number of outs made. 

The next table shows the top 10 in XB/Outs for all the guys with 400+ PAs (not just the leadoff men from the second table) using the second totals for XB and Outs. Again, the guys in red had 300+ PAs in the leadoff slot last year.

Name	XB/Outs
Jon Berti	0.308
Ronald Acuna Jr.	0.291
Josh Rojas*	0.290
Tommy Edman#	0.287
Michael Harris II*	0.282
Adley Rutschman#	0.280
Steven Kwan*	0.279
Freddie Freeman*	0.272
Bobby Witt	0.272
Jorge Mateo	0.268