NEW YORK -- For the No. 2 hitter in a batting order, time spent limbering up in the on-deck circle is valuable for the opportunity to gauge the velocity on a starter's fastball and the bite on his curve. The more pitches a leadoff man sees, in theory, the more insights the batter behind him can glean right out of the chute.
While Ben Zobrist can fully embrace that concept after 10 major league seasons, he hasn't had much opportunity to put it into practice during his stay in Kansas City. In his role as the Royals' No. 2 hitter, Zobrist spends about as much time in the on-deck circle as a motorist rolling through the EZ Pass Lane at a toll booth.
This is the adjustment Zobrist makes hitting behind Royals shortstop Alcides Escobar, the quintessential hacker. Through 13 postseason games, Escobar has swung at the first pitch a whopping 50 percent of the time (31 times in 62 plate appearances), the most of any player in the World Series. Are there times when Zobrist would prefer a less abrupt transition from the on-deck circle to the batter's box? Not really. He can live with the tradeoff when Escobar keeps creating enough havoc to warrant the Twitter hashtag #Eskymagic.
"Sure, it would be nice,'' Zobrist said. "But I don't need that, especially if he's on base already. It's nice to come up with a man on first, even if a guy has only thrown one or two pitches. I don't mind that at all.''
Kansas City has taken a 2-0 World Series lead over the New York Mets thanks in part to a lineup filled with hitters who can turn around a fastball and keep the strikeouts to a minimum. It all starts at the top. Escobar, 28, dives in head-first without so much as dunking a toe in the water. Zobrist, 34, packs the sandwiches, picks out a comfortable spot on the beach, crams an umbrella into the sand, slathers on sunscreen and takes his sweet time before wading into the surf one body part at a time.
But they've formed a synergy atop Kansas City's lineup and been in the middle of a large chunk of the action in October. Escobar leads all players with 20 postseason hits, while Zobrist is third with 17. Escobar and Zobrist also rank second and third in runs scored behind Mets second baseman Daniel Murphy with 12 and 11, respectively.
In the World Series opener, Escobar jumped on a first-pitch, 94-mph fastball from Matt Harvey and drove it to deep center field, where Mets outfielder Yoenis Cespedes misplayed it into an inside-the-park home run. Zobrist chimed in with a single and two doubles in Kansas City's 5-4, 14-inning victory.
Escobar came back with a 2-for-5 game and a pair of RBIs in Kansas City's 7-1 win in Game 2. Although Zobrist went hitless in five at-bats, his grounder to the right side advanced runners to second and third moments before Eric Hosmer's two-run single broke a 1-1 tie in the fifth inning.
If the Royals' top-of-the-order lineup construction flies in the face of common practice, they eventually concluded they had little choice by virtue of their sustained success with Escobar at the top. Kansas City posted an 82-49 record with Escobar in the leadoff spot during the regular season, compared to 8-10 with Alex Gordon at the top and 5-5 with Zobrist at No. 1.
"We tried tinkering with it,'' Kansas City hitting coach Dale Sveum said. "Gordon and Zobrist are two big on-base guys, and we put them up there and we just didn't win baseball games. We win games when Escobar leads off, and he's aggressive and nobody is telling him to take pitches or see pitches.
"It's just one of those things. You can look around most of baseball, and there aren't many prototypical leadoff guys, not the way [the] game is anymore. He's taken the unconventional to another level.''
The statistical profiles suggest that Zobrist is a fit for first in the order and Escobar might be best-suited to hitting eighth or ninth. Zobrist ranked 30th in the majors with 4.03 pitches per plate appearance this year and has a .355 career on-base percentage. Escobar, in contrast, has a .298 career on-base percentage and ranked 129th in pitches per plate appearance with 3.49.
But Escobar's approach clearly has an impact on the Kansas City hitters who follow. There's no quantifying the injection of life he brings to the Royals' lineup with his constant aggressiveness.
"People might not like it when he makes an out on that first pitch,'' Zobrist said. "But the bottom line is, he's going to put pressure on that pitcher from the first pitch on. That's a good way to start the game and define how our club approaches each pitcher. We're not waiting around. We're going to attack, and he's the start of all that. He's the leader of the charge.''
Escobar, who came to Kansas City from Milwaukee with Lorenzo Cain in the big Zack Greinke trade in December 2010, has earned a reputation as a slick fielder who's good for 20-30 stolen bases a year. He is also a handful to keep out of the lineup, as evidenced by his games played totals since his arrival in Kansas City: 158, 155, 158, 162 and 148.
"He's such a talented player,'' Royals manager Ned Yost said. "But with the grind of a 162-game season, there are little periods where his focus will tend to waver a little bit. But during the playoffs, he just locks in. And when he's focused, he's as good as any player in the league at his position.''
Escobar relies on a simple formula.
"If you throw a first strike, I'll continue to swing the bat,'' he cautioned Kansas City's opponents shortly before collecting the American League Championship Series MVP award last week.
Call the dynamic unconventional, or even inexplicable. The Alcides Escobar show has been fun to watch this postseason -- from the stands or the on-deck circle.