I confess I do not understand this opener stuff, but why not try to get 2-3 innings out of James?
The idea is to "open" with your "6th inning guy" to get the other teams best hitters out in the first. Then you go to the "bulk guy" who now gets to "ease" his way into the game and in theory would be in rhythm by the time the top of the order comes back around.
You use a guy like Framber because you expect to get about 5 innings from him, you're just using him for a different 5 innings.
The only reason why you don't have James go 2-3 innings is so that you can still use him tomorrow and don't burn 2 pitchers in one game, so to speak.
I'm not convinced it's really that effective, but that's the general idea of why you do it.
Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk