Sons of Sam Horn > SoSH Hall of Fame thread IV: 2011 The Future!

LahoudOrBillyC

Feb 9 2006, 12:34 AM

QUOTE (Vermonter At Large @ Feb 8 2006, 07:16 PM)

Okay fine. I will re-phrase what I wrote to read, "The Yankees won 61.4 percent of the games that Murphy finished, while the A's won 63.4 percent of the games Fingers finished." We'll just drop the arbitrary term save and never mention it in this thread again.

Actually, it is likely that the A's won a much higher percentage of Fingers finishes, since under the rules of Murphy's time he would have had twice as many saves--likely 40 or more every year. I expect Fingers number is closer to 90% (which is true of any reliever today, as well.

QUOTE (Vermonter At Large @ Feb 8 2006, 07:16 PM)

Its fairly clear Lahoud that you have a very narrow idea of what a relief pitcher was, that extends I guess from Hoyt Wilhelm to Goose Gossage, and not beyond. That's fine, that's your opinion. I'm sorry that Murphy doesn't fit your paradigm of the iron-man relief specialist.

Well, this isn't quite true. In a book I helped write a few years ago, I wrote two long chapters on the history of relief pitching--about 25,000 words, with a dozen tables and quite a bit of analysis. My idea of what a relief pitcher is is quite broad, I assure you. Which isn't to say its right or wrong, of course.

QUOTE (Vermonter At Large @ Feb 8 2006, 07:16 PM)

I didn't try to compare him with Fingers, or Rivera, or Wilhelm, you took us there. I am on record as saying that I think its folly to try to compare players from different eras, and its truly so with relief pitchers.

Yes, but that is not enough. Its not enough to say that Murphy was the best at what he did during his time. The best relief pitcher of the teens was Doc Crandall. In the 2000s it was Mariano Rivera. You can't then conclude that Crandall==Rivera.

Murphy was the best, yes. But the role wasn't 20% as valuable as the bullpen became later, and Murphy was the best largely by default. He was a B+ pitcher, and no other team was good enough to put a B+ pitcher in the pen. So he was the best of a mediocre lot.

I ask you: why not put Manny Mota in the Hall of Fame?

The relief ace role became important in the 1960s, but we can't retroactively credit Murphy for an importance that didn't exist.

QUOTE (Vermonter At Large @ Feb 8 2006, 07:16 PM)

I did an mini-analysis of relief pitching in the Inter-War period and found that two pitchers really stood out - Marberry and Murphy. In the context of their times, they were the best around.

I know. I once wrote an article about Firpo in fact.

QUOTE (Vermonter At Large @ Feb 8 2006, 07:16 PM)

Whatever you say, Murphy was well-respected in his day, by his peers and by the baseball world in general. I challenge you to produce a source that backs up your contention that, "McCarthy did not believe he could pitch very much, or very often, so he used him this way. "

In John Thorn's book "The Relief Pitcher" (Dutton, 1979), he goes into this in detail (pages 58-64, all devoted to Murphy). Murphy hurt his arm, which limited how much he could pitch, and Murphy himself is quoted saying that he had only one good pitch (a curve) so McCarthy asked him to relieve.

QUOTE (Vermonter At Large @ Feb 8 2006, 07:16 PM)

Fingers started 37 games himself, so the same thing could be said about him. All relievers are failed starters, but that doesn't disqualify them from having been good - adapting to the situation and becoming the best they can be.

Just like Manny Mota. In the case of Fingers, Gossage, Lyle, they were able to carve out a role that was extremely important since they pitched 140 innings a year.

You and I agree that Murphy was the best of his time, much like Doc Crandall was, and much like Jack Manning was in the 1870s. I think you overstate how important it is to be the best at the 1930s version of the role.

BosoxBob

Feb 9 2006, 02:49 AM

1996 Ballot
Sal Bando
Ron Cey
Darrell Evans
Rollie Fingers
Dan Quisenberry
Bruce Sutter
Kent Tekulve

Vermonter At Large

Feb 9 2006, 09:38 AM

QUOTE (LahoudOrBillyC @ Feb 9 2006, 01:34 AM)

You and I agree that Murphy was the best of his time, much like Doc Crandall was, and much like Jack Manning was in the 1870s. I think you overstate how important it is to be the best at the 1930s version of the role.

You're right. It was an innovation on the part of Yankees. Murphy wasn't even the first dedicated reliever, nor McCarthy the inventor. Miller Huggins has used the fragile Wilcy Moore in that role with good effect in the late 1920's.

McCarthy reprised the role in 1932, bringing Moore back from Boston and trying Ed Wells, Jimmie DeShong, old Herb Pennock and Brown over the next few seasons. In 1935 he converted Murphy to relief and established roles. Brown was a dedicated long man, who had roughly the same numbers of appearances as Murphy, but usually in 3 or 4 inning stints. Murphy was the dedicated short man. DeShong and Pat Malone were also in the mix. It was a great experiment that only the Yankees probably had the luxury of attempting, but credit McCarthy for bringing it off.

It worked. Within two seasons other teams were saying to themselves, "I want one of those," and other teams began using dedicated relievers. The Dodgers used Hugh Casey, the White Sox used Clint Brown, the Pirates Mace Brown, etc. When Murphy was hurt in 1936, McCarthy used Pat Malone as his short man to great effect as well. Murphy was, however, better than all of them.

We don't have access to full game logs in the 1930's, but we can look at how McCarthy used is bullpen during World Series games in the 1930's.

1936
Game 1: Ruffing CG (L)
Game 2: Gomez CG (W)
Game 3: Malone relieved Bump Hadley to pitch 9th inning and preserve 2-1 W.
Game 4: Pearson CG (W)
Game 5: Malone relieves Ruffing in 7th, game tied 4-4. Malone pitches 4 innings,
losing the game in 10th.
Game 6: Murphy relieves Lopez with one out in seventh, Yankees ahead 5-4.
Murphy pitches 2.2 inn, allowing one run preserving 13-5 (W).

Summary: Three high-leverage relief appearances, two saves, one loss.

1937
Game 1: Smith relieves Gomez in the 8th to mop up 8-1 W.
Game 2: Ruffing CG (W)
Game 3: Murphy relieves Pearson in 9th to mop up 5-1 W.
Game 4: Andrews relieves Hadley in 2nd after shelling, Wicker relieves Andrews
in 8th in 7-3 loss.
Game 5: Gomez CG (W)

Summary: No high-leverage relief appearances.

1938
Game 1: Ruffing CG (W)
Game 2: Murphy relieves Gomez in 8th with Yankees behind 3-2. Murphy pitches
two scoreless innings and gets W as Yankees score 4 runs behind him.
Game 3: Pearson CG (W)
Game 4: Ruffing CG (W)

Summary: One high-leverage relief appearance, one win.

1939:
Game 1: Ruffing CG (W)
Game 2: Pearson CG (W)
Game 3: Hadley relieves Gomez in 2nd, pitches 8 inn for 7-3 W.
Game 4. Sundra relieves Hillenbrand in 5th, score 0-0. Murphy relieves Sundra
with two out in 7th, Yankees behind 3-2. Murphy pitches 3.1 inn,
giving up one run, Yankees winning 7-4 in 10 innings.

Summary: One high-leverage relief appearance, one win.

1941:
Game 1: Ruffing CG (W)
Game 2: Murphy relieves Chandler in 7th, Yankees behind 3-2. Murphy pitches
three scoreless innings but Yanks fail to score.
Game 3: Russo CG (W)
Game 4: Breuer relieve Donald in 5th, Yankees behind 4-3. Murphy relieves
Breuer in 8th, same score. Murphy pitches 2 scoreless innings, gets W
when Yankees score 4 runs in the top of the 9th.
Game 5: Bonham CG (W)

Summary: Two high-leverage relief appearances, one win.

1943:
Game 1: Chandler CG (W)
Game 2: Murphy relieves Bonham in 9th, Yanks behind 4-1. Murphy pitches scoreless inning, but Yanks fall short, 4-3.
Game 3: Murphy relieves Borowy in 9th, Yankees ahead 6-2. Pitches scoreless inning.
Game 4: Chandler CG (W)

Summary: No high-leverage relief appearance

Seriously, reading through that, McCarthy used Murphy (and Malone during Murphy's injury year of 1936) exactly the way that modern relief pitchers like Fingers, Sutter and Gossage were used - in chunks of up to three innings, in high-leverage situations when the game was on the line, in the World Series.

I don't care what Thorn wrote, the facts are that McCarthy used Murphy in the exact same way that modern relievers were used on the biggest stage of all, and Murphy came through every time. I can't see how these facts can fail to pass your litmus test.

URI

Feb 9 2006, 09:48 AM

1997
Ron Cey
Dwight Evans
Keith Hernandez
Craig Nettles
Dave Parker
Tony Perez
Dan Quinsenberry
Ken Singleton
Reggie Smith

LahoudOrBillyC

Feb 9 2006, 12:28 PM

QUOTE (Vermonter At Large @ Feb 9 2006, 06:38 AM)

You're right. It was an innovation on the part of Yankees. Murphy wasn't even the first dedicated reliever, nor McCarthy the inventor. Miller Huggins has used the fragile Wilcy Moore in that role with good effect in the late 1920's.

It goes back a lot further than that. Thorn's book (which you don't take seriously I guess) lays out the story pretty well. McCarthy had very little to do with it.

QUOTE (Vermonter At Large @ Feb 9 2006, 06:38 AM)

We don't have access to full game logs in the 1930's, but we can look at how McCarthy used is bullpen during World Series games in the 1930's.
...
Seriously, reading through that, McCarthy used Murphy (and Malone during Murphy's injury year of 1936) exactly the way that modern relief pitchers like Fingers, Sutter and Gossage were used - in chunks of up to three innings, in high-leverage situations when the game was on the line, in the World Series.

Wow. If you can read those logs and draw that conclusion, there is obviously no way we will ever find common ground.

<Shouting>You are throwing out half the games.</Shouting>

Why do you get to throw out the 15 complete games McCarthy allowed? Those 15 games were decisions to NOT USE HIS BULLPEN. How can you seriously look at those logs, see 15 complete games, and actually believe that McCarthy used his bullpen the same way. C'mon VAL, you don't believe this stuff.

Rollie Fingers suited up for three World Series which lasted 19 games, and he was used 16 times. 16 times out of 19, he was called in.
John Murphy suited up for seven World Series, which lasted 34 games, and he was used 8 times. 8 times out of 34, he was called in.

16 out of 19
8 out of 34

When you read this data, and conclude that he was used "exactly the same way" as Fingers?

Its like arguing that a field goal kicker from the 1920s is just as valuable as a field goal kicker today. Sure they aren't as good and they are used a third as often, but if you ignore all the times the coach chooses to punt or try for it on 4th down, he was used just the same. They are used "the same way" in that they were used on 4th down.

QUOTE (Vermonter At Large @ Feb 9 2006, 06:38 AM)

I don't care what Thorn wrote, the facts are that McCarthy used Murphy in the exact same way that modern relievers were used on the biggest stage of all, and Murphy came through every time. I can't see how these facts can fail to pass your litmus test.

All right. Thorn spent a few years on this book, read through the NY papers throughout Murphy's career, interviewed his teammates, used quotes from both Murphy and McCarthy. You went to Retrosheet, found a few Series games, threw out all the games Murphy didn't pitch, and came to a different conclusion.

By the way, in my opinion Thorn's book is great, absolutely the definitive source for the pre-1979 reliever. It is very thorough, and very well researched. He concludes, properly, that Murphy was one of the 10 best relievers ever. Things have changed quite a bit since then, of course.

JohntheBaptist

Feb 9 2006, 02:12 PM

1997 Ballot

Ron Cey
Keith Hernandez
Dwight Evans
Pete Rose

Really thin ballot for me, I know. Here's why.

I'm still not sure how I want to value relievers, and what the demarkation line is for ones going into the Hall of Fame. As for now, I'm almost positive that Quisenberry and Sutter don't meet that mark, that Fingers is right on the line, and that Gossage will be above it. That being said, I need to better define the line for myself somehow.

I dropped Lynn- I wasn't terribly convinced myself, and his lack of support coupled with the fact that I think Dewey was the better player lead me to sub him in over Rice.

I'm not sold on Parker yet, though I'm looking forward to someone stumping for him. In that mold, I took a much longer, closer look at Cey and the more I look, the more I liked.

edit- definitely, definitely intended to include Hernandez

67YAZ

Feb 9 2006, 02:35 PM

What about Keith Hernandez?

1979 NL co-MVP, 3 other top-10s
11 connsecutive Gold Gloves (1978-1988)
Lifetime .296/.384/.436, 129 OPS+
.299 EQA
8 Seasons of WARP3 above 7.0: 10.4, 10.4, 10.1, 9.2, 8.6, 8.4, 8.2, 7.2 [and another season at 6.9]
Career at 1B: Rate2 - 109, RAR2 - 282, RAA2 - 164

In the field, Keith was amazing beyond the GGs and stats. Anyone here who saw the name would have to agree. He wasn't a masher at 1B, but the man got on base and scored over 1100 runs in his career. I think in this expanded HoF, Keith should be enshrined.

Edit: I'm not so up on what day it is...

Majordad1

Feb 9 2006, 02:51 PM

1997 Ballot

Rollie Fingers
Pete Rose
Bruce Sutter

DeltaForce

Feb 9 2006, 03:10 PM

1997 ballot
Dave Bancroft
Ron Cey
Keith Hernandez
Thurman Munson
Tony Perez
Pete Rose
Ken Singleton
Reggie Smith

We finally have the Red Sox '70s OF on the same ballot, and there is very little space between the three of them. Lynn's best was better than Evans's and Rice's best, Evans was a very good player for the longest of the three, and Rice probably had the highest percentage of all-star-quality seasons. Or something like that. I could see making a case for any of them. I guess the case for Evans is the easiest to make, but I keep wishing that Evans had one Rice '78 or Lynn '79 season -- although Evans '81 may well have been that season, the strike makes it difficult to know for sure. Anyway, I'd tentatively rank them Evans/Lynn/Rice for now, but I could see myself changing that around, and for this reason, I'm not yet voting for any of them.

In studying these three, I've indirectly talked myself into voting for Reggie Smith. The WARP system doesn't do him any favors, but every other metric makes him a HOF'er.

Speaking of HOF'ers, I can't believe I missed Keith Hernandez the first time. I hated Keith Hernandez. But, he's in the conversation as best first baseman of his era (Eddie Murrary is probably a little better, and Perez is in the same category, but that's it). He was probably overrated defensively, but he nonetheless had 11 gold gloves, to go along with a lifetime .384 OBP, a career OPS+ that was better than Rice's, and three seasons in which his WARP3 was above 10. He's not an inner-circle lock, but he's almost certainly ahead of a lot of guys that are making most of our ballots. (I still hate him.)

(edit: Oops, didn't see that Yaz67 already covered the Keith Hernandez territory. I agree with him.)

Vermonter At Large

Feb 9 2006, 03:43 PM

QUOTE (LahoudOrBillyC @ Feb 9 2006, 01:28 PM)

It goes back a lot further than that. Thorn's book (which you don't take seriously I guess) lays out the story pretty well. McCarthy had very little to do with it.
Wow. If you can read those logs and draw that conclusion, there is obviously no way we will ever find common ground.

<Shouting>You are throwing out half the games.</Shouting>

Why do you get to throw out the 15 complete games McCarthy allowed? Those 15 games were decisions to NOT USE HIS BULLPEN. How can you seriously look at those logs, see 15 complete games, and actually believe that McCarthy used his bullpen the same way. C'mon VAL, you don't believe this stuff.

I haven't read Thorn's book, and I'm sure its a great book. What I'm challenging here are the hyperbolic statements you used earlier:

QUOTE

Murphy usually pitched 2 innings an appearance, but only 35 times a year, an unbelievably paltry total. Murphy was not as good a pitcher as Mike Timlin, and he pitched fewer innings, and less important innings. Murphy was just as likely come in when the Yankees were losing and just mop up.

and

QUOTE

The fact that Joe McCarthy chose *not* to use Murphy, and to stick with his starters, is not something that helps Murphy's case. Murphy was used the way he was used because he had shown himself incapable of being used the way the real pitchers were used. McCarthy did not believe he could pitch very much, or very often, so he used him this way.

I provided those WS game logs to disprove those theses. McCarty used him when he needed to use him, mainly in important, high-leverage situations, and Murphy pitched extremely well in those situations. He was so successful that other teams sought to find pitchers of their own who could perform in similar conditions.

Complete games by starters were the norm back then, however, and remained that way pretty much until the 1970's. You seem to want to suggest that that in some way diminishes Murphy's stature, but I don't think that's a universal viewpoint. It was just a paradigm that didn't get shifted, until relatively recently.

So I think we are approaching common ground, really, and can both shed the hyperbole now

. Murphy was an excellent relief pitcher who excelled in high-leverage late-inning situations, although he wasn't used as often as modern relievers. He was probably the first pitcher to consistently excel in that role (and may indeed have been the first dubbed "Fireman" - although I will leave that to our resident historian to confirm) exclusively over a long period of time, and that success paved the way for the evolution of relief specialists over the next 30 years.

Is that common ground?

mabrowndog

Feb 10 2006, 07:40 PM

1996 BALLOT
Dave Bancroft
Dwight Evans
Rollie Fingers
Keith Hernandez
Graig Nettles
Dan Quisenberry
Pete Rose
Reggie Smith
Bruce Sutter
Frank White

* A pretty weak batch of newbs. The only three that could possibly gain consideration are Dewey, Cobra and Dr. Mike -- with the latter two being extreme stretches. But I'm voting for Dewey as a borderline candidate because of his defense.

His power numbers were more accumulation-based than gained from domination. He had a great eye and drew a ton of walks, but some of his swings and misses on low-and-outside stuff were the stuff of legend (dare I say Gedman-esque?). Anyway, that glove and cannon of his earned my vote.

* So with the decks cleared, am I justified in expecting a groundswell of support for Hernandez? Granted he wasn't the prototypical slugging corner man, and was a lot closer to Jim Bottomley in terms of his offensive distribution. But the man got on base plenty, hit with enough power to make pitchers fearful, and was one of the best glovemen I've ever seen at that position.

* Has Reggie Smith done or said anything to merit dropping like a rock? Here are his career numbers and splits, just to refresh everyone's memory. Note that he knocked the crap of of the ball in Chavez Ravine -- a career .905 OPS, so that 137 career OPS+ and 6.43 RC27 aren't simply figments of Fenway influence.

* VAL's data on Bancroft has me edging his way, at least for the stretch run of his eligibility. And his point about Mazeroski getting the short shrift as a defense-only guy is well taken. I wish I could say I'm not applying a double-standard by voting for Frank White, but that's exactly what I'm doing. If I could have my ballots back from the mid-late 60s, I'd try to find a way to get Maz in.

Tudor Fever

Feb 10 2006, 09:19 PM

Mazeroski was such a mediocre hitter (OPS+ of 84) that he wasn't a tremendously valuable player, in spite of his superlative defensive skills. His best WARP3 was 8.2, and his career total was 86.4. By contrast, Grich had seven seasons of 9.2 or more, and his career total was 115.4. No way Maz belongs IMO, even though he performed a mythically heroic public service on October 13, 1960.

Nor can I support Bancroft, with OPS+ of only 98. As VAL himself said:

QUOTE

Anyway, I wish I could put together a stunning argument for Bancroft in his final season, but I really can't. I'll still vote for him, but sadly I think he's another body for the HOVG.

Vermonter At Large

Feb 10 2006, 10:53 PM

QUOTE (Tudor Fever @ Feb 10 2006, 10:19 PM)

Mazeroski was such a mediocre hitter (OPS+ of 84) that he wasn't a tremendously valuable player, in spite of his superlative defensive skills. His best WARP3 was 8.2, and his career total was 86.4. By contrast, Grich had seven seasons of 9.2 or more, and his career total was 115.4. No way Maz belongs IMO, even though he performed a mythically heroic public service on October 13, 1960.

Nor can I support Bancroft, with OPS+ of only 98. As VAL himself said:

Yeah, well I was kind of hoping you'd overlook that statement, Tudor

... What I meant to say that I had hoped the new metrics would have made Bancroft a clear cut HOFer, but they didn't - they left him on the borderline. I still voted for him.

I will say, however, that when I apply the same metrics to Ozzie Smith, he's going to come up short as well, as did Maz and probably Frank White too. Its sad in a way, but by the same metrics I am learning that defense in the modern era (post WW2), no matter how flashy it may have seemed, really wasn't any more significant than stolen bases insofar as runs are concerned. I certainly don't think the extra defense makes up for truly mediocre offense in terms of HOF selection, in my view.

I also want to apologize for sidetracking this thread on the reliever thing so badly. Although the numbers were and are good, the narrative research was cursory at best and Lahoud was right to call me out on it (even if he went over the top on it - it was my fault to begin with). I'm going to continue the numbers thing because its interesting to me, but I don't think the numbers tell us anything much about how good or not good the relievers actually were. I'm sort of back to where I began with regarding being generally disinclined to vote for relief pitchers for the same reason I am now disinclined to vote for primary defensive players - I just don't know if their contributions in their limited specialties made all that much difference in terms of wins. I do promise to listen to the arguments though.

URI

Feb 13 2006, 05:14 PM

Bump...

We don't have all that many votes for this year.

Lose Remerswaal

Feb 13 2006, 05:33 PM

1997:

Rollie Fingers
Dan Quisenberry
Jim Rice
Bruce Sutter.

Rice and a bunch of relievers.

Dave Parker will get my 2nd year vote.

67YAZ

Feb 13 2006, 06:04 PM

1997 Ballot
Dave Bancroft
Keith Hernandez
Fred Lynn
Thurman Munson
Jim Rice
Reggie Smith

Considering Lynn helped push me over on Reggie Smith.

My mother's all-time favorite player was Dewey. She loved Dewey, kept one of his baseball cards in the corner of her mirror. During his at bats, everything would stop while she watched or listened. "Dewey always comes through when we need it," and it often seemed like it, too. I love the guy, too, but I don't think he measures up here.

Also, I do appreciate your tet-a-tet, Lahoud and VAL. Lots to think about, though I tend to fall on Lahoud's side. But I'm not set in stone, especially when Gossage come up.

LahoudOrBillyC

Feb 13 2006, 06:14 PM

Ron Cey
Dwight Evans
Keith Hernandez
Fred Lynn
Tony Perez
Jim Rice
Pete Rose
Reggie Smith

Tudor Fever

Feb 13 2006, 06:27 PM

QUOTE

My mother's all-time favorite player was Dewey. She loved Dewey, kept one of his baseball cards in the corner of her mirror. During his at bats, everything would stop while she watched or listened. "Dewey always comes through when we need it," and it often seemed like it, too. I love the guy, too, but I don't think he measures up here.

I think your mom had it right. If you compare the career stats of Evans, Rice, and Lynn, they are all fairly close but it seems that Dewey comes out ahead.

Evans:
PA: 10,569
OPS+: 127
EQA: 297
WARP3: 113.5
Seasons with WARP3 > 10: 2 (1981 and 1984)

Lynn:
PA: 7,923
OPS+: 130
EQA: 297
WARP3: 89.4
Seasons with WARP3 > 10: 1 (1979)

Rice:
PA: 9,058
OPS+: 128
EQA: 295
WARP3: 89.6
Seasons with WARP3 > 10: 1 (1978)

And OPS+ slightly overrates Rice because (1) OPS undervalues OBP and overvalues SLP, and Rice was higher, relative to the league, at SLP than at OBP and (2) it does not reflect his historically high GIDP rate.

LahoudOrBillyC

Feb 13 2006, 07:08 PM

Evans problem is that he didn't really become an impact player until after the Red Sox big years in the late 1970s. During the years when the three of them shared an outfield, he was clearly and obviously the worst of the three players. Starting in 1981, when Lynn was gone, he was better than both of them virtually every year.

I actually believe that Lynn was the best player in the truest sense of that term. It all comes down to how much you value career length. At his best, Lynn was better, and he was pretty good right to the very end. But he missed 25 a year like a clock.

Tudor Fever

Feb 13 2006, 07:44 PM

QUOTE (LahoudOrBillyC @ Feb 13 2006, 07:08 PM)

I actually believe that Lynn was the best player in the truest sense of that term. It all comes down to how much you value career length. At his best, Lynn was better, and he was pretty good right to the very end. But he missed 25 a year like a clock.

I agree that, when healthy and at peak age, Lynn was the best of the 3. However, those 25 per year added up, and made him less valuable.

Being old, I remember being amazed by Evans in 1981, as in "Out from under what rock did this great player crawl?" (Never end a sentence with a preposition.) I also recall waiting for Rice to regain his pre-1980 form. Never happened and I gave up hoping for it around 1983.

Tudor Fever

Feb 13 2006, 11:43 PM

1997 ballot
Ron Cey
Dwight Evans
Keith Hernandez
Fred Lynn
Thurman Munson
Graig Nettles
Dave Parker
Pete Rose
Ken Singleton
Reggie Smith

Spacemans Bong

Feb 14 2006, 12:27 AM

Cey
Evans
Hernandez
Lynn
Nettles
Parker
Rice
Quisenberry
Sutton

Vermonter At Large

Feb 14 2006, 06:53 AM

1997:
Thurman Munson
Graig Nettles
Reggie Smith

I think that before we go too far with the outfielder discussions of Rice, Evans and Lynn, we have to select Reggie Smith who was clearly better than any of them, by nearly every measure we can make. Just to re-post the OF numbers for the Expansion Era (I'll expand this out later to include Evans who really fell into the next era in my original analysis):

What hurts Lynn, Rice and Evans in my opinion isn't so much their career length as the Fenway Factor. If you look closely at the first chart in the blurb at the ASL (Away SLG+) column, you see that most hitters took a modest advantage from their home parks, typically an ASL of 95-99. Nearly all of the Red Sox greats, however, took a much higher advantage from Fenway than that. I think that hurts the marginal guys to some extent.

Anyway, food for further discussion ...

Here is a list of offensive totals and rates for Expansion Era outfielders who had either 8000 PAs and an OPS+ of at least 105 or players with shorter careers and an OPS+ of 120 or higher:

CODE

Name PA H BA R RBI OPS OPS+ ASL BB/PA 1B/PA XB/PA HR/PA K/PA SB ToH PuH
Willie Mays* 12493 3283 .302 2062 1903 .941 156 98 .117 .157 .053 .053 .122 338 .493 .411 .
Hank Aaron* 13940 3771 .305 2174 2297 .928 155 97 .101 .165 .052 .054 .099 240 .492 .421
Frank Robinson* 11743 2943 .294 1829 1812 .926 154 95 .121 .150 .051 .050 .130 204 .477 .392
Willie Stargell* 9026 2232 .282 1195 1540 .889 147 97 .104 .141 .053 .053 .215 17 .469 .396
Frank Howard 7353 1774 .273 864 1119 .851 142 98 .106 .151 .038 .052 .199 8 .449 .375
Reggie Smith 8050 2020 .287 1123 1092 .855 137 95 .111 .160 .052 .039 .130 137 .449 .371
Billy Williams* 10519 2711 .290 1410 1475 .853 132 93 .099 .168 .050 .040 .099 90 .448 .378
Jim Rice 9058 2452 .298 1249 1451 .854 128 91 .074 .179 .050 .042 .157 58 .447 .395
Rocky Colavito 7559 1730 .266 971 1159 .848 132 100 .126 .139 .040 .049 .116 19 .446 .358
Reggie Jackson* 11416 2584 .262 1551 1702 .846 139 102 .120 .132 .045 .049 .227 228 .444 .360
Fred Lynn 7923 1960 .283 1063 1111 .845 130 90 .108 .154 .054 .039 .141 72 .444 .368
Carl Yastrzemski*13991 3419 .285 1816 1844 .841 130 91 .132 .162 .050 .032 .100 168 .440 .348
Al Kaline* 11597 3007 .297 1622 1583 .855 134 95 .110 .175 .049 .034 .088 137 .439 .363
Bob Allison 5921 1281 .255 811 796 .829 127 97 .134 .128 .045 .043 .174 84 .438 .344
Rico Carty 6318 1677 .299 712 890 .833 132 91 .102 .186 .047 .032 .105 21 .438 .367
Greg Luzinski 7514 1795 .276 880 1128 .840 130 91 .112 .149 .048 .041 .199 37 .436 .358
George Foster 7812 1925 .274 986 1239 .818 126 99 .085 .157 .045 .045 .182 51 .433 .373
Roberto Clemente*10212 3000 .317 1416 1305 .834 130 97 .061 .211 .059 .024 .120 83 .432 .389
Ken Singleton 8558 2029 .282 985 1065 .824 132 102 .148 .168 .040 .029 .146 21 .431 .327
Bobby Bonds 8090 1886 .268 1258 1024 .824 130 99 .113 .147 .045 .041 .217 461 .430 .351
Tony Oliva 6879 1917 .304 870 947 .830 131 102 .065 .192 .055 .032 .094 86 .428 .382
Dave Parker 10184 2712 .290 1272 1493 .810 121 95 .067 .174 .059 .033 .151 154 .426 .379
Vada Pinson 10403 2757 .286 1366 1170 .769 111 96 .055 .182 .059 .025 .115 305 .422 .383
Oscar Gamble 5197 1195 .265 656 666 .811 127 96 .117 .149 .042 .038 .105 47 .421 .339
Tony Conigliaro 3591 849 .264 464 516 .803 120 95 .080 .145 .045 .046 .175 20 .420 .364
Jeff Burroughs 6449 1443 .261 720 882 .795 121 99 .129 .148 .039 .037 .176 16 .419 .329
Jim Wynn 8010 1665 .250 1665 1105 .802 128 98 .153 .131 .040 .036 .178 225 .418 .311
Rick Monday 7162 1619 .264 950 775 .804 125 98 .129 .149 .044 .033 .211 98 .418 .328
Bobby Murcer 7718 1862 .277 972 1043 .802 124 92 .112 .166 .041 .033 .109 127 .417 .339
Leon Wagner 4950 1202 .272 636 669 .795 121 102 .088 .167 .033 .043 .133 54 .417 .355
Hal McRae 8058 2091 .290 940 1097 .805 122 97 .080 .168 .068 .023 .097 109 .415 .359
Roger Maris 5846 1325 .260 826 851 .822 127 101 .112 .139 .041 .047 .125 21 .414 .334
Willie Horton 8052 1993 .273 873 1163 .789 120 96 .077 .167 .040 .040 .163 20 .413 .359
Al Oliver 9778 2743 .303 1189 1326 .795 121 98 .055 .196 .062 .022 .077 84 .413 .374
John Callison 7437 1757 .264 926 840 .773 114 95 .087 .151 .055 .030 .143 74 .411 .350
Rusty Staub 11229 2716 .279 1189 1466 .793 124 100 .112 .167 .049 .026 .079 47 .411 .333
Cesar Cedeno 8133 2087 .285 1084 976 .790 123 101 .082 .171 .061 .024 .115 550 .410 .343
Ken Griffey 8048 2143 .296 1129 859 ,790 118 95 .089 .193 .055 .019 .112 200 .411 .349
George Hendrick 7825 1980 .278 941 1111 .775 117 98 .072 .172 .047 .034 .129 59 .409 .359
Jose Cruz 8931 2251 .284 1036 1077 .774 120 100 .101 .179 .054 .018 .115 317 .396 .325
Roy White 7735 1803 .271 964 758 .764 121 97 .121 ,167 .045 .021 .092 233 .396 .311
Ron Fairly 8437 1913 .266 931 1044 .768 117 98 .125 .161 .040 .025 .104 35 .396 .308
Felipe Alou 7908 2101 .286 985 852 .761 113 99 .053 .188 .053 .026 .090 107 .395 .358
Don Baylor 9401 2135 .260 1236 1276 .777 118 103 .086 .149 .042 .036 .114 285 .393 .333
Amos Otis 8246 2020 .277 1092 1007 .768 114 96 .092 .168 .053 .023 .122 341 .391 .327
Tony Gonzalez 5793 1485 .286 690 615 .764 114 94 .081 .188 .051 .018 .122 79 .391 .334
Dusty Baker 8021 1981 .278 964 1013 .779 116 100 .095 .174 .044 .030 .115 137 .390 .323
Lou Brock* 11235 3023 .293 1610 900 ,753 109 98 .068 .200 .056 .013 .154 938 .388 .340
Tommy Davis 7739 2121 .294 811 1052 .733 108 98 .049 .215 .040 .020 .097 136 .381 .347
Garry Maddox 6775 1802 .285 777 754 .733 101 96 .048 .190 .059 .017 .115 248 .381 .347
Joe Rudi 6076 1468 .264 684 810 .738 111 103 .061 .158 .054 .029 .143 25 .380 .337
Jose Cardenal 7696 1913 .275 936 775 .728 103 99 .079 .181 .049 .018 .105 329 .378 .323
Willie Davis 9822 2561 .279 1217 1053 .723 105 107 .043 .188 .054 .019 .099 398 .372 .342
Curt Flood 6958 1861 .293 851 636 .732 100 99 .064 .210 .045 .012 .088 88 .372 .327
Al Bumbry 5619 1422 .281 778 402 .721 104 102 .084 .195 .048 .010 .126 254 .370 .311
Mickey Rivers 6027 1660 .295 785 499 .724 106 102 .044 .213 .053 .010 .078 267 .369 .325
Matty Alou 6220 1777 .307 780 427 .726 105 99 .050 .235 .046 .005 .061 156 .368 .333

ASL = Away Slugging. The player's away slugging percentage divided by his career slugging percentage.
ToH = Total Hitting. 0.7(BB/PA) + (1B/PA) + 1.8(XB/PA) + 3.0(HR/PA)

Since the ToH corrections add value to BB, 2B and HR over OPS equivalents, certain hitters come out better or worse by small amounts over OPS. Another reason for inequity with OPS+ numbers is the lack of park adjustment. You can see that in the top 10, with Rice overachieving OPS+ (with a 91 ASL value) and Jackson underachieving (102 ASL value). In discussing Rice, we will examine in much more detail his home park advantage and see how it mitigates. Jackson's high ASL (better road hitting) is actually surprising since two of his three primary home parks (Yankee Stadium, Oakland Colliseum, and Anaheim Stadium) were hitter's parks. In fact, his SLG was very high at Yankee Stadium, at career-level in Oakland, and below normal in Anaheim.

A general scan of the list shows three excellent players who came up slightly short of plate appearances to join either of the "clubs," but who were excellent hitters and deserve serious consideration: Frank Howard, Reggie Smith, and Rocky Colavito. Howard was ROY for the Dodgers in 1960, but never really played full-time until he was traded to the Senators in 1965 at the age of 28. He quuickly became one of the dominant HR hitters in the A.L. and hit HRs with the same frequency as Aaron, Mays, Stargell and Robinson. He had absolutely no speed, was a plodding fielder at best, but managed to reach base with pretty good regularity.

I'm very surprised that Reggie Smith hasn't ever gotten much support for the HOF. He ranks in the top-10 in his era in nearly every metric around, had six .300 seasons, 16 seasons in double figures in HRs, and five seasons with an OPS+ of over 150. He was a gold glove center fielder and a good baserunner (before his knees went bad). I think there are two reasons for his general lack of respect. First, he was never a self-promoter, and was a quiet man. Second, he was never the primary star on any of his teams. He played in the shadow of Yaz, Tony C. and Rico Petrocelli in Boston, was a member of the great 1970s Dodger teams with Cey, Garvey, Lopes and all, and shared the Cardinal limelight with Joe Torre, Ted Simmons and Lou Brock. He was never a big star, yet he quietly amassed some very impressive numbers.

Colavito put together 10 consecutive excellent seasons from 1956-1965, including eight seasons with 20+ HRs, six with 100+ RBI's and seven 130+ OPS+ seasons. He was an above-average fielder. He was a very streaky hitter, which caused him some riding from fans in Cleveland during his time there. He was essentially done by the age of 32. His rates were virtually identical to Reggie Jackson's. Both had good HR strokes, and walked a lot, but did relatively little in the single or line drive department. They were all or nothing hitters. Jackson struck out nearly twice as often as Colavito, however.

Home Run Hitters (with .040 or higher HR/PA):
Aaron .054
Mays .053
Stargell .053
Howard .052
Robinson .050
Jackson .049
Colavito .049
Maris .047
Conigliaro .046
Foster .045
Allison .043
Wagner .043
Rice .042
Luzinski .041
B. Bonds .041
B. Williams .040
W. Horton .040

Line Drive Hitters: (with .050 or higher XB/PA (HR's excluded))
McRae .068
A. Oliver .062
Cedeno .061
Clemente .059
Pinson .059
Parker .059
G. Maddox .059
Brock .056
Oliva .055
Callison .055
Lynn .054
Cruz .054
Rudi .054
W. Davis .054
Mays .053
F. Alou .053
Otis .053
Rivers .053
Stargell .052
Aaron .052
R. Smith .052
Robinson .051
T.Gonzalez .051
J. Rice .050
B. Williams .050
Yaz .050

Singles Hitters (With .180 or higher 1B/PA):
M. Alou .235
T. Davis .215
Rivers .213
Clemente .211
Flood .210
Brock .200
A. Oliver .196
Bumbry .195
Griffey .193
Oliva .192
Maddox .190
W. Davis .188
T. Gonzalez .188
Carty .186
Pinson .182

Pedestrians (With .120 or higher BB/PA):
Wynn .153
Singleton .148
Allison .134
Yastrzemski .132
Burroughs .129
Monday .129
Colavito .126
Fairly .125
Robinson .121
White .121
Jackson .120

Baserunning: The Expansion Era saw an revival of the all but lost art of base stealing. Conventional metrics,
such as OPS+, don't factor basestealing into the equation, but I wanted to try to get a rough idea of the contribution to
run production of the stolen bases, since there were so many prolific base stealers in this era.

SAOBP SASLG SAOPS OPS Dif SAOPS+ SB%
Brock .309 .501 .810 .753 +.057 108 75
Cedeno .316 .518 .834 .790 +.044 106 75
Otis .325 .472 .797 .768 +.029 104 78
Bumbry .321 .428 .749 .721 +.028 104 73
Bonds .325 .536 .861 .824 +.037 104 73
Rivers .305 .444 .749 .725 +.024 103 74
W. Davis .290 .455 .745 .723 +.022 103 75
Cardenal .310 .442 .752 .728 +.024 103 70
Cruz .337 .460 .797 .774 +.023 103 70
G. Maddox .300 .452 .752 .733 +.019 103 72
Mays .372 .589 .961 .941 +.020 102 76
Wynn .348 .470 .818 .802 +.016 102 69
Griffey Sr. .345 .459 .804 .790 +.014 102 70
Pinson .308 .474 .782 .769 +.013 102 71
R. White .338 .439 .777 .764 +.013 102 66
Aaron .366 .574 .940 .928 +.012 101 76
T. Davis .316 .423 .739 .733 +.006 101 69
D. Baker .333 .451 .784 .770 +.005 101 65
Murcer .343 .464 .807 .802 +.005 101 62
R. Smith .351 .508 .859 .855 +.004 100 61
Yastrzemski .368 .467 .844 .841 +.003 100 59
Kaline .364 .493 .857 .855 +.002 100 67
R. Jackson .337 .513 .850 .846 +.002 100 66
Parker .322 .487 .809 .810 -.001 100 57
Baylor .300 .470 .770 .777 -.007 99 70
M. Alou .298 .408 .706 .726 -.020 97 66

To calculate the value of stolen bases, I used speed-adjusted OPS (SAOPS) and normalized it against a hitter's career OPS. The basic formula for calculating SAOPS is as follows:

BB + H - CS TB + SB
----------- + ------- = SAOPS
PA AB

I generally applied this formula to the lifetime numbers of players with 125 or more SB's during this era. Players with fewer than 125 SB's generally had little noticeable differential, so they are not included here.

As we might have guessed, Brock had the highest differential, with Cedeno second. There is not, however, as direct a correlation to the number of SB's, nor to the SB% as might have been expected, rather the SAOPS varied in a complex fashion with the player's various rates. As a general rule, however, all players with positive differentials were above or at the theoretical 62.5% SB Pct "break even point."

I cannot apply this directly to the ToH value, but since there is a generally linear value between OPS and ToH (.052 +/- 1.0) I can approximate the base stealing offset by multiplying the offset by .052. For this I come up with adjusted
hitting values for basestealers as follow:

Mays .498 +.005
Aaron .495 +.003
Bonds .439 +.009
Pinson .426 +.004
Cedeno .423 +.013
Wynn .422 +.004
Murcer .419 +.002
Griffey .415 +.004
Brock .404 +.016
Cruz .402 +.006
Otis .402 +.011
White .400 +.004
Baker .392 +.002
Maddox .387 +.006
Cardenal .384 +.006
Bumbry .380 +.010
W. Davis .378 +.006
Rivers .375 +.006

So as a general rule, stolen bases do not appear to have a great overall effect on offense. Even Lou Brock's 938 career stolen bases only adjusted him .016 points, well short of most of his contemporaries. For those on the verge of the HOF, however, including Bonds, Pinson, Cedeno and Wynn, the extra points for stolen bases might be critical.

CODE

Pure Hitting: I calculated the ToH minus walks, calling it PuH. PuH is generally equivalent to slugging percentage,
and generally speaks to how hard a hitter hit the ball when he was swinging away.

Aaron .421
Mays .411
Stargell .396
Rice .395
F.Robinson .392
Clemente .389
Pinson .383
Oliva .382
Parker .379
B. Williams .378
Howard .375

Fielding for outfielders is probably simpler to observe through statistics than for any other position. In my view, there are three elemental characteristics: 1.) Range, 2.) Ball Handling, 3.) Arm. Range is far and away the most important of these characteristics and combines several skills including ball reading, acceleration and decision-making. Range factor is an adequate, if not perfect, measure of this, with PO/G a secondary measure. Its important to compare both statistics to players of the same position, however, since center fielders see, on the average, about 20% fielding chances than corner outfielders. Look at Reggie Smith, for instance, who split his time pretty much between CF and RF during his career. His range numbers are mediocre for CF, but exceptional for RF. This is because the split between positions had him seeing more chances than the average RF, but fewer than the average CF.

Putouts per game is a pointer stat. On the whole, PO/G are relatively consistent with RF, and RG. What it shows very well - better than RF or RG, is extremely low PO/G numbers. Looking at the bottom of the Left Field list, and see the plodders - Hondo, Willie Horton, Willie Stargell and Greg Luzinski, all with PO/G in the vicinity of 1.50. Lots of hits were falling in that other leftfielders would have gotten to.

Ball Handling is traditionally measured by Fielding Percentage, or the number of errors per total chances. For infield positions, errors are poor indicators of fielding skills, but for outfielders, I think they are better, because outfielding is generally a singular task. Outfield errors are also much more damaging on the whole than infield errors, and probably result in runs a higher percentage of the time. For this reason, errors are more significant than assists for outfielders, since they are more likely to result in runs scored than an assist is to prevent runs scored. It can be argued that increased range increases the likelihood of errors, and that is probably true. The argument that they are more likely to be made by a good fielder may work for shortstops, however, but not for outfielders. Here are the numbers for outfielders:

GG = Gold Glove Awards
RF+ = Normalized Range Factor
FPct = Fielding Percentage
RG = Palmer/Gillette Range Rating
THR = Palmer/Gillette Throwing Rating
PO/G = Putouts per game
A/G = Assists per game
E/G = Errors per game
Deployment%
Left Field GG RF+ FPct RG THR PO/G A/G E/G LF CF RF Other
George Foster - 107 .984 102 88 2.03 .063 .033 82 11 7 -
Carl Yastrzemski 7 104 .981 99 142 1.90 .094 .039 92 7 1 37(1B,DH)
Jim Rice - 99 .980 94 125 2.01 .088 .043 97 0 3 26(DH)
Joe Rudi 3 97 .991 100 78 1.92 .050 .028 97 - 3 20(1B,DH)
Billy Williams - 97 .973 94 101 1.71 .068 .048 83 2 15 11(DH,3B)
Lou Brock - 97 .959 96 84 1.75 .057 .078 86 5 9 -
Willie Horton - 89 .972 93 75 1.61 .049 .049 94 - 6 38(DH)
Willie Stargell - 88 .961 89 124 1.53 .079 .065 94 1 5 39(1B)
Frank Howard - 84 .975 89 86 1.47 .057 .040 64 - 36 22(DH,1B)
Greg Luzinski - 80 .972 85 82 1.51 .055 .045 100 - - 31(DH,1B)

Center Field GG RF+ FPct RG THR PO/G A/G E/G LF CF RF Other
Garry Maddox 8 137 .983 108 88 2.64 .056 .046 2 97 1 -
Willie Mays 12 135 .981 105 100 2.50 .069 .050 0 99 1 3(1B)
Curt Flood 7 135 .987 106 105 2.37 .067 .032 - 100 - -
Willie Davis 3 130 .978 105 102 2.35 .061 .055 - 96 4 -
Amos Otis 3 128 .991 98 97 2.56 .065 .024 3 95 2 1(DH)
Cesar Cedeno 5 127 .985 101 94 2.40 .059 .037 8 85 8 13(1B)
Fred Lynn 4 121 .988 95 95 2.50 .062 .030 11 87 12 4(DH)
Vada Pinson 1 118 .981 99 109 2.12 .072 .042 10 70 20 1(1B,DH)
Al Oliver - 117 .980 99 72 2.28 .047 .047 35 60 5 40(1B,DH)

Right Field GG RF+ FPct RG THR PO/G A/G E/G LF CF RF Other
Reggie Smith 1 119 .976 105 110 2.20 .076 .056 - 48 52 12(1B,3B)
Roberto Clemente 12 112 .973 105 140 1.98 .112 .059 1 2 97 -
Tony Oliva 1 112 .975 110 94 1.98 .060 .052 1 2 97 26(DH)
Bobby Bonds 3 111 .977 105 100 2.11 .074 .051 2 13 85 1(DH)
Hank Aaron 3 109 .982 102 92 2.01 .073 .042 11 10 79 14(1B,DH)
Dave Parker 3 109 .965 105 101 2.03 .077 .076 2 2 96 21(DH,1B)
Al Kaline 10 108 .986 107 100 2.02 .068 .029 1 17 82 10(DH,1B)
Frank Robinson 1 104 .984 101 89 1.87 .063 .032 38 2 60 23(DH,1B)
Bobby Murcer 1 104 .981 89 105 1.99 .076 .040 1 48 51 10(DH,3B,SS)
Rocky Colavito - 102 .980 104 106 1.87 .069 .039 28 - 72 1(1B)
Rusty Staub - 100 .969 98 136 1.80 .099 .061 3 1 96 35(DH,1B)
Reggie Jackson - 99 .967 99 92 1.93 .063 .068 1 9 90 23(DH)
Ken Singleton - 88 .980 91 71 1.75 .053 .037 15 - 85 13(DH)

bsj

Feb 14 2006, 10:11 AM

1997

R. Fingers
J. Rice
P. Rose

sorry vote has come in so late...this ballot was just completely uninspiring, and I kept putting off voting until I could give some real time to research...havent had that time yet

For now, this is all I got...may give Parker a vote eventually...just not yet...May be able to come up with another name of 2 later today...

DeltaForce

Feb 14 2006, 11:09 AM

QUOTE (bsj @ Feb 14 2006, 11:11 AM)

sorry vote has come in so late...this ballot was just completely uninspiring, and I kept putting off voting until I could give some real time to research...havent had that time yet

Yeah, the last two "years" haven't had any real no-brainers -- although that's about to change; the next two "years" are loaded.

Still, I think the fun part is trying to make arguments for and against the borderline guys -- the Jim Rices, the Ron Ceys, etc. How much debate could George Brett or Gary Carter really generate?

bsj

Feb 14 2006, 12:45 PM

QUOTE (DeltaForce @ Feb 14 2006, 11:09 AM)

Yeah, the last two "years" haven't had any real no-brainers -- although that's about to change; the next two "years" are loaded.

Still, I think the fun part is trying to make arguments for and against the borderline guys -- the Jim Rices, the Ron Ceys, etc. How much debate could George Brett or Gary Carter really generate?

Oh, I completely agree, don't get me wrong. The most fun I've had so far in this whole experiment we have been doing is the whole Harry Stovey thing, when myself and a couple others were able to get him from like 20% of the vote in ballot 13 to elected in 15. But I have been so freaking locked in with work and other shit this week I havent been able to do the research. Argh...

BosoxBob

Feb 17 2006, 03:34 AM

1997 Ballot
Ron Cey
Rollie Fingers
Keith Hernandez
Dan Quisenberry
Reggie Smith
Bruce Sutter
Kent Tekulve

URI

Feb 17 2006, 11:47 AM

1998 ballot:
Bert Blyleven
Gary Carter
Ron Cey
Dwight Evans
Pedro Guerrero
Keith Hernandez
Craig Nettles
Dan Quinsenberry
Ken Singleton
Reggie Smith

I'll fix the totals jpg either tonight or tomorrow morning...if you are having trouble seeing it, just right click or something like that.

I will say I'm suprised at the groundswell of support for Reggie Smith.

URI

Feb 17 2006, 12:39 PM

I was actually so surprised, that I took 3 guys that were more-or-less contemporaries and I ran their WARP3's to find out who had the best seasons.

Those contemporaries are: Jimmy Wynn (in our Hall), Ken Singleton (high vote: 27.3% on ballot #2, trended down, and is trending back up. Currently on ballot #9), and Jim Rice (high vote: 41.7% on ballot #3. Currently on 4th ballot).

Best 10 seasons:
Wynn 1965 (10.8)
Singleton 1977 (10.7)
Rice 1978 (10.5)
Wynn 1974 (10.2)
Singelton 1975 (10.1)
Wynn 1969 (9.8)
Wynn 1968 (9.5)
Rice 1986 (9.4)
Smith 1977 (8.9)
Rice 1983 (8.9)

For this, I only counted the top 50 seasons combined of all 4 guys (does anyone really want to compare Smith's 1981 to Rice's 1989?). I aslo put together a "season score" giving them points for a ranking. This is only to organize thought, not anything substancial.

Alphabetically...

Jim Rice (326 points over 13 seasons)
Season ranks: 3, 8, 9, 15, 18, 19, 21, 30, 34, 40, 40, 47, 50

Ken Singleton (314 points over 12 seasons)
Season ranks: 2, 5, 11, 12, 17, 22, 24, 27, 38, 39, 48, 48

Reggie Smith (207 points over 14 seasons)
Season ranks: 9, 16, 22, 24, 26, 27, 29, 31, 35, 35, 37, 42, 44, 45

Jimmy Wynn (341 points over 11 seasons)
Season ranks: 1, 4, 6, 7, 13, 14, 20, 31, 31, 43, 45

67YAZ

Feb 17 2006, 12:58 PM

1998 Ballot
Dave Bancroft
Bert Blyleven
Gary Carter
Ron Cey
Dwight Evans
Keith Hernandez
Freddy Lynn
Thurman Munson
Jim Rice
Reggie Smith

We're getting to end of the Reign of the Third Basemen in the 1970s. Brooks Robison, Mike Schmidt, George Brett, Ron Cey, Graig Nettles, Darrell Evens, Ron Santo, Sal Bando, and Bill Madlock. Not all in their primes during the 70s, but all on the field at some point. Rather amazing.

DeltaForce

Feb 17 2006, 01:56 PM

1998 ballot
Dave Bancroft
Bert Blyleven
Gary Carter
Ron Cey
Keith Hernandez
Thurman Munson
Tony Perez
Pete Rose
Ken Singleton
Reggie Smith

Blyleven and Carter are no-brainers.

Tudor Fever

Feb 17 2006, 02:12 PM

As a follow-up to URI's post: Using career WARP3/100 PA, Wynn comes out ahead, followed by Smith, Singleton, and Rice in that order. The following are their career WARP3, PA, and WARP3/100PA:

Wynn: 88.6, 8010, 1.1061
Smith: 86.4, 8050, 1.0733
Singleton: 86.5, 8558, 1.0108
Rice: 89.6, 9058, 0.9892

(Edit: Here are the same stats for Dewey Evans and Fred Lynn.
Evans: 113.5, 10569, 1.0739
Lynn: 89.4, 7923, 1.1284

According to this, Freddy was the best of the 6 when he could actually drag his carcass into the line-up. Intuitively, that makes sense to me.)

DeltaForce

Feb 17 2006, 02:24 PM

QUOTE (URISoxFan @ Feb 17 2006, 12:47 PM)

I will say I'm suprised at the groundswell of support for Reggie Smith.

I started voting for him last time; what had kept me away were his WARP totals, which are nothing special. On the other hand, other metrics scream "Hall of Famer." For example, Smith leads that group in each of the following:

OPS+ = 137 (Singleton 132, Rice 128, Wynn 128)
RC/27 = 6.4 (Rice 6.3, Singleton 6.0, Wynn 5.4)
win shares = 325 (Wynn 305, Singleton 302, Rice 282)
win shares per 648 PA = 26.2 (Wynn 24.7, Singleton 22.9, Rice 20.2)
batter-fielder wins (Palmer/Gillette) = 31.9 (Wynn 30.0, Singleton 20.4, Rice 18.6)
WARP1 per 500 PA = 5.86 (Wynn 5.84, Singleton 4.95, Rice 4.56)
seasons with 20+ win shares = 10 (Wynn 8, Singleton 7, Rice 7)

And he's second to Wynn in the following:

WARP3 per 500 PA = 5.38 (Wynn 5.53, Singleton 5.07, Rice 4.95)
seasons with 25+ win shares = 6 (Wynn 7, Singleton 6, Rice 4)

You're right that his peak seasons, measured by WARP3 (and WARP1), are low. Really low. This is what prevented me from voting for him. And the win shares system corroborates this also -- his best win-shares season was 29 twice. Wynn had four seasons above 30, including one at 36. Rice also had one season with 36 (although no others above 28). And Singleton had a season at 36 also (and two others above 30).

[Note: why is it that Singleton is getting so little love? Isn't he a better choice that Smith? I think so.]

I ended up voting for Smith because he was so consistently very good, and our collective vote for Oliva -- whose WARP numbers are almost identical to Reggie Smith's -- convinced me that WARP was missing something important. I can easily be talked out of Smith, however. I'm still not at all comfortable with the vote for Oliva, who I suspect got so much support because people loved watching him play.

mabrowndog

Feb 17 2006, 04:13 PM

1998 BALLOT
Bert Blyleven
Gary Carter
Dwight Evans
Rollie Fingers
Keith Hernandez
Graig Nettles
Dan Quisenberry
Pete Rose
Reggie Smith
Bruce Sutter

Some very good players on this year's ballot, including Flanagan, Guerrero, Lansford & Randolph. None except Blyleven and Carter are hall-worthy, imo, although Randolph is probably most deserving of them.

I do think we need to start discussing a very obvious issue in our HOF voting, which is the influence of parity. Since the mid-70s balloting it's become increasingly dificult to find players who've truly separated themselves from the pack the way the stars of yesteryear did, as evidenced by the monstrous OPS+, ERA+ and other relativistic data compiled by the likes of Ruth, Cobb, Williams, Gehrig & others.

And by "increasingly difficult" I'm referring to players ASIDE from all the known and suspected steroid freaks. The bottom line is that, for the most part, we're not seeing OPS+ or ERA+ figures anywhere near those of 50-60-70-80 years ago.

I suspect the distribution bell curve is a helluva lot narrower, and when I have time I'll see if the data supports my thesis.

Unless some other ambitious soul wants to give it a shot....

Oh, and URI.... You might want to re-upload that yearly vote totals chart when you get a spare moment.

Vermonter At Large

Feb 17 2006, 07:57 PM

There are two problems with win-based metrics such as WS and WARP:

1. They penalize players (like Rice and Smith) who played on good teams with several great hitters, while players who played on poor teams (like Wynn and Singleton) look better in isolation.

2. They are based, as are all cumulative stats, on PA's. Here is a list of the 600 PA seasons for Singleton, Smith, Rice and Wynn:

CODE

Total Seasons with 600+ PA's:
Singleton 10
Rice 10
Smith 7
Wynn 7

So Smith, who had a long career on good teams, but lots of injury problems and relatively few full seasons, is penalized in both counts in win-based metrics. Singleton, on the other hand, is probably skewed high.

Here are the Batting Runs Created for the best seasons for these four players:

CODE

Player Year BRC BRC/PA
Rice 1978 119.0 .159
Rice 1977 112.1 .157
Rice 1979 109.8 .161
Singleton 1979 103.7 .149
Rice 1983 102.7 .148
Singleton 1973 99.0 .142
Singleton 1975 98.0 .136
Singleton 1977 97.4 .148
Wynn 1969 97.1 .147
Rice 1986 96.9 .141
Singleton 1980 96.6 .143
Smith 1977 95.9 .158
Wynn 1970 95.2 .141
Smith 1971 94.4 .137
Wynn 1974 93.1 .144
Rice 1984 92.4 .130
Wynn 1967 92.3 .135
Wynn 1972 89.9 .137
Rice 1982 89.0 .139
Smith 1970 88.9 .140
Wynn 1965 88.7 .134
Smith 1969 88.3 .146
Smith 1974 88.2 .147
Wynn 1968 87.5 .134
Singleton 1978 84.1 .138
Rice 1975 83.4 .136
Rice 1985 82.8 .137
Smith 1978 81.5 .153
Rice 1976 81.3 .132
Singleton 1983 81.2 .129

Total 80+ BRC Seasons:
Rice 10
Wynn 7
Singleton 7
Smith 6

Total 100+ BRC Seasons:
Rice 4
Singleton 1

Clearly Rice and Singleton had the biggest seasons, with 9 of the 10 best seasons.

Here is how the numbers sort out if you sort those same seasons by the BRC/PA rate:

CODE

Those Same Seasons, sorted by BRC/PA
Player Year BRC BRC/PA
Rice 1979 109.8 .161
Rice 1978 119.0 .159
Smith 1977 95.9 .158
Rice 1977 112.1 .157
Smith 1978 81.5 .153
Singleton 1979 103.7 .149
Rice 1983 102.7 .148
Singleton 1977 97.4 .148
Wynn 1969 97.1 .147
Smith 1974 88.2 .147
Smith 1969 88.3 .146
Wynn 1974 93.1 .144
Singleton 1980 96.6 .143
Singleton 1973 99.0 .142
Rice 1986 96.9 .141
Wynn 1970 95.2 .141
Smith 1970 88.9 .140
Rice 1982 89.0 .139
Singleton 1978 84.1 .138
Smith 1971 94.4 .137
Wynn 1972 89.9 .137
Rice 1985 82.8 .137
Singleton 1975 98.0 .136
Rice 1975 83.4 .136
Wynn 1967 92.3 .135
Wynn 1965 88.7 .134
Wynn 1968 87.5 .134
Rice 1976 81.3 .132
Rice 1984 92.4 .130
Singleton 1983 81.2 .129

Total .140+ BRC/PA Seasons:
Rice 5
Smith 5
Singleton 4
Wynn 3

Total .150+ BRC/PA Seasons:
Rice 3
Smith 2

Here we can see that Singleton clearly was aided in his totals by having more PA's during his peak seasons. Rice is still on top, but Smith is a fairly clear second. He just had shorter seasons, as a whole.

The thing that hurts Rice, in my view again, is the Fenway Park factor. He hit over 60% of his doubles and HRs at home at a time when Fenway was yielding about 20% more HRs and 30% more doubles than a neutral park. One of these days, I'll get around to park correcting the BRC rates (which will require me to hand poke data) for Rice and Evans to see just how much their numbers are reduced by that, but I suspect it will be fairly large.

Still, by these metrics, I think Rice and Smith come out favorably, and I think Singleton and Wynn are diminished somewhat by some of the circumstances of their careers.

Tudor Fever

Feb 17 2006, 10:04 PM

QUOTE (Vermonter At Large @ Feb 17 2006, 07:57 PM)

There are two problems with win-based metrics such as WS and WARP:

1. They penalize players (like Rice and Smith) who played on good teams with several great hitters, while players who played on poor teams (like Wynn and Singleton) look better in isolation.

2. They are based, as are all cumulative stats, on PA's. Here is a list of the 600 PA seasons for Singleton, Smith, Rice and Wynn:

CODE

Total Seasons with 600+ PA's:
Singleton 10
Rice 10
Smith 7
Wynn 7

So Smith, who had a long career on good teams, but lots of injury problems and relatively few full seasons, is penalized in both counts in win-based metrics. Singleton, on the other hand, is probably skewed high.

Vermonter:
1. In his Win Shares book, Bill James argues pretty convincingly that a player's win shares are not really affected that much by the quality of teams a player plays on. You could, however, argue that a player who plays on teams that exceed their Pyth projections are overrated by win shares, and vice versa.

2. Singleton did not play on poor teams. He spent his first 2 seasons as a part-timer with the Mets on 83-79 teams, then he in his 3 Montreal years the Expos won 70, 79, and 79 games. He then was with the Orioles for 10 years in which they always had a winning record. These O's had 7 years with 90+ wins, in two of which the had at least 100 wins and in another of which they won the World Series. Rice's teams, in contrast, never won 100 games and won 90+ 5 times, and only once after 1979.

3. If you look at my post from earlier today, Rice had a worse WARP3/PA rate than Wynn, Smith, SIngleton, Lynn, or Dwight Evans. As you imply, BRC overrates him because he played in Fenway when it was Coors East.

Vermonter At Large

Feb 17 2006, 10:46 PM

Just a little further on my post above, here are the 100+ BRC seasons for outfielders who played primarily in the 1960's, 70's and 80's and who are either in, or borderline HOFers:

CODE

100+ BRC Seasons by Outfielders
Aaron 11
Mays 11
Belle 5
Mantle 5
Rice 4
Bi.Williams 4
Parker 4
F.Robinson 3
Dw.Evans 3
Yastrzemski 3
Bo. Bonds 2
Foster 2
Kaline 2
F.Howard 2
Luzinski 2
Puckett 2
Stargell 2
Clemente 1
Re.Jackson 1
Lynn 1
Oliva 1
Pinson 1
Singleton 1
Winfield 1
Brock 0
Cedeno 0
Dawson 0
Otis 0
Wynn 0
Smith 0

Mays and Aaron aside, we see that seasons like this are very, very rare. These are just high peak years, but just looking at that, I don't see Evans as belonging where he is on this chart, as a peer of Yaz and Frank Robby. Nice ballplayer, one of my favorites, but he's not this good. Fenway Factor ...

JohntheBaptist

Feb 18 2006, 12:29 AM

1998 Ballot:

Bert Blyleven
Gary Carter
Ron Cey
Rollie Fingers
Pedro Guerrero
Keith Hernandez
Dwight Evans
Dan Quisenberry
Reggie Smith
Bruce Sutter

Vermonter At Large

Feb 18 2006, 06:25 AM

QUOTE (Tudor Fever @ Feb 17 2006, 11:04 PM)

Vermonter:
1. In his Win Shares book, Bill James argues pretty convincingly that a player's win shares are not really affected that much by the quality of teams a player plays on. You could, however, argue that a player who plays on teams that exceed their Pyth projections are overrated by win shares, and vice versa.

2. Singleton did not play on poor teams. He spent his first 2 seasons as a part-timer with the Mets on 83-79 teams, then he in his 3 Montreal years the Expos won 70, 79, and 79 games. He then was with the Orioles for 10 years in which they always had a winning record. These O's had 7 years with 90+ wins, in two of which the had at least 100 wins and in another of which they won the World Series. Rice's teams, in contrast, never won 100 games and won 90+ 5 times, and only once after 1979.

3. If you look at my post from earlier today, Rice had a worse WARP3/PA rate than Wynn, Smith, SIngleton, Lynn, or Dwight Evans. As you imply, BRC overrates him because he played in Fenway when it was Coors East.

Tudor, you're absolutely right about Singleton - my memory just failed me in that respect. Sorry.

Regarding win-based stats, I love Bill James and I love the idea of Win Shares, but I think people put too much emphasis on their actual value. First of all, the concept of what constitutes a Win is a slippery slope indeed. Runs are difficult enough. BRC are theoretical runs based on the expected runs a player would produce given his batting rates and plate appearances. They vary quite a bit when totalled at the team level, however, for a number of reasons, but I believe that they are as accurate as any run production metric around. Taking runs, either theoretical or actual, and applying them to wins increases the variation by a factor of 10 or so, especially when reduced back down to the player level (or PA-level as some people are wont to do). So even with the most accurate set of tools, win-based metrics are going to be much more general than specific, and they really tell us nothing about the player himself.

Regarding James, he is the greatest theoretician in the history of the game regarding statistics. Like all of his inventions, Win Shares was truly visionary and gave us a completely new way of looking at the game. The problem, however, is that like RC before this, the actual computation of Win Shares leaves a lot to be desired. In some places the math is way too imprecise, while in others its impossibly complicated. Its just not quite right. This doesn't diminish the concept in any way, but it does further diminish the accuracy of Win Shares as some people apply them. Win Shares are an incredibly useful tool in understanding the game, in comprehending relationship between what players do and how runs and wins result from that.

So with Wynn, I just don't trust the premise that the win-based metrics tell us he was better than other measures such as OPS+ and BRC tell us he was. In his great seasons with the Astros, he was responsible for close to 40% of his team's batting runs - more than the sum total of Ortiz/Ramirez together during the past two seasons. That's an incredible amount of production from one player, and he truly was an excellent player, but I just can't buy the premise that win-based metrics don't overvalue him because of that.

Tudor Fever

Feb 18 2006, 10:41 AM

Vermonter, NP on Singleton. The Orioles have been pathetic for a long time and it's easy to forget that they were once a juggernaut.

Regarding OPS+ and BRC causing Wynn to be overrated: Wynn played in an extreme pitcher's environment, the opposite of Rice's circumstances. If you use unadjusted BRC totals to measure them, of course Rice is going to look better than he deserves to, and Wynn is going to look worse.

You can make a good case that OPS+ overrates good hitters who, like Wynn, play in environments that favor the pitcher. However, going the other way is the fact that OPS slightly overemphasizes slugging at the expense of OBP; a formula that would be more reflective of actual value would be ((1.2*OBP) + SLP). Wynn was relatively stronger in OBP (7 times in the top 10 in unadjusted OBP, including 4 in the top 5) than in SLP( 4 times in the top 10 in unadjusted SLP, none in the top 5).

Vermonter At Large

Feb 18 2006, 11:31 AM

QUOTE (Tudor Fever @ Feb 18 2006, 11:41 AM)

Vermonter, NP on Singleton. The Orioles have been pathetic for a long time and it's easy to forget that they were once a juggernaut.

Regarding OPS+ and BRC causing Wynn to be overrated: Wynn played in an extreme pitcher's environment, the opposite of Rice's circumstances. If you use unadjusted BRC totals to measure them, of course Rice is going to look better than he deserves to, and Wynn is going to look worse.

You can make a good case that OPS+ overrates good hitters who, like Wynn, play in environments that favor the pitcher. However, going the other way is the fact that OPS slightly overemphasizes slugging at the expense of OBP; a formula that would be more reflective of actual value would be ((1.2*OBP) + SLP). Wynn was relatively stronger in OBP (7 times in the top 10 in unadjusted OBP, including 4 in the top 5) than in SLP( 4 times in the top 10 in unadjusted SLP, none in the top 5).

You are right about Wynn in this regard. For my BRC park corrections, I just calculate double and home run indexes and only use them on their home splits, so its a little cumbersome. I'll try to run the corrections on Rice, Evans and Wynn for the purpose of this discussion tonight.

I think that OPS actually undervalues walks, but overvalues singles, at least in comparison with linear weights. I think it undervalues HRs and 3Bs a little bit too.

Tudor Fever

Feb 19 2006, 10:27 PM

1998 ballot
Bert Blyleven
Gary Carter
Ron Cey
Dwight Evans
Keith Hernandez
Thurman Munson
Graig Nettles
Pete Rose
Ken Singleton
Reggie Smith

Vermonter At Large

Feb 19 2006, 11:11 PM

No matter how you try to do it, there is no good way to apply park factors or park indexes to player statistics. The principle reason for this is that hitters adapt to parks differently. Using rate analysis, however, its possible to better normalize a hitter by eliminating his home park rates altogether, and apply his away rates to his total plate appearances. Here are the Away Rate Projections for selected outfielders from the 1960's, 70's and 80's (with corrected cumulative totals, rates and the plus/minus from their actual career numbers):

CODE

PA H BB 1B 2B 3B HR BA OBP SLG OPS BRC BRC/PA
Aaron 13819 3662 1465 2225 622 83 732 .298 .371 .540 .911 2079.5 .150
   -109 +63 -69 -2 -15 -23 -.007 -.003 -.014 -.018 -41.9 -.003

Mays 12402 3163 1476 1960 471 124 608 .291 .374 .524 .898 1831.1 .148
   -120 +12 0 -52 -16 -52 -.011 -.009 -.033 -.042 -85.3 -.007

Stargell 8951 2193 877 1271 403 18 501 .273 .343 .515 .858 1279.1 .143
   -39 -60 -8 -20 -37 +26 -.008 -.011 -.013 -.024 -26.3 -.003

F.Robinson 11641 2840 1432 1723 524 81 512 .280 .367 .498 .865 1653.6 .142
   -103 +12 -34 -4 +9 -74 -.015 -.008 -.039 -.046 -74.1 -.006

Jackson 11348 2644 1384 1521 522 45 556 .267 .355 .497 .852 1595.7 .141
   +60 +9 +12 +59 -4 -7 +.005 +.006 +.007 +.013 +26.7 +.002

Clemente 10146 2983 670 2141 406 112 325 .316 .360 .486 .846 1408.4 .139
   -17 +49 -13 -34 -54 +85 -.001 +.003 +.011 +.014 +31.0 +.003

Howard 7310 1718 775 1067 234 29 387 .265 .341 .489 .830 1006.6 .138
   -56 -7 -45 -11 -6 +5 -.009 -.009 -.009 -.018 -20.1 -.003

Oliva 6822 1931 423 1317 327 41 246 .304 .345 .485 .830 932.8 .137
   +14 -25 -3 -2 -7 +26 .000 -.002 +.008 +.006 +12.4 +.002

Singleton 8498 2099 1173 1504 323 25 246 .288 .385 .441 .826 1135.3 .134
   +70 -90 +63 +6 0 0 +.006 -.002 +.006 +.003 +4.9 +.001

Kaline 11493 2896 1345 2000 483 69 345 .287 .369 .451 .820 1533.1 .133
   -111 +68 -35 -15 -6 -54 -.010 -.004 -.029 -.033 -60.8 -.005

Bonds 8026 1902 883 1220 305 64 313 .268 .347 .462 .809 1067.1 .133
   +16 -31 +34 +3 -2 -19 .000 -.002 -.009 -.011 -13.6 -.002

R. Smith 7964 1943 820 1258 319 64 303 .274 .347 .465 .812 1062.8 .133
   -77 -70 -28 -44 +7 -11 -.013 -.018 -.024 -.043 -52.1 -.007

B.Williams 10412 2593 1020 1718 427 83 364 .278 .347 .458 .805 1377.2 .132
   -113 -24 -41 -7 -4 -62 -.013 -.013 -.035 -.048 -82.8 -.008

Rice 8964 2295 636 1542 332 72 350 .277 .327 .461 .788 1170.9 .131
   -157 -34 -76 -41 -7 -32 -.021 -.021 -.041 -.062 -88.1 -.010

Evans 10492 2361 1385 1542 399 63 357 .261 .357 .437 .794 1361.7 .130
   -85 -6 +37 -84 -10 -28 -.011 -.009 -.034 -.042 -66.7 -.006

Cedeno 8062 2104 629 1403 427 48 226 .285 .339 .448 .787 1040.1 .129
   +17 -35 +11 -9 -12 +27 -.001 -.002 +.004 +.002 +9.0 +.001

Wynn 7936 1651 1151 1055 246 40 310 .245 .353 .431 .784 1020.3 .129
   -14 -73 +5 -39 +1 +19 -.005 -.011 -.005 -.016 -15.4 -.002

Yastremski 13886 3222 1750 2222 528 42 430 .267 .358 .424 .782 1772.7 .128
   -197 -95 -37 -118 -17 -22 -.019 -.021 -.038 -.059 -124.9 -.009

Staub 11110 2722 1278 1889 500 44 289 .278 .360 .427 .787 1422.5 .128
   +6 +23 +11 +1 -3 -3 -.001 +.003 -.004 -.001 +3.8 .000

Lynn 7837 1873 799 1238 337 39 259 .268 .341 .438 .779 1002.5 .128
   -87 -58 +15 -51 -3 -47 -.015 -.018 -.045 -.064 -80.5 -.010

Parker 10098 2595 677 1727 495 50 323 .277 .324 .444 .768 1280.9 .127
   -117 -6 -45 -31 -25 -16 -.013 -.012 -.027 -.039 -63.9 -.006

Horton 7993 1974 552 1359 264 24 328 .267 .316 .442 .758 1006.5 .126
   -19 -68 +15 -20 -16 +3 -.006 -.011 -.014 -.025 -28.6 -.004

Cruz 8849 2239 814 1584 389 62 204 .280 .345 .421 .766 1104.5 .125
   -12 -84 -17 -2 -32 +39 -.004 -.011 +.001 -.010 -9.4 -.001

Pinson 10349 2784 517 1966 486 124 207 .285 .319 .423 .742 1259.8 .122
   +27 -57 +377 +1 -3 -49 -.001 -.003 -.019 -.022 +58.9 +.006

Brock 11189 2965 727 2193 504 123 145 .285 .330 .399 .729 1324.1 .118
   -58 -34 -54 +18 -18 -4 -.008 -.008 -.012 -.020 -31.0 -.003

Off the bat, we notice that all hitters have a tendency to hit slightly better at home than on the road. This we can chalk up to hitters adapting to their home parks, relaxing in the friendly confines of familiarity, and/or fan support. So only six players in the list above had higher BRC/PA numbers on the road than at home. The average hitter loses about 20 points of OPS or .003 BRC/PA in this projection

There are tons of interesting things in this analysis, but confining the discussion to the current players, we see that Rice and Evans both take fairly big hits from the Fenway factor, but probably not as severe as we might have expected. The lost fewer HRs than either Kaline or Billy Williams, for instance. Rice also lost fewer doubles than we might have expected.

In comparison, Jimmy Wynn didn't get much advantage from being separated from the original Dome, which had ridiculous HR indexes of below 70 when he played there. He gained a few HRs, but fewer than his fellow Domies Cedeno and Cruz. All of them took hits in doubles, particularly Wynn, so there were probably more than a few turf doubles in their portfolios.

Singleton was one of the few who gained OPS and BRC/PA from this analysis, which is somewhat logical since he played in pitchers' parks his whole career. In reality, though, his gain was mostly in singles. Did Weaver have the grass cut a little high in Baltimore?

Smith also played mostly in pitcher-friendly parks for most of his career, but he actually lost 43 points of OPS and .007 BRC/PA.

Lynn actually lost 47 HRs, which absolutely kills him in my estimation.

In this analysis, I think Singleton comes out most favorably, and I am jumping on his bandwagon here. Smith, Rice and Evans are all on the border (still), but at least I think the question of how much the Fenway factor hurt them has been answered. Rice took a much bigger hit than Evans did at home, losing 157 hits, but his rates are still comparable to Evans, who had a longer career.

Its tough.

LahoudOrBillyC

Feb 19 2006, 11:28 PM

QUOTE (Vermonter At Large @ Feb 19 2006, 08:11 PM)

No matter how you try to do it, there is no good way to apply park factors or park indexes to player statistics. The principle reason for this is that hitters adapt to parks differently. Using rate analysis, however, its possible to better normalize a hitter by eliminating his home park rates altogether, and apply his away rates to his total plate appearances.

This analysis eliminates half of a players games. You cannot simply toss out a player's home games--that makes no sense at all. If a player plays well at home (relative to everyone else), that counts.

Let's take this hypoethetical example. Let's say Larry Walker is playing for the Rockies and he hits .280/.355/.435 on the road (blah) and .450/.550/.750 at home (the best player of all-time). And let us say that Coors Field plays like it does, with a park factor of 130 or whatever.

By your estimation, Walker is a mediocre player, since he could't hit on the road. By my estimation, he is the MVP. While everyone else is helped by 30% in Coors, he is helped by 80%. He deserves credit for the extra 50%, which you are not giving him.

Park factors are actually one of the things the analysis community got right 30 years ago, and everyone pretty much agrees on what they mean.

Lose Remerswaal

Feb 20 2006, 08:31 AM

1998

Rollie Fingers
Dave Parker
Dan Quisenberry
Jim Rice
Bruce Sutter.

Same as last time, plus Parker.

Thinking about Gary Carter . . .

Tudor Fever

Feb 20 2006, 10:01 AM

Lose, why are you voting for Rice? He had a lower WARP3/PA than Singleton, Smith, Evans, and Lynn, none of whom you voted for. I respectfully submit that you are voting based on perceived reputation rather than looking at how much he actually did to help his team win games.

On the subject of WARP3, Gary Carter had 8 seasons of 9 or higher WARP3, which is superb.

Vermonter At Large

Feb 20 2006, 10:54 AM

QUOTE (LahoudOrBillyC @ Feb 20 2006, 12:28 AM)

This analysis eliminates half of a players games. You cannot simply toss out a player's home games--that makes no sense at all. If a player plays well at home (relative to everyone else), that counts.

Let's take this hypoethetical example. Let's say Larry Walker is playing for the Rockies and he hits .280/.355/.435 on the road (blah) and .450/.550/.750 at home (the best player of all-time). And let us say that Coors Field plays like it does, with a park factor of 130 or whatever.

By your estimation, Walker is a mediocre player, since he could't hit on the road. By my estimation, he is the MVP. While everyone else is helped by 30% in Coors, he is helped by 80%. He deserves credit for the extra 50%, which you are not giving him.

Park factors are actually one of the things the analysis community got right 30 years ago, and everyone pretty much agrees on what they mean.

I'm not eliminating half of a player's games. I am isolating the influence of their home park and comparing those numbers to their actual career numbers to try to gauge the influence of their home park. I could have (and did) isolate the park indexes and apply them to their rates, but you still run into the problem that different players deal with their parks in different ways, so generic park factors lose that (along with the abstraction of having to deal with rates).

I'm not saying, for instance, that Yaz would have hit 118 fewer doubles over the course of his career if he had played in Cleveland. I'm saying that Yaz gained 118 doubles playing in Fenway, which shows him to have been an adaptable hitter who took advantage of the Monster. The point is that the park doesn't influence each player the same way. Yaz, Boggs, Lynn and Mo Vaughan all used the wall well from the left side, going to the opposite field a lot. They probably wouldn't have done this (or had to do it) in a symmetrical ball park, but that doesn't really matter. They used the wall. Ted Williams didn't use the wall, nor really do Ortiz or Nixon. Teddy B. and Papi didn't need to use the wall, because they had/have power that transcends park factor. Nixon loses playing in Fenway because he doesn't go the opposite field and doesn't have the power to transcend park effects. Does this make him a victim of the park, or a victim of his own inability to adapt?

At its most rudimentary, park factors don't even isolate left/right hitting. So in the calculation of OPS+ or ERA+, Kevin Millar gets the same advantage in Fenway that Trot Nixon does using run-based PFs. Run-based park factors also fail to isolate the different types of hits. Look, for instance, at Forbes Field park factors (from Retrosheet) for the 1960's:

1960: .945
1961: .975
1962: 1.009
1963: .963
1964: 1.017
1965: .964
1966: 1.003
1967: 1.027
1968: 1.001
1969: .884
1970: .869

So first of all, there were absolutely no changes to Forbes Field after 1959, so the fluctuations in PF, from 87 to 103 are absolutely spurious. These numbers aren't measuring the park, they are measuring the players who played there during those years and they are measuring the way the game was played. So while in concept, PFs are a worthy notion, they are inexhorably flawed because they do not separate the park from the other aspects of the game.

Looking at Clemente and Stargell in ARP we see that both Stargell and Clemente hit significantly more HRs on the road, but fewer triples. This is because the center field dimensions of Forbes were so deep. This affected the big hitters a lot, but that effect wouldn't have been the same on Gene Alley, or Matty Alou or Bill Mazeroski.

Looking at the Astrodome is interesting. Isolating the HR index for that park, it was around 70 for HRs while Wynn, Cedeno and Cruz played there, which is ridiculous. All were robbed of HRs playing there, but Wynn was less affected than either Cedeno or Cruz. Why? Because Wynn probably hit HRs that transcended those dimensions. He was a fly ball hitter, while Cedeno and Cruz were line drive hitters. This also explains why Wynn hit fewer doubles on the road than at home.

The two Tiger right-handed hitters, Horton and Kaline, both were surprising in that they lost nothing from playing in the heavily lefty-favoring Tiger Stadium. The reasons were different: Horton had Howard-like big power that transcended the dimenions of the park. He was a dead pull hitter. Kaline was much like Yaz. He was primarily a line drive hitter, but could hit the ball hard to all fields, so could pull one down the line in left, or push one down the line in right with good power. He adapted to playing in Detroit.

Looking at Jim Rice is surprising. He only lost 21 HRs in this analysis, but he lost 76 singles and 41 doubles. Most right-handed hitters gain singles outside of Fenway (such as Evans) because left fielders play shallower in Fenway. Why did Rice lose so many singles? Those of us who remember seeing him play know why - Jim Rice hit the ball so hard to left field that he led the world in wall ball singles. In fact, a great many of those singles and doubles would have been HRs in many fields. Nobody hit the ball harder from the right side than Jim Ed Rice. He was an uncompromising hitter. If he had some elevation on the ball, it went over the Monster for a HR. If not, it would ricochet off the wall for a double or single. In some ways he was helped by Fenway, but in other ways he was hurt by it.

Looking at your example of Larry Walker, I pulled numbers for both he and Todd Helton to get an idea of how Coors affects them:

CODE

PA H BB 1B 2B 3B HR BA OBP SLG OPS BRC BRC/PA
Walker 7600 1839 897 1087 388 46 319 .276 .360 .492 .852 1063.3 .140
-230 +25 -12 -63 -15 -49 -.037 -.027 -.076 -.103 -88.5 -.012

Helton 4751 1221 641 698 309 14 200 .301 .392 .531 .923 711.5 .150
-151 -26 -73 -19 -8 -51 -.038 -.037 -.085 -.122 -92.5 -.019

Although both hitters lose over 100 points of OPS and a chunk of BRC/PA, I really don't think this hurts them in analysis. They both lose a lot of HRs in isolation, but their other numbers are variable. Helton loses very few doubles but quite a few singles. Helton is an adaptable hitter, not adverse to dropping in singles in front of a deep outfield and hits overall well in any park. Walker on the other hand, is more of a pull hitter, and loses more doubles than singles, because of the Coors factor. Both still have good numbers in isolation, and are in the range of HOF consideration certainly. Walker was an excellent hitter, but certainly not a .955 OPS hitter. Would you rather have Walker considered fairly through this type of analysis or treated like Chuck Klein who was pretty much a pariah here through his association with the short porch in Baker Bowl?

I'm not trying to re-write players' careers by projecting these numbers, just trying to add meaning to the numbers. In this aspect, I think this type of tool yields much more information than generic park factors.

mabrowndog

Feb 20 2006, 08:11 PM

QUOTE

Lose, why are you voting for Rice? He had a lower WARP3/PA than Singleton, Smith, Evans, and Lynn, none of whom you voted for. I respectfully submit that you are voting based on perceived reputation rather than looking at how much he actually did to help his team win games.

Boy, that SoSH/Maple Street Press annual can't hit the newstands soon enough...

bsj

Feb 21 2006, 09:40 AM

QUOTE (Tudor Fever @ Feb 20 2006, 10:01 AM)

Lose, why are you voting for Rice? He had a lower WARP3/PA than Singleton, Smith, Evans, and Lynn, none of whom you voted for. I respectfully submit that you are voting based on perceived reputation rather than looking at how much he actually did to help his team win games.

it is possible to vote for a player based on something other than saber #'s, no?

Seriously, I'll cast a ballot today. I'll take one more look at smith but no promises. His numbers just didnt impress me to be honest, your all of the excellent points above aside.

Majordad1

Feb 21 2006, 11:17 AM

1998 Ballot

Gary Carter
Rollie Fingers
Pete Rose
Bruce Sutter

QUOTE

Blyleven and Carter are no-brainers.

I have to respectfully disagree in the case of Blyleven.

While crusading for Rollie Fingers, I was refuted with statements like his ERA of 2.90 was "pedestrian" and his ERA+ of 119 wasn't good enough, even though other posters arbitrarily used an ERA+ of 120 to indicate dominance. Blyleven's career ERA was 3.31. and his ERA+ was 118. He had 287 wins over 22 years, while Fingers had 114 wins and 341 saves over 17 years. Blyleven has only 2 All Star appearances, with no CY, MVPs or other national level awards.

Fingers belongs in the Hall of Fame. Blyleven is relegated to the group of "very good, but not good enough" players.