I'm surprised that Yount is higher than Ripken, actually even that they're even the same tier. In the world of HOF SSs, I've always considered Wagner in Tier 1 by himself, Ripken Tier 2 by himself, then most of the others Tier 3 without a huge degree of separation, including Yount and Larkin. I'd be interested to see where Jeter would come in with your current methodology.
Yount and Ripken were about as close to tied as you can get; they were very similar in value from peak to career and at every breakdown in between. Yount is beating Ripken in my list because of the relative weights I've assigned. You could reasonably change those around and get Ripken on top of Yount, but no matter what you did, they'd always be virtually tied. FWIW, Bill James has Ripken above Yount on his top 100 list, with Ripken at 48 and Yount at 55 - 7 spaces apart. But he's got three pitchers and Campanella in 4 of those 7 spots, so apples to apples he's got them 3 spaces apart. I don't really disagree with your Wagner/Tier I, etc. lineup, except I think you've undervalued Yount somewhat. If you line up their OPS+, from best season to worst and ignoring Ripken's first very short callup season, they each played 20 years and Yount beats Ripken in 9 of the first 10 seasons. Ripken beats Yount in 6 of the second ten seasons. I see Yount as the better hitter (by a little) and Ripken as the better fielder (by a little more). But hitting is worth more than fielding, and Yount wins by a nose. If you see it the other way around, you're not wrong. If you see a big gap between them, regardless who you have on top, I think you are wrong.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
Just perception, nothing statistical in my rankings and I happened to see the majority of Cal's peak and little of Yount's. The only huge gaps I see are in All-Star appearances (little more than a popularity contest) and Gold Gloves.
That Newsday shortstop list is a joke, so you were right to laugh. Jeter hit about as well as Yount and Ripken but he was, charitably, an adequate shortstop at best (and there were some years when he was not at his best). Now, all that said, hitting as well as Ripken and Yount for 20 years is no small feat, and Jeter is without any doubt a deserving Hall of Famer. But I agree that he's not in the Ripken/Yount class. It looked like he might be about halfway through his career, but nothing much happened to improve his ranking after that. I think he probably belongs somewhere between Cronin and Larkin on my list. And note, since I assume you're a fan, that Larkin suffers most from his lack of durability; did you know he only played 140 games in a season seven times? That costs him a lot in total career points, and it also prevents him from having much of a peak since two of those seasons were early in his career when he wasn't great yet. When Larkin was healthy, he was Ripken/Yount class; he just wasn't healthy often enough to be ranked with them.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
Completely agree on Larkin, I don't collect him because he was the all-time best at the position or overrate his accomplishments, more for the memories of going to Cincy games with my dad (including Larkin's call up in 1986). I do wonder what he could have done if healthy the majority of his playing years, but what-ifs shouldn't be a factor in HOF worthiness discussions.
Sounds about right on Jeter too, marginally better overall, hyped much higher in collectibles due to NY market.
@JoeBanzai said:
I guess that makes sense as long as we agree that Killebrew was better! ;-)
I'll agree. Reggie was supposed to be such an awesome power hitter, but even George Brett,
not known for his power had a higher career OPS. And Reggie just barely beat him in SLG %.
Reggie was an overrated slugger when a gap hitter(doubles machine) can match those numbers.
Killebrew was the real deal as his numbers in those departments were much higher than Reggie.
@Darin said:
Reggie was supposed to be such an awesome power hitter, but even George Brett,
not known for his power had a higher career OPS. And Reggie just barely beat him in SLG %.
Reggie was an overrated slugger when a gap hitter(doubles machine) can match those numbers.
Killebrew was the real deal as his numbers in those departments were much higher than Reggie.
Brett's OPS was a little higher because Reggie played so many years in Oakland; Reggie's OPS+ is higher, which is what matters. I've got Reggie and Brett essentially tied (feel free to reverse my order of Reggie>Brett, I won't mind). I show them as close as two players could be as far as peak value, but Reggie has a few more "good" seasons than Brett so he wins. I may be understating Brett's value at 3B, or I may not, but I see Reggie as the better hitter and Brett not quite making up that gap with his fielding. As close as they are, I can say with confidence that had Brett not gotten injured 2/3 of the way through his epic 1980 season he would have topped Jackson. But he did, and Jackson's 1969 season is better than any season Brett ever had, and that stops Brett from beating Jackson at "peak" (which I have defined in a much more complicated way than "best season", but you get my point.)
I'll note, too, that just as I am giving added weight to peak offensive seasons, and therefore less relative weight to offense in off-peak seasons, so, too, am I giving more weight to defense in peak seasons and less relative weight to defense in off-peak seasons. This matters in the Jackson-Brett comparison because while Brett played at a "good" level at 3B for a long time, Jackson played at a "very good" level in RF at his peak, and got pretty bad later in his career. If every season were weighted equally, Brett would beat Jackson overall; weighting peak seasons more heavily keeps the defensive gap low. But unless you're willing to kick Koufax (and Kiner, and Puckett, and Jim Rice, and so on) out of the HOF entirely, I think you have to agree that peak performance does matter more than off-peak performance when you think about how good a player was.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
So 1969 was Reggies' best season. Not bad, 47 HR and 36 2B. 334 Total bases.
Pretty good slugging numbers.
Oh, in 1979 George Brett had 363 Total bases. 29 more than Jackson had in his
best season. Brett had several years better than Jackson in 1969, simply because Reggie
was a one trick pony. HR or K.
@Darin said:
So 1969 was Reggies' best season. Not bad, 47 HR and 36 2B. 334 Total bases.
Pretty good slugging numbers.
Oh, in 1979 George Brett had 363 Total bases. 29 more than Jackson had in his
best season. Brett had several years better than Jackson in 1969, simply because Reggie
was a one trick pony. HR or K.
If you ignore that Jackson's year was in 1969, and in Oakland, then Brett's season was better. And if you ignore the sun, it's night. Neither is terribly helpful.
Ryan Howard was a one trick pony. Here's a list of his top-10 appearances in OPS+:
2nd, 9th, 10th
Dave Kingman was the ultimate one trick pony; here's his list:
{This page intentionally left blank.}
Reggie Jackson on the other hand, was one of the best hitters in baseball history. Here's his list (and Brett's):
Of course categories like this don't interest you, as a lot of common sense is involved
coming to the conclusion that Brett was a better hitter.
And with categories you seem to like, for instance OPS+, Brett's highest year was over
200, beating Jacksons' 69 season, yet somehow Reggie is still the better hitter.
I liked them both. Didn't Jackson have a bunch of home run titles? That seemed to be omitted.
mark
Walker Proof Digital Album Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
@Darin said:
Seasons player struck out over 100 times:
Jackson: 18
Brett: 0
Seasons player won batting title:
Jackson: 0
Brett : 3
Of course categories like this don't interest you, as a lot of common sense is involved
coming to the conclusion that Brett was a better hitter.
And with categories you seem to like, for instance OPS+, Brett's highest year was over
200, beating Jacksons' 69 season, yet somehow Reggie is still the better hitter.
Picking out Ks and BA from the universe of statistics to advance a "better than" argument is so stupid my first thought was that I was having my leg pulled. But then you pointed out that Brett's best "season" in OPS+ was over 200, which was obviously a reference to 1980, and the entire basis of this debate has been that Brett didn't play a full season in 1980. That's how I know you're pulling my leg; nobody is that stupid.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
If you ignore that Jackson's year was in 1969, and in Oakland, then Brett's season was better. And if you ignore the sun, it's night. Neither is terribly helpful.
OPS+ does not agree. You use this measurement all the time but here you say it's wrong,
I actually tend to agree with you in this specific instance, but if so, doesn't that mean you feel that Reggie deserved a higher OPS+ EVERY year in Oakland?
2013,14 and 15 Certificate Award Winner Harmon Killebrew Master Set and Master Topps Set
Baseball was different anyway when Brett and Jackson played.
Brett has said several times that they used to be embarassed when they struck out,
they used to take pride in putting the ball in play. Now today's players don't care how
many K's they accumulate. And today's so called experts like yourself who thinks he knows
how to gauge who was the better player doesn't think strikeouts are of much importance either.
I wonder why, when a batter comes to the plate with bases empty, the one thing he is most trying to avoid
is striking out? It seems fairly important. To people with common sense.
Answer me one question. With Brett having put the ball in play so many more times than Reggie, how
many more runners did Brett advance from first to second or from first to third than Reggie did.
How many of those runners ended up scoring?
If you don't have these numbers in your analysis then I really can't take your argument seriously
because you never present a complete picture of a players abilities.
@Darin said:
Here's an interesting stat that Dallas won't give any credence to:
Jackson had 68 Sac flies in his career, Brett had 120.
Gee, I wonder how many times Jackson struck out with a runner on third, less than two out,
when Brett was putting the ball in play.
In an interesting bit of irony Brett hit exactly 52 more sac flies then Jackson. Brett also hit into exactly 52 more double plays then Reggie
mark
Walker Proof Digital Album Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
@Darin said:
Here's an interesting stat that Dallas won't give any credence to:
Jackson had 68 Sac flies in his career, Brett had 120.
Gee, I wonder how many times Jackson struck out with a runner on third, less than two out,
when Brett was putting the ball in play.
In an interesting bit of irony Brett hit exactly 52 more sac flies then Jackson. Brett also hit into exactly 52 more double plays then Reggie
mark
That is very interesting, lol..
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
@JoeBanzai said:
Don't like how OPS+ says Reggie was better when Brett's OPS was higher. Yeah, yeah Oakland was the hardest park to hit in ever.
It makes no difference whether you like it or not, or whether you understand it or not. Some parks - like Oakland and Anaheim back in the day - are harder to hit in than others, like Wrigley and Fenway in any day. No matter how many people want to pretend, and no matter how hard they want to pretend, that all parks are equal, it will never be so. Some kind of adjustment is required, and OPS+ is the best (relatively simple) adjustment that anyone has come up with.
@JoeBanzai said:
OPS+ does not agree. You use this measurement all the time but here you say it's wrong,
I actually tend to agree with you in this specific instance, but if so, doesn't that mean you feel that Reggie deserved a higher OPS+ EVERY year in Oakland?
There's some serious misunderstanding going on here. OPS+ by itself can't be used to determine who had a better season, else we can throw out Jackson '69 and Brett '80 and just heap our praises on Gates Brown in 1968. The length of the season - this is the factor you have yet to even acknowledge, let alone address - is the other half. Brett had a higher OPS+, but he missed so many games that Jackson's season was more valuable. As for deserving a higher OPS+ EVERY year in Oakland, I have no idea what you're talking about nor, I suspect, do you. I will say that if you sorted every hitter by raw OPS and separately by OPS+ for each of Reggie's years in Oakland, he would be higher on every OPS+ list than on the corresponding raw OPS list. But the adjustment doesn't turn bad seasons into good seasons; raw OPS is 90% of it (at least), the adjustment the other 10% (at most).
@JoeBanzai said:
Here's an interesting stat that Dallas won't give any credence to:
Jackson had 68 Sac flies in his career, Brett had 120.
Gee, I wonder how many times Jackson struck out with a runner on third, less than two out,
when Brett was putting the ball in play.
I have to know, how long did it take you to find this piece of trivia? In any event, while I did not look at this situation specifically (because it would be pointless) I certainly did look at how well each player hit in run producing situations generally. Jackson's WPA (a good proxy for situational hitting) was 50.7 for his career; Brett's was 49.7. Reggie's 1969 WPA was 6.9 in 1969; Brett's was 6.2 in 1980. And yes, every AB with a runner on third and less than two outs is in there. Brett no doubt is better to have up than Jackson in that situation, but there are also situations where it's better to have Jackson at the plate. Look at all of them if you're trying to learn anything worthwhile; otherwise don't look at all.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
@Darin said:
Thanks- Let's just agree you're not as smart as you think you are and move on.
I guess if you put more credence to what's on the back of baseball cards of the 50's to 90's to that of advanced statistics you will come to that conclusion.
mark
Walker Proof Digital Album Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
@Skin2 said:
As long as you have Mazeroski at the bottom of that list, I'm not going to debate.
The only thing that surprised me was that he landed below Highpockets Kelly.
I won't try to cajole you into a debate, but I would be interested in your overall impression. Try to ignore differences of just a few spots - those are well within the margin of error - and let me know if your impression is that I'm giving too much or too little weight to longevity, too much or too little weight to defense, too much or too little weight to the competitiveness of the era, if any player looks way too high or low, etc.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
Yes those two things are different. I completely get your point. On a team of "replacement" players a slightly lesser hitter might produce more runs for the team.
I can't say if Reggie won more games for his team than Harmon without also thinking about their attitudes on the field. Killebrew was never pulled from a game for lack of hustle and was far less of a distraction than Reggie. No way to translate that into wins or losses statistically, but in this case I'll take Killebrew as well.
The clear advantage for Reggie is his longer career. Killebrew got his "old man" years, but was cheated out of 2 or 3 "young years". I think anyone would reasonably assume Harmon's "value" would have been higher had he been allowed to play in the minors then promoted or allowed to play in Washington. BUT he wasn't, so we'll never know. We could look at the "average" stats for HOF sluggers in their first 2-3 years and "+" that to Killebrew's numbers. I'd like to see that!!!!! I did it myself for home runs and Killebrew comes up with about 700.
Reggie's second advantage is his running ability. Killebrew had 7 triples in 1961(in Minnesota, smaller park than Washington), while Reggie managed a high of 6 in cavernous Oakland. Young Harmon could run! Killer loses young/fast years again.
Lastly, in my opinion OPS+ does exactly what you say it doesn't............."measures actual accomplishment" adjusting a players number up or down because it was a down (or up) year for the AVERAGE player does not in fact measure their accomplishment. It measures it in relation to a lot of average players, a few crappy ones and a few great players. If you want to separate the players into tiers before figuring "+" that might show something more meaningful.
Exactly the same IMO than saying if Killebrew hits against 66% of lefties and we shorten the fences to "average" the distances his production/value gets better.
I'll stick with a combination of SLG and OPS without the + as the primary stats in measuring sluggers, giving more weight to BA and OBP for "all around" hitters (Brett would be a good example).
Fielding just doesn't affect my thinking unless the player is very good or very bad. As Teddy Ballgame said "nobody comes to the games to watch players catch the ball, they come to see them hit."
Again, good discussion!
Off to work.
2013,14 and 15 Certificate Award Winner Harmon Killebrew Master Set and Master Topps Set
Lastly, in my opinion OPS+ does exactly what you say it doesn't............."measures actual accomplishment" adjusting a players number up or down because it was a down (or up) year for the AVERAGE player does not in fact measure their accomplishment. It measures it in relation to a lot of average players, a few crappy ones and a few great players. If you want to separate the players into tiers before figuring "+" that might show something more meaningful.
I'll stick with a combination of SLG and OPS without the + as the primary stats in measuring sluggers, giving more weight to BA and OBP for "all around" hitters (Brett would be a good example).
But how many games you will help your team win is directly related to how well the average player is playing - those are your opponents! If a player has an OPS of .800 two years in a row, his team will be more successful, all else equal, playing opponents with an average OPS of .700 than they will playing opponents with an average OPS of .750.
While you're free to disagree with the exact methods used to make park adjustments, it is simply incorrect not to make them at all. There were some terrific hitters on the Astros in the 60's, 70's and 80's - HOF level hitters even - but their raw OPS numbers weren't terribly impressive. And when Johnny Bench and Hank Aaron played in the Dome, their raw OPS numbers weren't terribly impressive either. If, on average, it takes 6 runs to win a game in Fenway and 4 runs to win a game in the Dome, then a run produced in the Dome is worth more than a run produced in Fenway (1/4 of a win vs. 1/6 of a win). That's the theory - and it's not really open to debate - behind the "+".
Anytime you measure players without taking into account the circumstances in which they played, you are wasting your time. Everyone seems to understand that Honus Wagner (OPS .858) was a better hitter than Chuck Klein (OPS .922), and well they should - Wagner was a MUCH better hitter than Klein. But then people seem to forget that adjustments (whether mathematical or just mental) aren't only necessary for deadball vs. roaring '30's comparisons, they're always necessary. The adjustment required to compare Wagner and Klein is enormous, and the adjustment required to compare Jackson to Killebrew is small, but they're both required.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
I would say with the top four being from the 10's and 20's, and twelve of the top 25 being from the 10's and 20's, that your era adjustments aren't in there properly. OPS+ and other current measurements don't account properly for why the stars of certain era's were able to distance themselves from their peers, compared to more comeptitive eras's
A similar list for the top pitchers will produce a similarly skewed list of guys from that era.
@Skin2 said:
I would say with the top four being from the 10's and 20's, and twelve of the top 25 being from the 10's and 20's, that your era adjustments aren't in there properly. OPS+ and other current measurements don't account properly for why the stars of certain era's were able to distance themselves from their peers, compared to more comeptitive eras's
A similar list for the top pitchers will produce a similarly skewed list of guys from that era.
Yeah, I think you're right that the era adjustment needs a tweak, so I made one and Speaker drops a few spots. But note that what you are calling "the 10's and 20's" must also include players who peaked in the 00's and '30's to get a number as high as you did in the top 25. You may also want to count the next 25 - it's very heavy with post-war players, and the bottom 25 is just as heavy with pre-war players (both before and after my tweak).
A step in the right direction, with Stargell moving up several spots. Reggie should have
went down, of course. You do many more of these lists and eventually you'll have Reggie Number 1.
While you're free to disagree with the exact methods used to make park adjustments, it is simply incorrect not to make them at all. There were some terrific hitters on the Astros in the 60's, 70's and 80's - HOF level hitters even - but their raw OPS numbers weren't terribly impressive. And when Johnny Bench and Hank Aaron played in the Dome, their raw OPS numbers weren't terribly impressive either. If, on average, it takes 6 runs to win a game in Fenway and 4 runs to win a game in the Dome, then a run produced in the Dome is worth more than a run produced in Fenway (1/4 of a win vs. 1/6 of a win). That's the theory - and it's not really open to debate - behind the "+".
I agree that making park adjustments is a necessity. I think it's a great idea! If you are taking the averages of all hitters in a park.......some will even be pretty accurate. Some will be off by a lot, I think.
Notable exceptions would be Fenway Park and Yankee Stadium, especially before they were remodeled (that's when quite a few of the guys we talk about played).
Fenway was not an easy park for left handed batters, because of the "monster" managers would try to pitch more left handed hurlers there to compensate, thus making it an even more difficult park for left handed batters. Ted Williams said it was NOT an easy park to hit in for a left handed batter unless you could hit to left field (something he wasn't interested in).
Yankee stadium was of course a GREAT place to hit if you were a left handed batter and could pull the ball. Left was deeper than the porch in right and left center was "death valley" for right handers.
How many times have we heard that Duke Snider had it easy being the only left handed hitter in a great lineup? Did he? How much?
I am sure the more symmetrical parks would be more accurate.?
The numbers should be there and fairly easy to find for stat guys.
We seem to agree on the theory that a left handed batter has an overall advantage. It would be nice (for me anyway, any one else curious?) to see if that is true, and if so, know how much.
I realize you must hate hearing my theory's, but I'll bet you would be more interested if there were numbers to prove (or disprove) them! Especially disprove!!!!!! LOL
2013,14 and 15 Certificate Award Winner Harmon Killebrew Master Set and Master Topps Set
@JoeBanzai said:
We seem to agree on the theory that a left handed batter has an overall advantage. It would be nice (for me anyway, any one else curious?) to see if that is true, and if so, know how much.
I realize you must hate hearing my theory's, but I'll bet you would be more interested if there were numbers to prove (or disprove) them! Especially disprove!!!!!! LOL
On the contrary, I like hearing your (or anyone else's) theories, and that left-handed hitters have a natural advantage (in the same way strong/tall/fast people do) is perfectly valid. And I have no doubt that someone with the data and the time could quantify that advantage. But, and I've said this before and you haven't acknowledged it, nobody is going to spend that time because the result is nothing but trivia. It wouldn't be appropriate to use it to "adjust" for anything, any more than we would downgrade Frank Howard for being tall or upgrade Freddy Patek for being short.
As for park factors, you're hung up on the relative ease of hitting a HR to left or right field as if that's the only thing that differs among various parks. Sure, it's one of the things but it's never the only thing and hardly ever the most important thing. What made Dodger Stadium (when Koufax pitched) the hardest hitter's park were the acres of foul territory. Foul balls that would have gone into the stands anywhere else became outs in LA. And while there are a few parks (notably Fenway) where it can make a large difference whether a ball is hit to left or to right, it's more common to have parks like Oakland, or the Dome, where ALL the fences were deeper than in most other parks.
As for Reggie, his best year on the Yankees - where you are implying he was helped tremendously by the short right field fence - was in 1980. That year, he hit 25 HR on the road and 16 at home. His raw OPS was 1.123 on the road and .864 at home. Yankee Stadium was a pitcher's park, and it cost Jackson as much or more as it cost anyone else (that year - I didn't look at any others). Evaluating Reggie Jackson - or anyone else - by his raw OPS is incorrect.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
I can't acknowledge an opinion. It might be trivial it might be significant. Not sure how you ( a stat guy?) can jump to that conclusion with no data to back it up. A lack of data cannot prove it either way. I could easily say the difference in how two powerhouse sluggers plays defense is trivial as well. Before there were measurements on fielding, no matter how flawed, all you had was fielding %.
In THIS comparison both players were very close in physical ability and size. Baseball Reference has them listed at exactly the same height and weight. Your ranking rates Jackson higher I think Killebrew was better. I am logically looking for a way to prove my point, but there is no data there, well it's there no one has published it.
If Freddy Patek (good reference my man!) hit ALMOST as many home-runs as Frank Howard ("The Capital Punisher" best nickname ever) I would say he was a better hitter because he overcame an obstacle. Did something similar to another who has an advantage.
I looked at all of Jackson's Yankee Stadium years, not just one, and compared them to all his Oakland years, where you are implying that he was hurt tremendously, and he wasn't hurt that much in Oakland.
We're just going around in circles. I am not a stat guy, so I am not going to take the time to try to prove what we already know;
In baseball it's more difficult for a right handed batter to hit home runs than a left handed batter, so if two home run hitters are nearly equal, the right handed batter is better. ;-)
Gotta go
2013,14 and 15 Certificate Award Winner Harmon Killebrew Master Set and Master Topps Set
@JoeBanzai said:
In baseball it's more difficult for a right handed batter to hit home runs than a left handed batter, so if two home run hitters are nearly equal, the right handed batter is better. ;-)
Fair enough; that's a perfectly valid way to define "better". The right handed batter may also be "better" at chess, which would be just as relevant to what I'm doing with this list as the way you're using "better". But the one you would want to have on your team - if your only goal was to win - is the left handed batter; he is "better" in the only way that matters in baseball, and that's the way I'm using the word.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
As promised (threatened), I've done the same analysis of non-HOFers that I applied to the HOFers (non-pitchers, 20th century, and excluding cheaters and other ineligibles). I'm going to show them (the ones that popped into my head, by tier only and skip the actual ranking number because I think those are more distracting than helpful.
Allen (2)
J. Wynn (4)
W. Clark (4)
Staub (5)
Singleton (5)
Bo. Bonds (5)
Grich (5)
Magee (5)
F. Howard (5)
Da. Evans (5)
R. Smith (6)
Parker (6)
Murcer (6) Bando (6)
Pinson (6)
Cedeno (6)
Hernandez (6) T. Simmons (6)
Murphy (6) Torre (6)
Cash (6)
Cruz (6)
J. Clark (6)
Sheckard (6)
Hack (6)
R. White (6) Trammell (6)
Otis (7) Minoso (7)
Colavito (7)
Nettles (7)
Dw. Evans (7)
Harrah (7)
Whitaker (7)
W. Davis (7)
Mattingly (7)
Foster (7)
K. Boyer (7)
Leach (7)
Powell (7)
McGriff (7)
Oliva (7)
Cey (8)
P. Guerrero (8) Freehan (8) Fregosi (8)
Garvey (8)
Berger (8)
Lynn (8)
B. Bell (8)
D. Walker (8)
Stephens (8)
Elliott (8)
Vernon (8)
Campaneris (8)
Strawberry (8)
Hodges (8)
Randolph (8)
Bob Johnson (8)
Callison (8)
Oliver (8)
Bonilla (8)
Tenace (8)
Keller (8)
Maris (8)
Lopes (8)
Monday (9)
Canseco (9)
C. Jones (9)
York (9)
Babe Herman (9)
Camilli (9)
McRae (9)
Fairly (9)
E. Davis (10)
J. Carter (10)
Carty (10)
K. Gibson (10)
E. Howard (10)
Porter (10)
Holmes (10)
Buckner (10)
I would have no objection to anyone in tier 5 or better being in the HOF; those were all great players, and a good chunk of the most underrated players of all time. But below tier 5 there are only a handful that I would put in the HOF (shown in bold) and they are all catchers and infielders (and Minoso who didn't get a chance in MLB until he was 25). What I didn't notice when I made the change to the era adjustment that skin suggested (and I agree that it makes the list better) is that where before I had agreed with most players in tier 6 being a HOFer, I now disagree with quite a few of them. My line is now tier 5, and below that the player needs something "extra" to belong in the HOF.
I think this list raises an important question, too. There are a lot of players in tier 6 (Bobby Murcer, Cesar Cedeno, e.g.) who we think of as not just worse but much worse than existing HOFers (Ernie Banks, Hank Greenberg, e.g.). What I think is the case, though, is that tier 6 players are all pretty much equal in value, but the further back you go the fewer tier 6 (or any other tier) players there were, so Hank Greenberg stuck out to a degree that Bobby Murcer did not. The important question this raises is "does it matter?" For HOF worthiness, I mean. Hank Greenberg may have been (I'm making these numbers up) one of the top 2% of his era, and Bobby Murcer was in the top 10% in his era, but they were "worth" about the same number of wins to their teams. I tend to think of Hank Greenberg as more deserving of the HOF than Murcer, but the only way to really justify that is to give an explicit HOF advantage to players in weaker leagues/times, like the AL in the 1930's. I don't know what the right answer is to this - I'm happy tier 10 Mazeroski is in the HOF, so I agree it is about more than a formula - but I'm thinking my standards for HOF worthiness overall have drifted too low. I can't make myself believe that Bobby Murcer belongs in the HOF, but I also know that he was just as good a baseball player as Ernie Banks. Something to ponder.
P.S. I have Torre in the non-HOF list since he was inducted as a manager; he should have been inducted as a player a long time ago.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
Greenberg missed 4 1/2 years because he served in WW11. I am assuming that hurt him in your rating system. Otherwise I have to say he was a STUD! 8 years over 156 OPS+.
Looking at the years before the war, he was right there with Gehrig, Foxx, Dimaggio and Williams. Pretty good company.
2013,14 and 15 Certificate Award Winner Harmon Killebrew Master Set and Master Topps Set
@JoeBanzai said:
Greenberg missed 4 1/2 years because he served in WW11. I am assuming that hurt him in your rating system. Otherwise I have to say he was a STUD! 8 years over 156 OPS+.
I am excluding those years from my analysis, but then there really isn't anything there to exclude. I think it is the assumption of what Greenberg probably would have done in those 4.5 years that makes us think of him as a higher tier HOFer, but we should recognize that it's only an assumption. What Greenberg actually accomplished - what we can measure - was about the same as Bobby Murcer (whose 1971 season, by the way, was better than any season Greenberg ever had).
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
From Joe Torre in 1971 to Mark McGwire in 1998, the highest season for Win Probability Added (best single measure of offense) was Will Clark in 1989. That includes every season Barry Bonds played without cheating. The only players (measured by Win Shares, which includes defense) who have better seasons than Will Clark in 1989 since WWII are Ted Williams, Stan Musial, Mickey Mantle and Bonds (pre-cheating). It was, at the time, the greatest season all but the oldest of the sportswriters who voted on the MVP had ever seen, and they gave the MVP to Kevin Mitchell. He played 15 seasons without ever having a bad, or even below average, year; he was a post-season stud; he was a Gold Glove first baseman and, especially at his peak, one of the greatest clutch hitters who ever played the game. I have him sitting right between his contemporaries Tony Gwynn and Frank Thomas. Thomas was a better hitter but literally useless in the field; Clark was a better hitter than Gwynn but Gwynn was a better fielder. There's not a dime's worth of difference between those three in terms of what matters - winning baseball games - but Clark fell off the HOF ballot after a single vote and the other two sailed in on their first ballots.
HOF voters like players who were awesome at one thing much more than they like players who were merely great at everything. Look at the other players at the top of the non-HOF list. Allen, Wynn, Singleton and Bonds were all great at everything (power, average, fielding, baserunning) but weren't awesome at any one thing (HR, BA, etc.). Some similar players get noticed by hitting a milestone like 3,000 hits (Biggio) or being on a dynasty team (Perez), but some really great players never do.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
@JoeBanzai said:
Greenberg missed 4 1/2 years because he served in WW11. I am assuming that hurt him in your rating system. Otherwise I have to say he was a STUD! 8 years over 156 OPS+.
I am excluding those years from my analysis, but then there really isn't anything there to exclude. I think it is the assumption of what Greenberg probably would have done in those 4.5 years that makes us think of him as a higher tier HOFer, but we should recognize that it's only an assumption. What Greenberg actually accomplished - what we can measure - was about the same as Bobby Murcer (whose 1971 season, by the way, was better than any season Greenberg ever had).
I meant his shorter career hurt his value.
Can't really see Murcer having the value of Greenberg, other than 1971 and 1972. Hank had 9 years over 156 OPS+ Bobby had 2 and his next highest was 135 and 2 years in the 120's.
Greenberg's career OPS+ is 34 points higher. His value drops because he played first base?
Totally agree on Clark and Dick Allen. Allen was not liked by the writers, I am baffled as to why Will is not in. Have to admire him for retiring to spend time with his family.
Bonds and Singleton were wonderful players as well!
2013,14 and 15 Certificate Award Winner Harmon Killebrew Master Set and Master Topps Set
@JoeBanzai said:
Greenberg's career OPS+ is 34 points higher. His value drops because he played first base?
Greenberg's value doesn't drop because he played first base, it's just that his fielding adds next to nothing to his value. Murcer was a Gold Glove center fielder, so he makes up ground. He also makes up ground by playing 500+ more games than Greenberg, and because it was easier to have a higher OPS+ in the 1930's/40's than it was in the 1970's. That is, OPS+ is determined relative to everyone in the league, and the average quality of the players in the 1970's was greater than it was in the 30's and 40's.
All that said, there is no question that I think Greenberg was better than Murcer, and is deserving of the HOF while Murcer is not. But, what this exercise demonstrates - if you accept the assumptions behind it - is that Greenberg and Murcer were more or less equal in the actual contributions they made to their teams. In short, Greenberg's advantage over Murcer lies pretty much entirely within the years he was in the military, or rather our perceptions of the value he would have added had he played in those years.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
From Joe Torre in 1971 to Mark McGwire in 1998, the highest season for Win Probability Added (best single measure of offense) was Will Clark in 1989. That includes every season Barry Bonds played without cheating. The only players (measured by Win Shares, which includes defense) who have better seasons than Will Clark in 1989 since WWII are Ted Williams, Stan Musial, Mickey Mantle and Bonds (pre-cheating). It was, at the time, the greatest season all but the oldest of the sportswriters who voted on the MVP had ever seen, and they gave the MVP to Kevin Mitchell. He played 15 seasons without ever having a bad, or even below average, year; he was a post-season stud; he was a Gold Glove first baseman and, especially at his peak, one of the greatest clutch hitters who ever played the game. I have him sitting right between his contemporaries Tony Gwynn and Frank Thomas. Thomas was a better hitter but literally useless in the field; Clark was a better hitter than Gwynn but Gwynn was a better fielder. There's not a dime's worth of difference between those three in terms of what matters - winning baseball games - but Clark fell off the HOF ballot after a single vote and the other two sailed in on their first ballots.
HOF voters like players who were awesome at one thing much more than they like players who were merely great at everything. Look at the other players at the top of the non-HOF list. Allen, Wynn, Singleton and Bonds were all great at everything (power, average, fielding, baserunning) but weren't awesome at any one thing (HR, BA, etc.). Some similar players get noticed by hitting a milestone like 3,000 hits (Biggio) or being on a dynasty team (Perez), but some really great players never do.
In the case of Clark, he's not in the HOF because he didn't hit with enough power. Fair or not, that's why he's not in. If you're going to play the (by far) easiest defensive position, voters expect you to hit with power. 9 seasons (out of 15) under 20 homers is what did him in. He's also hurt (no pun intended) by the fact he was considered pretty fragile, averaging just 133 games a year in non-strike seasons.
In the case of Clark, he's not in the HOF because he didn't hit with enough power. Fair or not, that's why he's not in. If you're going to play the (by far) easiest defensive position, voters expect you to hit with power. 9 seasons (out of 15) under 20 homers is what did him in. He's also hurt (no pun intended) by the fact he was considered pretty fragile, averaging just 133 games a year in non-strike seasons.
He was also hurt by a low walk total. His 162 game average (taken with a grain of salt as he did miss more games than you would like) is about 100 runs scored, 100 RBI, and 23 HR but only 77 BB.
He hit a lot of doubles and a .497 SLG lifetime is very,very good, so I think he had plenty of power, not HR power but HR is not the only measure of power.
Never had an OPS above 1.000 but lowest was .799 very consistent! No batting titles or much for league leader first place finishes, just very good every year.
His final 51 games indicate he was still a great hitter!
Somewhat short career, missed a few too many games. I put him in the HOF, but can see why others would not.
I like Oliva (a lock for the Hall if not for bad knees) for the HOF and a lot of Clark's numbers are better.
2013,14 and 15 Certificate Award Winner Harmon Killebrew Master Set and Master Topps Set
Comments
I guess that makes sense as long as we agree that Killebrew was better! ;-)
I'm surprised that Yount is higher than Ripken, actually even that they're even the same tier. In the world of HOF SSs, I've always considered Wagner in Tier 1 by himself, Ripken Tier 2 by himself, then most of the others Tier 3 without a huge degree of separation, including Yount and Larkin. I'd be interested to see where Jeter would come in with your current methodology.
Yount and Ripken were about as close to tied as you can get; they were very similar in value from peak to career and at every breakdown in between. Yount is beating Ripken in my list because of the relative weights I've assigned. You could reasonably change those around and get Ripken on top of Yount, but no matter what you did, they'd always be virtually tied. FWIW, Bill James has Ripken above Yount on his top 100 list, with Ripken at 48 and Yount at 55 - 7 spaces apart. But he's got three pitchers and Campanella in 4 of those 7 spots, so apples to apples he's got them 3 spaces apart. I don't really disagree with your Wagner/Tier I, etc. lineup, except I think you've undervalued Yount somewhat. If you line up their OPS+, from best season to worst and ignoring Ripken's first very short callup season, they each played 20 years and Yount beats Ripken in 9 of the first 10 seasons. Ripken beats Yount in 6 of the second ten seasons. I see Yount as the better hitter (by a little) and Ripken as the better fielder (by a little more). But hitting is worth more than fielding, and Yount wins by a nose. If you see it the other way around, you're not wrong. If you see a big gap between them, regardless who you have on top, I think you are wrong.
Just perception, nothing statistical in my rankings and I happened to see the majority of Cal's peak and little of Yount's. The only huge gaps I see are in All-Star appearances (little more than a popularity contest) and Gold Gloves.
This HOF SS rankings did make me laugh: http://www.newsday.com/sports/baseball/yankees/derek-jeter-vs-hall-of-fame-shortstops-1.8899728 They had to stretch hard to make Jeter #2 all time.
That Newsday shortstop list is a joke, so you were right to laugh. Jeter hit about as well as Yount and Ripken but he was, charitably, an adequate shortstop at best (and there were some years when he was not at his best). Now, all that said, hitting as well as Ripken and Yount for 20 years is no small feat, and Jeter is without any doubt a deserving Hall of Famer. But I agree that he's not in the Ripken/Yount class. It looked like he might be about halfway through his career, but nothing much happened to improve his ranking after that. I think he probably belongs somewhere between Cronin and Larkin on my list. And note, since I assume you're a fan, that Larkin suffers most from his lack of durability; did you know he only played 140 games in a season seven times? That costs him a lot in total career points, and it also prevents him from having much of a peak since two of those seasons were early in his career when he wasn't great yet. When Larkin was healthy, he was Ripken/Yount class; he just wasn't healthy often enough to be ranked with them.
Completely agree on Larkin, I don't collect him because he was the all-time best at the position or overrate his accomplishments, more for the memories of going to Cincy games with my dad (including Larkin's call up in 1986). I do wonder what he could have done if healthy the majority of his playing years, but what-ifs shouldn't be a factor in HOF worthiness discussions.
Sounds about right on Jeter too, marginally better overall, hyped much higher in collectibles due to NY market.
I'll agree. Reggie was supposed to be such an awesome power hitter, but even George Brett,
not known for his power had a higher career OPS. And Reggie just barely beat him in SLG %.
Reggie was an overrated slugger when a gap hitter(doubles machine) can match those numbers.
Killebrew was the real deal as his numbers in those departments were much higher than Reggie.
Brett's OPS was a little higher because Reggie played so many years in Oakland; Reggie's OPS+ is higher, which is what matters. I've got Reggie and Brett essentially tied (feel free to reverse my order of Reggie>Brett, I won't mind). I show them as close as two players could be as far as peak value, but Reggie has a few more "good" seasons than Brett so he wins. I may be understating Brett's value at 3B, or I may not, but I see Reggie as the better hitter and Brett not quite making up that gap with his fielding. As close as they are, I can say with confidence that had Brett not gotten injured 2/3 of the way through his epic 1980 season he would have topped Jackson. But he did, and Jackson's 1969 season is better than any season Brett ever had, and that stops Brett from beating Jackson at "peak" (which I have defined in a much more complicated way than "best season", but you get my point.)
I'll note, too, that just as I am giving added weight to peak offensive seasons, and therefore less relative weight to offense in off-peak seasons, so, too, am I giving more weight to defense in peak seasons and less relative weight to defense in off-peak seasons. This matters in the Jackson-Brett comparison because while Brett played at a "good" level at 3B for a long time, Jackson played at a "very good" level in RF at his peak, and got pretty bad later in his career. If every season were weighted equally, Brett would beat Jackson overall; weighting peak seasons more heavily keeps the defensive gap low. But unless you're willing to kick Koufax (and Kiner, and Puckett, and Jim Rice, and so on) out of the HOF entirely, I think you have to agree that peak performance does matter more than off-peak performance when you think about how good a player was.
So 1969 was Reggies' best season. Not bad, 47 HR and 36 2B. 334 Total bases.
Pretty good slugging numbers.
Oh, in 1979 George Brett had 363 Total bases. 29 more than Jackson had in his
best season. Brett had several years better than Jackson in 1969, simply because Reggie
was a one trick pony. HR or K.
If you ignore that Jackson's year was in 1969, and in Oakland, then Brett's season was better. And if you ignore the sun, it's night. Neither is terribly helpful.
Ryan Howard was a one trick pony. Here's a list of his top-10 appearances in OPS+:
2nd, 9th, 10th
Dave Kingman was the ultimate one trick pony; here's his list:
{This page intentionally left blank.}
Reggie Jackson on the other hand, was one of the best hitters in baseball history. Here's his list (and Brett's):
J: 1st, 1st, 1st, 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 9th, 10th
B: 1st, 1st, 1st, 4th, 5th, 5th, 7th, 9th, 10th, 10th (that 7th is 1979)
And that's all I have to say about that; this is silly.
Seasons player struck out over 100 times:
Jackson: 18
Brett: 0
Seasons player won batting title:
Jackson: 0
Brett : 3
Of course categories like this don't interest you, as a lot of common sense is involved
coming to the conclusion that Brett was a better hitter.
And with categories you seem to like, for instance OPS+, Brett's highest year was over
200, beating Jacksons' 69 season, yet somehow Reggie is still the better hitter.
I liked them both. Didn't Jackson have a bunch of home run titles? That seemed to be omitted.
mark
Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
Picking out Ks and BA from the universe of statistics to advance a "better than" argument is so stupid my first thought was that I was having my leg pulled. But then you pointed out that Brett's best "season" in OPS+ was over 200, which was obviously a reference to 1980, and the entire basis of this debate has been that Brett didn't play a full season in 1980. That's how I know you're pulling my leg; nobody is that stupid.
Jackson won the HR crown 4 times. 1973 he won it with 32..........down year for the bomb.
Brett won three batting titles while averaging 40 doubles 8 triples and 19 hr a season, he had good extra base power.
Don't like how OPS+ says Reggie was better when Brett's OPS was higher. Yeah, yeah Oakland was the hardest park to hit in ever.
These guys were pretty different hitters so saying one was "better" than the other isn't easy.
How about George hitting third and Reggie cleanup?
Better yet Killebrew at the 4 spot! ;-)
OPS+ does not agree. You use this measurement all the time but here you say it's wrong,
I actually tend to agree with you in this specific instance, but if so, doesn't that mean you feel that Reggie deserved a higher OPS+ EVERY year in Oakland?
Baseball was different anyway when Brett and Jackson played.
Brett has said several times that they used to be embarassed when they struck out,
they used to take pride in putting the ball in play. Now today's players don't care how
many K's they accumulate. And today's so called experts like yourself who thinks he knows
how to gauge who was the better player doesn't think strikeouts are of much importance either.
I wonder why, when a batter comes to the plate with bases empty, the one thing he is most trying to avoid
is striking out? It seems fairly important. To people with common sense.
Answer me one question. With Brett having put the ball in play so many more times than Reggie, how
many more runners did Brett advance from first to second or from first to third than Reggie did.
How many of those runners ended up scoring?
If you don't have these numbers in your analysis then I really can't take your argument seriously
because you never present a complete picture of a players abilities.
Here's an interesting stat that Dallas won't give any credence to:
Jackson had 68 Sac flies in his career, Brett had 120.
Gee, I wonder how many times Jackson struck out with a runner on third, less than two out,
when Brett was putting the ball in play.
In an interesting bit of irony Brett hit exactly 52 more sac flies then Jackson. Brett also hit into exactly 52 more double plays then Reggie
mark
Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
That is very interesting, lol..
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
Hard to hit into double plays when you're striking out all the time.
It makes no difference whether you like it or not, or whether you understand it or not. Some parks - like Oakland and Anaheim back in the day - are harder to hit in than others, like Wrigley and Fenway in any day. No matter how many people want to pretend, and no matter how hard they want to pretend, that all parks are equal, it will never be so. Some kind of adjustment is required, and OPS+ is the best (relatively simple) adjustment that anyone has come up with.
There's some serious misunderstanding going on here. OPS+ by itself can't be used to determine who had a better season, else we can throw out Jackson '69 and Brett '80 and just heap our praises on Gates Brown in 1968. The length of the season - this is the factor you have yet to even acknowledge, let alone address - is the other half. Brett had a higher OPS+, but he missed so many games that Jackson's season was more valuable. As for deserving a higher OPS+ EVERY year in Oakland, I have no idea what you're talking about nor, I suspect, do you. I will say that if you sorted every hitter by raw OPS and separately by OPS+ for each of Reggie's years in Oakland, he would be higher on every OPS+ list than on the corresponding raw OPS list. But the adjustment doesn't turn bad seasons into good seasons; raw OPS is 90% of it (at least), the adjustment the other 10% (at most).
I have to know, how long did it take you to find this piece of trivia? In any event, while I did not look at this situation specifically (because it would be pointless) I certainly did look at how well each player hit in run producing situations generally. Jackson's WPA (a good proxy for situational hitting) was 50.7 for his career; Brett's was 49.7. Reggie's 1969 WPA was 6.9 in 1969; Brett's was 6.2 in 1980. And yes, every AB with a runner on third and less than two outs is in there. Brett no doubt is better to have up than Jackson in that situation, but there are also situations where it's better to have Jackson at the plate. Look at all of them if you're trying to learn anything worthwhile; otherwise don't look at all.
Thanks- Let's just agree you're not as smart as you think you are and move on.
I guess if you put more credence to what's on the back of baseball cards of the 50's to 90's to that of advanced statistics you will come to that conclusion.
mark
Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
As long as you have Mazeroski at the bottom of that list, I'm not going to debate.
The only thing that surprised me was that he landed below Highpockets Kelly.
I won't try to cajole you into a debate, but I would be interested in your overall impression. Try to ignore differences of just a few spots - those are well within the margin of error - and let me know if your impression is that I'm giving too much or too little weight to longevity, too much or too little weight to defense, too much or too little weight to the competitiveness of the era, if any player looks way too high or low, etc.
Yes those two things are different. I completely get your point. On a team of "replacement" players a slightly lesser hitter might produce more runs for the team.
I can't say if Reggie won more games for his team than Harmon without also thinking about their attitudes on the field. Killebrew was never pulled from a game for lack of hustle and was far less of a distraction than Reggie. No way to translate that into wins or losses statistically, but in this case I'll take Killebrew as well.
The clear advantage for Reggie is his longer career. Killebrew got his "old man" years, but was cheated out of 2 or 3 "young years". I think anyone would reasonably assume Harmon's "value" would have been higher had he been allowed to play in the minors then promoted or allowed to play in Washington. BUT he wasn't, so we'll never know. We could look at the "average" stats for HOF sluggers in their first 2-3 years and "+" that to Killebrew's numbers. I'd like to see that!!!!! I did it myself for home runs and Killebrew comes up with about 700.
Reggie's second advantage is his running ability. Killebrew had 7 triples in 1961(in Minnesota, smaller park than Washington), while Reggie managed a high of 6 in cavernous Oakland. Young Harmon could run! Killer loses young/fast years again.
Lastly, in my opinion OPS+ does exactly what you say it doesn't............."measures actual accomplishment" adjusting a players number up or down because it was a down (or up) year for the AVERAGE player does not in fact measure their accomplishment. It measures it in relation to a lot of average players, a few crappy ones and a few great players. If you want to separate the players into tiers before figuring "+" that might show something more meaningful.
Exactly the same IMO than saying if Killebrew hits against 66% of lefties and we shorten the fences to "average" the distances his production/value gets better.
I'll stick with a combination of SLG and OPS without the + as the primary stats in measuring sluggers, giving more weight to BA and OBP for "all around" hitters (Brett would be a good example).
Fielding just doesn't affect my thinking unless the player is very good or very bad. As Teddy Ballgame said "nobody comes to the games to watch players catch the ball, they come to see them hit."
Again, good discussion!
Off to work.
But how many games you will help your team win is directly related to how well the average player is playing - those are your opponents! If a player has an OPS of .800 two years in a row, his team will be more successful, all else equal, playing opponents with an average OPS of .700 than they will playing opponents with an average OPS of .750.
While you're free to disagree with the exact methods used to make park adjustments, it is simply incorrect not to make them at all. There were some terrific hitters on the Astros in the 60's, 70's and 80's - HOF level hitters even - but their raw OPS numbers weren't terribly impressive. And when Johnny Bench and Hank Aaron played in the Dome, their raw OPS numbers weren't terribly impressive either. If, on average, it takes 6 runs to win a game in Fenway and 4 runs to win a game in the Dome, then a run produced in the Dome is worth more than a run produced in Fenway (1/4 of a win vs. 1/6 of a win). That's the theory - and it's not really open to debate - behind the "+".
Anytime you measure players without taking into account the circumstances in which they played, you are wasting your time. Everyone seems to understand that Honus Wagner (OPS .858) was a better hitter than Chuck Klein (OPS .922), and well they should - Wagner was a MUCH better hitter than Klein. But then people seem to forget that adjustments (whether mathematical or just mental) aren't only necessary for deadball vs. roaring '30's comparisons, they're always necessary. The adjustment required to compare Wagner and Klein is enormous, and the adjustment required to compare Jackson to Killebrew is small, but they're both required.
I would say with the top four being from the 10's and 20's, and twelve of the top 25 being from the 10's and 20's, that your era adjustments aren't in there properly. OPS+ and other current measurements don't account properly for why the stars of certain era's were able to distance themselves from their peers, compared to more comeptitive eras's
A similar list for the top pitchers will produce a similarly skewed list of guys from that era.
Yeah, I think you're right that the era adjustment needs a tweak, so I made one and Speaker drops a few spots. But note that what you are calling "the 10's and 20's" must also include players who peaked in the 00's and '30's to get a number as high as you did in the top 25. You may also want to count the next 25 - it's very heavy with post-war players, and the bottom 25 is just as heavy with pre-war players (both before and after my tweak).
Anyway, here's the revised list:
1 Ruth (1)
2 Cobb (1)
3 Wagner (1)
4 Mays (1)
5 Mantle (1)
6 Speaker (1)
7 T. Williams (1)
8 Musial (1)
9 Aaron (1)
10 E. Collins (1)
11 Hornsby (1)
12 Morgan (1)
13 Gehrig (1)
14 F. Robinson (2)
15 Ott (2)
16 Schmidt (2)
17 Lajoie (2)
18 Mathews (2)
19 R. Henderson (2)
20 Yastrzemski (2)
21 Foxx (2)
22 R. Jackson (2)
23 DiMaggio (2)
24 McCovey (2)
25 Brett (2)
26 P. Waner (2)
27 Crawford (3)
28 Vaughan (3)
29 Yount (3)
30 Snider (3)
31 Bench (3)
32 Kaline (3)
33 Murray (3)
34 Boggs (3)
35 Carew (3)
36 Killebrew (3)
37 Ripken (3)
38 Raines (3)
39 Gehringer (3)
40 Stargell (4)
41 B. Williams (4)
42 A. Simmons (4)
43 Biggio (4)
44 Clemente (4)
45 Berra (4)
46 Molitor (4)
47 Santo (4)
48 Bagwell (4)
49 Mize (4)
50 Sandberg (4)
51 Gwynn (4)
52 Thomas (4)
53 Winfield (5)
54 Alomar (5)
55 Appling (5)
56 Perez (5)
57 Cronin (5)
58 Heilmann (5)
59 Clarke (5)
60 Fisk (5)
61 HR Baker (5)
62 G. Carter (5)
63 Brock (5)
64 Medwick (5)
65 Goslin (5)
66 Frisch (6)
67 Wheat (6)
68 B. Robinson (6)
69 Banks (6)
70 Cepeda (6)
71 Flick (6)
72 Ashburn (6)
73 J. Robinson (6)
74 Larkin (6)
75 Doby (6)
76 Greenberg (6)
77 Reese (6)
78 Averill (6)
79 Roush (7)
80 Terry (7)
81 Puckett (7)
82 Slaughter (7)
83 Dawson (7)
84 Boudreau (7)
85 Fox (7)
86 Carey (7)
87 Billy Herman (7)
88 J. Rice (7)
89 Cochrane (7)
90 Dickey (7)
91 Sisler (7)
92 Cuyler (8)
93 O. Smith (8)
94 Kiner (8)
95 Manush (8)
96 Hartnett (8)
97 Doerr (8)
98 S. Rice (8)
99 J. Collins (8)
100 Wallace (8)
101 Sewell (8)
102 H. Wilson (8)
103 J. Gordon (8)
104 Traynor (8)
105 Hooper (9)
106 Bancroft (9)
107 Rizzuto (9)
108 Klein (9)
109 Evers (9)
110 Bottomley (9)
111 Maranville (9)
112 Campanella (9)
113 Shoendienst (9)
114 Combs (9)
115 Chance (9)
116 Aparicio (9)
117 L. Waner (9)
118 Youngs (10)
119 Tinker (10)
120 Kell (10)
121 Bresnahan (10)
122 Mazeroski (10)
123 T. Jackson (10)
124 Lindstrom (10)
125 Kelly (10)
126 Hafey (10)
127 Lombardi (10)
128 Schalk (10)
129 R. Ferrell (10)
And best of all, Mazeroski is now atop Highpockets Kelly!
A step in the right direction, with Stargell moving up several spots. Reggie should have
went down, of course. You do many more of these lists and eventually you'll have Reggie Number 1.
I agree that making park adjustments is a necessity. I think it's a great idea! If you are taking the averages of all hitters in a park.......some will even be pretty accurate. Some will be off by a lot, I think.
Notable exceptions would be Fenway Park and Yankee Stadium, especially before they were remodeled (that's when quite a few of the guys we talk about played).
Fenway was not an easy park for left handed batters, because of the "monster" managers would try to pitch more left handed hurlers there to compensate, thus making it an even more difficult park for left handed batters. Ted Williams said it was NOT an easy park to hit in for a left handed batter unless you could hit to left field (something he wasn't interested in).
Yankee stadium was of course a GREAT place to hit if you were a left handed batter and could pull the ball. Left was deeper than the porch in right and left center was "death valley" for right handers.
How many times have we heard that Duke Snider had it easy being the only left handed hitter in a great lineup? Did he? How much?
I am sure the more symmetrical parks would be more accurate.?
The numbers should be there and fairly easy to find for stat guys.
We seem to agree on the theory that a left handed batter has an overall advantage. It would be nice (for me anyway, any one else curious?) to see if that is true, and if so, know how much.
I realize you must hate hearing my theory's, but I'll bet you would be more interested if there were numbers to prove (or disprove) them! Especially disprove!!!!!! LOL
Nice to see Frank Robinson so high on your list. Great player who seldom gets talked about for the right reasons.
On the contrary, I like hearing your (or anyone else's) theories, and that left-handed hitters have a natural advantage (in the same way strong/tall/fast people do) is perfectly valid. And I have no doubt that someone with the data and the time could quantify that advantage. But, and I've said this before and you haven't acknowledged it, nobody is going to spend that time because the result is nothing but trivia. It wouldn't be appropriate to use it to "adjust" for anything, any more than we would downgrade Frank Howard for being tall or upgrade Freddy Patek for being short.
As for park factors, you're hung up on the relative ease of hitting a HR to left or right field as if that's the only thing that differs among various parks. Sure, it's one of the things but it's never the only thing and hardly ever the most important thing. What made Dodger Stadium (when Koufax pitched) the hardest hitter's park were the acres of foul territory. Foul balls that would have gone into the stands anywhere else became outs in LA. And while there are a few parks (notably Fenway) where it can make a large difference whether a ball is hit to left or to right, it's more common to have parks like Oakland, or the Dome, where ALL the fences were deeper than in most other parks.
As for Reggie, his best year on the Yankees - where you are implying he was helped tremendously by the short right field fence - was in 1980. That year, he hit 25 HR on the road and 16 at home. His raw OPS was 1.123 on the road and .864 at home. Yankee Stadium was a pitcher's park, and it cost Jackson as much or more as it cost anyone else (that year - I didn't look at any others). Evaluating Reggie Jackson - or anyone else - by his raw OPS is incorrect.
I can't acknowledge an opinion. It might be trivial it might be significant. Not sure how you ( a stat guy?) can jump to that conclusion with no data to back it up. A lack of data cannot prove it either way. I could easily say the difference in how two powerhouse sluggers plays defense is trivial as well. Before there were measurements on fielding, no matter how flawed, all you had was fielding %.
In THIS comparison both players were very close in physical ability and size. Baseball Reference has them listed at exactly the same height and weight. Your ranking rates Jackson higher I think Killebrew was better. I am logically looking for a way to prove my point, but there is no data there, well it's there no one has published it.
If Freddy Patek (good reference my man!) hit ALMOST as many home-runs as Frank Howard ("The Capital Punisher" best nickname ever) I would say he was a better hitter because he overcame an obstacle. Did something similar to another who has an advantage.
I looked at all of Jackson's Yankee Stadium years, not just one, and compared them to all his Oakland years, where you are implying that he was hurt tremendously, and he wasn't hurt that much in Oakland.
We're just going around in circles. I am not a stat guy, so I am not going to take the time to try to prove what we already know;
In baseball it's more difficult for a right handed batter to hit home runs than a left handed batter, so if two home run hitters are nearly equal, the right handed batter is better. ;-)
Gotta go
Fair enough; that's a perfectly valid way to define "better". The right handed batter may also be "better" at chess, which would be just as relevant to what I'm doing with this list as the way you're using "better". But the one you would want to have on your team - if your only goal was to win - is the left handed batter; he is "better" in the only way that matters in baseball, and that's the way I'm using the word.
Fair enough. Don't care about how they play chess, but fair enough.
As long as Killebrew is better! ;-) LOL
As promised (threatened), I've done the same analysis of non-HOFers that I applied to the HOFers (non-pitchers, 20th century, and excluding cheaters and other ineligibles). I'm going to show them (the ones that popped into my head, by tier only and skip the actual ranking number because I think those are more distracting than helpful.
Allen (2)
J. Wynn (4)
W. Clark (4)
Staub (5)
Singleton (5)
Bo. Bonds (5)
Grich (5)
Magee (5)
F. Howard (5)
Da. Evans (5)
R. Smith (6)
Parker (6)
Murcer (6)
Bando (6)
Pinson (6)
Cedeno (6)
Hernandez (6)
T. Simmons (6)
Murphy (6)
Torre (6)
Cash (6)
Cruz (6)
J. Clark (6)
Sheckard (6)
Hack (6)
R. White (6)
Trammell (6)
Otis (7)
Minoso (7)
Colavito (7)
Nettles (7)
Dw. Evans (7)
Harrah (7)
Whitaker (7)
W. Davis (7)
Mattingly (7)
Foster (7)
K. Boyer (7)
Leach (7)
Powell (7)
McGriff (7)
Oliva (7)
Cey (8)
P. Guerrero (8)
Freehan (8)
Fregosi (8)
Garvey (8)
Berger (8)
Lynn (8)
B. Bell (8)
D. Walker (8)
Stephens (8)
Elliott (8)
Vernon (8)
Campaneris (8)
Strawberry (8)
Hodges (8)
Randolph (8)
Bob Johnson (8)
Callison (8)
Oliver (8)
Bonilla (8)
Tenace (8)
Keller (8)
Maris (8)
Lopes (8)
Monday (9)
Canseco (9)
C. Jones (9)
York (9)
Babe Herman (9)
Camilli (9)
McRae (9)
Fairly (9)
E. Davis (10)
J. Carter (10)
Carty (10)
K. Gibson (10)
E. Howard (10)
Porter (10)
Holmes (10)
Buckner (10)
I would have no objection to anyone in tier 5 or better being in the HOF; those were all great players, and a good chunk of the most underrated players of all time. But below tier 5 there are only a handful that I would put in the HOF (shown in bold) and they are all catchers and infielders (and Minoso who didn't get a chance in MLB until he was 25). What I didn't notice when I made the change to the era adjustment that skin suggested (and I agree that it makes the list better) is that where before I had agreed with most players in tier 6 being a HOFer, I now disagree with quite a few of them. My line is now tier 5, and below that the player needs something "extra" to belong in the HOF.
I think this list raises an important question, too. There are a lot of players in tier 6 (Bobby Murcer, Cesar Cedeno, e.g.) who we think of as not just worse but much worse than existing HOFers (Ernie Banks, Hank Greenberg, e.g.). What I think is the case, though, is that tier 6 players are all pretty much equal in value, but the further back you go the fewer tier 6 (or any other tier) players there were, so Hank Greenberg stuck out to a degree that Bobby Murcer did not. The important question this raises is "does it matter?" For HOF worthiness, I mean. Hank Greenberg may have been (I'm making these numbers up) one of the top 2% of his era, and Bobby Murcer was in the top 10% in his era, but they were "worth" about the same number of wins to their teams. I tend to think of Hank Greenberg as more deserving of the HOF than Murcer, but the only way to really justify that is to give an explicit HOF advantage to players in weaker leagues/times, like the AL in the 1930's. I don't know what the right answer is to this - I'm happy tier 10 Mazeroski is in the HOF, so I agree it is about more than a formula - but I'm thinking my standards for HOF worthiness overall have drifted too low. I can't make myself believe that Bobby Murcer belongs in the HOF, but I also know that he was just as good a baseball player as Ernie Banks. Something to ponder.
P.S. I have Torre in the non-HOF list since he was inducted as a manager; he should have been inducted as a player a long time ago.
Greenberg missed 4 1/2 years because he served in WW11. I am assuming that hurt him in your rating system. Otherwise I have to say he was a STUD! 8 years over 156 OPS+.
Looking at the years before the war, he was right there with Gehrig, Foxx, Dimaggio and Williams. Pretty good company.
I am excluding those years from my analysis, but then there really isn't anything there to exclude. I think it is the assumption of what Greenberg probably would have done in those 4.5 years that makes us think of him as a higher tier HOFer, but we should recognize that it's only an assumption. What Greenberg actually accomplished - what we can measure - was about the same as Bobby Murcer (whose 1971 season, by the way, was better than any season Greenberg ever had).
Oops.
Oops.
I wish Will Clark would have played a few more years. Definitely could
have been a HOF'er. Loved watching him hit. He finished really strong.
Will Clark should be a HOFer.
From Joe Torre in 1971 to Mark McGwire in 1998, the highest season for Win Probability Added (best single measure of offense) was Will Clark in 1989. That includes every season Barry Bonds played without cheating. The only players (measured by Win Shares, which includes defense) who have better seasons than Will Clark in 1989 since WWII are Ted Williams, Stan Musial, Mickey Mantle and Bonds (pre-cheating). It was, at the time, the greatest season all but the oldest of the sportswriters who voted on the MVP had ever seen, and they gave the MVP to Kevin Mitchell. He played 15 seasons without ever having a bad, or even below average, year; he was a post-season stud; he was a Gold Glove first baseman and, especially at his peak, one of the greatest clutch hitters who ever played the game. I have him sitting right between his contemporaries Tony Gwynn and Frank Thomas. Thomas was a better hitter but literally useless in the field; Clark was a better hitter than Gwynn but Gwynn was a better fielder. There's not a dime's worth of difference between those three in terms of what matters - winning baseball games - but Clark fell off the HOF ballot after a single vote and the other two sailed in on their first ballots.
HOF voters like players who were awesome at one thing much more than they like players who were merely great at everything. Look at the other players at the top of the non-HOF list. Allen, Wynn, Singleton and Bonds were all great at everything (power, average, fielding, baserunning) but weren't awesome at any one thing (HR, BA, etc.). Some similar players get noticed by hitting a milestone like 3,000 hits (Biggio) or being on a dynasty team (Perez), but some really great players never do.
I meant his shorter career hurt his value.
Can't really see Murcer having the value of Greenberg, other than 1971 and 1972. Hank had 9 years over 156 OPS+ Bobby had 2 and his next highest was 135 and 2 years in the 120's.
Greenberg's career OPS+ is 34 points higher. His value drops because he played first base?
Totally agree on Clark and Dick Allen. Allen was not liked by the writers, I am baffled as to why Will is not in. Have to admire him for retiring to spend time with his family.
Bonds and Singleton were wonderful players as well!
Greenberg's value doesn't drop because he played first base, it's just that his fielding adds next to nothing to his value. Murcer was a Gold Glove center fielder, so he makes up ground. He also makes up ground by playing 500+ more games than Greenberg, and because it was easier to have a higher OPS+ in the 1930's/40's than it was in the 1970's. That is, OPS+ is determined relative to everyone in the league, and the average quality of the players in the 1970's was greater than it was in the 30's and 40's.
All that said, there is no question that I think Greenberg was better than Murcer, and is deserving of the HOF while Murcer is not. But, what this exercise demonstrates - if you accept the assumptions behind it - is that Greenberg and Murcer were more or less equal in the actual contributions they made to their teams. In short, Greenberg's advantage over Murcer lies pretty much entirely within the years he was in the military, or rather our perceptions of the value he would have added had he played in those years.
Got it!
In the case of Clark, he's not in the HOF because he didn't hit with enough power. Fair or not, that's why he's not in. If you're going to play the (by far) easiest defensive position, voters expect you to hit with power. 9 seasons (out of 15) under 20 homers is what did him in. He's also hurt (no pun intended) by the fact he was considered pretty fragile, averaging just 133 games a year in non-strike seasons.
He was also hurt by a low walk total. His 162 game average (taken with a grain of salt as he did miss more games than you would like) is about 100 runs scored, 100 RBI, and 23 HR but only 77 BB.
He hit a lot of doubles and a .497 SLG lifetime is very,very good, so I think he had plenty of power, not HR power but HR is not the only measure of power.
Never had an OPS above 1.000 but lowest was .799 very consistent! No batting titles or much for league leader first place finishes, just very good every year.
His final 51 games indicate he was still a great hitter!
Somewhat short career, missed a few too many games. I put him in the HOF, but can see why others would not.
I like Oliva (a lock for the Hall if not for bad knees) for the HOF and a lot of Clark's numbers are better.