Gibson Home Run...I didn't recall that it was a 5 1/2 minute at bat.
Coinstartled
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https://youtu.be/N4nwMDZYXTI
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it's interesting, to me if no one else, that his career tends to be summed up in this one AB.
It's just one of those times that you will always remember. But you are right....other than that at bat I don't know that much about his career. He must have been very good up to that point for Lasorta to put him in with the game on the line and all his injuries.
Good power hitter and base stealer with a .268 or so lifetime average. He was one of the cogs on the near but no all star 1984 World Champion Tigers.
Though Jack Morris and Alan Trammell were certainly discussion worthy.
I better find that sofa icon before DA shows up.
Isn't Trammell the SS they want to put up there with Ozzie Smith? LOL
during most of the 1980's Kirk Gibson had a very solid career with some good Detroit Teams.
Kirk Gibson was the NL most valuable player during the regular season this year
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......
Gibson struggled with injuries and inconsistency. When he got hot - 1980 for example - he was an amazing player. But he was constantly injured, playing in 140 games just three times.
For me, 1988 isn't even his definitive home run. My favorite from him is his "He don't wanna walk you!" home run off of Goose Gossage in the 1984 Series. This is just an incredible clip with Sparky Anderson in a starring role:
Well, since Mark wants me to I'll weigh in, but I don't have much to say. I always liked Kirk Gibson, and we was always a good (but never great) player, when he was healthy. How often was he healthy? Not very often; he met the minimum PA for the batting leader a total of 6 times in his 17 year career. Also on the minus side he wasn't much of a fielder and he didn't deserve - not even close - the MVP he got on the Dodgers. On the plus side, he was a terrific baserunner until his legs gave out, he was a better hitter with men on base or in scoring position than he was with the bases empty and, as history will record thanks to that famous home run, he always seemed to be giving 100%.
For some perspective on how important it is to elevate your game with men on base, Gibson's 7th best season in Win Probability Added - an advanced metric that assigns a + or - to every at bat based on how it improved or worsened the team's chances of winning - was 2.0. This year, in a season that is being discussed as MVP-worthy, Aaron Judge's Win Probability Added was 2.0. Hitting like Babe Ruth when your team is up by 5 runs and the bases are empty and hitting like Mario Mendoza in the late innings of close games - which is a very fair description of Judge - leaves you with total stats that look impressive but wins you as many games as an injured Kirk Gibson won for the Tigers in 69 total games in 1982.
thank you for that stat.
Video brings back memories. Roger Craig Tigers pitching coach,played for the early Mets. Looked like Ted Williams Chet Lemon. Nettles.
Gibson absolutely deserved that MVP in 1988. No, he wasn't the "best" player in 1988 though he had an excellent season (5th in WAR). 1988 is that rare bird where the "intangibles" thing that voters loved to get hung up on (Terry Pendleton) was actually true. Gibson transformed the entire culture of the Dodgers when he went to that team.
1988 Kirk Gibson Win Probability Added 5.0, WAR 6.5(even though the defensive value and positional adjustments in WAR are worthless)
1988 D. Strawberry Win Probability Added 5.0, WAR 5.4
1988 Will Clark 5.1/6.6
1988 Brett Butler 3.1/6.8....and that 6.8 WAR kind of shows why the positional adjustment and defensive value is worhtless.
THere is nobody else from 1988 better than those guys there...so why would Gibson not deserve that MVP? Only Will Clark edges him by a tenth of a run in each of those measures...hardly anything significant. When you account that Gibson was playing hurt more often and lost a few games to injury(but not enough games to lessen his overall value), I think that tenth of a run is more than accounted for.
The only other candidate would be Barry Larkin with his 7.0 WAR or Hershiser with his 7.1.
Yup. Larkin had a 3.1 Win Probability Added.
Hershisher as a pitcher is a different debate, but 7.1 vs 6.5 is not quite enough to give it to the pitcher, and alsoGibson playing through some injuries is enough to offset that small difference.
The key to Gibson's at bat was Mike Davis before him. Eck had him 0-2 but he worked it back around and got a walk. That was a long at bat. That's the forgotten at bat in Dodger history that should be talked about because without it there is no Gibson at bat.
Just going through the threads and saw that I missed this one (after I posted the first time). The deserving MVP in 1988 was Will Clark. He beat Gibson in WPA and WAR, as skin already documented, but beyond that:
WAR (a nearly useless system for defensive measurement) screws Clark on defense; the overall gap was bigger than WAR shows
WPA excuses Gibson for missing games. Assuming his replacement was worse than he was, the WPA for his position was more than .1 below the WPA for Clark.
Clark hit better than Gibson, he fielded better than Gibson, and he played more games than Gibson. He was better than Gibson, and more valuable than Gibson. All that said, the slight that Clark received in 1988 from the MVP voters was nothing compared to what he would suffer the following year, when Clark had the best season of a generation and still didn't win.
I remember well in the 1989 playoff series between Cubs/Giants......the Cubs COULD NOT EVER get Clark out!! He must have hit as close to 1.000 as anyone ever has.
....
I hear you on all the numbers but it's hard to say Clark was more valuable than Gibson. That's just opinion and it could go either way. The work Gibson did that year for the Dodgers went well beyond any number and that is why he won the MVP. He truly was the most valuable player. Not the best and not the statistical greatest but he was the most valuable which is what the award is for. In fact, of all years I would say this is one year they really got the award right by not giving it to the statistical best player but giving to the guy that provided value in getting his team to the postseason.
Gibson winning surely wasn't as silly as Stargell winning in'79, but you're simply declaring that he had value that doesn't show up in any statistics, not demonstrating it. And I guess the rationale is that you can't demonstrate it since it doesn't show up in any statistics, you (and MVP voters) just know value when you see it. But what can be demonstrated with statistics is that Gibson himself didn't win as many games for the Dodgers that year as Clark won for the Giants. So any value he had must show up in the statistics of his teammates, because a team doesn't win a game in which it produced fewer runs than its opponent even if it produced those fewer runs with more heart. So to declare Gibson (or Stargell) more valuable than his statistics is to declare one or more of his teammates less valuable than their statistics. I never hear about that side of the equation, but if one side exists so must the other. Any nominations for Dodgers who weren't as good as their stats say they were?
Same chances as finding a coin listed as "over graded" on Ebay.
I was at the game about two weeks before the end of the 1988 season (and MVP voting) where Gibson scored from second on a passed ball to win the game in the bottom of the ninth. It was an electric moment in a game the Dodgers really needed to win. That hustle was likely on voters minds a few weeks later.
Gibson did score the winning run in the bottom of the 9th in a 1-0 victory vs the Braves on September 14, 1988, but it was on a double by Mike Marshall not a passed ball.
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.
Yeah, the passed ball happened in August. I did have to look that up because I certainly didn't remember it; I've seen so many people score from second on passed balls/wild pitches there's no way to remember them all. Randal Grichuk did it this year and didn't get a single MVP vote!
@grote15: I remember that 1-0 game, but I was thinking of the game @dallasactuary found with the past ball. Thanks for looking that up. August, then. To think I was a sophomore at UCLA then, and now my wife says I am "pushing 50."
Anyway, I guess the takeaway for me was the Dodgers had a lot of buzz the last few months of that year... lots of comeback/exciting wins, Orel having the scoreless inning streak, etc., that it probably influenced the voters to pick the Dodger, Gibson, for MVP over other candidates. The Dodgers were horrible in 1987 (73-89, fourth in NL West), the team had acquired Gibson in the offseason, and rightly or wrongly, many people attributed that quick turnaround (to 94-67, first in NL West) in Dodger fortune to Gibson's "valuable" play and equally "valuable" (and non-statistical)
leadership (i.e., hustle, heart, intensity).
in 1987, the Dodgers scored 635 runs; in 1988 they scored 628 runs. This was the part of the game over which Kirk Gibson had some measure of control, and they got just a little but worse. Gibson wasn't the reason they get worse, not by any means, but if had any hidden effect on his teammates, it is very well hidden indeed.
In 1987, the Dodgers allowed 675 runs to score; in 1988 they allowed 544 runs to score. This is the part of the game over which GIbson had virtually no control (he played LF pretty much at the same level Guerrero had in '87), and the Dodgers improved dramatically. If Gibson is being credited with making his teammates better, then it was his teammates who were pitchers who got the benefit of this effect. While they were pitching. From the left fielder.
I have no doubt that you are correct that there was buzz surrounding the Dodgers, and that sportswriters were crediting Gibson with their improvement. What I'm telling you is that they were wrong.
And I'm going to let this go now because I like Gibson and looking up this stuff has just reminded me what a great year he had in '88 (statistically, I mean) and I'm pissing on it. Clark deserved the MVP in '88, but Gibson's winning it doesn't make the top 50 of MVP's I complain about.
Hard to argue with that.