I think that for posterity we put Irvin as an LF, even if it takes a couple of weeks and even if we vote on him here.

the "NL dominance," [in HOM active players] by this measure, takes a little longer than some might think
Al leads until 1951, NL basically catches up, but NL doesn't establish lead until 1960 and doesn't start utterly dominating until 1964-71, when it's an amazing imbalance

1952 NL (12/14/14)
Brooklyn - C Roy Campanella, 2B Jackie Robinson, SS Pee Wee Reese, OF Duke Snider
New York - RP Hoyt Wilhelm, OF Willie Mays*, OF Monte Irvin*
St. Louis - OF(1B) Stan Musial, OF Enos Slaughter
Philadelphia - SP Robin Roberts, OF Richie Ashburn
Chicago
Cincinnati
Boston - SP Warren Spahn, 3B Eddie Mathews
Pittsburgh - OF Ralph Kiner

1952 AL (11/12/16)
New York - C Yogi Berra, 1B Johnny Mize*, OF Mickey Mantle (Charlie Keller 1 G)
Cleveland - SP Bob Lemon, SP Bob Feller, SP Early Wynn, OF Larry Doby (Quincy Trouppe 6 G)
Chicago - SP Billy Pierce, 2B Nellie Fox, OF Minnie Minoso
Philadelphia
Washington
Boston (Ted Williams 2 G, Lou Boudreau 2 G)
St. Louis - RP Satchel Paige
Detroit - SP Hal Newhouser

I think if you look at the actual numbers that these players put up in 1952, you'll see that whereas most if not all of the NL players were putting out peak-like performances, many of the AL players were either at the end of their careers (Mize, Feller, Trouppe, Boudreau, Paige, Newhouser). Not to mention that in hindsight the NL group was far superior overall.

The point is this: You can't just count HOM numbers and form much of a conclusion about the relative league quality. A better method would be to count the number of HOM players who were at, or nearly at, the peak of their careers. A variant of that would be to count the number of A-level HOFers in each league who were at their peak in any given year. These give you a truer indication of how the leagues compared. And if you use this method, the NL's marked superiority beginning in the early 50's jumps out at you far more clearly.

I agree with that point, basically - which is why I specifically said "BY THIS MEASURE, takes a little longer than some might think" and why I listed some of the examples as I did so people could examine that point.

On the other hand, at 27-10, it's not likely it's just going to be all about old-timers hanging on, either.

In the same spirit, listing other lopsided TOTAL HOMers years since 1900 (not listing those right next to others already listed or listed here):

1901 NL (19/20/21)
Pittsburgh - SS-OF(2B) Honus Wagner, OF Fred Clarke
Philadelphia - 1B Hughie Jennings, OF-1B Ed Delahanty, OF Elmer Flick
Brooklyn - 1B Joe Kelley, SS Bill Dahlen, OF Willie Keeler, OF Jimmy Sheckard
St. Louis - SS Bobby Wallace, OF Jesse Burkett
Boston - P Kid Nichols, OF Billy Hamilton
Chicago - P Rube Waddell, 2B Cupid Childs*
New York - P Christy Mathewson, SS George Davis
Cincinnati - 1B Jake Beckley, OF Sam Crawford (Amos Rusie 3 G)

1901 AL (7/7/7)
Chicago - P Clark Griffith
Boston - P Cy Young, 3B Jimmy Collins
Detroit
Philadelphia - P Eddie Plank, 2B Nap Lajoie
Baltimore - P Joe McGinnity, C Roger Bresnahan
Washington
Cleveland
Milwaukee
........................


1939 NL (11/11/11)
Cincinnati (Al Simmons 9 G/2T)
St. Louis - 1B Johnny Mize, OF Joe Medwick, OF Enos Slaughter
Brooklyn
Chicago - C Gabby Hartnett, 2B Billy Herman, 3B Stan Hack
New York - P Carl Hubbell, OF Mel Ott
Pittsburgh - SS Arky Vaughan, OF Paul Waner
Boston - Al Simmons(2T)
Philadelphia

1939 AL (16/17/21)
New York - P Red Ruffing, C Bill Dickey, 2B Joe Gordon, OF Joe DiMaggio, OF Charlie Keller (Lou Gehrig 8 G, Wes Ferrell 3 G)
Boston - P Lefty Grove, 1B Jimmie Foxx, 2B Bobby Doerr, SS Joe Cronin, OF Ted Williams
Cleveland - P Bob Feller, SS Lou Boudreau*, OF Earl Averill(2T)
Chicago - P Ted Lyons, SS Luke Appling
Detroit - 1B Hank Greenberg, 2B Charlie Gehringer, OF Earl Averill(2T) (Hal Newhouser 1 G)
Washington (Early Wynn 3 G)
Philadelphia
St. Louis

..........

1984 NL (13/14/14)
EAST
Chicago - SP Dennis Eckersley**(2T), 2B Ryne Sandberg
New York - 1B Keith Hernandez
St. Louis - SS Ozzie Smith
Philadelphia - SP Steve Carlton, 3B Mike Schmidt
Montreal - C Gary Carter, 1B-OF Pete Rose(2T), OF Andre Dawson, OF Tim Raines
Pittsburgh

WEST
San Diego - RP Rich Gossage, 3B Graig Nettles, OF Tony Gwynn
Atlanta
Houston - SP Nolan Ryan
Los Angeles
Cincinnati - 1B Pete Rose(2T)
San Francisco

1984 AL (23/25/27)
EAST
Detroit - 2B Lou Whitaker, SS Alan Trammell, DH-1B Darrell Evans
Toronto - SP Dave Stieb
New York - SP Phil Niekro, 2B Willie Randolph, OF Dave Winfield
Boston - 3B Wade Boggs, OF Dwight Evans (Dennis Eckersley** 9 G) (ROGER CLEMENS*)
Baltimore - 1B Eddie Murray, SS Cal Ripken (Jim Palmer 5 G)
Cleveland - SP Bert Blyleven
Milwaukee - SP Don Sutton, RP Rollie Fingers, 3B-DH Paul Molitor*(11G), SS(DH) Robin Yount, DH-1B Ted Simmons

1984
AL WEST
Kansas City - SP-RP Bret Saberhagen*, 3B George Brett
California - 1B Rod Carew, 2B(13) Bobby Grich, DH Reggie Jackson
Minnesota
Oakland - 2B Joe Morgan (RICKEY HENDERSON)
Chicago - SP Tom Seaver, C Carlton Fisk
Seattle
Texas

Marc sunnyday posted his prelim (#50).
#80-83:
I challenged him on ranking Roush 12, a gap ahead of the pack, where whoever ends up in ranks 13-14 will feel like overrated. Paul Hines and Geroge Gore are two in that pack. I presented their fielding careers in terms of playing time and their "Rate" in CF according to Clay Davenport.


Marc replied, in part (#85-86)
As to the 19C guys, i.e. where do Hines and Pike and Gore and O'Rourke go relative to one another, after Hamilton at an obvious #1, I dunno, is Hines obvious at #2?

Oh, and as for Roush, I don't know why that's unexpected, he was on my ballot for 50 years. I think you could argue that he was the best NL position player of the '10s. Of course, you could argue that for a lot of guys.


Roush played only four NL seasons in the '10s; six seasons including the Federal League and two of the six were short in playing time ('14, '16). Even if you favor Roush by starting the "'10s" in 1914 or 1916, how does he match Benny Kauff (another CF with two FL and four NL seasons)? Nor is it clear he was better than Hornsby in the league and Groh on his team during 1916-19, his four NL seasons in the decade.

That paragraph essentially repeats #90.
As yet I have only approached Marc's question about the 19th century CFs.
> As to the 19C guys, i.e. where do Hines and Pike and Gore and O'Rourke go relative to one another,
> after Hamilton at an obvious #1, I dunno, is Hines obvious at #2?

Mike Webber was the campaign manager for Roush. 2006-08-25 in the Edd Roush thread he re-posted the all-time rankings of CFs by three others whom he recognized as supporters. He hoped that their rankings of Roush around all-time 15 would contribute to his cause. Marc is one of the three.

Here are the crucial portions of their all-time rankings which highlight where those three supporters of Roush ranked the 19th century centerfielders Hines, Gore, and Hamilton.

==
1.

Eric Chalek 2006-08-23 covered "MLB-only CFs through 2005"
(but I suppose he includes Larry Doby's whole career)

Eric Chalek, I
6 Hines, P
7 Gore, G
8 Snider, D
9 Hamilton, B
10 Duffy, H
11 Doby, L
12 Browning, P
13 Averill, E
14 Griffey, Jr
15 Van Haltren, G
16 Roush, E

Eric Chalek, II "keltnerized"
6 Hamilton, Billy 66
7 hines, paul 62
8 Griffey Jr., Ken 54*
9 Snider, Duke 48
10 gore, george 46
11 roush, edd 43
12 Browning, Pete 43
13 duffy, hugh 42
14 doby, larry 36

2.

Marc Sunnyday 2006-08-23 covered MLB CF through "about 2000" in some integrated fashion
with parenthetical remarks on NeL CF except Stearnes is missing.

>>
[Inner Circle - the familiar six including Charleston]
Lock

[Griffey probably here, accord'g to accomp'g prose]
Snider 249
Puckett 211--aside from the inner circle, TPR has Puckett ahead of everybody but Wynn and Ashburn, and his combined HFM, HFS, BI and GI is pretty good; no real weaknesses in this system

Show Cause Why Not

Dawson 196--a HoMer in my book
Hamilton 195
Browning 187
Hines 186
Roush 184
Carey 176
Wilson 176--e.g. pretty borderline, one-dimensional
Gore 175
(Torriente probably near the top of this group)

Show Cause Why

Doby 173--e.g. added NeL value, that's why [ie, this is without NeL credit]
<<

3.

Andrew Siegel 2006-08-23 covered all CF through Griffey but Stearnes is missing.

[the familiar six]
(7) Hamilton
(8) Snider
(9) Griffey
(10) Torriente
[gap]

(11) Doby
[gap]

(12) Hines
(13) Gore
(14) Averill
(15) Edmonds
(16) Roush

==
Those "gaps" above and below Doby at #11 match Marc's 2008 ladder (sunnyday # )
except Marc now couples Roush with Doby, a gap ahead of the pack, and he lists
Stearnes and doesn't count Griffey in the ten who are a gap ahead of Doby.

Those selections are directly from Edd Roush #45-48 by Mike Webber, indirectly from then-current Jimmy Wynn thread. Mike selected them because he hoped that their support would help revive Roush's case.

Edd Roush 48. Mike Webber Posted: August 25, 2006 at 03:09 PM (#2156710)
I hope Doc, Marc, and Andrew don't mind me reposting their comments here, but hopefully in a couple of election cycles - it is "1984" as I type this - I think Edd being in the top 15 on these lists will be arguements in his favor. Especially since 2 of the three incorporate Negro Leaguers, and one includes active players.

Being the 15th best centerfielder ever is a pretty stong arguement in my book. Still borderline, but on the "in" side of the line.

==
Damn this website! I don't have the highlights quite right in the preceding article. Roush and the author should be bold. At least I have the Hines, Gore, and Hamilton consistently underlined.

No, I don't think Hamilton is the obvious #1 among 19c CFs. He is one plausible choice, Hines is another, not Gore. Strong "careerists" will prefer O'Rourke to both Hs. Pike is not in the discussion at this level. Evidently only one of our three Roush supporters considered Hamilton > Hines obvious (Andrew).

None of them put Roush ahead of Hamilton or Hines and only put him just ahead of Gore (Marc). Let me insert Charleston, Stearnes, and Torriente above Roush where necessary, and delete the active or recent players . . .
Two years ago our three Roush supporters would have ranked him thus in the present CF poll.

Eric Chalek, 19 and 14
Marc Sunnyday, 15 (since then he has passed Dawson, Browning, Hines; they were all in the pack and Roush has left the pack behind a gap)
Andrew Siegel, 15

That is about what I would expect from his best friends.

HOM CenterFielders who are not in the Hall of Fame
How did they fare in our "Group" polls?

Group1 (12)
- 11, Dawson

Group2 (12)
- 10, Wynn

Group3 (21)
- 3, Hines
- 5, Gore
- 21, Browning

Group4 (12)
- 10, Pike
- 12, Oms

Revised Prelim

I'd like to vote now but I really want to wait until I see what Chris comes up with for MLEs and how Dan R translates them to WARP. The downballot slots are close enough that there numbers will have a large impact.

1) Cobb (and I can't stand the guy)
2) Mays
3) Speaker (best defensive CF ever?)
4) Mantle
5) Charleston
6) DiMaggio
7) Stearnes
8) Hamilton
9) Torriente
10) Max Carey (BFF?)
11) Paul Hines
12) Duke Snider
13) Ashburn
(Tommy Leach if he's a CF)
(Reggie Smith)
14) Pete Hill (lots of uncertainty & doubt)
15) Jim O'Rourke (could be better but I think he's behind Hines)
16) Doby
17) Gore
18) Cool Papa Bell (in/out)
19) Alejandro Oms (could move, will be PHoM within 5 elections)
[Dom DiMaggio] (out)
20) Earl Averill
21) Jim Wynn
22) Edd Roush
23) Andre Dawson
24) Lip Pike (career is too short)
25) Pete Browning - mistake
26) Willard Brown - a big time mistake. Offensively he's Andre Dawson. Defensively he was good, indifferent or awful depending on how he woke up that day. Attitude was a big minus. HoM talent/potential but most evidence suggests he never lived up to that talent.

until I see what Chris comes up with for MLEs

I'lll try to get updated MLEs for Bell and Brown done over the weekend, along with FWS for them and for Torriente, who also needs career XBH. Oh, and Doby has only a few seasons: he'll be quick to do.

Oms I doubt I will get to: integrating CWL data and NeL data takes a lot more time. I could do XBH based on current translations, and then Dan R would have enough data to do WAR for Oms if he wants. We'll see. Now that my semester is underway, time is a lot more scarce than it was recently.

I don't know if Speaker is the best defensive CF ever by *ability*, but I don't think there's much doubt that he was by *value*. A superlatively gifted CF with the brilliance to play ultra-shallow in the deadball era could simply make more of an impact than the best fielding CF once the lively ball was implemented. In the same sense, the greatest K pitcher of all time was probably Dazzy Vance, but the one whose K ability had the most value was either Ryan, Clemens, or the Unit.

That actually opens up some tricky cross era comparisons. Let's say, for the sake of argument, that Speaker could be +30 runs every on defense (I don't think that he was, but I do remember Dan mentioning that some systems like DRA have CRAZY SD's in early baseball), while a modern center-fielder could only be, say, +15 runs at most. Is it fair to give Speaker the extra credit for those runs? They obviously produced real wins. I guess this may come down to value vs. ability as merit, but either way there could be a "fairness to all eras" consideration here as well. SD adjustment may mitigate the issue to some extent, but I am not sure it would remove it entirely.

I find it, um, interesting that most of us have come down on the "ability" side when discussing DH-vs-no-DH players; we recognize Win Shares undervalues modern AL batters compared to NL. Extending this argument a bit further, if the NL decided to go a 8-man game (take away one OFer or an IFer from the defense), this would increase the value (in runs) for each batter who would now come to the plate 80ish more times a year, without a smidgen change in his ability.

But... more than half our voters seem to edge toward the "value" side of the argument when it comes to park effcts (G Cravath) or changes in the game (Speaker's CF defense?).

Anyone wish to plead "guilty as charged, your honor, but the charge is irrelevant and should be dismissed?"

Yes, there are definitely some crazy outliers. How 'bout a minus-39 for Joe Jackson in 1919? Maybe he was on the payroll for the regular season too! :) (FRAA has him at a much more modest -12). And if Ed Delahanty was really +44 in 1893, or Flick +38 in 1901, or Sheckard +66 over 1902-03 combined, then...well, wow. Clearly, some of this is pitcher BABIP prevention being credited to the fielders. But another chunk of it is that defense mattered more back then. There were many fewer strikeouts and home runs, increasing the number of balls in play and their relative importance in run scoring. Furthermore, errors were much more common, meaning that an extremely sure-handed defender could save many more runs relative to the average in those days than one can today.

As for how to address it: there were still no more wins above replacement to go around in the deadball era than there are today (after accounting for overall standard deviations). If fielding mattered more, that means pitching mattered less--certainly, if you assigned all deadball pitchers the same BABIP and just calculated a defense-independent ERA for them using their K BB and HR rates, they'd all look somewhat similar. The logical conclusion would be to elect more position players and fewer pitchers from that era. However, the flip side is that--indeed perhaps because they had to exert less effort, since they relied so much more on their defense--pitchers threw far more innings in those days than they do now. So although the total pool of WARP is the same, it's being divvied up among fewer players, thus leading to more of them having HoM-worthy statistics as a percentage of the total. I don't think there's any one right way to correct for this; it's just a voter preference issue.

Tom, adjusting for the DH is only a value vs. ability question if you use a 'tarded system like Win Shares. With my approach, every player is compared to a replacement at his position, meaning that the inclusion of value for DH's does not lead to a reduction of value for other position players--it just means that the hitting WARP that were previously going to pitchers who hit now go to DH's. Yes, if they went to an 8-man game, that would increase the value of each position player, but there would also be fewer position players, so the total # of HoM-worthy position players would not change.

Let's say, for the sake of argument, that Speaker could be +30 runs every on defense (I don't think that he was, but I do remember Dan mentioning that some systems like DRA have CRAZY SD's in early baseball), while a modern center-fielder could only be, say, +15 runs at most. Is it fair to give Speaker the extra credit for those runs? They obviously produced real wins.

I think it's almost imperative to give him the 'credit' (it's not EXTRA credit). Otherwise, you end up with possible crazy results, like Speaker was the best player in MLB in 19xx, BUT for HOM purposes isn't even the best player on his own team, etc.

I know I've posted about this before, but I'm really not feeling the preference for Mantle over Speaker, and I'd like to ask every voter who puts the Commerce Comet over the Grey Eagle to reevaluate. Let's compare here, with a war-credited Mays thrown in for good measure. (For Mays, I'm using a DRA/TotalZone hybrid for defense and Dan Fox's EqBRR for baserunning to be as favorable to him as possible. For Mantle, there's no significant difference between those figures and the FRAA/Fielding WS numbers, so I've stuck with the originals).

Speaker



3-year peak: 32.8
7-year prime: 68.7
Career: 145.4
Salary: $502,506,620


Mantle



3-year peak: 35.6
7-year prime: 71.6
Career: 123.7
Salary: $429,078,376


Mays



3-year peak: 31.4
7-year prime: 67.8
Career: 161.4
Salary: $555,926,690

Ranked by 3-year peak: Mantle 35.6, Speaker 32.8, Mays 31.4
By 7-year prime: Mantle 71.6, Speaker 68.7, Mays 67.8
By Career: Mays 161.4, Speaker 145.4, Mantle 123.7
By Salary: Mays $556M, Speaker $502M, Mantle $429M

OK, if you're a pure peak/short prime voter, I get it. But then you should have Mantle #1 or #2 (Cobb's peak was roughly as stratospheric).

What I don't understand are the Mays-Mantle-Speaker placements. The gap in career value between Mantle and Speaker is enormous--Speaker's offensive value above average was the same as Mantle's, and then he tacks on a mere twenty-two wins of defense. Put another way, Mantle and Speaker had roughly equivalent career value through age 33 at 110 WARP2 apiece. After that, Mantle was reduced to three banged-up years, two of them at first base. By contrast, Speaker promptly hit .378/.474/.606, .380/.469/.610, .344/.432/.510, and .389/.478/.578 the next four seasons, while sticking in CF. We're not talking about meaningless late-career stat-padding here. We're talking about an extra half-decade of MVP-caliber performance. I find it hard to swallow that one measly extra win per season over the top three years is sufficient to counteract over Twenty wins after age 33. It just doesn't pass the smell test. And again, if you really think that way, then why do you have Mays above Mantle?

It seems to me that people are implicitly dinging Speaker on a timeline basis. In terms of the ease of domination of their leagues, there is simply no empirical justification for this. The regression-projected standard deviation of Mantle's leagues was 95.7% of the 2005 level, while in Speaker's it was 94.5%. (The late aughts and late teens AL had quite low standard deviations). It's just not true that it was easier to rack up X Win Shares/WARP in Speaker's time than in Mantle's. And in terms of league strength, sure, Speaker didn't have to compete with black players--but with a handful of exceptions, Mantle didn't either. Moreover, Speaker was playing in by far the stronger league during the teens, battling with Cobb and Collins for MVP honors every year, while the NL only had Cravath and George Burns to write home about. By contrast, Mantle was playing in the far weaker league during his time, with the black stars clustered in the NL. So if there's a league strength case to be made, it has to go to Speaker, I think.

Does your ballot rank Mays ahead of Mantle ahead of Speaker? If so, please stick your neck out to justify your placement!

Upon re-reading my rambling stream-of-consciousness post #70 on this thread, I realize that Dan isn't talking to me.

Speaker is an interesting case. He does quite well in many advanced stats, including win shares, yet I believe there's a reluctance to believe he was as good as his stats suggest. There are a few good reasons for this. First, he was not offensively dominant. Very good, even excellent, but not historically great. He rarely led the league in offensive categories, although he was always among the leaders. Mantle, on the other hand, was historically dominant - he didn't just lead the league, year after year, in the most important offensive stats, he utterly dominated his leagues in a few of those years at nearly a Ruth/Williams/Bonds kind of level. It is reasonable based on this to think that Speaker's defensive advantage can't make up for this - keep in mind that defensive statistics are probably more open to interpretation than Dan would suggest.

So this leads to the reasonable assumption that Mantle was a good deal better than Speaker at their respective peaks, and that makes up for Speaker's career advantages, leading to the ratings.

I do not believe, for a second, that the American league of the 1950's and 1960's was inferior in terms of the level of competition than the level of competition during Speaker's time. The fact that the American League was much slower to integrate than the NL during the 1950's and 1960's should not be considered a point in Tris Speaker's favor. It is reasonable to say that the AL was the stronger league in Speaker's time, and the weaker league in Mantle's, but it is a logical fallacy to then assume it means that the AL of 1915 was stronger than the AL of 1955.

I also don't believe it was harder to dominate the AL of 1915 than the AL of 1955, no matter what Dan's analysis tells him. The AL of 1915 had several players putting up statistics dwarfing the rest of the league, including Cobb, Speaker, Collins, and Johnson. The only one putting up numbers even close to Mantle in the 50's AL was Ted Williams, of which nothing needs to be said.

Overall I am confident that Mantle was better than Speaker in terms of peak value, and Speaker was better in terms of career value. I'm guessing a lot of people would agree with me. Putting Mantle over Speaker overall is eminently justifiable by the numbers (although I can see an argument for the opposite), and no one needs to stick their necks out to justify it.

Speaker rarely led the league in offensive categories because he played in the same league as Ty Cobb, Dizzypaco. There is no doubt that Mantle was a superior hitter at his peak, but I do not see why you say it is "reasonable...to think that Speaker's defensive advantage can't make up for this." Of course defensive stats from the teens are less reliable than the ones we have today. But we certainly do know that Speaker was universally regarded as the greatest defensive outfielder the game had ever seen until Willie Mays. Speaker's own fielding stats simply back up what his reputation was already telling us. We also know from modern play-by-play statistics that an otherworldly defensive CF (Andruw Jones or Darin Erstad) most definitely can save over 20 runs a year. And if you add 20 runs of fielding on to Speaker's hitting, you get a peak that's about one win a year below Mantle's--enough to be noticed, but hardly a huge advantage for Mantle.

In terms of overall quality of competition, I'm sure you're right that the 50s AL was tougher than the teens AL, but we have a strict no-timelining policy at the HoM, do we not? The point is that Speaker was playing in the much stronger league of his time, while Mantle was playing in the much weaker league of his time. It's on those grounds that a constitutionally acceptable league strength argument would have to go to Speaker.

Again, the reason why everyone was tearing up the teens AL and only Mantle and Williams did so in the 50's AL is precisely because these were two of the periods of greatest league strength disparity in major league history. You're focusing on Cobb/Speaker/Collins but ignoring the NL, where MVP awards would have gone to the likes of George Burns and Gavvy Cravath. And you're not comparing Mantle to Mays, Aaron, Banks, F. Robinson, Mathews, Musial, etc. There were far more inner circle HoM position players in their prime in the 1950s (Williams, Mays, Musial, Aaron, Mantle, Mathews, Berra if you give a big catcher bonus, and the beginning of F. Robinson) than there were in the teens (Cobb, Speaker, Collins, the end of Wagner and Lajoie, the beginning of Hornsby). If anything, the argument goes the other way!

Yes indeed, Mantle was better than Speaker in terms of peak value, and Speaker was better in terms of career value. But Mantle's advantage in peak is marginal, while Speaker's advantage in career was enormous. In magnitude, it's equivalent to ranking Nellie Fox above Lou Whitaker, or Harlond Clift above Paul Molitor, or Elmer Flick/Joe Kelley over Al Kaline (a difference of about +3 on 3-year peak and 7-year prime, and of -22 on career). It's logically consistent for a pure peak voter, but it's just too far from the reality of winning baseball games to be credible.

From Post 119: First, he was not offensively dominant. Very good, even excellent, but not historically great. He rarely led the league in offensive categories, although he was always among the leaders.

Umm, he rarely led in categories because he was competing with Ty Cobb in the Teens and Babe Ruth in the 20s. Those two just happen to have the led league in the most offensive categories. First and second in black ink? Ruth 161 points and Cobb 150. Despite competing with those two players for his entire career, Speaker is still 46th in career Black Ink. Tied with? Joe Dimaggio.
The only player whose career overlaps Cobb and Ruth who is above Speaker is Gehrig. But if you look at Gehrig's Black Ink it demonstrates how difficult it was to get Ink competing with Ruth/Cobb. Almost all of Gehrig's Black Ink is from 34 to 38. The Black Ink before that was the result of historically great XBH years or RBI totals from driving Ruth in.

Looking at Grey Ink, Speaker is 6th all-time with 346. Most of those are top 5. Speaker was top 3 in AVG 10 times in 16 years. He was top 4 in OBP 13 years out of 16. And top 5 11 years out of 16. I don't think there are many players with that profile. And at this same time, he was a Gold Glove defender most every year.

Oops, I forgot a term. Speaker was top 5 in Slugging 11 years out of 16.

What Dan said.

Black Ink / Grey Ink (place)
Cobb: 150 / 417 (2nd / 1st)
Mantle: 65 / 272 (14th / 17th)
Mays: 57 / 337 (19th / 8th)
Speaker: 34 / 346 (46th / 6th)

Ty Cobb: Just wow. If you cut Cobb in half, his Black Ink would be 2 players tied for 10th (or Lou Gehrig) and his Grey Ink would be 34th and 35th (or Alex Rodriguez and Billy Williams).
The top 6 in Black Ink are so far ahead of the rest: Ruth 161, Cobb 150, Hornsby 125, Williams 122, Musial 116, Wagner 109. Then Brouthers is 7th with 79.

I know Black Ink / Grey Ink have their faults, but it is amazing to see how dominant some of these players were. Alex Rodriguez will tie Gehrig for 10th if he holds on to his SLG lead and can finish first in HR.

CF is strange with how severe the talent disparity can be. After Cobb and Speaker dominate the position for 20 years, Earl Averill comes in and per both Dan WARP and WS is consistently the best CF in the AL. I think 9 times by WARP and a similar number by WS. I am at work without my stats so going by memory. The problem was there wasn't any competition so Averill was an "All-Star" almost by default. In some years, Averill was the best despite having less than 4.0 WARP. He wasn't having great years, but he was the best in the league.

Yeah, I mean, Dizzypaco's argument is no different than dinging Foxx and Greenberg for playing in the same league as Gehrig, or Yount and Trammell for playing in the same league as Ripken, or Jeter for playing in the same league as A-Rod. Sometimes you'll just get random gluts of great players in the same league at the same position, just like you'll get random droughts (like 1950s 1B). They don't say anything about the Merit of the players involved.

The correct approach to dealing with this is, as I've said some umpteen zillion times,

1. Assess the overall ease of domination of a league based on its intrinsic characteristics (like run scoring and years since expansion), rather than on how specific players actually happened to perform in it. This enables you to distinguish between star gluts (the 50s NL) and droughts (the teens NL) and leagues that were actually easy to dominate (the 1998 NL) or hard to (the AL around 1905).

2. After adjusting for ease of domination, compare players to their positional peers by looking at the broad bottom of the distribution (I look at the bottom 3/8), which is much less susceptible to random fluctuations than the overall average (like RCAP) or particularly the top.

Question: if Reggie Smith gets elected to the HoM in 2009 (which seems quite possible), which positional pool would he belong in? CF or RF? The total games played are roughly similar. He was primarily a CF in Boston, and that's presumably when he defensive value was highest. On the other hand, for those couple of years in Los Angeles when his offensive rate stats went through the roof, he was in RF. I don't know what he played in Japan.

The possibility of him being elected very soon makes me wonder about his placement on the appropriate list.

I did forget to mention Lloyd as an inner circle HoM position player whose prime was in the teens.

Part of the Ink phenomenon is just expansion--it's twice as easy to lead an league with eight teams than one with 16...

I thought I would look at players who spent most of their careers with 24 teams or more for the B.I. and G.I.

Here are the hitters in the top 30 of Black Ink who are 1969 and later:

11. Schmidt - 74
12. Bonds - 69
13. Rodriguez - 68
15. Rose - 64
20. Gwynn - 57
22. Yastrzemski - 55
28. Henderson - 50

Here are the hitters in top 30 of Grey Ink who are 1969 and later:

1. Cobb - 417
...
5. Anson - 358
...
10. Hornsby - 329

14. Bonds - 289
24. Rose - 239
30. Schmidt - 224
(Alex Rodriguez is tied for 35th with 208. He should be in the top 30 after this season.)

Here are the pitchers in the top 30 of Black Ink who are 1969 and later:

1. Walter Johnson - 150
2. Alexander - 126
3. Grove - 108
4. Spahn - 101
5. Young - 100

6. Clemens - 100
7. Randy Johnson - 96
10. Maddux - 85
11. Ryan - 84
16. Carlton - 66
21. Seaver - 57
22. Pedro Martinez - 55

Here are the pitchers in the top 30 of Grey Ink who are 1969 and later:

1. Young - 472
...
5. Alexander - 339

6. Maddux - 333
8. Clemens - 314
10. Seaver - 296
12. Carlton - 282
13. Johnson - 277
17. Perry - 253
19. Ryan - 251
23. Mussina - 244
24. Sutton - 240
25. Blyleven - 237
(Pedro Martinez is currently 31st)

Simple check on ease of domination:

Tris Speaker was 3 times the best hitter in his league (by BBref's batting wins). Four times he was 2nd. Two of those four were Ruth and Cobb years, so if you wanna say "but he played with Ruth and Cobb", you could argue he was five times the best. Of couse maybe a Negro Leaguer might have beaten him if they had the chance.

Mantle had 9. And some of them weren't 'squeak over the line' years, they were blow-em-all-away seasons.

I don't have the stats with me right now; I'll get them in a day or two; but Speaker also had a huge home park advantage, more than typical for his teammates. Yes, real value came from this, but in a neutral setting... well, I guess I'd say if I were managing a pre-1920 ball team, I'd take Speaker, but in the live ball era, I have the Mick higher.

TomH:


1. How many times do I have to say that you simply cannot compare Speaker and Mantle just to their AL peers, because Speaker played in perhaps the strongest AL (relative to its contemporaneous NL) ever, while Mantle played in perhaps the weakest AL (relative to its contemporaneous NL) ever? Please, pretty pretty please, can we never ever mention Speaker and Mantle's ranks in the American League ever again?? Can I get these comparisons banned? I BESEECH YOU ALL, if we are going to talk about ranks, use the major leagues. Mays and Aaron and F. Robinson and Musial and Banks and Mathews were all playing at the same time as Mantle, you know. You can't reward Mantle because his league was slow to integrate.

2. Of course Mantle was a better pure hitter at his peak than Speaker was! I have never suggested otherwise. The peak gap on offense ALONE is indeed significant.

3. But again, as I seem to still have to insist at every opportunity, catching the ball also forms part of this sport! There is no question that Speaker is one of the two greatest defensive center fielders of all time. He was universally regarded as such, and the quantitative evidence at our disposal (be it FRAA, FWS, or DRA) completely supports that reputation. Moreover, modern play-by-play defensive stats certainly can tell us the overall magnitude of just how much of a difference a superlative center fielder can and cannot make on a team's bottom line of runs and wins. I am not giving Speaker any kooky +35 seasons here or anything--I only have him at +10 a year, peaking at +24. Guys put up +24 seasons in CF all the time these days, and the best CF of our day (Andruw, Erstad) did so routinely at their peaks. Do we really think that the man universally acclaimed as a top-two all time fielding CF never would have broken +20? Well, once you tack on a few +20 defensive seasons to Speaker's hitting, then the gap in peak between him and Mantle narrows substantially. Mantle still does retain a small peak/prime edge.

4. My point was never that Speaker's peak was actually equal to Mantle's. It wasn't. I am only saying that the gap between their peaks is rather small, while the gap in career value is immense, and that you have to be an almost religiously devoted pure peak voter to not see the forest for the trees on this one. Again, it's the same as putting Harlond Clift over Paul Molitor. No, Molitor never put up a season like Clift's '37 or '38. But really, come on.

5. Synthesizing all this, here are Speaker and Mantle's major--not American--league ranks in total value (hitting plus baserunning plus fielding) for every season they were top 10, year-by-year, along with the portion coming from each type of win above average, and the players who topped them for the years they ranked #2 through #5:

Speaker




Mantle



Looks a little different when you include those NL players too, dunnit? Speaker and Mantle were each the best player in baseball three times, the second-best player twice, and the third-best player once. After that, it's all Speaker: he has four fourth-place finishes to Mantle's three, they each have one fifth-place showing, and then Speaker has another six top-ten placements to Mantle's one. If anything, if you're talking about rank in the majors, Speaker was more dominant than Mantle! (He wasn't, of course; this is a gimmicky approach, but it's the one that TomH is advocating).

6. I have no idea about Speaker's home/away splits. But he split his career between two very different parks: one was short to left field, the other was short to right. If he retained a substantial home-field advantage throughout his career, that just suggests he was a great enough hitter to adapt to his surroundings and take advantage of them, rather than a guy who just had the dumb luck to play in a park suited for his skills.

7. Well, Speaker played pre-1920, and Mantle played in the live ball era, so you just have to evaluate which one was more valuable within his own context (hint: Speaker!). :)

Brock,
Here is one
Wt Ht Bat Throw
155 72 B L Bell (Riley 150# 71)
200 72 L L Charleston (Riley 190#)
215 73 L R Hill
190 69 L L Oms
175 71 L L Stearnes (Riley 72)
190 69 L L Torriente

Generally I have entered Riley's weight and height data where available. Perhaps the Bell, Charleston, and Stearnes data (only 2 of 6 match Riley) matches the NBHOFM website. Those are the older HOFers who were in this database "originally".

Simple check on ease of domination:

Tris Speaker was 3 times the best hitter in his league (by BBref's batting wins). Four times he was 2nd. Two of those four were Ruth and Cobb years, so if you wanna say "but he played with Ruth and Cobb", you could argue he was five times the best. Of couse maybe a Negro Leaguer might have beaten him if they had the chance.

Mantle had 9. And some of them weren't 'squeak over the line' years, they were blow-em-all-away seasons.

I'm with Tom. I would add that Mantle's competition wasn't all that stiff while Speaker was competing with Cobb and he still comes out looking good anyway.

EDIT: sorry, Dan. I didn't read carefully your analysis. Point still stands though.

Which point still stands? Mine is that after giving Speaker reasonable credit for his defense (i.e., the best center fielder of his generation, average +10 peak +25, rather than anything extreme like average +20 peak +35), Speaker was the best, second-best, and third-best player in baseball just as often as Mantle was. Speaker was the best in the major leagues in '12, '14, and '16, the second-best in '17 and '23, and the third-best in '13, while Mantle was the best in '56, '57, and '61, the second-best in '55 and '58, and the third-best in '60. After that, of course, it's all Speaker due to his much greater number of star-caliber seasons.

Black/Hispanic HOMers during Mantle's career, by league by year, listed below

just a compilation, but this does implicitly address "leading AL" issues with Mantle, re the competition. Um, check out 1962 for instance.

Basically Mantle arrived in 1951 to what already was a lesser pool of black/Hispanic stars.
And from 1952-65 - Mantle's prime, heck almost his whole career - the NL added Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Frank Robinson, Willie McCovey, Billy Williams, Bob Gibson, Juan Marichal, Willie Stargell, Jimmy Wynn, Richie Allen, Joe Morgan, and Ferguson Jenkins.

The AL added - no such players of that level of quality.

13 young black/Hispanic future HOMers join the party in a span of 14 years - and Mantle didn't have to compete against any of them. No insult intended to Mantle, but it's noteworthy.

* for part-time

1951 NL - Willie Mays, Monte Irvin, Roy Campanella, Jackie Robinson
1951 AL - Larry Doby, Minnie Minoso, Satchel Paige*

1952 NL - Willie Mays*, Monte Irvin*, Roy Campanella, Jackie Robinson
1952 AL - Larry Doby, Minnie Minoso, Satchel Paige (Quincy Trouppe 6 G)

1953 NL - Monte Irvin, Roy Campanella, Jackie Robinson, Ernie Banks*(10 G)
1953 AL - Larry Doby, Minnie Minoso, Satchel Paige

1954 NL - Willie Mays, Monte Irvin, Roy Campanella, Jackie Robinson, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron
1954 AL - Larry Doby, Minnie Minoso

1955 NL - Willie Mays, Monte Irvin*, Roy Campanella, Jackie Robinson, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente
1955 AL - Larry Doby, Minnie Minoso

1956 NL - Willie Mays, Monte Irvin, Roy Campanella, Jackie Robinson, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Frank Robinson
1956 AL - Larry Doby, Minnie Minoso

1957 NL - Willie Mays, Roy Campanella, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Frank Robinson
1957 AL - Larry Doby, Minnie Minoso

1958 NL - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Frank Robinson
1958 AL - Larry Doby, Minnie Minoso

1959 NL - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Frank Robinson, Willie McCovey*, Billy Williams*, Bob Gibson*
1959 AL - Larry Doby*, Minnie Minoso

1960 NL - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Frank Robinson, Willie McCovey*, Billy Williams*, Bob Gibson*, Juan Marichal*
1960 AL - Minnie Minoso

1961 NL - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Frank Robinson, Willie McCovey, Billy Williams, Bob Gibson, Juan Marichal
1961 AL - Minnie Minoso

1962 NL - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Frank Robinson, Willie McCovey*, Billy Williams, Bob Gibson, Juan Marichal, Minnie Minoso*, Willie Stargell (9 G)
1962 AL - NONE

1963 NL - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Frank Robinson, Willie McCovey, Billy Williams, Bob Gibson, Juan Marichal, Willie Stargell, Jimmy Wynn, Richie Allen (8 G), Joe Morgan (7 G)
1963 AL - Minnie Minoso

1964 NL - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Frank Robinson, Willie McCovey, Billy Williams, Bob Gibson, Juan Marichal, Willie Stargell, Jimmy Wynn*, Richie Allen, Joe Morgan (10 G)
1964 AL - Minnie Minoso (5 G)

1965 NL - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Frank Robinson, Willie McCovey, Billy Williams, Bob Gibson, Juan Marichal, Willie Stargell, Jimmy Wynn, Richie Allen, Joe Morgan, Ferguson Jenkins (7 G)
1965 AL - Satchel Paige (1 G)

1966 NL - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Willie McCovey, Billy Williams, Bob Gibson, Juan Marichal, Willie Stargell, Jimmy Wynn, Richie Allen, Joe Morgan, Ferguson Jenkins
1966 AL - Frank Robinson

1967 NL - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Willie McCovey, Billy Williams, Bob Gibson, Juan Marichal, Willie Stargell, Jimmy Wynn, Richie Allen, Joe Morgan, Ferguson Jenkins
1967 AL - Frank Robinson, Rod Carew, Reggie Jackson*

1968 NL - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Willie McCovey, Billy Williams, Bob Gibson, Juan Marichal, Willie Stargell, Jimmy Wynn, Richie Allen, Joe Morgan (6 G), Ferguson Jenkins
1968 AL - Frank Robinson, Rod Carew, Reggie Jackson

Dan - you make some good points. But. Yes, the AL was slow to integrate in 1955. So was the AL in 1920!! Let's run your chart again, taking away all of the dark-skinned players from the major leagues for each CFer:

Speaker - oh, his ranks remain the same :) As I'm feeling Olympian, he gets three golds, two silvers, one bronze.

Mantle - Six golds, two silvers, one bronze.

Yes, defense matters. It makes their primes closer.

sorry, my counting skillz aren't very good this morning. It's seven golds for Mantle-in-MLB-sans-black-players, not 6. Every .. single .. year from 1955 to 1962, excluding 1959. Babe Ruth would be pleased with such a record.

I just did a quick league strength study for the 50s and 60s, and my preliminary results are absolutely jawdropping. I looked at every position player who switched leagues between 1951 and 1968 (Mantle's career), a sample of 249 players. I took their rate in each season of batting wins per year, baserunning wins per year, and fielding wins per year, and added 8.7 to turn them into wins created per year. I then weighted each player by the harmonic mean of his playing time in the two seasons before and after the switch, giving 87 full seasons' worth of sample (where a player who plays every game in both the year before and after the switch is counted as 1.00). Finally, I took the ratio of their weighted performances before and after the switch. The ratio for batting wins was 1.092, for baserunning wins it was 1.001, and for fielding wins it was 1.007. This is, astonishingly, on par with the gap between the major leagues of 1944 and those of 1942/46. Notable examples:

Frank Robinson went from a 151 OPS+ in the 1965 NL to a 198 in the 1966 AL
Pete Runnels went from a 130 OPS+ in the 1963 AL to an 88 in the 1964 NL
George Strickland went from a 67 OPS+ in the 1951-52 NL to a 98 in the 1952-53 AL
Harvey Kuenn went from a 118 OPS+ in the 1960 AL to an 86 in the 1961 NL
Earl Torgeson went from a 96 OPS+ in the 1954-55 NL to a 120 in the 1955-56 AL
Dick Stuart went from an 81 OPS+ in the 1962 NL to a 126 in the 1963 AL, and then back from a 118 in the 1964 AL to a 101 in the 1965 NL
Moose Skowron went from a 115 OPS+ in the 1962 AL to a 60 in the 1963 NL, and then back to a 108 in the 1964 AL
Tommie Agee went from a 105 OPS+ in the 1967 AL to a 69 in the 1968 NL
Frank Howard went from a 111 OPS+ in the 1964 NL to a 138 in the 1965 AL
Roy Sievers went from a 143 OPS+ in the 1961 AL to a 117 in the 1962 NL
Lee Thomas went from a 128 OPS+ in the 1965 AL to a 70 in the 1966 NL

...and the list goes on and on. Overall, 152 of the 249 players and 53 of the 87 seasons' worth of playing time sampled (both 61%) improved upon switching from the NL to the AL or deteriorated upon switching from the AL to the NL, while the remaining 39% did the opposite.

A 1.09 conversion factor is so dramatic it boggles the mind. Could any of the group's other number crunchers possibly take the time to do their own study here and make sure I'm not entirely off the reservation? This would have tremendous implications for my PHoM, and for my understanding of the game's history in general. It suggests, for example, that Mantle's 223 OPS+ in the 1957 AL would have only been a 200 in the 1957 NL, or that Aaron's 181 OPS+ in the 1959 NL would have been a 202 in the 1959 AL. It would be great to have someone else do a reality check on this.

TomH, this is precisely why I impose a segregation penalty on pre-1947 players. You will get no argument from me on this. But the study I just completed suggests it should be something on the order of 20 points of OPS+ a year, not the mere tiebreaker I've been employing so far.

And wouldn't the segregation penalty be even bigger for pre-1947 leagues, since the integration of the NL presumably had at least a trickle down effect on the quality of the AL, e.g. forcing out sub-par white ballplayers? This is, indeed, pretty big if true. Mays becomes the solid #1 at CF, and Bonds jumps past Williams on the all-time list, and possibly even Ruth.

Interestingly, I just repeated the study on 1910-19 and found no difference in league strength, although the sample was much less robust (82 players, 28 full seasons' worth of play). For every 1917-18 Lee Magee, there was a 1917-18 Dave Shean.

Also, just reverse-engineering BP's all-time adjustments, they have a conversion factor of 1.054 between the AL and the NL for 1959, which fits with my preconceptions a lot better than the extreme 1.09 figure produced by my study.

Of course it would, Blackadder. It's just hard to put a hard number on it, especially since the ratio of black baseball talent to white baseball talent may not have been static throughout the 1890-1947 period. The real way to do it would be to get MLE's for every single player in the Negro Leagues, have better black players bump worse white players out of the league until you reach the maximum talent level over 16 teams, and then reduce everyone's wins above that new replacement level at the same ratio until total league runs scored equaled total league runs allowed. But you'd need complete NgL MLE's for that, and I don't think we'll ever get those, will we?

But you'd need complete NgL MLE's for that, and I don't think we'll ever get those, will we?

If the HoF would release its data in encyclopedic form, we'd have the evidentiary basis for it. If they would release the data in database/spreadsheet format, it would be possible for someone with database management skills to crunch the numbers.

I don't see it as unimaginable that we will have MLEs for all NeL players, 1920-47. But I'd guess we are at least 10 years away from having it.

Chris, any chance you could use your well-established NgL MLE methodology to work out a conversion factor between the NL and AL for the 1951-68 period to double-check mine?

addendum to post 136 - what about "almost" HOMers, stars of this sort debuting 1951-68 and getting a lot of support in our 2008 election?

- Reggie Smith, our No. 1 holdover, would list for AL in 1966 with 6 G. He's full-time ALer in 1967-68, adding to the about-time improvement in this area in the late 1960s.
- Luis Tiant, our No. 9 holdover, would fill in 1964-68 for AL and be the only such pitcher other than Satchel Paige.
- Tony Perez, No. 14 of the holdovers, gets one back for NL with 12 G in 1964 and then 1965-68.
- Don Newcombe, No. 20, would already be on the NL list at 1951, and add 1954-60 (also AL in 1960, where the only black HOMer he'd face on the mound would be Minnie Minoso).
- Lou Brock, No. 23, plays 4 NL games in 1961 and then adds to the 1962-68 NL pile.
- Elston Howard, No. 28, would be a huge AL addition as he'd list from 1955-68. But he was only on 12 of 50 ballots in 2008 voting, with a high of No. 5.
- Bobby Bonds, No. 30, would provide another NL player in 1968.

And so it goes from there, pretty even near the bottom, at least at a glance.
Newcombe and Howard would be the only 1950s additions, and they are long shots at this point.
And Tiant and Perez cancel each other out for 1963-65 as well.

Point being, the 1951-65 lopsidedness is not skewed by too many "just missed" AL stars compared to NL....

Dick Cramer's original study, quite the extensive mastrpiece, (published in the 1980 BRJ, and The Hidden Game by Pamler/Thorn) showed for 1957 and 1959 that an AL hitter would have lost 18 and 16 pts of SLG respectively if his league were NL quality (not that his SLG would have gone DOWN if he had moved to the NL, since the NL was a better run-scoring league); I don't have the OBP equivalent, but assuming similar OBP diffs that would mean about 7 runs (.7 wins) a year per hitter difference.

Howie,
If you go further down the list, black or hispanic
AL: Campaneris, Oliva, Aparicio
NL: Cepeda

I asked about #139 over in "Dan Rosenheck's WARP Data", to check my understanding of his study. The league quality thread would have been a better destination.
(sigh)


At SABR34 (2004) I talked to Dick Cramer about his approach. He was hoping or planning to redo it with more accurate measures available today. I think he told me next year that he had done so, with similar results. Whatever the results it would be good to have that available, published online.

I was getting something closer to two wins here, which is just implausibly large. Thanks for the reality check. I'd love to see the nitty-gritty of his approach, and how he's reading the data differently than I am.

Part of the Ink phenomenon is just expansion--it's twice as easy to lead an league with eight teams than one with 16...

I don't particularly buy into this. There might be twice as many players in a 16 team league than an 8, but there aren't necessarily twice as many guys who have the ability/potential/whatever to actually lead the league in something. How many guys there are who have that sort of potential, it seems to me, is more reflective of at least 2 other things than it is of the raw number of guys in the league.

1. The talent pool. How many guys there are who have the ability to lead the league is going to reflect the number of guys on the right end of the talent distribution, which is going to reflect, among other things, the overall size of the talent pool. Guys, not teams.

2. And it's also going to be dependent on where on the right end of the talent distribution the very best players happen to fall. IOW how far to the right end of the distribution a guy has to be to be a candidate to lead the league depends on where the outermost points are located. Or to put it another way, it probably would have been no harder for Babe Ruth to lead a league that had 16 or 32 or 100 teams. Barry Bonds would have led 1,000 team league in walks, OBA and OPS, because the addition of another 970 teams would have added exactly zero players with the potential to OPS 1.000.

OTOH if there is nobody in a league that is any better than Carlos Quentin, then, sure, it's going to be hard to lead that league. It might in practice be harder to lead a weak league. But that's just because it's harder for Carlos Quentin than it is for Barry Bonds. IOW it's not because there are 10 Carlos Quentin's, it's because there's no Barry Bonds.

>>
Wt Ht Bat Throw
155 72 B L Bell (Riley 150# 71)
200 72 L L Charleston (Riley 190#)
215 73 L R Hill
190 69 L L Oms
175 71 L L Stearnes (Riley 72)
190 69 L L Torriente

Generally I have entered Riley's weight and height data where available. Perhaps the Bell, Charleston, and Stearnes data (only 2 of 6 match Riley) matches the NBHOFM website. Those are the older HOFers who were in this database "originally".
<<

Larry Lester covers the early Hall of Famers in The Negro League Book (SABR 1994).
145-170 72 Bell
180-230 73 Charleston

Robert Peterson (1970)
Bell: 135 pounds in 1922 when he pitched semipro in East St Louis and left that team for the St Louis Stars
Charleston: mentions the weight gain but doesn't say anything specific
Torriente: 190 70

--
By the way, according to the same sources
Wt Ht
190 74 Dihigo (Riley 75) (Lester 190-225 75.5) (Peterson 190 73 "his full size")

Just a further response to Dizzypaco's comment that

I also don't believe it was harder to dominate the AL of 1915 than the AL of 1955, no matter what Dan's analysis tells him. The AL of 1915 had several players putting up statistics dwarfing the rest of the league, including Cobb, Speaker, Collins, and Johnson. The only one putting up numbers even close to Mantle in the 50's AL was Ted Williams, of which nothing needs to be said.

I understand that the nuances of standard deviation calculations, particularly when you are trying to distinguish between actual ease of domination and observed deviations from the mean, can be a bit daunting. So let's take a much less technical approach: following Joe Dimino's method for starting pitcher innings translations, let's look at the average of the #6 to #15 finishers in OPS+ in the major leagues over rolling nine-year periods during the entire 16-team era. Given the large sample sizes (90 player-seasons), this should serve as a reasonable proxy for ease of offensive domination: it intentionally ignores the absolute top outliers, who are likely to be once-in-a-generation players that say little about the overall ease of domination of the league, but focuses on the middle of the leaderboards, which should provide a sense of how far above average we can expect most of the best players in the league to be. Here are the results:

1901-1909: 143
1906-1914: 143
1911-1919: 142
1916-1924: 142
1921-1929: 146
1926-1934: 148
1931-1939: 147
1936-1944: 148
1941-1949: 144
1946-1954: 143
1951-1959: 146

This should make pretty clear why I say the deadball era was not easy to dominate on the whole. If it were, wouldn't you expect guys who ranked around 5th in their league in OPS+ to have a higher average OPS+ circa 1915 than circa 1955? Well, in fact, it's the other way around. What you had in the deadball era was NOT a high standard deviation overall but rather very high kurtosis ("fat tails"): a few outliers named Lajoie, Wagner, Cobb, Collins, and Speaker ripping the league to shreds, while the other players were actually clustered quite close to average. Once you got past the two giants of the aughts or the three of the teens, you were down into the dregs pretty quickly.

The top position players in the weak early-mid teens NL were Wheat, George Burns, and Gavvy Cravath, and in the second half of the decade you added the pre-peak Hornsby and Groh. The AL was certainly stacked, with Speaker/Cobb/Collins throughout the decade, and Baker and Jackson tearing things up as well around 1910. But the #4/#5 OPS+ finishers in the strong league were still guys like Fournier, Strunk, and Veach, with pre-peak Sisler coming along at the end. In short, the game was extremely top-heavy. Now look at how deep the 1950's were: you had T. Williams, Mantle, Mays, Musial, Aaron, F. Robinson, Mathews, Berra, Kaline, J. Robinson, Banks, Snider, Kiner, etc. If the deadball era was so easy to dominate, why were only a handful of players able to take advantage of it? Shouldn't that rising tide have lifted all boats (as it certainly did in, say, the Steroid Era NL)?

Now, maybe there was some systematic reason why kurtosis was so high in the deadball era--a small handful of great players utterly obliterating the league, with the rest of the All-Stars left in the dust. But I certainly can't think of one. It seems to me that the only valid explanation is indeed a random "star glut," which is why I don't discount the achievements of that period's giants more in my WARP.

Paul - Thanks so much for the NgL height and weight data. I'd done a web search, but that particular info was hard to find. I think I found the NgL Hall site, but it didn't have reliable data. For example, the only source for Bell had him at 6' 2" and 140 pounds. That's unreasonably thin for anyone over the age of 18, and may well come from the same source as the rookie data you found. The data you provided, while suggesting that Bell was very thin, doesn't have him down as anorexic. What I'm doing here is trying to see if top center fielders are, in general, smaller than other top ballplayers (yes, although it's a generalization), and how many of them have what Bill James calls "Kirby Puckett" bodies - short and stocky but still very fast (a high percentage). I also want to know if the very very best defensive center fielders have the KP bodies (no) or larger (yes, in general, Curt Flood being on the borderline). This allows me to get an extra indicator on those guys we have for whom very little defense data is available and we have to go on reputation. I got the idea from living in St. Louis and watching Mel Gray play football, and then from being from the same high school (Webster Groves) as the current and presumably eternal (the distance is no longer run) holder of the 100-yard dash record, Ivory Crockett. Both were about 5' 7" tall, weighed more than one would expect for a speedster of that height, and were blindingly fast anyway. There appears to be a "sweet spot" for speed in the human body makeup between about 5' 6" and 5' 8", weighing about 170-190 pounds. But those guys, while as fast as anyone, don't seem to be the truly dominant fielders at center. I'll post up the data later today. Again, thanks! - Brock

Another approach to calculating a segregation penalty would be to go backwards. If I remove all the black players from the majors in, say, the 1970-80 period, and fill in their playing time with replacement players (lowering the replacement level a little in the process), how much do I have to improve the remaining white players' average OPS+ to get a league OPS+ of 100? The two problems with this method are 1. it assumes that the ratio of black to white talent was the same from 1893-1947 as it was from 1970-80, which may be false and 2. I don't have a spreadsheet with every player's race, and I'm not about to look up 500 photos to put one together myself. Does anyone have any ideas to help me with this logistical challenge?

Mark Armour, who leads the SABR Bioproject, added a race variable to his database. I don't know how many values ("races") but one purpose was to identify all players who would have been unacceptable before 1947. Scope, major leagues 1947-1986 or so. That was a lot of work, more than looking at photos. It was not a Bioproject project, so the data may not be available to SABR members. On the other hand he may have put it in the public domain.

> 1. it assumes that the ratio of black to white talent was the same from 1893-1947 as it was from 1970-80, which may be false

get serious!
I am skeptical about 1908-1927 vs 1928-1947.
1908-1947 may be practically all you need but let me be discouraging about the leap from 1970s to any segregation period.

Willie Mays comment -

Mays' ranks in OPS+ thru his prime, chronologically:

1 1 4 1 1 / 3 3 / 3 3 2 1 1

The "/" are when he switched parks (twice). It's been often siad Mays adjusted his swing to the various dimensions of his home place (and the prevailing winds!). Slight trough in the middle of his career may reflect this. He adjusted well tho!

Looking at the defensive stats shows this also; his ##s by Win Shares and WARP actually show a brilliant early career, lull in mid-career, and then amazing numebrs ofr a mid-30s CFer.

Like DiMaggio, Mays was a truly all-around skilled player who was even better than the numbers he put up.

As a Larry King impersonator once said on Saturday Night Live, "Willie Mays was a heckuva ballplayer."

I don't see it as unimaginable that we will have MLEs for all NeL players, 1920-47. But I'd guess we are at least 10 years away from having it.

10 years is a bit pessimistic! ;>)

The data is in a database, and could theoretically be released tomorrow. All that's needed is for the HOF to give up on someone putting an encyclopedia deal in their laps, and allowing the data to be made public.

Hi. Here's the height and weight data I promised for the HoM center fielders plus a few selected others, sorted by height then weight.

Billy Hamilton 5 06 165
Hack Wilson 5 06 190
Lip Pike 5 08 158
Jim O'Rourke 5 08 185
Kirby Puckett 5 08 210
Curt Flood 5 09 165
Dom Dimaggio 5 09 168
Jimmy Wynn 5 09 170
Earl Averill 5 09 172
Paul Hines 5 09 173
Alejandro Oms 5 09 190
Cristobal Torriente 5 09 190
Richie Ashburn 5 10 170
Edd Roush 5 11 170
Max Carey 5 11 170
Turkey Stearnes 5 11 175
Willie Mays 5 11 180
Vince Dimaggio 5 11 183
Tris Speaker 5 11 193
George Gore 5 11 195
Terry Moore 5 11 195
Mickey Mantle 5 11 198
Willard Brown 5 11 200
Cool Papa Bell 6 0 155
Pete Browning 6 0 180
Darren Lewis 6 0 189
Duke Snider 6 0 190
Oscar Charleston 6 0 195
Ty Cobb 6 1 175
Larry Doby 6 1 182
Pete Hill 6 1 215
Joe DiMaggio 6 2 193
Andre Dawson 6 3 195

The non-HoMers, and the reasons for including them, are:

Curt Flood, because the current state of the competition for best defensive outfielder ever seems to be down to Speaker, Mays, and Flood (SMF). Hack Wilson because he's sort of the poster boy for short stocky guys who can run but who aren't exactly prime defenders. The two "other" DiMaggio brothers and Terry Moore because everyone seems to agree that they are just one step below the SMF trio. Darren Lewis because I wanted a more modern top glove, and Lewis played 11 years in the bigs despite being helpless to hit the pitching.

As you can see, I was on to a small something here. There really is a cluster of guys at 5' 8" and 5' 9", and anoth