Suppose that you have a 27-year-old player and a 24-year-old player of the same accomplishment...Jose Reyes and Albert Pujols...

This is where I stopped reading.

This is where I stopped reading.

Who are two people who have never been in my kitchen?

Matt Holliday is one day older then Albert Pujols. Holliday clocks in at 34, Pujols is not on the list.

Not James' best favorite toy, but I thought the following passage was quite good:

I have to tell you, as a baseball fan, I absolutely adore C. C. Sabathia. I always have. I've compared all these players to somebody else. It is sacrilege to compare C. C. Sabathia to any other pitcher. He is totally unique. For one thing, although listed weights of baseball players are so bogus that it's hard to see the point of listing them, C. C. has to be the heaviest player in major league history. He's huge -- 6'7"and has an aircraft carrier frame supporting large piles of necessary and unnecessary flesh, all of this adorned with comic little ears that stick out from his face as if the Lord couldn't find a flat place to put them. He has a unique delivery, hanging his massive leg in the air in seeming defiance of both gravity and nature, yet he is balanced and graceful. He projects a sort of genial warrior calm on the mound. He was an outstanding pitcher when he reached the majors in 2001 and has gotten steadily better, cutting his walks from 95 in 180 innings to 37 in 241 innings. He's 26 now, like Peavy, and his age is pushing him downward on this list; he is less of a young talent, and more of a mature product. But I don't think I've ever missed a C. C. Sabathia start in Kansas City when I was near KC or in Boston since I've been in Boston, and I hope he pitches forever.

There's no way Sabathia weighs more than Walter Young, who looked like he *ate* the current Sabathia.

The usual scintillating James.

Quite the man-crush on Sabathia, eh?

Robinson Cano is farther down on that list than I thought he'd be. A lot farther.

What, no Ryan Theriot? 8-)

The Pujols thing deserves an explanation.

In the companion article rating the young talent of the individual teams, he lists Edwin Jackson as an A grade talent. wow.

Matt Holliday is one day older then Albert Pujols. Holliday clocks in at 34, Pujols is not on the list.

Maybe the photos of Pujols playing in the Dominican winter league against Babe Ruth back in the 20's convinced Bill to leave him off the list.

Glad as I am to see Kyle Kendrick get recognition like this (#50), I would think that being 138th out of 142 qualifying pitchers in strikeout rate last year would make James unenthusiastic about him.

Companion list also lacks Justin Upton. Although he may just consider him B grade.

The Texas Rangers have nobody even in the top 75 ... {sigh}

I didn't see Jered Weaver on there. Hard to see him not ranking ahead of guys like Chad Gaudin and Kyle Kendrick.

Robinson Cano is farther down on that list than I thought he'd be. A lot farther.

Ha, someone else said it, now I don't have to bring it up. This is a pretty poor showing from a guy I've never really read before but have heard so much about.

Third, I made a "speed adjustment", since speed correlates strongly with defensive value

That explains Mike Cameron.

This list stinks. And I'm a James fanboy.

Quoth James:

Does Hernandez' youth outweigh Sabathia's production?

Nothing outweighs Sabathia.

I like Bill, but would any GM trade Tim Lincecum for anyone after 20 ? Its biased against the Lincecum's, Price's, Justin Upton's who haven't proven that much in the majors, but I would think the major's 6th highest K rate (given a 140 IP threshold) ought to get Timmah some recognition.

Its biased against the Lincecum's, Price's, Justin Upton's who haven't proven that much in the majors

Yeah, really. And therefore biased in favor of guys who have "proven" something. Bobby Jenks? I'd be surprised if he's more than a journeyman five years from now, unless he gets a career-ending injury.

And there's several players who have already been cut by one or more teams who had given up on them. This isn't a list of up-and-coming players, it's more like a list of "random good young players".

"Its biased against the Lincecum's, Price's, Justin Upton's who haven't proven that much in the majors"

I think that is a much better bias than the Baseball Prospectus rankings, which think that Joba Chamberlain is more valuable than Brandon Webb.

AROM, Jered Weaver shows up in the team-by-team list, which isn't too kind to Howie Kendrick and Casey Kotchman, both of whom rank as a B. Somehow, K-Rod still is "young", though he continues to scare me (and seems to be slipping, just a little, every year).

I think Bill James was just writing to the standard of the MSM for this one.

I think that is a much better bias than the Baseball Prospectus rankings

Can you link to this? I can't find it.

I really appreciated his passage about Sabathia.

It's also strange to think that CC is still under 27.

guy I've never really read before but have heard so much about.

I guess that explains it.

haplo (#2),

Excellent. I'll take "Postage Stamps" for $500, Alex.

We saw a prelude to this book a few weeks back. I'm still appalled the Pujols isn't on the list.

As poetic as some of his comments were, and as dazzling as he was in his prime, James is obviously no longer able to field his position. Maybe he can survive for a few years at DH, but it doesn't look good.

And how is it that Carlos Zambrano isn't on this list anywhere? At first I thought he was too old, but Joe Blanton is six months older than him, and he's #42. Seriously? Is it only because I'm a Cub fan that I can't imagine ranking Blanton ahead of Z?

There are three high-performance 26 year old pitchers on this list - Peavy, Sabathia, and Webb - and I can understand Zambrano being below these three at this point, but not off the list.

By the way, I didn't realize all four were the same age until I looked at this. That's a pretty darned good group.

Re: #23. I can't find it either. Nate Silver gave a rough draft of the top 20 valuable commodities, and that's here: BP Unfiltered. Evan Longoria and Jay Bruce are in the top 20, which strikes me as crazy, even if it is a draft. I can't find the final article, if it ever appeared.

SI.com has the rankings that he made in May, which has a few little head-scratchers (Cano and Kendrick ranked evenly, Kazmir and Hughes ranked evenly) but not as prospect-crazy as I remember.

Baseball America also did a big fantasy draft a couple years ago - in which the participants almost en masse decided that unproven 22 year olds were more valuable than proven 28 year olds. I may have gotten my memories mixed up.

I really appreciated his passage about Sabathia.


True. The dude can still write. I wish we could Diamond Mind a hundred years of baseball every year so there's be reason for a yearly Historical Abstract.

Zambrano's a day younger than Peavy, nearly a year younger than Sabathia, and more than two years younger than Webb. I'm sure he projects worse (although probably not much worse) than all of them going forward, but he's arguably had a better career thus far than any of them, and I'm surprised he's not on the list.

We discussed the massive problems with this list's methodology in an earlier thread.

I am very skeptical that C.C. Sabathia is the heaviest player in major league history. Yeah, he's taller than most guys and so could weigh more without looking fatter, but man, I am really not sure about that one.

Fish: thanks for the link.

I think your BA memory is a little foggy. They did have some weird prospect outliers, but I thought they leaned towards the established guys.

In the companion article rating the young talent of the individual teams, he lists Edwin Jackson as an A grade talent. wow.

Actually his direct quote is:

Edwin Jackson just misses being A grade

Plus, I don't think that anyone's ever doubted Jackson's talent. He's just never been able to put it together.

This is embarassingly bad. Pedroia over Mauer, Morneau, Khalil Greene and Cano?

What I don't understand - if he is combining youth and actual performance - Russell Martin is a 24 year old who was the best catcher in the National League this past season by a healthy margin, and one of the three best catchers in baseball - yet he was somewhere between 26-30? I find that interesting, if performance and youth are both important.

Zambrano's a day younger than Peavy, nearly a year younger than Sabathia, and more than two years younger than Webb. I'm sure he projects worse (although probably not much worse) than all of them going forward, but he's arguably had a better career thus far than any of them, and I'm surprised he's not on the list.

Hell, forget those guys, he's got Bobby Jenks and Manny Corpas ahead of him.

Sorry, but I'll take Howie Kendrick over any of the relievers on that list. There's no way an everyday second baseman who just hit .320 at age 23/24 is less valuable than a guy who pitches 60-80 innings per year.

This was mentioned in the previous thread, but Johan Santana hasn't turned 29 yet (only two months older than Webb, who is erroneously listed as "26"). Santana's not on the list.

Ah, intangible assets. Like those things Merrill Lynch once counted as earned income. Got it.

Another problem with the "methodology" (it's really a definitional issue) ... why cap it at age 33? Why limit a 27-year-old to 6 seasons while giving a 24-year-old 9? Why not do it as "who's going to deliver more value over the next 5 or 10 seasons?" Or alternatively, if you want to get fancy, project how much playing time they're likely to have left and look at value over the remainder of the career. My guess is the expected # of remaining PA doesn't differ that much between a star 24-year-old and a star 27-year-old ... perhaps especially for pitchers ... basically that long-term, the (fairly random) injury risk ends up dominating age-related decline risk.

Even so, the Pujols omission is unexplainable. Given the Webb mis-aging, I wonder if Pujols is mis-aged as well.

On Zambrano, the only thing I can think of is that the nearly 1000 IP through age 25 leads to a prediction of a major drop-off. But of course that would have to be even more true of Sabathia. Though with Z, his K-rate did drop this year and his BB-rate the last two seasons has been horrific (and it wasn't good before that), so that could explain the Z-Sabathia difference.

10. Cole Hamels, Philadelphia starting pitcher (23).
Uses the changeup more often than a high school cheerleader.

I'd love to know James's thought pricesses that arrived at that statement.

Walt (#42) asked:

Why not do it as "who's going to deliver more value over the next 5 or 10 seasons?"

That's essentially Nate Silver's methodology, as a way to standardize the payoff period of each player. He uses PECOTA-based projections of performance over the coming 6 years. This link goes to the methodology as well as the rankings -- the previously posted link in #28 omitted the methodology.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/baseball/mlb/05/07/bp.ufd.first/index.html

I am very skeptical that C.C. Sabathia is the heaviest player in major league history. Yeah, he's taller than most guys and so could weigh more without looking fatter, but man, I am really not sure about that one.

For people of Sabathia's body shape, I wouldn't be surprised if it's almost (or even more than) 10 pounds per inch. In other words, A 6'0" person who looks a lot like him would weigh something like 70 pounds less... maybe 240? That would put CC at 310 or so. BB-Ref has him at 290 but that is probably low.

There's no way Sabathia weighs more than Walter Young, who looked like he *ate* the current Sabathia.

That is absolutely right. BBRef has him at 6'5", 322 but that must be--oh, jeeze. At least an inch or two short, and probably twenty pounds.

There was a Yankee game once when Young was standing next to Sheffield and he made Sheffield (6', 210) look like Pedroia.

The Kenny Lofton ad is not for a moving company.

This was my method, in short. First, I eliminated from my study all players who were 29 years old in 2007 or older, since 29-year-olds in 2007 are now 30, and 30-year-old baseball players are not young. A 28- year-old player can be considered to have a little bit of youth left; a 30-year-old, no way. Second, I figured the runs created by each player -- for Rios, 105. Third, I made a "speed adjustment", since speed correlates strongly with defensive value, and defensive value is more difficult to measure. Fourth, I divided that total by the runs scored/runs allowed per game by the player's team, thus building in context adjustments. Fifth, I multiplied that by the number of years the player had left before he was 33 years old.

Ok, let's try to follow this on Pujols.

Pujols had 132 RC last year.

I don't know what the speed adjustment is; did he just add "speed score" over average or something? Let's call it 0 for now.

Dividing the total by the runs scored/runs allowed per game by the player's team ... 4.48 and 5.12; not sure if he means total or averaged, but let's guess average, so it's 4.80. 132/4.8=27.5.

Pujols' season age is gonna be 28 next year, so he has 5 years before being 33, so 27.5x5=137.5

Hmm.

The Pujols thing deserves an explanation.

This entire exercise reeks. It is clear that the rankings were based mostly on potential, and having realized all of yours (Pujols) put you down, or off, the list when compared with players with mostly unrealized potential (Jay Bruce).

How many people would trade David Wright's next 9 years for Prince's next 10?

For people of Sabathia's body shape, I wouldn't be surprised if it's almost (or even more than) 10 pounds per inch. In other words, A 6'0" person who looks a lot like him would weigh something like 70 pounds less... maybe 240? That would put CC at 310 or so. BB-Ref has him at 290 but that is probably low.

Am I missing something? While C.C. is rather on the rotund side, I'd be very surprised if he was 10 pounds an inch, which would result him in being 790 pounds.

It is clear that the rankings were based mostly on potential, and having realized all of yours (Pujols) put you down, or off, the list when compared with players with mostly unrealized potential (Jay Bruce).

That may explain the Z thing too.

I love James's writing in general. But in making lists like this he can get rather sloppy.

I remember during the 2002 WS, I got curious as to where James ranked Benny Santiago among catchers in the NBJHBA. I figured somewhere ~40. So that's where I started looking. Nope, not in the 40's, 50's 60's...jeeze, he can't be this low. Guy had (when the book was published), somewhere ~ 1500 games caught with an OPS+ ~ 100. He's got to be better than Alan Ashby (#68) or Ernie Whitt (# 72). Maybe he's in the 30's. Nope, nor the 20's. In fact he wasn't listed at all. # 100 was Earl Smith, a guy who caught 720 games in the 1920's, and never more than 98 in a season. James also listed, but did not comment on #'s 101-125. Santiago wasn't there either, but Tom Pagnozzi and Ron Karkovice were.

I shot off an e-mail to Rob Neyer, who was equally puzzled and said he would write Bill (I didn't have his e-mail or I would have gone to the source.) Rob CC'd me Bill's reply, which went something like "It wasn't an oversight. I just didn't have anything to say about him, so I left him off." Really? Pass.

I would expect a similar response if queried about some of these dubious choices.

Man, Prince looks good in that throwback Brewers jersey. Any chance they can bring that back permanently?

James is right, unsurprisingly, about nobody ever improving IP, W, ERA, and K's from a Cy Young season before. Fun trivia question, though: what three pitchers managed to get worse in all four after a Cy Young season -- and still win the award again anyway?

Cute question. I did cheat and look it up on bb-ref, so I won't give it away.

The only one I know off the top of my head is Clemens in 1998.

EDIT: Found the other two on BB-Ref, one of them surprised me as I didn't know he had one multiple Cys.

I don't understand the cheerleader joke. Is that an American joke, Aussies don't get?? I feel like Rory Breaker in Lock, Stock...

Am I missing something? While C.C. is rather on the rotund side, I'd be very surprised if he was 10 pounds an inch, which would result him in being 790 pounds.

He's speculating that a 6-foot person who weighed 240 would look "as fat" as C.C., and that for every inch of height above that, it would take an additional 10 pounds to look "as fat"... so, by that logic, he's estimating that the 6'7" C.C. weighs 310.

Walter Young sounds like a good candidate, although I don't remember him, and shorter or not, I just have to think that at least one of the Wells/Lolich/Garces/etc. types got well over 300. Hell, what about guys like Broxton, Jenks, Turnbow, Jeff Juden who are also tall, and in terms of girth, are also huge and/or blubbery. C.C. doesn't look particularly fat or blubbery to me; he just seems like a very large man.

Rob CC'd me Bill's reply, which went something like "It wasn't an oversight. I just didn't have anything to say about him, so I left him off."

Really?? That's ridiculous. At least list him and say something like "You all remember him" (or, yes, "pass.") It doesn't make any sense at all to base your list of the all-time greats on which guys you can come up with clever quips about.

Am I missing something? While C.C. is rather on the rotund side, I'd be very surprised if he was 10 pounds an inch, which would result him in being 790 pounds.

He's actually made of depleted uranium.

how do the dodgers end up 20th out of all major league teams in young talent?

I continue to be surprised by the fact that Bill James, an employee of the Red Sox front office, can put out stuff like this without repercussions. How is it that this is allowed but other execs. can't/won't say anything beyond "so and so's a quality player"?

Really?? That's ridiculous. At least list him and say something like "You all remember him" (or, yes, "pass.") It doesn't make any sense at all to base your list of the all-time greats on which guys you can come up with clever quips about.

Really, really.

Here's the exact quote (I still have the e-mail in my archives):

When I first did the ratings I had Benito in the 80s somewhere; I kept moving him down, and the problem was that there were a bunch of catchers at the bottom of the rankings--Earl Smith, Babe Phelps, Shanty Hogan, Stan Lopata, etc.--that I really did not want to eliminate. Santiago eventually got squeezed out because I simply had NOTHING to say about him, and I felt at that time that he did not HAVE to be included.

I don't believe it. I'm sure it was an oversight and he didn't want to admit it. Even if most of it is true: he had Santiago ranked in the 80's (I don't believe that either. By 1999 Santiago had to have passed contemporaries like Ernie Whitt and Alan Ashby, both ranked in the high 60's/low 70's), and he wanted to save space for the other guys above, he could have dumped Bo Diaz (# 97), for which he wrote "was essentially the same player as Jody Davis- batted .250 with moderate power and good defense." Yeah, I can see bastardizing your rankings to make that pithy comment.

I totally believe James's explanation here. He's much less likely to be embarrassed by a display of lordly condescension than he would be about admitting that he actually might have temporarily forgotten all about Benito Santiago.

I totally believe James's explanation here. He's much less likely to be embarrassed by a display of lordly condescension than he would be about admitting that he actually might have temporarily forgotten all about Benito Santiago.

Perhaps.

However,in the "Last Minute Notes" section of the book, he does a post year 2000 update of the active postion players. In the catcher section he says:

"In the 2000 season, 4 young catchers vaulted onto the list of top 100...Javvy Lopez, Jason Kendall, Charles Johnson, and Todd Hundley...All of these players have now have between 91 and 108 career win shares, a raw number which would suggest a rating between 81 and 100"

Santiago, after the 1999 season, when the original ratings were compiled, had a WS total of 143, a raw total suggesting a rating much higher than 81 I would think, based on Bill's own words.

Santiago, with over 1500 games caught after the 2000 season didn't warrant a mention, but Todd Hundley, with only 2 seasons of qualifying for the batting title and 970 games caught, did.

Where would Santiago rank now? In 2001-03, he posted OPS+'s of 103, 96 and 91, respectively. The last was in limited action but didn't he create a lot of Win Shares? And wasn't what the lists in James's book more or less based on Win Shares? Not that he should need those three seasons to pad his total and crack the Top 100.

btw, Benito was an All-Star in 2002.

Where would Santiago rank now?

Probably in the high 30's, low 40's. He should have been no worse than the mid 60's in the NBJHBA, better than Alan Ashby (#68) and Don Slaught (#67).

I just think it's weird to think that he had nothing to say about Santiago, I mean his throwing out people on the bases was at least comment worthy.

I don't understand the inclusion of Weaver on this list - among others - and not Kendrick or Kotchman. That will likely turn around in a big way over the next few seasons.

I just think it's weird to think that he had nothing to say about Santiago, I mean his throwing out people on the bases was at least comment worthy.

Indeed. It wasn't like Santiago was a boring player. The 33 game hitting streak as a rookie, throwing out people from his knees, all the bouncing around he did mid career, etc. You could easily have gotten a couple paragraphs out of him.

I totally believe James's explanation here. He's much less likely to be embarrassed by a display of lordly condescension than he would be about admitting that he actually might have temporarily forgotten all about Benito Santiago.

I could swear that I read somewhere that James admitted that he simply goofed on Santiago- maybe he was backed into a corner on admitting that... He updated his book after Bonds went all 1300 OPS, I think he had a section where he said the real question was how to rank Bonds now, then he said he'd forgotten Santiago when he did the first version of the book.

actually from Googling this in the 2003 version he moved Santiago"

C. Piazza moves up to No 4 all-time - Benito Santiago moves up to "no lower that 60th"

also:

Willows, California: In your book where you rate the greatest players at each position, Benito Santiago was nowhere to be found on the list of catchers. Would he be on the list now after his season with the Giants? I was wondering why he wasn't included while guys like Bo Diaz and Ron Hassey were. Kevin Askeland

Bill James: There's an update to the book out in paperback in a week or two. I put him in there somewhere. Sneak into Barnes and Noble and check out the back pages of the paperback. . .I answered the question there. I don't remember exactly what I said, but I confessed to the mistake and tried to correct it.

It may have taken him awhile, but he did admit that Santiago's initial exclusion was a mistake

Well, there ya go.

I'm not going to take credit for anything, but it's nice that Bill fessed up about a goof, and no longer hides behind a bogus excuse.

One thing I really like about Rob: He fesses up to mistakes readily.