Greatest Panamanian player ever to play in the majors (Super Mariano is #2).

Would he still be a slam dunk HoMer this election if he had played his whole career at first?

One of the more interesting twists and contortions of the numbers in the NBJHA was James' placing Killebrew above Carew. His major point was that power is underrated and batting average overrated, and that Killebrew was thus a better hitter than Rodney. With this I agree. But Bill, Carew was half 1B - half 2B over his career, while Killer was 1B-3B-LF, and played them more poorly than Carew did; as complete players, Carew to me is clearly ahead. He would likely squeak in to my "upper half HoM".

Carew to me is clearly ahead

I think I have them closer than you do, Tom, but I agree that Carew was better.

As a Twins fan who saw them both, Killebrew's offensive edge is more than enough to outweight Carew's alleged defensive edge. Carew was not much better as a 2B than Killebrew was at 3B, and the edge at 1B is not significant enough to make a difference. Twins pantheon of position players, and of course I'm a peak voter, and I don't rate players who are still active:

1. Killebrew--still the one
2. Puckett--more of an impact player at his peak than Carew, no question
3. Carew
4. Oliva--for peak value, little or no difference or Oliva possibly even a bit better, but in this case the career lengths are a tie-breaker

5. Hrbek--like Oliva, coulda woulda if he had stayed in shape (with Oliva of course it was injuries)
6. Allison--serious impact player at his peak
7. Gaetti--very little to choose versus Allison when you consider defense
8. Versalles--overrated even at his peak but still...
9. Smalley
10. Battey

Carew will of course be #1 on my ballot. But c'mon, better than Killebrew? Not even close.

Tricky....

As a pure first baseman, he would be better than Beckley, but not by much.

As a pure first baseman, he would be better than Beckley, but not by much.

Yeah, he's got that sort of Minoso/Goslin thing going on where he might be able to sneak at a bat position. His 1973-77 peak is pretty nice (OPS+'s of 1-3-3-4-4), though he did play in the weaker league.

Anyhow, all hypothetical... through 1975 (when he switched positions) he's got close to 5000 PA at 2B with a 130 OPS+. Even if his fielding was mediocre, the positional adjustment him over the top. Looks a lot like Larry Doyle through that age.

The rest of his career is a very healthy 132 OPS+ in 5500 PA at 1B. That includes two of his best seasons (76-77) and fills out his career nicely.

Mauer and Morneau might already be #6 and #7 on that list, after 2007 certainly.

Hey Marc/Sunny (can we start just calling you Sunny Marc? or does that sound too much like a follower of Timothy Leary?):

I see you're putting Carew first. Since you're Dobie Moore's longtime best friend, I'm interested in hearing whether you felt any temptation to put Moore ahead of Carew, or whether you feel there's a great distance between the two. (I'm probably gonna do the same thing, but I don't think they're that far apart.)

A passing recollection. I think either J Click or D Fox recently put together numbers showing that Rod Carew had some fantastic baserunning seasons. I wonder how much his baserunning could contribute relative to Killebrew's likely lack of it.

He stole home 7 times in 1969. That was then, and remains to this day, one of the most amazing feats I've ever encountered.

Would Carew have enough bat for selection as a first baseman? Here's another one of my tables, using my favorite context-adjusted RCAA tool:



Hmm: clearly better than Cash, but then Cash hasn't been elected (I do vote for him). Killebrew is ahead of him, but it's not a night and day difference. Versus Greenberg and Allen it's a career versus peak thing.

But he's half second baseman (which I why I dragged Doyle into this), and I've been voting for Doyle. I won't have any problem putting Carew #1 on my ballot.

This system does really like that .388 BA year - nice small "outs" denominator.

It was James Click, and he has Carew and Yount as the two top non-SB baserunners of the Retrosheet era. From 1972-85, Click has him with the following Equivalent (non-SB) Baserunning Runs scores: 4, 5.3, 2.6, 4.8, 4.9, 9.5 (in the .388 BA year), 3.8, 2.5, 1, -.1, -2.9, 1, 1.2, 7.1. And considering that speed tends to decline with age, you'd have to give him credit for at least his 1972-77 level of baserunning, over 5 runs per year, for the first part of his career. Ex*tremely* impressive. By contrast, Rickey Henderson averaged 3.1 EqBR a year from 1980-93, Tim Raines 3.9 from 1982-87, and Derek Jeter 3.6 from 1996-2003 (endpoints selected to be most favorable to the players). Robin Yount accumulated a massive 65 EqBR for his career. If you give Carew 5 a year from 67-71 (prorated for his shortened 1970), he comes out to right about the same.

Dan, thanks for the info! Assuming the best case for Killer, that he's mildly positive or at level par for baserunning, Carew is like 55-60 runs better by baserunning than Harmon. That's probably at least one off-peak season of production there or half a peak year. If Killer's really bad on the bases, which is unlikely since he must have been a station-to-station kind of runner and wouldn't make too many extra outs, therefore, then the gap could open up a prime/peak season's worth of value (say 80-90 runs). Is it enough to even them up? I dunno. But it's worth noting, certainly.

Mark D.:

>Carew 90 57 53 52 43 39 34 32 28 27 23 21 19 16 15 10 8 8 3

I figure Dobie Moore is probably 5 years of Carew's peak, but also 5 years of his not so peak (Wreckers time, and early in which period we know that he was playing 3B and batting 8th). Sorta like this, maybe.

Moore (?) 90 57 53 52 43... 32...23...16...8...3

IOW Carew matches him every step of the way but with other better seasons in betwixt and between.

IOW Carew matches him every step of the way but with other better seasons in betwixt and between.

Right, but that's just offense, no? On defense, you have an apparently excellent SS vs. a mediocre (at best) 2B who became a mediocre 1B halfway through his career. That chops away at a good deal--though not all--of the offensive advantage Carew has built up.

Where do we get mediocre fielding 1B? Despite never winning a gold glove against less than stellar competition, the data I've seen has Carew above average until 1983 when age caught up with him. I will agree with mediocre 2B.

Carew might deserve 2 extra career WARP due to 1981 strike credit.

Just as a point of information--mediocre means average, mediocre doesn't mean terrible. Carew was probably not actually mediocre at either position.

Where do we get mediocre fielding 1B?

Well, the Win Shares book rates him a C- at 1B, worse than at 2B, in fact. BP's rate stats have him slightly above average at 1B overall, as you say. I was kind of splitting the difference.

Just as a point of information--mediocre means average, mediocre doesn't mean terrible. Carew was probably not actually mediocre at either position.

I know. I was being nice. :)

Just wanted to throw in that Carew was my first favorite player. I spent my elementary school years trying to hit with his stance, and it wasn't until I was in junior high that I realized nobody else could hit with that stance, either.

I re-ran Carew's numbers using my 1987-2005 methodology to demonstrate to a skeptical reader of my NYT column why I have him equal to Grich. Here is his new chart:



3-year peak: 24.7
7-year prime: 46.8
Career: 75.2
Salary: $211,070,770