Wednesday, December 12, 2012
2013 Results: Bonds, Clemens, Piazza and Biggio are elected to the Hall of Merit!
(bbtf)
Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Mike Piazza and Craig Biggio have been elected to the Hall of Merit!
The timing for our first year electing 4 candidates could not have worked out better, since class of 2013 is the strongest in terms of electees that we’ve ever had. The top of the 1934 ballot included Ty Cobb, Tris Speaker, Eddie Collins, Pop Lloyd, Smokey Joe Williams and Cristobal Torriente, but only 2 were elected.
Bonds and Clemens were each unanimous at 1 and 2. I believe that’s the first ...
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1 2 >There isn't much room for debate on their batting. Larkin's at +189 runs, Concepcion at -139. Only way this could be remotely true is if Concepcion was better than Ozzie on defense.
Mr. Kaat needs a tautology lesson, I fear.
OK, this is just crazy talk. It was a freakin perfect game. In the World Series.
I can't think of any single game feat more impressive than that (context considered).
Yawn. A bunch of players think their longtime teammate should be honored as well. This is some sort of revelation? Koufax and Drysdale probably think Maury Wills belongs. Winfield and Henderson probably think Mattingly belongs. Ask Brock and Gibson and they will probably say absolutely Joe Torre belongs. I'm sure Mantle, Berra. and Ford thought it was criminal that Maris wasn't inducted.
On that specific question (comparison to Rice only), would they be wrong?
Unlikely. They might say something nice but Roger kept everyone at a distance.
It's been re-worked to make Maris out to be some Gary Cooper type character but in his day he was not regarded as such.
On that specific question (comparison to Rice only), would they be wrong?"
About as close as two players can be. Both in career WAR and for being the exact same type of slugger at their peaks, and peaking at the same time in the late 70's.
I was going to say, I read the headline without noticing the colon and figured TFA would be about the relative merits of all four for the HOVG.
As AROM points out in #1, the argument for Concepcion being as good as Larkin is pretty dire. I understand Dan R's argument about DC's value relative to his own contemporary SS, but that's not Kaat's argument. The traditional stats look like this:
G PA R H HR RBI BB SO SB BA OBP SLGBarry Larkin 2180 9057 1329 2340 198 960 939 817 379 .295 .371 .444
Dave Concepcion 2488 9640 993 2326 101 950 736 1186 321 .267 .322 .357
Concepcion had an admirably long career, but Larkin's edge in rate stats is overwhelming. The traditionalist argument for Concepcion is entirely intangible (because I don't think Kaat is trashing Larkin's defense, or particularly exalting Concepcion's; even if Concepcion was great, Larkin was still very, very good).
That's just ugly. The 88 OPS+ would be among the very worst in the HoF.
Only Ozzie (87), Maz (84), Schalk (83), Aparicio (82) and Marranville (82) are worse. Hell Bob Lemon has an 82.
Never heard Concepcion considered as near the glove man as the other no hit SS's. Am I wrong?
This is why former players always make for great GMs.
[/sarcasm]
DB
I disagree; I think Morris's game was more impressive. He held the opposing team scoreless for 10 innings in a Game 7. Larsen was pitching a Game 5 with the series tied at 2, so not win-or-go-home, and his team scored 2 runs for him in the 9 innings (as opposed to Morris's team, who didn't score for him at all over 9 innings).
Perfect games, at their core, are flukes.
Yeah, and in the case of the Larsen game, there were three defensive gems and a ball hit into the stands down the line that was foul by not that much. The most impressive thing about Larsen that day was his 97-pitch count, and the fact that he went to three balls on only one batter.
And even Morris's fabulous performance was to some extent a fluke, as it hinged upon Lonnie Smith's baserunning boner, which would've likely given the Braves the win if he hadn't made it.
In terms of pitching performance under pressure, I can't think of any game I've ever seen that topped Chris Carpenter in last year's deciding Division Series game against Roy Halladay. 1-0 on the road against the best pitcher in baseball, in a win-or-go-home situation, how in the hell can you possibly beat that?
some dumb reporter asked Stengel afterwards if that was the best game he had ever seen Larsen pitch, and Casey said "so far"
He was considered a great glove man. Even in Philly, there was an argument about whether Bowa** or Concepcion was a better fielder.
** Bowa set the record at the time for fewest errors in a season, ergo, he was a great fielding SS.
Side note, Bowa's humor claim to fame is that he called Concepcion "Elmer", which Bowa thought was his name because he always saw E Concepcion in the box score. Bowa, at least, felt a real rivalry with Concepcion. I'm not sure it wasn't 1-sided.
See: Game 7, 1991 World Series.
I do think it's a huge deal that this was a Game 7 in a World Series. The entire season, the championship, swung on the game; they had gone as far as they could go, and with a win there would be no more work to be done (unlike Carpenter's game or Larsen's game). It was immortality.
I would never downplay Morris's effort. I just don't think it is a significant point in his case for the Hall of Fame. I don't think it makes him a great postseason pitcher per se. It was -- and as you note he had help from his fielders, as all pitchers do -- a great single game performance at a time when his team could not afford to settle for anything less than that performance.
I have a simple rule in life. I never have a drink earlier than noon or whatever time it is that I first see/hear reference to Lonnie Smith's baserunning.
Agree that Morris's performance in that game is an all-time classic gem, and there's no need to downplay it.
Does that make him a Hall of Famer?
Of course not.
If we are talking just pure pitching performance, Larsen's perfect game was much more impressive.
Morris allowed 7 hits and 2 walks to go with 8 Ks in 10 innings. He wasn't in any way unhittable, he had runners in scoring position in three innings, and as stated, only Lonnie Smith's baserunning error prevented him from losing. It was a perfectly fine performance, but it wasn't even his best performance of all-time.
? I responded to Snapper's #4, which specifically considered context:
Some do. It's a minority opinion, but he has his supporters. A lot of it for being innovative in how he played on turf. I think this would get him more support if "turf shortstop" had turned out to be an evolution instead of an evolutionary dead end.
That it was game 7, and went into extra innings with no margin for error, makes Morris' feat barely more impressive.
What's the most impressive showing for a position player in a WS game? Reggie's 3 HR on 3 swings?
Sound principles to live by, my good man. Sound principles to live by.
Some of the newer metrics hate Bowa a lot; DRA has him as one of the worst SS of his, or any, era. Here's WAR Fielding Runs for shortstops (1970-79 only), however:
Player Rfield GMark Belanger 193 1402
Bert Campaneris 86 1342
Dave Concepcion 55 1349
Bill Russell 47 1317
Larry Bowa 43 1489
Tim Foli 43 1165
Bud Harrelson 28 1009
Freddie Patek 25 1329
Chris Speier 25 1295
Roger Metzger -32 1191
Don Kessinger -42 1355
Bowa doesn't look ridiculous there. But it does show that Belanger and Campaneris were the gold standard. I was an NL fan and only got to see Belanger or Campaneris on TV, usually in the postseason, so can't comment much from observation, but the rankings of the NL shortstops in that list are similar to what I would have come up with at the time. (Yes, we did think Bowa was pretty good :)
Yes. If you remove the World Series context, you have Haddix to consider, other perfect games, The Spahn/Marichal 16 inning duel, the 20K games, etc.
Mark Belanger 193 1402
Bert Campaneris 86 1342
Dave Concepcion 55 1349
Bill Russell 47 1317
Larry Bowa 43 1489
Tim Foli 43 1165
If that's close to accurate, Concepcion doesn't deserve a sniff. If you're going in with a 88 OPS+ you better be an elite fielding SS, best in your era. He's in a lump of guys for 3rd best.
FWIW, highest 9 inning game score ever.
Not good. He'd have to retire first.
And full context (playoff implications, state of the game, state of his body), the most impressive I've seen was Pedro's six innings of no-hit ball in what had been a slugfest Game 5 of the 1999 ALDS.
Not better than either of these.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SFN/SFN196307020.shtml
No hitter and hits 2 homers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFHZGIQusOg
Dan Rosenheck has Concepcion's name in his screen name, but actually pushes Campaneris as the best remaining SS candidate from that era in HoM arguments.
I might have to institute a #22-style drinking rule with respect to that game. When Pedro came in, you knew it was over. In the damn 4th inning.. sigh.
--In the HoF structure, he'd be a VC pick.
--That case would rest on the ten solid years at the core of his career, age 25-34, when he put up 99+% of his total value according to WAR.
His 25-34 years rank 19th all-time for SS according to WAR.
Top twenty-one:
Wagner*
----------70
----------60
----------55
Ripken*
Larkin*
----------50
Trammell
Jeter
----------45
Smith*
Appling*
Reese*
Boudreau*
Cronin*
Tejada
Wallace*
----------40
Bancroft*
Campaneris
Vaughan* (better earlier...)
Fletcher
Tinker*
----------35
Peckinpaugh
Bell (Jay)
Concepcion
Parent
Dark
----------30
*HOF
NOTES: Damn, that Honus!!! Rizzuto would probably be on the list, but he missed three years (age 25-27) due to WWII. Jimmy Rollins will probably make the list, as he has two more years to go before he's filled up the 25-34 years and is currently hovering at just under 29. A-Rod not here because he switched to 3B at age 28.
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