Many readers out there may have thought Jason Kendall was already retired. But he was actually active until Tuesday afternoon, when the Royals announced that Kendall has now officially retired.
Kendall had season-ending surgery on his shoulder (rotator cuff) in September of 2010 and then missed all of 2011 while recovering from the procedure. This season, he was playing for Double-A Northwest Arkansas. Or, more specifically, he played in two games and had three plate appearances after signing a minor-league deal July 19. He’s now called it quits for good.
What Kendall should see when he reflects back on his playing career is a body of work that should make him very proud.
A three-time All-Star catcher, Kendall got the most out of his talent from behind the plate, in the batters box and on the basepaths. He ends with a career .288 batting average and .366 on-base percentage, which is very good for a catcher. The counting stats aren’t bad, either, as Kendall collected 2,195 hits, 1,030 runs, 394 doubles and 189 stolen bases in his 15-year career. He also was hit by a pitch 254 times, ranking him fifth all-time behind Hughie Jennings, Craig Biggio, Tommy Tucker and Don Baylor.
Repoz
Posted: July 24, 2012 at 06:30 PM |
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1. Matt Clement of Alexandria Posted: July 24, 2012 at 06:49 PM (#4191239)Yeah, and it's called "what if he'd come up with someone other than the Pirates". They ruined him.
Def. Games as C
1996 NL 129 (4th)
1997 NL 142 (1st)
1998 NL 144 (1st)
2000 NL 147 (1st)
2001 NL 133 (2nd)
2002 NL 143 (1st)
2003 NL 146 (1st)
2004 NL 146 (1st)
2005 AL 147 (1st)
2006 AL 141 (2nd)
2008 NL 149 (1st)
2009 NL 133 (3rd)
2010 AL 118 (4th)
Active 2,025 (1st)
Career 2,025 (5th)
He had very close to a Hall of Fame caliber peak, and even a little bit of value outside of it.
I'd probably have him in the top 30 at least.
He's 19th overall, between Darrell Porter and Jim Sundberg.
If you set it to 90% of games at C (which would define Bench, Berra, and others as non-catchers) he's only behind Rodriguez, Dickey, and Cochrane.
By WAR, he ranks as the 19th best catcher in history. He's crowded together with guys like Jim Sundberg, Darrell Porter, Jorge Posada, Bill Freehan, Lance Parrish, Charlie Bennett, Roy Campanella, and Joe Mauer.
He'll undoubtedly be in the running to play Rooster Cogburn in the inevitable remake of "True Grit" for the next generation. Godspeed, you low down dirty Pirate, godspeed!
I think you're missing Gary Carter.
The McClatchy/Bonifay Pirates did some phenomenally dumb things, but costing Jason Kendall a Hall of Fame career has to be in the Top 3.
That other thread is worth reading just for Harvey's recollection of the Kendall-Parra mound conferences.
Nah, its still management's job to sit the player down when warrented. The manager's makes out the lineup card. If Kendall wanted to play, management should have told him that it would have happened if and when the thumb healed and then put him on the DL.
Oh, I agree, they should have done that, but in practice I'm sure there's a give and take between player and team, and Kendall seems like exactly the sort of fellow that would be aggressively in favor of playing injured.
it's consistent with kendall's demeanor but that doesn't mean that management should allow itself to be bullied
and kendall wasn't as on edge early in his career
my 2 cents is that after the injuries kendall put himself through whacko level training to make his body impervious to conventional weapons and in so doing snapped a couple of neurons in the process
Kendall's really good years came in the younger days of my baseball fandom, pre-OBP awareness. To me at the time, he was mostly the catcher who was a good leadoff hitter. Have any other recent catchers stolen, say, 160 bases, or had 3 20-steal seasons?
Before them, John Wathan stole 64 bases in 1982-83, though that represented more than half his career total. Biggio also had a couple of 20-steal seasons as a primary catcher, though he wasn't there long enough to rack up big numbers.
26 Jason Kendall, 1998
22 Jason Kendall, 1999
22 Jason Kendall, 2000
18 Jason Kendall, 1997
15 Jason Kendall, 2002
13 Jason Kendall, 2001
12 Jason Kendall, 2010
11 Jason Kendall, 2006
11 Jason Kendall, 2004
21 BJ Surhoff, 1988
18 BJ Surhoff, 1990
14 BJ Surhoff, 1989
14 BJ Surhoff, 1992
12 BJ Surhoff, 1993
11 BJ Surhoff, 1987
16 Brad Ausmus, 1995
14 Brad Ausmus, 1997
12 Brad Ausmus, 1999
11 Brad Ausmus, 2000
10 Brad Ausmus, 1998
21 Russell Martin, 2007
18 Russell Martin, 2008
11 Russell Martin, 2009
10 Russell Martin, 2006
25 Ivan Rodriguez, 1999
10 Ivan Rodriguez, 2001
10 Ivan Rodriguez, 2003
10 Ivan Rodriguez, 2008
21 Benito Santiago, 1987
15 Benito Santiago, 1988
11 Benito Santiago, 1989
10 Benito Santiago, 1993
14 Eli Marrero, 2002
11 Eli Marrero, 1999
10 Bob Brenly, 1987
10 Bob Brenly, 1986
13 Joe Mauer, 2005
10 Jason Varitek, 2004
11 Einar Diaz, 1999
13 Joe Girardi, 1996
11 Darren Daulton, 1992
10 Ron Karkovice, 1992
10 Andy Allanson, 1986
I blame the perennially incompetent Yankee organization.
Bastards.
Surhoff played mostly third in '93. The other years for him check out, though.
Anyway, the short version appears to be that Kendall is indeed the best basestealing catcher of recent vintage, and by a pretty healthy margin. Also, the fact that a question like this can be answered by half a dozen people within half an hour is a big part of the reason that I love it here.
Nah, the Dodgers played Martin just as much. Martin is just like Kendall in that he wants to play everyday and will try to convince his manager to let him. For some reason, his manager allows this despite Martin sucking on offense horribly due to overuse.
One final Jason Kendall note - he's one of the most surprising players to turn out to be the son of a major leaguer, to me at least. He has the aura of someone who grew up in a two-room shack behind a tollbooth, got a new pair of shoes every two years from his neglectful and/or desperate parents, channeled his frustration into a maniacal work ethic, that sort of thing.
Thanks for the memories, Jason. It was a privilege watching you play.
Kendall is 6th all-time in career steals among players listed as catchers on MLB.com, and the top 5 all retired in 1915 or earlier. Going further down the list, the most recent catcher to steal even 130 bases is Ray Schalk (177, retired in 1929). Below that, you get to Pudge and Pudge, who stole 128 (Fisk) and 127 (Rodriguez), respectively.
That was awesome. Also the dash for home when FRod dropped the return throw from the catcher. Bill King went nuts.
Player Rfield PA OPS+ G BA PosFrank White 121 8468 85 2324 .255 *46/5D9
Roger Peckinpaugh 100 8387 87 2011 .259 *6/3
Dave Bancroft 93 8248 98 1913 .279 *6/457
Jim Gilliam 41 8322 93 1956 .265 *457/983
Dick Bartell 40 8740 96 2016 .284 *654
Tony Fernandez 31 8793 101 2158 .288 *654/D
Garry Templeton 29 8208 87 2079 .271 *6/359
Jason Kendall 10 8702 95 2085 .288 *2/79D
Maury Wills 1 8306 88 1942 .281 *65/4
Jay Bell -12 8525 101 2063 .265 *64/53D
Edgar Renteria -15 9066 94 2152 .286 *6/4D3
Donie Bush -34 8746 91 1948 .250 *6/54
Tony Taylor -37 8501 88 2195 .261 *45/376D
Ray Durham -94 8423 104 1975 .277 *4/D8
… except there aren't any other catchers on it. Unsurprisingly: as several noted upthread, there are hardly any catchers who played as long as Kendall, and they are either significantly weaker hitters (Boone, Sundberg, Ausmus) or significantly better (Carter, the Pudges). It's interesting to see Kendall grade out close to durable glove men like Bancroft and Bartell; that might give a sense of his overall value, though his catching makes him unique (as does his propensity for the HBP).
He always wanted to retire as a Natural.
Not only was Jason's career OPS+ at 120 through '99, he had 71 SB against only 16 CS (82%).
Although he had a 124 OPS+ in 2000, SB-CS was 22 and 12 (not quite break even)and all indications were that he just never ran as well again after that...
Had another few decent seasons with the stick but then by 2005 he wasn't even doing that anymore...really sad for a career that could have been.
This is the really strange one.
He was one of my absolute favorites in the time where I was developing as a baseball fan, along with other underrated walkers like Ray Lankford, and I imagine he feels great about his life accomplishments even with the minor tragedy of his being a Pirate in that time of incompetence. I hope he becomes an awesome announcer or analyst for MLB TV or something.
It turns out that AFTER Kendall became my favorite player, I found out that we shared a birthday (he's exactly one year older than I am and he is exactly the same age as Derek Jeter). So now I'm a little freaked out because Kendall had a really nice long career and now he's retired.
So not only am I sad that this really interesting player is no longer playing, I am now pretty old.
Godspeed Jason. Hopefully he can red-ass his way into a roving minor league instructor or even a minor league manager position.
Player-manager, maybe?
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