Win Shares Rates the 200 Man Veterans Committee Ballot
Mr. Greenia breaks out the best and worst candidates on the revised Veteran’s Committee ballot.
This is an analysis of the 200-player ballot that was compiled by
the Hall’s Historical Overview Committee. Using data from Bill James’
new book
HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1931584036/iowafarmrepormin">
Win
Shares, I constructed a spreadsheet with each candidate’s
career WS and three-year peak. I also looked for top players who were
not included among the 200 candidates. Here are some lists.
Top 25 Candidates in Career Win Shares
Tony Mullane 399
Bill Dahlen 394
Geo. Van Haltren 344
Dick Allen 342
Bob Caruthers 337
Ron Santo 324
Willie Davis 322
Vada Pinson 321
Stan Hack 316
Jimmy Ryan 316
Joe Torre 315
Norm Cash 315
Jimmy Wynn 305
Bobby Bonds 302
Frank Howard 297
Mickey Vernon 296
George J. Burns 290
Bob L. Johnson 287
Bob Elliott 287
Jack Quinn 287
Charlie Buffinton 283
Sal Bando 283
Minnie Minoso 283
Boog Powell 282
Ken Boyer 279
Worst Ten Candidates in Career Win Shares
Johnny Vander Meer 134
Spud Chandler 127
Glenn Beckert 125
Ron Perranoski 125
Denny McLain 115
Vic Raschi 113
J.R. Richard 106
Carl Erskine 105
Johnny Murphy 104
Sam Jethroe 61
Top 25 Candidates in Three-Year Peak Win Shares
Bob Caruthers 54.0
Tony Mullane 53.0
Charlie Buffinton 46.3
Will White 46.0
Dick Allen 38.7
Ron Santo 35.3
Frank Howard 34.0
Bucky Walters 34.0
Al Rosen 34.0
Jimmy Wynn 33.3
Wally Berger 33.3
Joe Torre 32.7
Stan Hack 32.3
George J. Burns 32.3
Sal Bando 32.0
Bobby Bonds 31.7
Heinie Groh 31.7
Wes Ferrell 31.7
Rocky Colavito 31.3
Norm Cash 31.0
Vern Stephens 31.0
Bobby Veach 31.0
Carl Mays 30.7
Roger Maris 30.7
Gavvy Cravath 30.7
Worst Ten Candidates in Three-Year Peak Win Shares
Milt Pappas 18.3
Ron Perranoski 18.3
Doc Cramer 18.0
Vic Raschi 18.0
Roy McMillan 17.7
Johnny Podres 17.7
arl Erskine 17.7
Don Kessinger 17.3
Elroy Face 17.3
Julian Javier 16.7
Johnny Murphy 13.3
Bill James admits that the system vastly overrates pre-1893
pitchers. Given this, we can eliminate from serious consideration the
four pitcher candidates from that era (Mullane, Caruthers, Buffinton,
White).
That leaves us with nine candidates who rank among the top 20
candidates in both career and peak win shares:
Dick Allen-1B (4th in career, 5th in peak)
Ron Santo-3B (6th & 6th)
Stan Hack-3B (9th & 13th)
Frank Howard-LF (15th & 7th)
Joe Torre-C (11th & 12th)
Jimmy Wynn-CF (13th & 10th)
Bobby Bonds-RF (14th & 16th)
George J. Burns-LF (17th & 13th)
Norm Cash-1B (11th & 20th)
Six other players rank in the top 30 on both lists:
Bill Dahlen-SS (2nd & 27th)
Vada Pinson-CF (8th & 27th)
Sal Bando-3B (21st & 15th)
Heinie Groh-3B (29th & 16th)
Rocky Colavito-RF (28th & 19th)
Minnie Minoso-LF (21st & 27th)
In addition to the first nine, we see two other early 20th century
stars who are not even on the 200-man ballot. Sherry Magee (354 WS,
35.0 Pk) and Jimmy Sheckard (339 WS, 32.0 Pk) would rank among the top
20 candidates in both career and peak win shares. Larry Doyle (289,
30.0) and Cy Seymour (272, 31.3) are two other overlooked stars from
the early 1900’s who would rank among the top 30 candidates in both
measures.
On the flipside, we have seven candidates who rank among the worst
20 candidates in both career and peak win shares: Johnny Murphy,
Julian Javier, Carl Erskine, Elroy Face, Vic Raschi, Ron Perranoski,
and Johnny Podres. In addition, Johnny Vander Meer and Stu Miller
rank among the bottom 30 candidates in both measures.
The screening committee voting for the Hall of Fame Committee on
Baseball Veterans is taking place this spring (right now?) using the
200-player ballot. The 60-member Writers’ Screening Committee will
choose 25 of these players to place on the final ballot, and the six
-member Hall of Famers’ Screening Committee will choose five
candidates of their own.
Let’s hope they concentrate their votes on the 15 players
identified above and not so much on Gil Hodges (37th rank career WS,
64th rank in peak), Maury Wills (45th career, 35th peak) and the like.
Daniel Greenia
Posted: June 18, 2002 at 06:00 AM |
24 comment(s)
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1. Chris Dial Posted: June 18, 2002 at 12:31 AM (#605316)Nowadays I hear that Edgar Martinez should be considered. Dick Allen definitely has it over Edgar, by a good margin (AFAICT).
Dunno, just wanted to say, "What about Dick Allen? Isn't his claim as strong as anybody not in the Hall?"
I mean, playing in the field is worth something, but is it really enough to put him over Martinez by a good margin?
Daniel, would you consider breaking out pitchers as a separate list? Post-1920 pitchers almost always have fewer Win Shares than position players.
Good point: we see no pitchers among the 15 candidates. Setting aside Mullane, Caruthers, Buffinton, and White (and McCormick, who didn?t make the ballot), here are pitcher candidates who rate well in both career and peak WS:
B. Walters?..258 (41st)?..34.0 (7th)
C. Mays..??..256 (43rd)?..30.7 (23rd)
W. Cooper?..266 (32nd)?..28.3 (48th)
W. Ferrell??233 (66th)?..31.7 (16th)
D. Luque.??.241 (57th)?..29.7 (31st)
J. Tannehill?.233 (66th)?..29.0 (35th)
B. Adams..??243 (54th)?..27.0 (64th)
U. Shocker?..225 (77th)?..28.0 (53rd)
L. Warneke?.220 (90th)?..28.7 (42nd)
M. Harder??234 (65th)?..26.0 (81st)
In addition are a few dead-ball era pitchers who did not make the ballot, such as Jack Powell (287, 29.7) and George Mullin (255, 26.7). Also, 1940?s star Dizzy Trout (228, 30.7). There might be others.
DG
Somebody has career Win Shares for Edgar. Joe? Rich?
-- MWE
If you're the sort of person to consider character issues, there's a case for putting Edgar ahead of Dick Allen. James would be rolling in his recliner if he realized that people were using WS to advocate Allen's HOF candidacy.
TOT RT CC P3 P5 TL
123 29 31 30 27 07 Fred Clarke (400)
123 23 28 33 25 14 Joe Torre (315)
122 30 24 32 29 08 Frank Chance (237)
115 27 30 28 25 05 Cap Anson (381)
115 31 23 30 24 07 John McGraw (207)
Columns:
RT = Rate (WS per 162 games)
CC = Career Value Credit (see the book)
P3 = Peak 3 (avg of best 3 seasons)
P5 = Peak 5 (avg of best 5 consecutive)
TL = Timeline
(Career Win Shares in parentheses)
Total may be off due to rounding of individual numbers.
(If this doesn't work, I'll give it up.)
TOT RT CC P3 P5 TL
123 29 31 30 27 07 Fred Clarke (400)
123 23 28 33 25 14 Joe Torre (315)
122 30 24 32 29 08 Frank Chance (237)
115 27 30 28 25 05 Cap Anson (381)
115 31 23 30 24 07 John McGraw (207)
Win Shares - 262
Peak 3 - 73 WS
Peak 5 - 108 WS
All of which proves that Bill should revisit and recant his distortions about Dick Allen. His own method shows that despite a career that was shortened by injury and controversy, Allen is a seriously viable HoF candidate.
As I wrote awhile back, Allen and Santo should be the Vet Committee's HoF selections for 2003.
What's missing is the Win Shares per 162 games. Santo had 23.26, while Willie Davis had 21.47. Santo had a better peak, but Davis was more consistently good (he played five more years than Santo). Plus, centerfielders seem to be more durable than the third basemen, so that has to be factored in.
FWIW, James has Santo pegged as the number 6 third baseman, while Davis is number 27.
Besides, Davis was a very underrated player. I don't think he deserves ensrinement in the Hall, but he's not THAT far away.
The Hall of Fame monitor is used to see if a player meets the de facto criteria for the Hall. It doesn't mean that it meets James' (or anyone else's) criteria.
How much time did Edgar miss? What kind of contribution would he have made if he had played in his mid-20?s? This situation is not at all like DiMaggio, who lost three prime years when he was punching out 30 WS per season. If Edgar had been at that level, even the M?s would?ve noticed. Also, it?s possible that Edgar may have been one of those late bloomers. What are his MLE?s for his minor league play?
Martinez became a regular in 1990 at age 27, posting 17 WS that year followed by seasons of 20 and 24. In 1989, at age 26, he was given 196 PA and sucked (74 OPS+). Looks like that low playing time may have partly been his fault. Let?s generously assume that given full-time play, he would have played at the level of 1990 for the other two-thirds of the 1989 season, so add 12 WS to the four he actually had.
We now have a win share progression from 1989-92 of 16-17-20-24. Let?s assume a gradual developmental curve for 1987 and 1988. Give him years if 14 and 15 WS. Subtracting the three he actually had gives him an extra 26 WS for ages 24-25.
I don?t think we can assume he would have played in the majors before then. So this analysis concludes we should give Edgar about 38 more win shares. That puts him at 302, tied with Bobby Bonds, Ken Singleton and Rabbit Maranville. Not quite Dick Allen caliber, but in with the marginal hall of famers.
Realize that doing this creates a problem, in that we have to evaluate every player?s lost opportunity in a similar manner. Many outstanding players have been held back in the minors or on the bench longer than necessary.
We also have the correlating exercise of taking away win shares from players (Pete Rose) when they ought not to have been playing. ;-)
DG
(KJOK, Schoendienst is already in the HOF)
He knows. KJOK was referring to part of the thread where they were analyzing top managers that were also good players.
Allen 342 career WS (312 bat, 30 def) in 7314 PA
Edgar 264 career WS (251 bat, 13 def) in 7113 PA
Allen peak WS season: 41/40/35/33/32
Edgar peak WS season: 32/28/27/25/24
Both were below average thirdbasemen:
Allen 2.96 def WS per 1000 innings
Edgar 2.77 def WS per 1000 innings
They're in the same neighborhood defensively as Lansford (2.92), Mathews (3.02), Madlock (2.65), Jacoby (2.81), Bailey (2.98), Sprague (2.78), et al.
The very worst fielder in history among long-career thirdbasemen according to win shares is Dean Palmer (1.90). Chipper Jones (1.99) and Paul Schaal (1.93) are in the same range.
The leaders are all players from 100 years ago: Lave Cross (6.03), Jimmy Collins (5.93), and Tommy Leach (5.76).
DG
Maris had 31-36-25 win shares in 1960-61-62. There?s a lot more to the game than hitting homeruns. Anyway, that?s not what I?d call a low peak.
McLain had 20-33-29 in 1965-68-69. That?s a higher peak than Randy Johnson, who had 26-26-26 the past three years. Remember, a pitcher?s W-L record says as much (or more) about the support he got as it does how well he pitched. In 1968 the Tigers gave him great support with three others who were among the league?s top ten players: Freehan (35 WS), Horton (28), and McAuliffe (28), along with Northrup (24).
Richard had 21-19-23 in 1977-78-79. I?m not sure why you believe he was better than that. He had 18 wins each season and only in 1979 was he among the league?s top six in ERA. Perhaps because a lot of strikeouts often leads to pitchers being overrated(?) Also, the Astrodome was an awful park for hitters, giving Astros pitchers deceptively low ERA?s in general.
Finally, if I understand correctly, the win shares system gives more credit to the defense for a pitcher?s success than other rating systems. I believe James is saying that what we commonly think of as pitching ability is attributable to the defense more than most of us realize. So 20th century pitchers are usually ranked lower by James than we expect.
DG
This groups seems to like WS and frankly so do I. But TPR has its adherents and then there's the HOF voting over the years which suggests a logic all its own. So I combined the lot of them.
I added career WS/10 + peak WS (3 yr + 5yr)/10 + TPR + BBWAA HOF votes at peak/10 + my own special sauce, and I came up with the following.
Qualifiers
1. Bob Caruthers 148.4
2. Ron Santo 144
3. Bill Dahlen 143.1
4. Tony Oliva 138.5
5. Dick Allen 129.6
6. Minnie Minoso 127.2
7. Tony Mullane 126.9
8. Jack Glasscock 120.5
9. Heinie Groh 116.6
Gil Hodges 116.6
11. Bucky Walters 116.5
12. Ken Boyer 114.4
13. Bobby Bonds 112
Joe Gordon 112
15. Stan Hack 110.7
16. Harry Stovey 109.3
17. Pete Browning 108.9
18. Frank Howard 107.5
19. Rocky Colavito 107.3
20. Thurman Munson 99.9
21. Joe Torre 92.5
22. Bill Freehan 90.7
I further tested my rating against past HOF voting and found that it generally took 140 points to go in the front door, and about 106 to go in the back. Except for catchers where 90 was a better predictor, and relief pitchers where who the heck knows (so I adopted 90 for relief pitchers, though there are no qualifiers at that level). So that's where my list of 22 "qualifiers" comes from.
A few observations: I don't think it's fair to reject Caruthers and Mullane out of hand. You adjust expectations but you consider their credentials. I think they belong. 3B have clearly been underrepresented so you have a bunch ready to go in. Dick Allen, yes, by all means. He and Tony Oliva would make a nice pair of bookends, for obvious reasons. If BBWAA voting preferences are an indicator, Hodges, Oliva, Maris, Kuenn, Caveretta, Wills, Marion, Sain, Reynolds, Lolich, Boyer and Santo (in that order) are the only ones who got 100 votes. Most of them are not strong candidates otherwise.
But then, of course, this is a new committee, who knows how they will vote. I would anticipate a bias in favor of post-WWII players, because that is where the personal experience and personal relationships of the voters are. So, finally, I would have to predict that Santo, Oliva, Hodges, Bonds and Torre are the most likely to get voted in. Allen, Minoso and Boyer are the long-shots.
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