My prognostication: Clark, Johnson and Oms.

Reggie Smith has a lot of momentum, though.

I could handle Smith going in instead of Johnson, Chris. :-)

Well, with Dawson elected, Oms, Smith, and Johnson are my top-ranked outfield candidates, so this lineup, with respect to outfielders only, is all good as far as I am concerned :-).

However, I think that we would do better to elect some infielders. But we are so far from agreement about the infielders that most worthy. There's no precedent for someone breaking from out of the top 10 to election in a single year.

Are we on the verge of going a bit over the top for OF here? Or, worse yet, for "hitters"? Browning, Dawson, Clark, Johnson and Oms all in 2 years, not to say that Boggs wasn't a bit of a hitter, too. I think Leach is the next "glove." I would urge everybody to take a look at Tommy or, at a minimum, your particular fave with the leather. Or better yet, my particular fave(s), Williamson, Rizzuto, E. Howard, Pesky and then Leach.

Oh, just read Chris' post. Yes.

Don't forget Belle. In my (very preliminary) analysis, he scores well above Clark.

I think both of them will find themselves on my ballot which, combined with only voting for Boggs among the new eligibles, will put pressure on my backlog. Still, with Oms and Johnson in the verge, there's still possibilities of it being unclogged a bit later.

Bat, glove - eh, whatever. My top infielder is Larry Doyle. I also have Bando and Elliott on my ballot - and a bunch of pitchers. We've been electing all of these outfielders without my support. Browning and Dawson weren't on my ballot, and neither are Johnson and Puckett. That's why my consensus score is below average.

I'm much more impressed with Clark than with Belle. Clark has a good chance at being #1 on my ballot; Belle probably won't be on it at all. Hershiser and Gooden probably both wind up stuck behind Saberhagen for me, and I had Saberhagen just off my ballot last year.

What's the argument for Johnson over Smith? They had the same OPS+ and roughly the same career length (counting MLE and Japan credit). After that it's all Reggie:

1. Smith played CF for half his career, Johnson didn't.
2. Johnson needs to be docked for the war.
3. Smith has a higher peak.
4. Smith played in much tougher leagues with lower standard deviations.

I can't see a single counterargument for Indian Bob...would his supporters care to share one?

I wouldn't even mention Puckett in this discussion, I can't believe he's taken seriously as a candidate. 13 fewer points of OPS+ than Lil' Reggie *and* two fewer seasons played. Peak was no higher. Come on.

Clark is #1. Belle could compete for a spot at the bottom of the ballot. I'm not sure about Hershiser yet.

As I said on their individual threads:

2006

1. Will the Thrill Clark
2. Albert don't call me Joey Belle

And 3. Dizzy Dean

Belle may be Kiner or Keller but, hey, I had both of the special Ks in my top 5. Belle could just plain mash. Clark was more peaks and valleys, Belle was nothing but prime cuts.

Don't care for Johnson and Oms--both were way overshadowed by various and sundry contemporaries. I would prefer Rosen and Duffy, hitters with other values.

Bob has advantages of in-season durability and consistency (never really having an off year). Johnson does better by WARP (even WARP3, which you would think would benefit Smith with the timeline adjustment), Smith by Win Shares, but there's an argument that Johnson is hurt in WS due to playing for terrible A's teams that underperformed their Pythag and he could only do so much about that. But I had Johnson 4th and Smith 6th, so I don't see much of an advantage for him.

Belle is our first "bat" who peaked after 1993 - a time of extravagent hitting statistics and a certain amount of statistical decentralization. And we're going to have a lot of "bats" from that time: McGwire, Sosa, Ramirez, Thome, Bagwell, Thomas, ... . That's not really an argument, but it is a cause for caution.

I'm a little bit on uncertain ground here, because I've been focusing on infielders in working out my estimated Zone Rating method, but my impression after looking at Belle's Zone Rating under Dial's system is that Belle may have hurt his teams badly with his glove. I'll post some more about it as soon as I do some math.

1. Smith played CF for half his career, Johnson didn't.
2. Johnson needs to be docked for the war.
3. Smith has a higher peak.
4. Smith played in much tougher leagues with lower standard deviations.

Smith also dominated his positions to a greater extent, too.

Bob has advantages of in-season durability and consistency (never really having an off year)

In durability, sure. But consistency? Reggie never really had an off year, either. He was better some years than others, but he never had a bad year.

We have too many OFs. We need more IFs. Yet the backlog is stacking up with OFs and there's disagreement on IFs. Let's just compromise and elect Tommy Leach...the best of both worlds.

7 of our top 9 returnees are "bats".

And then there is Will Clark and maybe Belle.

Gloves, people! Way too few 2B, 3B, and C have been elected!
McGraw - .500 OBP
Monroe - much, much more dominant in his day than Oms or Redding were.
Ed Williamson - many thought he was the BEST PLAYER pre-1890.
Bob Elliot - .296 EqA, from an underrepresented era, good defense, long career, 47 MVP
Nettles, Clarkson, Rizzuto, Concepcion, Leach, Traynor, Howard: all decent options, and more we could all name.

Bob Elliot - .296 EqA, from an underrepresented era, good defense, long career, 47 MVP

Best third baseman of the Forties, too.

I'd like to see some more pitchers in the HoM, too.

Funny, but if you read my posts from 100 "years" ago, you will find that I have changed my tune in that regard. :-)

HOM by pct of games at each position in the field or DH, thru 2005

HOM batters by percentage of games played at position (min. 10 pct at a position, otherwise it's not listed and not tallied)

If 75 pct is your cutoff, then we have elected 14 Cs, 15 1Bs, 15 2Bs, 10 3Bs, 13 SSs, 54 OFs, 59 Ps.
If 65 pct is your cutoff, then we have elected 16 Cs, 16 1Bs, 19 2Bs, 11 3Bs, 19 SSs, 60 OFs, 60 Ps.
If 50 pct is your cutoff, then we have elected 16 Cs, 18 1Bs, 19 2Bs, 15 3Bs, 21 SSs, 64 OFs, 60 Ps.

C (15.72) - Cochrane 100, Dickey 100, Hartnett 98, JGibson 95, Campanella 95, Freehan 90, GCarter 90, Fisk 90, Bennett 88, Berra 87, Mackey 80, Bench 78, TSimmons 77, Santop 75, Bresnahan 71, Trouppe 65, Ewing 47, Torre 41, Kelly 36, McVey 30, White 28, O'Rourke 11

1B (22.17) - Start 100, Gehrig 100, Mize 100, KHernandez 100, Beckley 100, Terry 99, Brouthers 98, Sisler 97, Leonard 95, Connor 88, McCovey 88, Foxx 87, Anson 83, Greenberg 83, Murray 81, Suttles 70, Banks 51, Carew 50, Allen 47, Wilson 45, Killebrew 40, Stargell 40, Stovey 37, Torre 36, Charleston 35, Musial 35, DaEvans 32, McVey 31, Rose 27, Jennings 26, Lloyd 25, Yastrzemski 23, Heilmann 22, Ewing 19, Kelley 16, Delahanty 15, Hines 12, Lajoie 12, Mantle 11, FRobinson 11, Spalding 10, O'Rourke 10, Dihigo 10, JRobinson 10, Irvin 10

2B (19.67) - McPhee 100, Doerr 100, Childs 100, NFox 100, Gehringer 99, Morgan 99, Whitaker 99, Randolph 99, E Collins 98, Gordon 98, Herman 95, Sandberg 93, Grich 86, Lajoie 83, Frisch 77, Hornsby 72, Grant 70, Barnes 69, JRobinson 65, Carew 47, Richardson 43, HR Johnson 25, Ward 24, Groh 20, Hill 20, Pike 18, Rose 18, Molitor 15, Dihigo 15, Wright 10, Wilson 10

3B (16.02) - Baker 100, BRobinson 99, J Collins 98, Hack 98, Santo 95, Mathews 93, Boggs 93, Schmidt 92, Boyer 90, Groh 79, Sutton 69, Brett 63, DaEvans 54, White 51, Beckwith 50, Wilson 40, Allen 38, Sewell 34, Killebrew 33, Molitor 30, Trouppe 25, Torre 23, Davis 22, Frisch 20, Rose 18, Wallace 17, Dihigo 15, JRobinson 15, McVey 14, Richardson 13, Vaughan 11, Ott 10

SS (19.67) - OSmith 100, Pearce 96, Boudreau 95, Reese 95, Trammell 95, Glasscock 94, Appling 94, Cronin 92, Wells 90, Moore 90, GWright 89, Dahlen 88, Vaughan 85, Wallace 74, Jennings 70, HR Johnson 70, Lloyd 70, Wagner 68, Sewell 65, Davis 58, Yount 52, Banks 45, Ward 39, Beckwith 35, Barnes 28, Grant 20, Sutton 19, Hornsby 16, Dihigo 15, Irvin 10, WBrown 10

OF (61.19) - Carey 100, Clarke 100, Hamilton 100, Thompson 100, Wheat 100, Goslin 100, DiMaggio 100, Averill 100, Doby 100, Slaughter 100, TWilliams 100, Ashburn 100, Snider 100, Clemente 100, Keller 100, Simmons 99, Burkett 99, Cobb 99, Flick 99, Gore 99, Sheckard 99, Speaker 99, Medwick 99, Roush 99, CJones 99, SJJackson 98, Stearnes 98, Keeler 97, PWaner 97, Mays 97, JWynn 97, Kiner 96, CP Bell 95, Crawford 94, Minoso 93, Dawson 93, Magee 91, Ott 90, Kaline 89, Mantle 88, Aaron 86, BWilliams 86, WBrown 85, Winfield 85, Browning 84, DwEvans 83, Hines 82, Torriente 80, Kelley 79, Ruth 79, Heilmann 77, FRobinson 77, RJackson 77, Irvin 75, Pike 73, Delahanty 72, Hill 70, O'Rourke 69, Rogan 65, Musial 65, Stovey 63, Yastrzemski 63, Charleston 60, Stargell 60, Kelly 47, Yount 43, HRichardson 40, Rose 38, Caruthers 33, Suttles 30, Killebrew 20, Santop 20, Dihigo 20, Bresnahan 20, McVey 18, Ewing 17, Greenberg 17, Allen 15, Davis 13, Wagner 13, Berra 13, McCovey 12, Spalding 11, Ward 10, White 10, JRobinson 10, Trouppe 10

DH (1.86) - Molitor 44, RJackson 23, Brett 19, Murray 19, Winfield 14, Yastrzemski 13, TSimmons 12, FRobinson 11, DwEvans 11, BWilliams 10, DaEvans 10

P (59.64) - Alexander 100, Covaleski 100, Faber 100, Plank 100, Vance 100, Grove 100, Hubbell 100, Lyons 100, Newhouser 100, Feller 100, Ruffing 100, Rixey 100, Wynn 100, Spahn 100, Roberts 100, Koufax 100, W Ford 100, Drysdale 100, Bunning 100, Wilhelm 100, Marichal 100, Gibson 100, Waddell 100, Pierce 100, GPerry 100, Palmer 100, Jenkins 100, Seaver 100, Carlton 100, Niekro 100, Sutton 100, Blyleven 100, Ryan 100, Gossage 100, Fingers 100, Stieb 100, Eckersley 100, R Foster 99, MBrown 99, Mathewson 99, Walsh 99, SJ Williams 99, Young 99, B Foster 99, Paige 99, WJohnson 98, McGinnity 98, WFerrell 97, Lemon 97, Keefe 96, Nichols 96, Rusie 95, RBrown 95, Griffith 95, Clarkson 94, Galvin 92, Mendez 90, Radbourn 78, Spalding 80, Caruthers 66, Rogan 35, Dihigo 25, Ward 25, Ruth 20

Caveats: Totals treat all careers as equal. A little off on players like McVey and Sutton due to changing schedule length. Guesstimates on Negro Leaguers. Hybrid P-hitters such as Ward, Ruth, Caruthers, Spalding have estimates that attempt to reflect their respective roles.

Prelim

PHoM: Clark, Murphy, Stovey (making the longest gap between HoM and my PHoM yet)

1. Tony Perez
2. Reggie Smith
3. Will Clark
4. Tommy Leach
5. George van Haltren
6. Mickey Welch
7. Graig Nettles
8. Rusty Staub
9. Lou Brock
10. Hugh Duffy
11. Ken Singleton
12. Bob Johnson
13. Orlando Cepeda
14. Norm Cash
15. Kirby Puckett

16-20. Redding, Murphy, Willis, Bonds, Streeter
21-25. Doyle, Grimes, Mullane, Strong, Greene
26-30. McCormick, Gleason, Monroe, Robinson, Souell


As usual, I am very much a career voter. Belle isn't even close. I coudl easily put Clark first, though, and I may before the election comes.

From Howie's list
all pitchers............. 59.6 (28%)
gloves C-2B-SS-3B 71.1 (33%)
bats OF-1B-DH....... 85.2 (39%)

Looking at the 2005 voting, the distribution between pitchers and hitters isn't quite right. Depending on peak/career weighting, Dean, Saberhagen, Redding, Reuschel and John deserve attention. For instance, some ballots indicated a preference for career and low replacement level but contained all hitters in place of John or Reuschel...

Tommy Bridges looks like he'll be back on my ballot after a few decades off, so that will leave me with six pitchers on my ballot in 2006.

2006 prelim

1- Will Clark
Great, great player for a while, good player for longer. Peaked in a poor hitter’s park before home runs began really flying.
2- John McGraw
3- Bucky Walters
4- Reggie Smith
5- Bill Monroe
Not that I expect a sudden swell of support for his case :)
6- Bob Johnson
aboout he vs. Reggie: Johnson has a higher EqA, and was about as valuable in the field.
7- George Van Haltren
8- Frank Chance
9- Luis Tiant
10- Dick Redding
11- Bob Elliot
12- Burleigh Grimes
------ fuzzy PHoM line ----
13- Rick Reuschel
14- Kirrrrbeeeeee PUCKETT!
15- Ed Williamson
resurfaces after a long hiatus

next are Nettles and Bus Clarkson.

Newbies:

Albert Belle – really great hitter. Not the type who was likely to lead my team for a dozen years. Poor man’s Dick Allen. Don’t call him “Joey”.

Orel Hershiser – wonderful guy. Not good enough.
Doc Gooden – troubled guy. Not long enough.

Returning top 10 disclosures:

A. Oms - Hmmmm... one more good-hitting OFer from the 20s and 30s. He might make my ballot if there weren’t a lot of these guys around already. Really.

Gavvy Cravath - Yo. Let’s see, Frank Chance hit better, even though Frank didn’t benefit from a Really homer-happy park. Frank fielded MUCH better, at a more important position. Frank had more MLB at-bats. And Chance got all of 4 voters to list him last week.

TomH, I don't know whether you're looking at WARP1 or WARP3. In WARP1, Johnson only has a higher EqA if you don't make any adjustment for the war. And in WARP3...well, more examples of how WARP3 is downright batty; Johnson played in segregated leagues during a war while Smith played in integrated leagues with no war and they both lose 4 points off their EqA in the WARP1-WARP3 adjustment. Huh?? And how was Johnson as valuable in the field? Smith played half his career in CF, while Johnson played just one year there. Anyways, at least you have their rank order right. :)

Can I draw you guys' attention to Vern Stephens and Ernie "Schnozz" Lombardi, both of whom played glove positions and hit like real people. I have yet to be convinced that the Ozzie Smiths of this world played SS so much better than Vern as to make up 25+ OPS+ points. I think it's the glovers-who-could-hit that we are missing.

Stephens falls short for both peak and career voters. His career was far too short for the careerists, and since three of his best years were during the war, he doesn't have enough peak for the peakers. I'd probably vote for him if his '43-'45 were accomplished against real competition...but that could probably be said of a lot of people (Cavarretta? Nicholson? Holmes?), and obviously had he been playing in leagues at full strength those years his numbers wouldn't have been as good. Lombardi's durability is poor even for a catcher, and his defense, baserunning, and double play propensity were historically bad.

If the concept is offense-first guys at defense-first positions (when they were actually defense-first--Doyle doesn't count because 2B was just like 1B when he played), I'd go with Gene Tenace and Toby Harrah. Neither is hanging off the edge of my ballot, though.

What about Schang, also?

And McGraw, who will be on my 2006 ballot -- short career, but 3B was a glove position back then.

I temporarily withdraw the consistency argument against Reggie Smith, I may have missed something and need to take another look.

Speaking of Tommy Bridges, I was going to ask if someone could make the case for him again. I think I may have been underrating him.

HOM not HOF after 2005 election (51 total)

Allen, Dick
Barnes, Ross
Beckwith, John
Bennett, Charlie
Blyleven, Bert
Boyer, Ken
Browning, Pete
Caruthers, Bob
Childs, Cupid
Dahlen, Bill
Dawson, Andre
Evans, Darrell
Evans, Dwight
Ferrell, Wes
Freehan, Bill
Glasscock, Jack
Gordon, Joe
Gore, George
Gossage, Rich
Grich, Bobby
Groh, Heinie
Hack, Stan
Hernandez, Keith
Hines, Paul
Jackson, Joe
Johnson, Grant
Jones, Charley
Keller, Charlie
Magee, Sherry
McVey, Cal
Minoso, Minnie
Moore, Dobie
Pearce, Dickey
Pierce, Billy
Pike, Lip
Randolph, Willie
Richardson, Hardy
Rose, Pete
Santo, Ron
Sheckard, Jimmy
Simmons, Ted
Start, Joe
Stieb, Dave
Stovey, Harry
Sutton, Ezra
Torre, Joe
Trammell, Alan
Trouppe, Quincy
Whitaker, Lou
White, Deacon
Wynn, Jimmy

HOF not HOM after 2007 HOF election (59 total)

Aparicio, Luis
Bancroft, Dave
Bender, Chief
Bottomley, Jim
Brock, Lou
Cepeda, Orlando
Chance, Frank
Chesbro, Jack
Combs, Earle
Cooper, Andy
Cuyler, Kiki
Dandridge, Ray
Day, Leon
Dean, Dizzy
Duffy, Hugh
Evers, Johnny
Ferrell, Rick
Gomez, Lefty
Grimes, Burleigh
Gwynn, Tony - eligible 2007
Hafey, Chick
Haines, Jesse
Hooper, Harry
Hoyt, Waite
Hunter, Catfish
Jackson, Travis
Johnson, Judy
Joss, Addie
Kell, George
Kelly, George
Klein, Chuck
Lazzeri, Tony
Lindstrom, Freddy
Lombardi, Ernie
Manush, Heinie
Maranville, Rabbit
Marquard, Rube
Mazeroski, Bill
McCarthy, Tommy
McGraw, John
Pennock, Herb
Perez, Tony
Puckett, Kirby
Rice, Sam
Ripken, Cal - eligible 2007
Rizzuto, Phil
Schalk, Ray
Schoendienst, Red
Smith, Hilton
Sutter, Bruce
Taylor, Ben
Tinker, Joe
Traynor, Pie
Waner, Lloyd
Welch, Mickey
White, Sol
Willis, Vic
Wilson, Hack
Youngs, Ross

Out of these, Gwynn and Ripken are locks when they become eligible. Only Kirby Puckett, Hugh Duffy, and Phil Rizzuto finished with 200 points in 2005. Other than Gwynn/Ripken, we may not add any more HOFers until after 2008.

Bob Johnson only played 3 years during WWII, not 13, ya know. And the late-30s / early 40s were strong. Reggie timed his move from the AL to the NL well... as the NL was getting weaker :) Frank Robinson, the first reasonable counter-example I could think of, has his EqA drop 3 fewewr pts than Reggie.

As to defense, BP has Reggie as an avg RF/CF, plus a year at 1B. Johnson is a '103' in LF, avg in CF for a year. Pretty close, ain't it?

Update from last year

After 2005's election, we have a total of 9 spots left (3 per year from 2006-2008).
It looks like the remaining elections will be:

2006 - Will Clark, backlog, backlog
2007 - Ripken, Gwynn, McGwire
2008 - Raines, backlog, backlog

McGwire will have some protests, and I could be overestimating support for Will Clark, but I think each of them makes it sometime before we go to yearly voting. That leaves only 4 spots for the backlog.

The current backlog still consists of about 13 individuals Essentially, I include everyone who received more than 230 points in the last election). Let's look at how they have done since 2000:



Is there anyone else more worthy than another outfielder? Analyzing the numbers for each candidate, I see that:

1. It looks like Johnson and Oms will be elected in 2006, but I see some support for Albert Belle. Plus, there may be a backlash against outfielders.

2. Reggie Smith is following Oms to the path of election. Will we still feel this way in December? That is when Reggie is projected to be elected.

3. Walters and Redding are still battling for the final HOM spot.

4. Puckett dropped like a rock. The anti-outfielder sentiment hit him first.

5. Cravath is gaining and could pass Puckett and the Walters/Redding pitching tandem. Same goes for Tony Perez.

6. Duffy and Leach gained a little support, but it probably is not enough.

7. 2006-2008 will be interesting when the shine rubs off of Saberhagen, and he is directly compared with Hershiser and Cone.

8. Luis Tiant and Graig Nettles have built up some support, but probably too little too late.

Per Howie's list in the "Eligibles" thread, the following 9 individuals could become backloggers:

2006 - OF Albert Belle, P Orel Hershiser, P Dwight Gooden
2007 - OF-DH Harold Baines, SS Tony Fernandez, OF Paul O'Neill, P David Cone
2008 - P Chuck Finley, 2B Chuck Knoblauch

Revised predictions, based on the above voting trends:

2006 - Will Clark, (Johnson), (Oms)
2007 - Ripken, Gwynn, McGwire
2008 - Raines, (Reggie Smith), (pitcher from Redding, Walters, Cone or Puckett, Cravath or Perez)

karlmagnus--I used to like Schang, but he *really* couldn't stay on the field, even for a catcher. I am McGraw's best friend, he is my #1 backlogger.

TomH, Win Shares sees their fielding *very* differently. After translating both BP's and WS's numbers to a FRAA scale with the standard deviation of Chris Dial's Zone Rating numbers, BP has Johnson at +48 for his MLB career and Smith at +3, while Win Shares has Johnson at -3 and Smith at +59. I don't have any particular reason to rely on one uberstat's measure of defense more than another, so I just average the results, and get Johnson at +23 and Smith at +31. That leads me to believe Smith fielded his positions a nudge better than Johnson fielded his--and Smith spent half of his career in CF.

The late 30s/early 40s were strong compared to what? Why? As far as I'm concerned, the main thing we do know is that Johnson didn't have to face Satchel Paige or beat out Josh Gibson for OPS titles, while Reggie benefited from no such shielding. And what's your source for saying that the late-70s NL was weaker than the AL? Is there a league-switcher study you can refer me to?

"Depending on peak/career weighting, Dean, Saberhagen, Redding, Reuschel and John deserve attention."

And Tiant deserves election...

I'm thinking of moving from my combined voting system which produces this ballot:

1) Luis Tiant
2) Tommy Bridges
3) Bus Clarkson
4) Will Clark
5) Rick Reuschel
6) Bob Johnson
7) Graig Nettles
8) Bret Saberhagen
9) Virgil Trucks
10) Reggie Smith
11) Norm Cash
12) Tommy Leach
13) Ben Taylor
14) Lee Smith
15) Gavy Cravath
16-20) Ron Cey, Dick Redding, Jim McCormick, Vic Willis, Urban Shocker

To a fully WAR2 ballot like this one:

1) Tiant
2) Bridges
3) Reuschel
4) Saberhagen
5) Bus Clarkson
6) Trucks
7) Leach
8) Nettles
9) John McGraw
10) Will Clark
11) Reggie Smith
12) Jim McCormick
13) Bob Johnson
14) Lee Smith
15) Ben Taylor
16-20) Dick Redding, Vic Willis, Urban Shocker, Wally Schang, Norm Cash

My PHoM picks are going to be Will Clark, Bill Freehan and Dave Stieb.

> I don't have any particular reason to rely on one uberstat's measure of defense more than
> another

We've had this discussion before but Johnson's teams underperformed their Pythag and the team in general had poor defense so the defensive win shares available suffered. Call it the reverse-Duffy effect.

Puckett didn't drop nearly enough if you ask me. The guy is a joke of a candidate--César Cedeño lite. The *only* arguments I've heard for him being better than Cedeño, not to mention a serious peak/prime candidate like Murphy, are that the stats must be wrong on his defense (including Defensive Regression Analysis and play-by-play-based Zone Rating), that he somehow deserves all the credit for his teams out-Pythagging, or that he should be projected out as if he hadn't had a career ending injury. There's no rigorous quantitative measure that would put him among the top 10 backlog outfielders--we've got (in whatever order you choose) Reggie Smith, Leach if you count him, Cravath with MLE credit, Indian Bob, Chuck Klein, Bobby Bonds, Kiki Cuyler, Dale Murphy, Brett Butler, Bobby Veach, José Cruz, Roy White, George Burns, Amos Otis, Chet Lemon, Harry Hooper, Roy Thomas, George Van Haltren, Ken Singleton, Fred Lynn, George Foster, Cedeño, Pinson, Strawberry, Colavito, Staub...what does Puckett have on ANY of these guys?? Either people are just voting on Fame and have the 1991 World Series on repeat play, or...I don't know. I called for his supporters to explain what made him better than any of those guys on his thread and got virtually no response. I hope that's not because people are just set in their ways and not listening.

Johnson also played on crappy teams, which made it slightly tougher to accumulate WS.

I know, I know, I'm still lookin for that league strength study. The Hidden Game (from memory, book is at home on shelf) showed the AL better than the NL from 1973 forward thru end of study in 1977ish.

Why does team quality affect WS? I understand of course how over/underperformance of a team's component statistics (hits, walks etc.) affects them, but why would players on a 50-win team whose component stats predict 50 wins be incorrectly penalized?

Why does team quality affect WS? I understand of course how over/underperformance of a team's component statistics (hits, walks etc.) affects them, but why would players on a 50-win team whose component stats predict 50 wins be incorrectly penalized?
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I'm not really the guy to explain this one, bt my understanding is this is due to the fact that negative win shares are not credited. Even with its super-low replacement level, some players (especially on bad teams) actually deserve <0 win shares. In effect, those guys are rounded up to zero while productive players like Johnson get rounded down to compensate. IOW, there aren't enough wins by the team to credit productive players for what they truly deserve.

yup

Puckett wouldn't be a choice of mine, but a plausible argument can be made for him on a peak/prime basis. He's a centerfielder with excellent in-season durability, who FRAA likes quite a bit as did the Gold Glove voters. I like Reggie Smith quite a bit more, but it is easy to see why someone else might differ.

But if you want an 80s peak/prime CF with excellent in-season durability, Dale Murphy leaves him in the dust...Murphy was a fine fielder and his offensive blows Kirby's away.

I was doing some experimenting with my system, trying to better recognize defensive excellence.

Some prelim thoughts:

1. Will Clark will be number 1. 3 over-qualified MVP years, 3 other high all-star/low MVP type years, 3 other low all-star years.
2. Tommy Leach will move up, maybe to number 2. Just a great defensive player with numerous great defensive years and all-star years.
3. Nettles will be moving up.
4. Albert Belle had several great years, but I need to place him in his 90s context. I don't give credit for medical hardships. At this point he is somewhere between 14 and 25.
5. Bob Johnson - I don't get it. Another slugging outfielder? At least pick one that stood out or played CF. The 30s are over-represented enough. Do we need the 8 to 10th best hitter from the AL when there 4 leagues plus Mexico, the Caribbean leagues, etc.?
6. Kirby Puckett - glad to see him dropping. A truly bad choice.

Re: Murphy.

6 years out of 8 as a top 6 player in the National League:
1980: 4th and 10th in the majors
1982: 2nd / 3rd
1983: 2nd / 5th
1984: 2nd / 4th
1985: 5th / 8th
1987: 6th / 9th

That is a HoM peak

Allright, it's time to get some momentum behind Graig Nettles. Can anyone tell me what leaves him so far behind Brooks Robinson?

The following numbers are all standard deviation-adjusted. SFrac is the percentage of the season played (compared to a player with league average PA/G in 162 games). BWAA is batting wins above average, BRWA is baserunning wins above average, FWAA is fielding wins above average, Replc is wins above average a replacement player at the same position would have accumulated in the same playing time, and WARP is the first three minus the fourth (wins above replacement). Note that Replc drops by 0.6 wins in 1973 to account for the DH. 1972 and 1981 are adjusted to 162 games. aTTL is career totals excluding sub-replacement seasons. Sorry for the goofy formatting, but the PRE tag doesn't seem to be able to handle consecutive whitespaces anymore.


Nettles



3-year peak: 18.8
7-year prime: 38.6
Career: 62.2

Robinson



3-year peak: 20.6
7-year prime: 39.9
Career: 63.4

OK, I admit it, Brooks was better--barely. Nettles doesn't have the shiny MVP year that Brooks does. Other than that, they're virtually interchangeable. Nettles was a better hitter--25.8 BWAA after moving the DH adjustment from Replc to BWAA vs. 21.4 for Robinson. Brooks was a better fielder--or, more precisely, he maintained his defensive excellence for a longer period of time. Nettles's 1971, when he set the all-time records for assists and double plays by a third baseman in the same season, is by my measure the greatest single defensive season at *any* position since 1893 (ignoring intrinsic positional value and treating first basemen and shortstops the same). They look like virtual clones to me, especially if one factors in that the NL was much stronger than the AL during Brooks's 60's peak--just take a look at what happened to Frank Robinson when he switched leagues. Yet Brooks was elected in his second year of eligibility, and Nettles isn't close. What gives?? As with Puckett, I think some voters' attention must be distracted by Fame and Gold Gloves. Take a look at the record, and you'll see that Nettles and Brooks are one of the most closely matched pairs of players in history. They should both be in the HoM.

I'll post this on Nettles' thread as well.

Tommy Bridges, you ask? (Devin, #31)

I have his career RA+ Pythpat equivalent record as 190-124, which is a very good winning percentage. His 5 best equivalent years were 20-12, 19-12, 15-7, 16-9, 14-7. That 14-7 was a war year, 1943, but he then missed 1944 and failed to come back effectively afterwards. His IP don't look like much of a workhorse at first glance, but he did top out at 294.7 innings in the 1936 AL, which was a 5.54 RPG league - a time when innings could be very long. (That year, 1936, was his best year, the 20-12 indicated above.) From 1938 onward, his IP show the "Ted Lyons" pattern that was so common among older pitchers from 1925 through 1945: pitching fewer than 200 innings per year, but with great effectiveness.

We've inducted lot's of 30's/40's hitters but not so many 30's/40's pitchers.

Some contrasting pitchers. Remember that Bridges was 190-124 overall, 84-47 in his best 5 years, 20-12 in his best year, 19-12 in his second best.

Walters (adjusted both for wartime and for his own offense): 197-148 overall, 104-58 in his best 5 years, 26-10 in his best year (1939), 23-11 in his second best. Walters had a higher peak than Bridges, fueled by some heroic inning totals, but was considerably less effective outside that peak.

Saberhagen: 174-111 overall, 84-41 in his best 5 years, 21-8 in his best year (1989), 19--10 in his second best. Actually a fairly similar career pattern to Bridges but not in the same order. (Bridges had a distinct peak and a distinct "tail"; Saberhagen's years were more scrambled.) Saberhagen was more effective at his peak than Bridges, but not by much; Bridges has a more valuable "tail."

Gomez would be another pitcher belonging to the same basic group. I have him at a career equivalent of 169-109, also with a nice peak.

Why does team quality affect WS?

Dan G. mentioned one reason above; a second effect is produced by the fact that win shares are not competition-adjusted within seasons: they don't account for the fact that bad teams play harder schedules than good teams because they don't get to play themselves. This effect is much smaller in a 14-16 team league than in an 8-team league. It is also quite small for teams with winning percentages between .400 and .600 (i.e. most teams), but it can become pronounced for teams outside this range. When one plays consistently on extreme teams, it can have a significant effect on career win-share totals. (Tip of the cap to jimd, who first explained and promoted awareness of this effect bak in the day.)

Anyone else think Doug Jones is interesting enough for a thread?

His IP don't look like much of a workhorse at first glance, but he did top out at 294.7 innings in the 1936 AL, which was a 5.54 RPG league

DanR or JoeD,

Just curious. Have either of you run any correlations or regressions or somethings on R/G and individual pitcher IP totals? What sort of relationships are detectable from this?

Thanks!

I've studied the relationship between R/G and the stdev of RA+, but not innings pitched. You certainly would expect lower IP totals in higher-scoring leagues due to higher BFP/IP. I'll try to check it out this week.

Throwing out some numbers for Doug Jones, looks a lot more dominant than Lee Smith or the other closers on the board:

1987-89: 224K/53BB/9HR in 255 IP, 1997 82K/9BB/4HR in 80 IP, 1992 and 1994 similar.

If Nettles falls short of Brooksie, well, that's not a great endorsement, at least not for me. Brooksie is pretty seriously over-rated.

DanR, aren't there better 3Bs out there than either? Maybe not, but I prefer Ed Williamson and Al Rosen. I realize that some voters don't like the 19C and others do like a longer career but the main argument for Nettles seems to be the very standardized nature of his career. Right length, right arc, good glove...he fits the profile. But does he fill it up? I don't know.

I could join in trying to sell some shortstops if that rings your chimes.

Murphy was better than Puckett at his peak (but how much better depends on inherently subjective evaluation of defence), but completed collapsed after his peak. I can see a preference for Puckett there too. My point isn't that voters should choose Puckett, it's really that the difference between him and the other outfielders is not beyond rational argument...which may be a good reason to look closer at the pitchers.

Evaluating Nettles' defence at his peak is pretty tricky. In '70-'71, the Indians had a young shortstop, Jack Heidemann, who seems to have been not much with the glove. Nettles played deep and off the line. The other factor is that there seem to have been many more right-handed hitters in the league in '70-'71 than afterwards. The magnitude is quite surprising. In 1970, the Indians pitchers faced more than twice the number of right-handed hitters than left-handed hitters, and in 1971, the factor was almost twice. Many other teams faced similar distributions. The number of right-handed hitters appears to have steadily decreased, and by 1985, some teams faced almost the same number of left-handed and right-handed hitters.

Robinson had Belanger at his side, so all those right-handed hitters had a brick wall pretty much to hit through. This, of course, goes a long way to explaining the O's pitchers' ERAs of the time.

Maybe not, but I prefer Ed Williamson and Al Rosen.

Bando and Elliott?

I chose to compare him to Brooks because they are such similar players and because Brooks was elected so easily. Since Brooks got in with 68% of all possible points, if I can point out to just half of his supporters that Nettles is an *identical* player, he'd make the HoM.

I do think there is one better 3B out there: my #1 backlogger, John McGraw. But since he has so little support, I chose to call attention to the guy who is actually on people's radar screens.

Rosen only has five real years in MLB. The standard for that short of a career is Hughie Jennings, and he's no Hughie Jennings.

I wouldn't say "the main argument for Nettles seems to be the very standardized nature of his career." I would say the main argument for Nettles is that he exceeds the HoM's established standards for induction. He doesn't have a monster peak--he was probably the best player in the AL in 1976, but no one was particularly great that year, his next-best showing was 3rd best in 1971, and then he falls off the leaderboard. But he has an extremely high prime--he played at an All-Star level for nine consecutive years (from 1970-78). Then he has a bit of career filler around that. Sure, if all you're looking for is The Big Year™, Rosen's your guy. But if you are looking for sustained excellence, Nettles has an extremely strong case. His rank among AL 3B from '70 to '78 was 2, 1, 1, 1, 2, 1, 1, 2, 1. His competition during that time included Bando, Brett, Brooks, and Bell. That should at least warrant some consideration.

Of course I feel very strongly about the shortstops. But the problem is that while Fox was the only backlog 2B, uniting his support, the backlog is full of qualified SS--Rizzuto, Concepción, Campaneris, Pesky, Bancroft--which prevents any one of them from rising too high in the voting. If all the people who recognize the value of position scarcity could just get together and agree which one was the most deserving, the winner would probably jump to the top of the backlog. But in fact, they all deserve to get in, and none of them will. So with so few elections left to go, I'm focusing my efforts on the players who might actually make it. Nettles seems to me like a glaring omission, not just relative to my own definition of Merit, but to the HoM's own established criteria (namely Brooks who was inducted in a landslide), which makes him seem to me like a good bet.

Mike Green, but since FRAA, DRA, and my modified Fielding Win Shares are all compared to league averages for the position, why would the overall frequency of GB to the left side matter? All 3B benefited from that equally. It might be the case that a high number of GB to the left side would increase the standard deviation of 3B fielding performance--with more chances, the best and worst fielders have more opportunities to distinguish themselves--but that's real value, it helped win pennants, and it should be rewarded.

Lots of ground balls to the left side, and a weak defensive shortstop will skew the data a fair bit, and will explain the high DP and assist totals for the third baseman. To give another example, the Braves in 72-74 faced many more right-handed hitters than they did in 84-86. This means that the defensive peaks of Darrell Evans and Glenn Hubbard look a little higher than they ought to.

Nettles was a great defensive third baseman, and it's easily visible from his years with the Yanks beside Dent and others. I doubt that his 1970-71 Cleveland years were in fact significantly better than his Yankee years.

One more thing. The Indians of 1971 led the league in walks allowed (by 170(!) over the second worst staff). There were a lot of runners on first to erase with those ground balls to third and in the hole...

I find myself to be a Puckett voter, somewhat to my surprise, so I might as well try to answer Dan's questions. I'm new, of course, and started out evaluating players on, essentially, OPS+ times playing time, plus a fielding rating times playing time, cumulative over their careers. Puckett did not do particularly well on this measure, ~#40 on my original list. However, as I gradually add more detail to my scoring system, Puckett seems to benefit a little each time, where other players get a little better here and a little worse there.

In particular, I find Puckett edging slightly ahead because:
1. I have the late 80's as a (very) slightly more difficult time for hitters than usual, which happens to perfectly coincide with his peak.
2. I give some credence to fielding reputation alongside stats, where Puckett is highly regarded. This is probably his beiggest edge in my scoring.
3. My spot checking of putout and assist statistics show a trend towards a greater role of CF over time, such that a modern CF gets a little more fielding credit than earlier CF.

These are just tiny advantages, and Puckett happens to benefit the most, but he's essentially interchangeable with Johnson, Bonds, Cravath, Murphy, and Ryan, who are all floating around the bottom of my ballot. Pinson, Staub, Lynn, and Van Haltren (and Leach) are all very close as well. Smith I prefer to the rest of these guys by a fair amount. Cedeno I have embarrasingly forgotten to re-score.

Anyway, I think when we have a lot of very similar players, fame does act as a tie-breaker for a many of us voters, if mostly subconsciously, and Puckett is the definite leader in that regard. This would explain why Puckett might bubble to the top in many of our analyses, even though we all have different criteria - we "trust" that Puckett was really good, perhaps. On the other hand, Dan may well be right, and we would want to guard against that bias. In my case, that means doing some more head-to-head comparisions between OF this week.

Meanwhile, even with OF voting fractured, it has nothing on the IF and P. There's even less intra-positional and intra-era agreement there. I, personally, would especially like to see Smith, Bridges, and Rizzuto go in. I feel like I had a fairly heavy representation of OF last election (Smith-Dawson-Puckett-Johnson-Browning) but that's still 9 pitchers and gloves, plus Boggs, and mostly higher on the ballot. However, my choices of gloves and pitchers don't match other voters' as well as the bats, so my low ranked Dawson and Browning go in, and the gloves I like are left behind. That seems to be a pretty common phenomena across ballots, and we don't seem to be trending towards any particular glove. Bancroft, Clarkson, Monroe, and Concepcion are others I like, and Nettles and Doyle are not far behind. Anyone else? :)

It seems to me that the low replacement level of Win Shares and BP Warp cause those systems to severely overrate the value of Puckett's in season durability.

Nettles's 1971, when he set the all-time records for assists and double plays by a third baseman in the same season, is by my measure the greatest single defensive season at *any* position since 1893 (ignoring intrinsic positional value and treating first basemen and shortstops the same).

Just out of curiosity, Dan, how do you rate Orlando Cabrera's 2001 season with the Expos, which, IIRC, Win Shares had as the most valuable defensive season of all-time?

Do you guys think Torii Hunter is a good CF?

Lots of ground balls to the left side, and a weak defensive shortstop will skew the data a fair bit, and will explain the high DP and assist totals for the third baseman. To give another example, the Braves in 72-74 faced many more right-handed hitters than they did in 84-86. This means that the defensive peaks of Darrell Evans and Glenn Hubbard look a little higher than they ought to.

That doesn't work for Nettles. It appears the 1971 is legit.

I'd also like to point out that the biggest reason we have a "glove" shortage is that the most qualified SS -Rizzuto- is being held out of the HoM because he's not getting full war credit from some voters. That's just an abomination.

Rizzuto was
a)widely cited by his contemporaries as a great player
b)even without credit, had a HoM peak
c)missed his age 25-27 seasons to the war
d)has all the assorted postseason glory/award hardware that you could want from a HoM player
e)Is a member of the Hall of Fame

It seems to me that he gets much, much less support among the electorate than he should. Is it just the war credit? There's substantial evidence that we've got a shortage of WWII-era players, too.

I don't have any particular reason to rely on one uberstat's measure of defense more than another,

Check out our exploration of how WS analyzes OF defense on the Bresnahan thread. Post 60 is the most relevant to supplying a reason to be suspicious of OF Fielding Win Shares. The preceding posts explore how we arrived at that point, as well as the usual number of digressions and parallel discussions.

As I said before, part of the problem is probably that Rizzuto played at the same time as Boudreau, Stephens, Pesky and Joost--thus the two ASG appearances. I think those are a bit like WS defense. There was an obvious cap on ASG roster slots available for 1) Yankees and 2) SSs. Diminishing any of these guys is like diminishing Anson-Brouthers-Connor or Gehrig-Foxx-Greenberg-Mize for not being more dominant.

As to Torii Hunter, maybe it's obvious, but Torii is pretty highly regarded. Puck did everything just as good except he threw the ball back into the IF or to home plate substantially better. WS has him as an A+ CF and I think WS has got it just right.

Mike Green--again, these defensive measures (WS converted to FRAA, BP FRAA, Defensive Regression Analysis) are always measured against league average, and *definitely* control for things like handedness (at least DRA does). I'd imagine DP opportunities are also in there although I'd have to check with Michael Humphreys to be sure. Also, it would be very weird if Nettles were as good in the field with the Yankees as he was with Cleveland, given what we know about defensive aging patterns--peaks are typically at age 23-24, and fielders generally lose 1.5 runs a year thereafter.

Kenn--The 1980's definitely had a very low standard deviation. That doesn't mean we should elect sub-elite players from that era. Why not take Murphy if it was harder to rack up a high OPS+ in those days? He was a far superior hitter to Puckett and played the same position. As for the relative value of CF to corner OF, interestingly, I find that the CF-corner OF gap (as measured by replacement level) was at an all-time historic low right around 1989. In 1988-89, the worst starting CF in the game were like Lloyd Moseby and Gary Pettis, guys whose hitting wasn't far off league average. Ten years earlier, you had guys like Rick Manning and Rowland Office holding down everyday jobs. I don't know exactly why this is, although I'd be interested to hear suggestions, but the empirical fact is that the worst 3/8 of starting center fielders were much further below average in 1980 than in 1990. It seems appropriate to me that Puckett should be penalized rather than rewarded for that.
Also, Doyle is about as far from a "glove" as you can find. Not only did he field his position terribly, but he played it when it was no more difficult to find a good hitter there than it was at 1B.
I'm iffy on the Negro Leaguers but you know I like Bancroft, Concepción, and Nettles.

Jim Sp--clearly it does, but that is true of all players who played 154 or 162 games. That doesn't explain why Puckett is the unique beneficiary of that, while someone like Murphy who was also a horse is left behind.

Sean Gilman--Cabrera's 2001 gets a very good but hardly spectacular +1.2 FWAA2 for that year. The thing is that by 2001 I have both Chris Dial's Zone Rating data and Mitchel Lichtman's UZR, which have him at +10 and +13 (after regression). If I were using FRAA and FWS Cabrera's 2001 would definitely be among the all-time leaders. I'll ask Michael Humphreys what DRA thinks of Cabrera that year.

Sunnyday--I'm under the impression Hunter's tailed off from his early-00's defensive excellence (which one would expect from aging), but certainly John Dewan's Plus-Minus system thinks that Hunter was an elite CF from '03-'05.

'zop--I don't think Rizzuto's exclusion is *the biggest* abomination, but obviously I agree that he is a clearly deserving HoMer. I'm not sure why your point E is relevant--George Kelly is a member of the Hall of Fame, after all--and A and D seem pretty tangential as well since his statistical record is fully documented. That said, said record is definitively qualified for the HoM. Again, I think that the high number of backlog shortstops is preventing the electorate from uniting around one.

jimd--Sure, but there's an even stiffer criticism to be made of BP's FRAA--namely, that we don't know how the sausage is made *at all*. Until I can get complete historical DRA from Michael Humphreys, FRAA and FWS are all I have to go on. Given that FWS's flaws are clearly documented and FRAA is a complete black box, I just take an average.

Until I can get complete historical DRA from Michael Humphreys, FRAA and FWS are all I have to go on.

Is he going to make that available? That was one of the more intriguing analyses of traditional fielding stats I've ever read, though I haven't heard much more about it since.

'zop--I don't think Rizzuto's exclusion is *the biggest* abomination, but obviously I agree that he is a clearly deserving HoMer. I'm not sure why your point E is relevant--George Kelly is a member of the Hall of Fame, after all--and A and D seem pretty tangential as well since his statistical record is fully documented. That said, said record is definitively qualified for the HoM. Again, I think that the high number of backlog shortstops is preventing the electorate from uniting around one.

My points aren't reason's to vote for Rizzuto in absence of a deserving statistical record, Dan. Rather, they're STRONG evidence that Rizzuto's missing years should be fully credited. If the stats for extant seasons support Rizzuto's candidacy support his inclusion- and they do-, and the contemporary evidence support the idea that he was a great player- and it does-, and we are clearly shortchanging players from that period, thereby violating the constitutional mandate to be fair to all eras- which is exactly what's happening, then I can't see how Rizzuto isn't being elected.

I also guess that I was trying to imply that while I can see why some voters may not approve of your standard deviation analysis, Rizzuto is a Meritorious candidate without any fancy statistical mumbo-jumbo.

First paragraph was loaded with typos. It should read:

My points aren't reasons to vote for Rizzuto in absence of a deserving statistical record, Dan. Rather, they're STRONG evidence that Rizzuto's missing years should be fully credited. If the stats for extant seasons support Rizzuto's inclusion- and they do-, and the contemporary evidence support the idea that he was a great player- and it does-, and we are clearly shortchanging players from that period, thereby violating the constitutional mandate to be fair to all eras- which is exactly what's happening, then I can't see how Rizzuto isn't being elected.

>we are clearly shortchanging players from that period

Agreed.

The other group that is being grossly under-valued is black players between the demise of the NgL and prior to full integration of the MLs, guys who really didn't have the opportunity to create a record. (By contrast, the NgLers at least had the opportunity to create a record, if not in the MLs.)

I'm talking about Don Newcombe, among a few others.

jimd, his article published online includes lists of the best fielders at each position, and if you email him he'll give you individual player-season results (like MGL used to do when UZR was proprietary). But he's never made the full dataset available, despite my repeated (friendly) badgering. :)

Prelim ballot as follows:

1. Addie Joss
2. Eddie Cicotte
3. Ernie Lombardi
4. Vern Stephens
5. Wally Schang
6. John McGraw
7. Sam Leever
8. Tommy John
9. Carl Mays
10. Bret Saberhagen
11. Elmer Smith
12. Frank Howard
13.Mickey Welch
14. Will Clark
15. Alexandro Oms.

You will note that I have taken to heart the strictures about not enough "glove" positions and to a large extent agree with them. However I think we're electing the wrong ones, the good fielders who really can't hit a lick when in fact there are more Meritorious players in the glove positioners who can hit. Thus the appearance of John McGraw on my ballot, I think for the first time -- it's a very short career, but he played 3B (equivalent to a modern 2B) and his 135 OPS+ is thus equivalent to 150 for an outfielder. Also, there are very few 3B indeed from that era -- he's clearly better than Jimmy Collins, whom we've enshrined, even if for not as long.

The same applies to Lombardi, Stephens and Schang, all of whom played glove positions competently (I don't believe that Schnozz was a historically bad catcher; if he had been, he would have been worth more to the Reds at 1B -- we have a double champion there without any HOMers currently.) We may have elected too many hitters from the 20s and 30s, but Lombardi was a glove posiotion player who also hit, not the same thing.

4. Vern Stephens

karlmangus, I'm curious how you can defend putting Stephens at 4, and not have Rizzuto on your ballot at all. Rizzuto has only 3 fewer WARP2 (BP) than Stephens, and that's before adjusting for the missed seasons due to WWII.

Sure, Stephens has the gaudy OPS+, but that was mainly during the war and came with a stone glove that eventually led to a move to 3B. Rizzuto was a superlative defender and baserunner. In 1949, Stephens' greatest season, he was ranked 7th in the MVP voting, and Rizzuto was ranked 2nd.

Stephens has a 26 point higher OPS+ than Rizzutto; wartime competition wasn't that inferior, as he demonstrated for the Red Sox in '49. Rizzutto is one of a number of infielders like Fox who are bad enough hitters that they can't make it up with fielding prowess. Stephens didn't move to 3B until 1952; had he really had a stone glove it would surely have been 1B. MVP voting might well have been reversed in '49 had the Sox won the last weekend.

I don't trust WS and WARP, except as indicators; they're frequently 30%-40% off.

Actually Stephens OPS+ isn't particularly gawdy at al, surprisingly. You want a glove with some gawdy OPS+, how about E. Howard (also appropriately adjusted for time missed, in his case, due to racism--i.e. quota-ism). Or Tommy Leach? I mean, not gawdy really, but about as good as Stephens and a much better glove with more career. And how about Pesky for a dandy little glove man?

Stephens has a 26 point higher OPS+ than Rizzutto; wartime competition wasn't that inferior, as he demonstrated for the Red Sox in '49. Rizzutto is one of a number of infielders like Fox who are bad enough hitters that they can't make it up with fielding prowess. Stephens didn't move to 3B until 1952; had he really had a stone glove it would surely have been 1B. MVP voting might well have been reversed in '49 had the Sox won the last weekend.

OK---well surely your agree that one data point (Stephens' '49) is not evidence of the quality of wartime competition, no? How much are you discounting Stephens' war years? By zero? 5%? 20%?

How much credit are you giving Rizzuto for his defense+ baserunning advantage? 1 win? 3 wins? 5 wins?

I think that you have to consider stats beyond OPS+ and "eyeballing" when assessing these two players. Say what you will about the 1949 MVP vote, but in a year when Stephens had 159RBI, the voters vastly preferred Rizzuto.

The voters who also preferred George Bell over Alan Trammell in 1987? THOSE voters?

Look, BBWAA guys have a long history of preferring shortstops who play for winners (as opposed to 1Bmen, for example; it seems not to matter much if you have the numbers), and you can lead the league in RBI for a non-winner andthey seem to care not a whit.

I don't have Stephens near my ballot, but it IS a defensible position. He WAS a MUCH better hitter than Phil, even when acocuting for WWII. He was NOT a 'stone glove'; BP has him a MLB avg shortstop, and an above-avg 3Bman.

I don't have Stephens near my ballot, but it IS a defensible position. He WAS a MUCH better hitter than Phil, even when acocuting for WWII. He was NOT a 'stone glove'; BP has him a MLB avg shortstop, and an above-avg 3Bman.

This is not defensible logic. Of course he was a better hitter than Rizzuto- the question is how much better, in terms of runs, wins, or whatever Rizzuto was in the other facets of the game. There is ample evidence that in all non-hitting elements, Rizzuto was a vastly superior player to Stephens (and pretty much every other player of his generation).

That sort of "quantify offense, eyeball defense + baserunning" analysis causes players whose primary value does not lie in hitting to be either underrated or inconsistently rated. I believe that a rigorous analysis of Rizzuto's whole candidacy, beyond just a "oh, career 93 OPS+ DING!" is very important.

The voters who also preferred George Bell over Alan Trammell in 1987? THOSE voters?

Just as any statistic, be it OPS+, WS, or WARP can spit out some strange results, so too can MVP voting. But in a pre-PBP era, when we don't have precise defensive #'s, the opinion of a player's contemporaries is very valuable to determine Merit. Hell, it's valuable even now.

What's striking about Stephens is that even in the year when the Red Sox were a contender, and when he had his own version of Bell's 47HR, he still finished well below the light-hitting Rizzuto. That says something about contemporary assessment of Rizzuto's defense.

I'd love to see how Newcombe does in a stdev pitching analysis. Still, he seems to be more of a peak candidate.

Out of all the SS and 2B I like Clarkson the best and I like 6 SS better than any remaining 2B. We're done with 2B. Rizzuto and Bancroft are next on my list but they're nowhere near the ballot. It's really hard to get excited without the whole package - bat and glove.

No 'zop (I'd just like to make it clear that I am NOT a Joba Chamberlain fan!) the 1949 MVP voting says only that MVP voters are infleunced by the Yankee publicity machine, and by the desire to vote for a winner. There is no way that Rizzutto's '49 with an OPS+ of 88 can rationally be ranked ahead of Stephens' with an OPS+ of 138 or even comparable with it. Defense just isn't THAT important, when comparing two competent fielders at the same position. Rizutto's '50 I grant you was a very fine season indeed, but in '49 the MVP voters just wanted to give the Scooter a medal.

This is not defensible logic. Of course he was a better hitter than Rizzuto-the question is how much better, in terms of runs, wins, or whatever Rizzuto was in the other facets of the game.

defensible logic THIS:

Stephens leads in career WS, 265 (192 batting/running, 73 on def) to 231 (133 bat, 97 def).
Stephens played 1720 games to Scooter's 1661.

Per 154 games, then, we have
S.S. offense defense total
Vern . 17.2 ... 6.5 ... 23.7
Phil ... 12.3 ... 9.0 ... 21.3

Add in war credit, and Rizzuto's longer career and nice peak, and yes, I see him ahead, but it's certainly defensible to look at the above and conclude Vern was better.

As to contemporoary opinion, guess who had more top-10 MVP finishes? Who was voted to more all-star teams? Ooh, maybe we shouldn't polish Scooter up too much. The crusty old writers may hav evoted him into the HoF FIFTY YEARS AFTER THE FACT, but I'd suggest we not trust them above our own eyeballs, since most of them didn't see Stephens play either!

In 1949, Rizzuto was the *only* Yankee that played every day. DiMaggio missed half the year with an injury and Casey Stengel platooned almost everyone else. Voters needed a position player on their ballot from the pennant winner, who else were they going to vote for? Stephens lost a lot of support sharing the lineup with Ted Williams -- the runaway MVP. These votes are funny.

>The voters who also preferred George Bell over Alan Trammell in 1987? THOSE voters?

I don't think they are the same voters, and I think MVP voting has gotten demonstrably worse over the years.

>wartime competition wasn't that inferior, as he demonstrated for the Red Sox in '49.

And Vern was in a different park in '49 than during the war.

>he 1949 MVP voting says only that MVP voters are infleunced by the Yankee publicity machine

That's a fairly long chain of inference, there. How do you account for the fact that Vern was 4th in MVP voting among BoSox players?

>he desire to vote for a winner.

Don't disagree with this part, but then the question is why the voters preferred Phil to all other Yankees. If you look up and down that roster, what the Yankees had that year was no real superheroes (DiMaggio hurt, Berra in his "show me" year, a bunch of pretty good pitchers, etc.) but a well balanced team. It is arguable that Rizzuto was indeed their best player. And, again, that Stephens was about the Red Sox' 4th best player. So, let's see. Best player on the league champion versus 4th best player on the runner-up. I don't think a preference for Rizzuto can be dismissed as the result of mere publicity.

The crusty old writers may hav evoted him into the HoF FIFTY YEARS AFTER THE FACT

The VC inducted Scooter. Crusty old writers never gave him more than 38% of the vote. Most years, the writers gave more votes to Marty Marion, Allie Reynolds and Johnny van Der Meer.

Bottom line: How do we know that an OPS+ differential of 25 points cannot be made up by SS defense? There's a lot we don't know about SS defense, or at least about measuring and quantifying SS defense. A lot of folks think Greg Gagne wa the Twins' all-time best SS over Zoilo Versalles, and I don't know that that's wrong.

Zoilo wasn't good for very long. For time periods that short, Roy Smalley needs to be in the discussion. Gagne played 8 years.

DanR, the difference between Nettles 70-71 performance, and his 72-73 (or 74-75) is over a win per season. That's nothing like 1.5 runs per year. The other thing is that Nettles had played the grand total of 21 games at third base in 1969. A little rust would actually be expected in 1970 anyways.

If you want to argue that Nettles was roughly as good as Robinson at his prime, I'll buy that. On the other hand, if you suggest that Nettles was considerably better than Robinson defensively at their respective peaks, my response would be that the numerical evidence is not sufficiently reliable to support that conclusion.

2006 Prelim

Again, I’m mostly a peak/prime Win Shares voter though I look at a lot of information—especially my own annual MVP ballot and all-star selections, OPS+ and ERA+, HoFS, HoFM, ink, etc.—in trying to correctly interpret the numbers. Re-did backlog gloves 2 years ago and backlog bat last year. Thank goodness my consensus score is back down toward the bottom where it belongs. Probably won’t get to the planned re-do of backlog arms, but must look at Bret Saberhagen, whom I have not yet evaluated. I will get Orel at the same time but don't expect to find much.

2006 PHoM—Will Clark, Albert Belle, Alan Trammell

PHoM/not HoM so far 21st century elections—Puckett, Mattingly, Munson, Dean, Pesky, Rosen, Duffy, probably Belle

HoM/not PHoM 21st century elections—Whitaker, Randolph, Stieb, Bresnahan.

I would commend everybody to consider Williamson, Rizzuto, E. Howard, Pesky and Leach in light of our dearth of glove love and Newcombe for another arm (Dean and Bond are lost causes, but of course so are all my gloves, oh well).

1. Will Clark (new, PHoM 2006)
2. Albert Belle (new, PHoM 2006)—coupla mashers. WS peaks are beyond question, Clark at 44-37-34 and Belle at 37-34-34-31 (with 1994 and 1995 adjusted appropriately). Clark’s total moves to 341 with adjustments. We’re short of gloves and arms but these guys are just better. I don't have another more or less “pure” bat on my ballot, so my conscience is clear.

3. Dizzy Dean (2-2-3, PHoM 2002)—for a peak voter, the one big oversight of the HoM project to date

4. Ed Williamson (3-12-6, PHoM 1924)—more peak and more glove than than almost any other available IF

5. Phil Rizzuto (4-9-14, PHoM 1995)—lots of Yankees on this list; fact is, I hate the Yankees, but they had the horses or in this case the gloves

6. Elston Howard (5-5-5, PHoM 1994)
7. Don Newcombe (6-7-9, PHoM 1997)—these 2 guys missed more opportunities than anybody; Newcombe coulda been Robin Roberts, for Howard the comp is Mickey Cochrane

8. Tommy Bond (8-11-12, PHoM 1929)—he’s baaaack; pretty much the all-time WS peak monster even after I give his defenses half his credit

9. Larry Doyle (9-8-13, PHoM 1975)—an eminently deserving MVP at his best

10. Johnny Pesky (11-15-24, PHoM 2004)—28 WS (in his rookie season) and 34 WS in the years before and after spending 3 years fighting WWII; adjusted WS peak (adjusted to 162 games), then, is 36-30-30, compared to Rizzuto’s 37-27-26 and Trammel’s 35-29-26; rate is 23.8 to Rizzuto and Trammel’s 22.5; rates below Rizzuto due to his years in the wilderness of 3B

11. Al Rosen (12-18-38, PHoM 2005)—the #1 WS peak of anybody in my 30 hitters but, of course, the shortest career of the lot; but, also fills a position imbalance

12. Hugh Duffy (13-34-26, PHoM 2005)—I understand WS over-rates him, that’s why he’s here and not higher up

13. Addie Joss (14-21-20, PHoM 1967)—all-time great ERA+

14. Kirby Puckett (15-3-4, PHoM 2001)—drops down after re-eval

(14a. Alan Trammell [15a-24a-11a, PHoM 2006])

15. Tommy Leach (16-28-44, PHoM 1998)

Close—i.e. right around in/out line, as I think we will elect about 4-6 more backloggers before we’re done

16. Gavvy Cravath (17-17-21, PHoM 1995)
(16a. Jimmy Sheckard [19a-50c-HM])
17. Dick Redding (18-24-18, PHoM 1971)
18. Vern Stephens (19-22-19)
19. Dick Lundy (20-35-35)
20. Ken Singleton (22-33-37)
21. Vic Willis (24-31-33)
22. Dave Parker (21-27-27)

HoVG

23. Dale Murphy (23-16-16)
24. Thurman Munson (27-10-10, PHoM 2002)
25. Eddie Cicotte (28-26-25)
26. Hack Wilson (25-36-29)
27. Dan Quisenberry (26-19-15)
(27a. Wes Ferrell [30a-29a-27a])
(27b. Roger Bresnahan [30b-20-31])
28. Frank Howard (30-47-36, PHoM 1987)
29. Don Mattingly (29-6-7, PHoM 2001)
30. Bill Monroe (31-32-34)
(30a. Joe Sewell [32a-50b-HM])

31. Reggie Smith (32-37-43, PHoM 1988)
32. Sal Bando (34-29-30)
(32a. Ken Boyer [32b-30a-21a-])
33. Pie Traynor (33-47-32)
34. John McGraw (35-40-50)
(34a. Lou Whitaker [36a-38a-31a])
35. Chuck Klein (36-22-23)
(35a. Quincy Trouppe [36b-42a-42a])
36. Jim Rice (38-25-23)
37. Wally Berger (37-50-HM)
38. Tony Perez (39-30-28)
39. Alejandro Oms (40-42-40)
(39a. Dewey Evans [40a-50a-HM])
40. Dave Bancroft (4a-NR-NR)

41. Orlando Cepeda (43-41-39, PHoM 1987)
42. Bucky Walters (45-38-36)
43. Fred Dunlap (42-45-45)
44. Bruce Sutter (44-39-41)
45. Bob Johnson (46-46-46)
(45a. Jim Bunning [46a-41a-41a])
46. Hilton Smith (47-43-42)
47. Luis Tiant (49-48-48)
48. Lefty Gomez (HM-HM-HM)
49. Luke Easter (HM-HM-HM)
50. Burleigh Grimes (50-49-49)

Honorable Mention

Rabbit Maranville (HM-NR-NR)
Bobby Avila (HM-HM-NR)
Bobby Estalella (HM-HM-HM)
Graig Nettles (HM-NR-NR)
Tony Oliva (HM-HM-31)
Lou Brock (NR-NR-NR)
Dave Concepcion (NR-NR-NR)
(Biz Mackey [NR-NR-NR)]
Lee Smith (HM-HM-new)
Luis Aparicio (NR-NR-NR)

It is interesting when you break down the HOM-not-HOF and HOF-not-HOM lists by position

pos HOM HOF diff
1B_ _4_ _6_ _-2
2B_ _7_ _4_ _+3
3B_ _8_ _6_ _+2
SS_ _5_ _6_ _-1
LF_ _6_ _3_ _+3
CF_ _4_ _5_ _-1
RF_ _4_ _6_ _-2
_C_ _5_ _3_ _+2
_P_ _6_ _17 _-11

There are 7 open spots in the HOM but 2 of them are going to go to Will Clark and Mark McGwire which closes the 1B gap. There are outfielders in the top returnees likely close the gap in CF and RF. Are we saying that not only does the HoF not have the right people at the margins but one of their problems is they've inducted way too many pitchers?

What does Win Shares have against Tiant? I don't even look at Win Shares so I have no clue. Is it the increased run environment of Fenway? Does he not put up enough innings (WS likes innings)? Is it a defensive adjustment that WS doesn't get correct? Are relievers eating his WS? I look at sunnyday's ballot, see Tiant way down below Sutter and it makes no sense at all when you look at WARP.

What does Win Shares have against Tiant?

I don't know if it has anything against him, DL.

My problem with him is that he has too many contemporaries that were much better than him. I'm also 99.9% certain that it wasn't just a coincidence that so many pitchers lasted forever.

I'd rather reward Bucky Walters or Lee Smith instead.

Are we saying that not only does the HoF not have the right people at the margins but one of their problems is they've inducted way too many pitchers?

Apparently so. A number of us have been occasionally saying that we're short on pitchers overall, but we also can't seem to agree on who those pitchers should be. We have more agreement at the other positions so we've substituted marginal position players for marginal pitchers.

If you're a peak voter, Tiant gives you 400 top flight innings in 68 and 1/2 of 72 (he relieved for 30 innings). Sutter gives you 340 highly leveraged top flight innings. Once you look at prime and career, there is no contest.

Peak for a pitcher is a little more difficult to suss out than it is for a hitter, despite our best efforts to disentangle pitching from defence. A peak voter looks at Tiant's 1973 and 1974 seasons, and is unimpressed because of the OPS+. WARP sets a low replacement value and likes Tiant's seasons almost as much as Will Clark's 3rd or 4th best year.

The combination of high weightings to peaks and a high replacement value will tend to lead to an undervaluing of pitchers.

> too many contemporaries that were much better than him

Isn't that a problem with just about everyone in the backlog?

Tiant's 3 years younger than Marichal. They both pitched 3500 innings.

numbers are adjusted to remove final fading seasons
pitcher PRAR PRAA
Marichal 1005 238
Tiant 1067 237

There is an ERA+ difference of 122 to 114 but a big chunk of that is Candlestick v. Fenway and NL v. AL. Marichal was the better fielder by Fielding Runs but Tiant was a little better hitter.

Top 3 seasons in WARP1
Marichal 36.1
Tiant 30.2

Top 10 seasons in WARP1
Marichal 84.8
Tiant 78.4 (which means their 7 shoulder seasons are equal)

Career WARP1
Marichal 91.2
Tiant 99.2

It's purely a career argument but it looks like the difference is Tiant spread his 3500 innings out over more seasons. Tiant's injuries from 1969-1971 appear to be the real killer, they stole 3 of his prime seasons.

This is going back to Dan's comment well above.

> Kenn--The 1980's definitely had a very low standard deviation. That doesn't mean we should
> elect sub-elite players from that era. Why not take Murphy if it was harder to rack up a high > OPS+ in those days? He was a far superior hitter to Puckett and played the same position.

That's a peak vs. career argument, though, isn't it? Murphy was clearly superior for 6 years, then Puckett is clearly superior for four years, but at a much lower level that won't carry much weight at all in your voting system, and somewhat less than the good years in mine. I still suspect our differences is really on the defensive side, as I don't really disagree that much with your offensive assessment. I gather that you rate Murphy equal to Puckett defensively, possibly even better, which is where Puckett makes up the rest of the ground with me, and probably a lot of Puckett voters. Is that the case?

> As for the relative value of CF to corner OF, interestingly, I find that the CF-corner OF gap > (as measured by replacement level) was at an all-time historic low right around 1989. Ten
> years earlier, you had guys like Rick Manning and Rowland Office holding down everyday jobs. > I don't know exactly why this is, although I'd be interested to hear suggestions, but the
> empirical fact is that the worst 3/8 of starting center fielders were much further below
> average in 1980 than in 1990. It seems appropriate to me that Puckett should be penalized
> rather than rewarded for that.

I'm simply using the basic defensive stats to estimate more plays taken by CF over time. All I have evidence for is a very gradual trend to greater CF responsibility over decades, based on spot checks every decade or so (the process is time consuming). You are saying there is evidence for a shorter term drop in CF importance in this specific time period, which I would not have picked up. If true, did it really get easier to play CF, or were there a lot of decent CF, and should a player be penalized for the latter? I still go back and forth on that question regarding other players, as well.

> Also, Doyle is about as far from a "glove" as you can find. Not only did he field his
> position terribly, but he played it when it was no more difficult to find a good hitter there > than it was at 1B.

Yeah, I know, but our 3B are a bit sparce, so you take what you can get. He's not getting a good rating on the strength of his glove, that's for sure.

There is an ERA+ difference of 122 to 114 but a big chunk of that is Candlestick v. Fenway and NL v. AL.

I'm confused. Aren't park and league incorporated into ERA+?