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Hall of Merit — A Look at Baseball's All-Time Best Monday, January 16, 20122013 Hall of Merit Ballot Discussion2013 (November 26, 2012)—elect 3* * Might be an elect-4 election this year. Thanks to Dan for the list. John (You Can Call Me Grandma) Murphy
Posted: January 16, 2012 at 04:08 PM | 231 comment(s)
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I'll also be cleaning up the Plaque Room a little bit at a time for the next couple of weeks, so don't think I have forgotten about that. I have just been incredibly busy and that stuff will always have to come first (and Joe is even more busy, so he has less time than myself :-)
Thank you for your patience.
Wild prediction of 2013 results - not easy because of the one-year boycott option:
1. Bonds
2. Clemens
3. Piazza
4. Biggio
5. Schilling
6. Sosa
7. fustercluck between top of leftover heap and many newcomers. maybe Wells here?
I'd imagine that even the boycotts won't keep Bonds and Clemens out of top 2, but who knows what happens a year from now.
I don't boycott, either...
1) Bonds
2) Clemens
3) Piazza
4) Schilling
5) Tommy Bridges
6) Biggio
remainder from this year's ballot
~20th Sosa - he's pretty even with Norm Cash
~40th Lofton
2. Clemens
3. Biggio
4. Leach
5. McGriff
6. Piazza
7. Perez
8. Sosa
9. Bonds (Bobby)
10. Duffy
11. Welch
12. Willis
13. Williams
14. Bell
15. Monroe
I tend to give extra weight to players that I think have been unfairly passed over, which is why you will see Piazza only in at 7. Schilling is not worthy of induction, in my opinion. (feel free to mock...)
Having said all of that, if we are only inducting 3 and they are anyone other than Bonds, Clemens and Biggio, something has gone terribly wrong.
C'mon Rusty, the third player could be Piazza as easily as Biggio. I don't think Backne is going to be a major election fall back.
And as far as the first non-newly eligible, I think it will be the top back-logger with less popular support and more devoted fans. Say maybe Hugh Duffy, Cannonball Dick while Luis Tiant and Phil Rizzuto fall back.
(ranking someone higher than you think they really belong because you think other people have historically voted them too low) seems an awful lot like unconstitutional strategic voting to me.
I don't know how you could classify McGriff as "unfairly passed over". He's only been on the ballot for a few years now.
Piazza was the better hitter and he played catcher.
1) Barry Bonds - 2nd to Williams in LF due to war credit. Top 5 player in baseball history.
2) Roger Clemens - 2nd to Walter Johnson among pitchers. Top 10 player in baseball history.
3) Mike Piazza - 4th among C behind Gibson, Bench and Berra. He is close enough to Dickey, Hartnett and Carter that a case could be made that he's 7th due to all the unknowns regarding catcher defense. Top 60 player in baseball history.
4) Curt Schilling - 18th among pitchers. Ignoring early pitchers he's behind Blyleven and Robin Roberts but ahead of Carl Hubbell, Gaylord Perry and Dazzy Vance. Top 65 player in baseball history.
5) Tommy Bridges - Have been supporting Bridges since the 1970 ballot. Still think he's great.
6) Craig Biggio - 13th among second basemen ahead of Gordon and Doerr, essentially tied with Billy Herman and behind Ryne Sandberg. Top 180 player in baseball history.
7) Urban Shocker
8) Bus Clarkson
9) Phil Rizzuto
10) Gavy Cravath - four guys in a row that require credit
11) Luis Tiant
12) Bob Johnson - on every ballot since I started voting in 1968
13) Ben Taylor - how do we induct Palmeiro and Beckley but not Ben Taylor?
14) Bert Campaneris
15) Tony Mullane - didn't realize he was blackballed until now
16-20) Bucky Walters, Dave Bancroft, Hilton Smith, Norm Cash, Johnny Pesky
21-25) Dick Redding, Wally Schang, SAMMY SOSA, Don Newcombe, Dave Concepcion
26-30) Babe Adams, Tommy Leach, Dizzy Dean, Jack Fournier, Wilbur Cooper
Sosa and Norm Cash are not far apart. Both are good bat, high peak, short prime, better than expected glove players and they both used corked bats. Cash actually has higher raw BWAA2 and FWAA2 according to Dan R. Their run scoring environments couldn't be much more different.
34) Kenny Lofton - but ranked as high as Earl Averill and higher than Andre Dawson, Jimmy Wynn, Edd Roush, Willard Brown and Pete Browning. I think we overrate CF as a voting group.
79) David Wells - pretty decent showing
I'd probably put Hubbell and Perry ahead of Schilling. That said, Schilling is still a clear "frontlog" candidate - someone who doesn't need to mix in with the backloggers, and who can be elected as soon as the opportunity arises. There was a Schilling thread recently on the BBTF "mainland" that I participated in.
While researching for an upcoming article arguing for the elimination of the Hall's 10-years-played rule, I realized that I had failed to include the article's centerpiece, Orlando Hernandez, on the list of HoM eligibles for the 2013 election.
"El Duque" has a wonderful narrative. He was the postseason pitcher that some imagine Jack Morris to be. But he is not a hall of famer. Ninety major league wins does not get you in the conversation; and nine seasons played bans him from even being on the ballot.
However, the HoM looks deeper. Orlando Hernandez was trapped in Cuba for most of his prime. He defected and signed with the Yankees at age 32. He was an immediate hit, winning 21 games minors/majors/postseason that first year. He went on to post 21.1 pitching WAR in his career. There are 52 starting pitchers in the HOF who debuted in 1889 or later; 27 had more WAR age 32+, 25 had fewer. It isn't hard to imagine El Duque posting 35+ pitching WAR before age 32. Say, a 3-year peak averaging 6 WAR and 7 or 8 more years averaging 2 to 3 WAR.
It's probably a tough argument to justify. He probably wasn't as good as David Wells. But he deserves our consideration and our best attempts to translate his value.
Orlando Hernandez at the BR Bullpen.
Why we lurkers love the HoM!
Is it? I would imagine that El Duque threw a LOT of pitches in his Cuba prime - knowing nothing about Cuban ball, I still doubt they are as pathological about pitcher injuries as US leagues. I definitely am intrigued by a theory that El Duque left 40 WAR on the island and is an easy HOMer.
I could be convinced with El Duque, especially if we get some stats. Contemporary opinion is not inconsistent with an HoM caliber career . . .
As for the Hall of Fame: Can we get Orlando Hernandez a spot on the 2013 BBWAA ballot? There is no longer any practical reason for requiring candidates to have played ten years. The rule didn't even exist during the Hall's first two decades. It was instituted for the 1958 election, as a quick and dirty method to limit the ballot to a manageable size.
In judging players we care about quality over quantity, right? El Duque had a better career than many players who show up on the ballot (Tony Womack?!? Terry Mulholland?!?) And many players have packed enough into their first nine seasons to be elected to the Hall even if they had never played again. So why is Orlando Hernandez summarily dismissed from HOF consideration based on a short-sighted archaic rule?
1. Bonds
2. Clemens
3. Piazza
4. Biggio--quite the cohort
5. Duffy
6. McCormick
7. Belle
8. Bond
9. Welch
10. Rizzuto
11. Stephens
12. Newcombe
13. Pesky
14. Dean
15. Williamson
Schilling is very close. If #16, e.g., he would be behind Welch and Newcombe and ahead of Bucky Walters, which seems reasonable.
Sosa is also very close and probably should be on the list. Is he better than Belle? I need to look at that. I think probably not. How about the next "sluggers" behind him? That would be Gavy Cravath, Dave Parker, Jim Rice and George Foster. Dunno yet.
Lofton and Finley. What's with the WS vs. WARP on that? I prefer Finley but they're both probably below #25.
Wells? I cannot imagine him ahead of the backlog. He makes Jim Kaat look pretty good IMO.
1. Barry Bonds
2. Clemens...closer to #1 than I'd expected, actually. I have him 3rd all-time among Ps, and so close to Pete Alexander that he may as well be tied for 2nd with him.
3. Piazza...around 5th all time among Cs, depending on what exactly I do to compare him with the 19th-century stars White and Ewing.
4. Biggio...I have him 5th among 2Bs as well, above Gehringer, Alomar, Sandberg, etc., somewhat to my surprise. If that holds up, I could end up swapping him and Piazza here, but for now at least the catcher candidate gets the edge.
5. Williamson
6. Newcombe
7. Schilling...easily over the line, but near the bottom of the "in" cohort, just ahead of most of my peaky ballot favorites like Appier and Dean. For me, Hubbell and Vance are well ahead of him, and Perry a bit ahead (peak voter), but I'm with the growing consensus that Schilling goes in quickly once the inner-circle types get out of the way.
8. E. Howard
9. Pesky
10. Appier
11. Rizzuto
12. Rosen
13. Cravath
14. Dean
15. Bando
Sosa would have comfortably made the bottom half of my 2012 ballot had he been eligible a year sooner; I have him a notch below Cravath, myself, but also clearly over the in-out line for corner OFs. In this year's madness, he'll end up something like 17th, and just off-ballot for now.
Lofton places well below Bernie Williams on offense, but makes up the distance on defense and baserunning to get just ahead of him, near the bottom of my top 50.
Finley is outside the top 50, right around Brett Butler, which seems about right. Better than his brother-in-law, though.
Julio Franco...I'd forgotten his nifty little middle-infielder peak, all those years ago! It's not enough, of course, but he's also in that just-outside-top-50 cluster, somewhere around Tony Lazzeri.
David Wells...not close, just no peak to speak of. Ends up close to Chief Bender, and well outside the top 50.
Roberto Hernandez joins the very-good-but-no-chance group of closer candidates; I have him right around folks like John Wetteland and Ron Perranoski. That's not remotely good enough for a reliever; still, he was an excellent closer for longer than most.
No one else is even that close, though I'd love to be able to evaluate El Duque's Cuban years.
1) Bonds
2) Clemens
3) Piazza
4) Biggio
Piazza over Biggio is hard to evaluate. Biggio began as a (plus defensive) catcher and deserves the appropriate credit; he wasn't a whole-career 2B. Piazza's peak offensive seasons outweigh Biggio's longer prime - for now.
5) Schilling
6) Luque (was #1 last year)
Also a tough one. Schilling was a better rate pitcher. Luque, if not held back, would have had more volume. Both had more relief appearances than usual for Merit-level SP. Schilling "wins" on his stellar postseason record.
7) Schang
8) Sammy Sosa
I didn't like Sosa at first; I thought he was valueless outside his six-year peak. But through 1997 (BB Reference figures) he has almost as many dWAR (10.4) as oWAR (10.8). Then, in 1998-2003, his defensive value zeroes out, but he's mashing. This placement is tentative and depends on the firsthand commentary of those who saw young Sosa play. DL's comment that his value is similar to Cash, whom I consistently vote for, is interesting.
9) Tommy John
10) Hilton Smith
11) Buddy Bell
12) Norm Cash
13) Luis Tiant
14) Lee Smith
15) Tommy Leach
16) Kenny Lofton. Literally. A speed-and-defense player caught in an extreme power era. It's revealing that Jimmy Ryan and George van Haltren are both among his top 4 Similarity Scores. Lofton was more valuable than either as a position player heads-up, even without timeline effects.
Also near ballot: Bando, Rizzuto, Bobby Bonds, Albert Belle, Vic Willis, Bucky Walters.
I second the request for fuller treatment of El Duque's pre-Yankee career.
Collins, Eddie
Hornsby, Rogers
Lajoie, Nap
Morgan, Joe
Gehringer, Charlie
Robinson, Jackie
Grich, Bobby
Frisch, Frankie
Carew, Rodney
Whitaker, Lou
Barnes, Ross
BIGGIO, CRAIG
Sandberg, Ryne
1992 - 9th top 4 are Sandberg, Baerga, Knoblauch and Alomar
1993 - 2nd top 4 are Robby Thompson, Biggio, Alomar, Whitaker
1994 - 1st top 4 are Biggio, Kent, Whitaker, Baerga
1995 - 1st top 4 are Biggio, Knoblauch, DeShields, Baerga
1996 - 3rd top 4 are Knoblauch, Alomar, Biggio, Ray Durham
1997 - 1st top 4 are Biggio, Knoblauch, Mike Lansing, John Valentin
1998 - 1st top 4 are Biggio, Kent, Jose Offerman, Ray Durham
1999 - 4th top 4 are Alomar, Randy Velarde, Edgardo Alfonzo, Biggio
2000 - 16th top 4 are Kent, Alfonzo, Luis Castillo, Alomar
2001 - 5th top 4 are Bret Boone, Alomar, Kent, Durham
2002 - 22nd top 4 are Kent, Soriano, Adam Kennedy, Jose Vidro
2003 - moves to CF top 4 2B are Marcus Giles, Bret Boone, Soriano, Mark Loretta
2004 - plays OF top 4 2B are Mark Loretta, Kent, Juan Uribe, Orlando Hudson
2005 - 14th top 4 are Utley, Brian Roberts, Polanco and Kent
That's a 6 year run where he's probably the "best 2B in baseball" but Alomar and Knoblauch are not that far behind. There are 3 HoM caliber 2B (Biggio, Alomar and Kent) plus the end of Whitaker and Sandberg's careers and a ton of "very good" 2B during this time - Ray Durham, Chuck Knoblauch, Carlos Baerga, Jose Vidro, Edgardo Alfonzo, Bret Boone. Replacement level 2B in 1994/95 are guys like Joey Cora, Brent Gates, Mark Lemke and Nelson Liriano.
Would love to take credit (and I did count his catching in my evaluation of him), but that was Ardo. :)
Also, completely forgot to note above that I group old 2Bs with new 3Bs for comparison-by-position purposes, and vice versa. So Biggio is competing with Home Run Baker in my list, but not with Collins or Hornsby or Lajoie. Kind of an important omission; sorry about that.
My post wasn't a rebuttal to anybody's post here, DL. I was just adding my two cents to the discussion, that's all.
Well, 5th is a pretty far cry from "best at."
Murphy - nobody except Mark Donelson who stated that he had Biggio 5th at 2B ahead of Gehringer.
Well, 5th is a pretty far cry from "best at."
Besides, second at shortstop doesn't mean you're in Wagner territory either. :-)
Easy to imagine, tough to justify. That link I included has some stats. Probably much more can be found in Peter Bjarkman's A History of Cuban Baseball, 1864-2006.
The stats in the appendix D ("statistical records") of Bjarkman's book are the same as in the BR Bullpen article cited:
In addition, it's noted that he pitched in 246 games, had 75 complete games (according to earlier in the book, 23 shutouts) and walked 455 (that's a K/BB of approximately 2.66). I can't seem to find league context or league ERA anywhere (this appendix is primarily leaders in each category per year), but I'll look a little more closely (the BR bullpen article cites some totals for individual seasons based on this book, so I'm sure they're here somewhere).
Looking at the year-by-year breakdowns in section II chapter 8 ("cuba's revolutionary baseball (1962-2005)"), Bjarkman only lists leaders of each section, so here's El Duque's stats when he led things (i.e., best in the league in each category):
1988 Selective Series XIV (Super-Provincial) (first place I can find his name): 3.18 ERA (does not say how many games, but the CG leader had 10 and the leader in wins had 10).
1988-1989 National Series XVIII (Provincial): 7-0 record
1990 Selective Series XVI (Super-Provincial): 10-1 record, threw a no-hitter in an 11-0 mercy rule victory. Apparently this was a wins record at the time.
1992 Selective Series XVIII (Super-Provincial): 10-2 record, 2.23 ERA
1993-1994 National Series XXXIII (Provincial): 11 wins
Soon after this time he was suspended after his half-brother, Livan, defects to the United States and then later suspended for life after receiving some kind of cash gift from an MLB scout. Regardless, that's all I can find right now, but it seems reasonable to say that he was one of the best, if not the best, pitcher in Cuba for this six year stretch (just eyeballing it, Osvaldo Fernandez seems to have been very good).
I'm very sure I missed stuff, but that's all I can see right now. Sorry for it not being much more in depth.
For what it's worth, Bjarkman lists El Duque as one of his "twenty-one greatest league pitchers" - ranked by ERA, he comes in at twelve, with only two current pitchers (as of 2004) still on the list. Jose Contreras is directly above him, interestingly.
Directly above him in the stats at the back is the interestingly-named Ernesto Guevara, who had an ERA of 3.75, a record of 133-108 in 345 games played, and a K/BB of 1238/541. I figured this might be interesting based on his name.
Wouldn't disagree with that, but I'm not as high on Ashburn as the rest of the electorate either.
To be fair, CHONE WAR ranks him as +115 runs on defense, but DRA has him at +30 (. Humphreys states that the primary difference between the two systems is +15 runs/season in Cleveland when batted-ball data was available (1992-96 and 1998-99) and notes that "Smith's two other systems, Smith(pgor,bod) (2000-02) and Smith(R(t),f,bh,ph) (2003 onward) rate him as basically average, including the first two years in Cleveland when the batted ball data ran out, when he was stealing bases at the same clip he had been in 1999. Given some of the massive coding problems we're discovering in outfielder batted ball data, I strongly suspect some coding bias in Cleveland for those seasons. For the time being, I would pencil in the average between Smith's estimates and DRA, which would be about +75 defensive runs, a good but not great total" (Humphreys, p278). Regardless of how you much you accept DRA, seeing Lofton as a fantastic, better-than-the-backlog player requires a strong defensive rating and if he loses even half that rating, his placement would seem to be well in line with where most HoM voters seem to be placing him. (as a note for comparison, DRA basically agrees with dWAR for 2000+, but has his fielding from 1992-1999 as +13 run, a far cry from TZ's +109 runs, at least as far as I can tell from eyeballing the book and BRef).
I really hope that no one minds my posting in this thread - I know I'm not a member of this project, but I've always been fascinated by it and, given that Humphreys addresses this very issue and I just finished reading his chapter on center fielders, it came to mind immediately. :)
The error bars are too wide for me to deny that Lofton could easily be a few wins worse than Total Zone generates, but I'm skeptical of anything saying Lofton was average in his youth. It seems unlikely that a guy who was an adequate CF in his upper 30s wouldn't have been great when he was probably the fastest man in the game in his 20s. His old-fashioned stats like RF are good. With an unadjusted career WAR (and similar season-by-season totals) just above Tim Raines, you can be conservative, take away a few defensive wins, and still have a guy who deserves a 6-10 spot on the ballot.
"With an unadjusted career WAR (and similar season-by-season totals) just above Tim Raines".
I wanted to mention that IS true for Baseball Reference WAR (65.3-64.6) if you look at other "Uber-Stat" systems Raines tends to be on top.
fangraphsWAR= 70.9-66.3 (advantage Raines)
baseballgaugeWAR= 70.9-48.6 (advantage Raines)
baseballgaugeWinShares= 382.1-293 (advantage Raines)
baseballgaugeWSAB= 196.9-116.8 (advantage Raines)
danrosencheckWARP1= 80.7-60.3 (advantage Raines; the Lofton total here is an estimate. I've only got these numbers through 2005 so I plugged in brWAR to cover 2006-2007).
I was going to also dig up baseballprospectusWARP1 but I've got to get going.
Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is that baseballreferenceWAR is in the minority showing Lofton with a better number than Raines. I do think Lofton should certainly be considered for the ballot... But I think a 6-10 spot as a conservative placement seems pretty damn high. Mind you, I don't have a ballot and haven't voted in HOM elections before.
Besides, second at shortstop doesn't mean you're in Wagner territory either. :-)
Nobody minds a good comment. Thanks for the contribution to the discussion.
> I don't have a ballot
It's not like ballots are all that exclusive. Just rank the players and try to defend it. The crowd is getting less wise every year, we could use a bump up in numbers.
Baseball-Reference: Lofton (65.3) over Sosa (59.7)
FanGraphs: Lofton (66.3) over Sosa (64.1)
Baseball Gauge WAR: Lofton (48.6) over Sosa (48.4)
Baseball Gauge WS: Sosa (324.3) over Lofton (293)
Baseball Gauge WSAB: Sosa (143.9) over Lofton (116.8)
While this is hardly definitive (this is really just a starting point) I think we can conclude that Lofton is a pretty serious candidate and it is pretty conceivable to have him in the 6-10 range on the ballot (I say this not being sure where I will place him). Also, there's no shame in being a slightly lesser player than Raines, no matter what HOF voters think.
Yes, comments welcomed, Arnett - and do consider submitting a ballot next time around. Sounds like you know your way around these sort of discussions, and plenty of longtime voters have pretty divergent opinions on players. We all can learn from new viewpoints about players....
And I just looked up Sosa in Dan Rosencheck's WARP1 (and using BaseballReferenceWAR for anything after 2005) and he's at 62.3 (and remember RAines is at 80.7 and Lofton at 60.3.
And I agree that Lofton very well may deserve a spot around 6-10... I just don't think it's clear that he does. However, if I were to get a serious ballot created he very well may fall in there... Then again, I've got a soft spot for Luke Easter, Gavvy Cravath, Jim McCormick, and George Van Haltren so who knows!
One of the things that intrigues me the most in these uber-stat comparisons (such as looking at Raines, Lofton, and Sosa) is the variety in the numbers (less so with WS and WSAB because they are constructed so differently than WAR(P)s but with the others... although I see that (using the 4 we've referenced) Lofton and Sosa are close in all 4 (remember, excluding WS and WSAB) while Raines is more all over the place (when directly compared to Lofton and Sosa).
I'm hoping to add in baseball prospectus WARP1 to the fray here but I don't have the info (yet).
Tim Raines 71.7
Sammy Sosa 61.9
Kenny Lofton 46.2
And this system has all 3 pretty separated...
Ignoring Raines (since he's not even relevant to this discussion since he's already in the Hall of Merit) and looking at Lofton and Sosa only:
Lofton does better in brWAR (65.3-59.7), fgWAR (66.3-64.1), bgWAR (48.6-48.4)
Sosa does better in drWARP1 (62.3-60.3), bpWARP1 (61.9-46.2), bgWS (324.3-293), bgWSAB (143.9-116.8)
Of course neither is going to get in this election as we already have 4 newbies fighting for the 3 spots...
Sosa is at 57.7 WARP with a generous +86 fielding runs above average. Raines is at 67.9 with slightly below average defense. Raines was probably better than Lofton, but I don't think the difference is all that massive as long as you believe Lofton was a good to great defender in his 20s.
I don't put any weight on win shares; they were nice to look at 10 years ago, but they have been surpassed by better systems.
Do you know which version of Baseball Prospectus WARP you are referencing?
I'm pretty sure the numbers I listed above are correct for WARP1 but was wondering because your numbers are different...
Correct. Edmonds isn't eligible until 2017. The comparison between Lofton and Edmonds is essentially irrelevant for another 4 years.
Oops. DanG is correct.
Also, Edmonds turns 42 in June and didn't play at all in 2011. Much as I'd love to see him get those 7 HR and 51 hits to reach 400 and 2000, I don't find anything hinting at a comeback in 2012.
Yes, it's the Scooter who's about to get drowned.
1. Barry Bonds
2. Roger Clemens
Wasn't sure how the top two would come out until I looked at the numbers. Bonds, arguably the best player ever, is comfortably ahead of Clemens, arguably the best pitcher ever.
3. Craig Biggio
4. Mike Piazza
Again, wasn't sure who would be 3rd and who would be 4th until I ran the numbers. Biggio's career length and durability nudge him ahead of Piazza. BB ref career WAR agrees with me (66.2 to 59.6)
5. Curt Schilling
Doesn't need any postseason credit to come out ahead of the backlog.
6. "Cannonball" Dick Redding
I’ll keep making the case even though others are jumping off the bandwagon. Currently trails only HoFers Torriente, Hill, Charleston and Mendez on Seamheads career Win Shares. Most career WAR and Wins above Bench of players not in the Hall of Fame. #1 pitcher in 1914/15 (Cuban League), ‘17 and ’19. #1 player in 1917 (25.9 Win Shares). Top three in ‘12/’13, 1915, and ‘15/’16. Top ten in ’12, ’16 and ’21. Great peak, long prime.
7. Sal Bando
8. Vic Willis
9. Ben Taylor
10. Don Newcombe
The best third baseman and the best first baseman available plus two pitchers with solid peak/prime numbers.
11. Luis Aparicio
My hobby horse as I think I'm the only one who voted for him last year. His 49.9 WAR is no illusion. +95 baserunning, +28 reaching base by error or avoiding double plays, +149 fielding. Did everything well that isn't included in OPS+.
12. Tommy Bridges
13. Fred McGriff
14. Sammy Sosa
15. Bob Johnson
I'm surprised Sosa did this poorly but after looking at the numbers, I decided he's better than Johnson but not as good as McGriff.
Kenny Lofton came in at 17.
That said, while I probably wouldn't put Redding on my ballot now, it's not out of the question to rank him as the top backlogger. However, I see that you have him 3 spots ahead of Taylor. Redding and Taylor are essentially tied in Seamheads' uberstats, and while Redding seems to have been pretty undistinguished in the part of his career missing from Seamheads (1911 is a possible exception), Taylor, according to the HOF data, had 2-4 more solid years not included in Seamheads' database. What is your thinking on the difference between Taylor and Redding?
Link: http://www.baseball-reference.com/about/war_explained_comparison.shtml
Has it been determined whether this will be a 3 or 4 electee year?
(1) Barry Bonds - The best position player of his generation and one of the top five all-time.
(2) Roger Clemens - The best pitcher of his generation and top 2-3 all-time.
The two men above can be tossed into a "top 10 all-time" discussion and taken seriously. That's heads-and-shoulders above your run-of-the-mill HOMer. And it creates an enormous gap between the top two and everyone else this year.
(3) Mike Piazza - Somewhere in the 5th-7th range of catchers. Agreed that the contributions of catchers are somewhat underrated by statistics. Greatest HITTER at his position in MLB history.
After this a slight drop-off and I'm bookmarking this for later, but I don't see my top 3 changing between now and then.
A few additional thoughts...
* Curt Schilling is not a top 20 all-time pitcher, but is almost certainly the best available pitcher in this election.
* Craig Biggio is a top 10 all-time second baseman, but he is (a) further from #1 at his respective position than Piazza is at his and (b) at a position which is less difficult to play
* Surprised that I didn't catch any comments about blacklisting Bonds and/or Clemens in 2013. Anyone planning to do so? For those planning it, does Clemens' aquittal of perjury charges make any difference to your perception of his guilt or innocence?
* At this point really stumped on where Lofton falls betwixt the glut of CF candidates.
What I meant was that Schilling is..."the best available pitcher AMONG MERE MORTALS in this election."
Sorry.
I suppose the voters to ask would be the handful (3 or 4) who blacklisted McGwire and Palmeiro in their first elections. We may see a couple more this time due to actual court cases or a couple less due to the sense that they were HoMers anyway. I'd guess we're looking at a range of 2-6 boycotts, but probably not enough to drop either one below Biggio or Piazza.
No blacklist here
I put in JJackson and Rose right away, too (the latter just behind Grich on "merit," though)
On a peak basis, maybe not, but he does have significantly more career. He appears to have an edge defensively as well.
A word of caution on the evaluation of all post-1990 pitchers. As IP/game and IP/season went down for top pitchers after 1990, the rate statistics of those pitchers decentralized (and perhaps became more FIP-driven). Schilling had between 3200 and 3300 career IP; there was a time when we were considering 3000-inning pitchers for the HoM as low-usage peak cases. Schilling had only two seasons as an RA+ virtual 20-game winner (although his virtual losses are quite low.) All of the stats you cite there are rate stats. If you start arguing almost entirely by rate stats, then you wind up arguing that Pedro Martinez was the greatest pitcher who ever lived. Maybe that is where you want to wind up anyway, but I'm just pointing it out.
My own version of that career rate stat: year-by-year RA+ equivalent record, added up to be a career record, turned into a career W/L percentage, with that W/L percentage back-formed into a pseudo RA+:
Schilling 130, Seaver 128, Gibson 126, Maddux 127, Clemens 138, Martinez 151. (Of course, the last three are also post-1990.)
Of course, for all of this note of caution about IP, I probably am willing to accept Schilling as a top-30 pitcher. (Maybe not top 20.)
This was a shock. I had no idea. So, I'm asking: Does anyone out there who has a ranking system have any opinion and/or any systemic approach? I realize that I haven't factored in peak or prime, and Sammy has a great run of big-homer seasons, with 2000 right in the middle, so his peak may blow Bobby out of the water. But what I'm asking about right now is whether anyone else's analysis has Bobby anywhere near Sammy in terms of gross career value. I'd also appreciate peak and prime comments, but I mostly want to know whether WAR has led me down a completely indefensible path, or whether Bobby Bonds, in fact, might rank among the New Kids, rather than beneath all of them. Basically, I'm trying to be cautious. I'm aware that my consensus scores have not been good recently, but most of that is that I didn't vote for Palmeiro, Brown, or Cone. This year, that doesn't matter, so I'm trying to get closer to consensus. That doesn't mean that I'll just take everyone else's word for things (not that everyone agrees anyway), but I'd like my consensus score to improve, now that the Big Three problems are gone. What I don't want is to rank Bobby Bonds in a place that everyone else thinks is just insane. I get enough of that out of Babe Adams and Deacon Phillippe. So, thanks in advance for any help you can give, - Brock Hanke
Sosa is above average 89-92, very good 93-97 and below average 98-05.
That seems to match reputation for both players.
RF JACKSON, REGGIE 47.73 HOF HOM
RF SHEFFIELD, GARY 44.36
RF GWYNN, TONY 41.50 HOF HOM
RF WINFIELD, DAVE 38.97 HOF HOM
RF WALKER, LARRY 38.66 HOM
RF SMITH, REGGIE 37.98 HOM
RF EVANS, DWIGHT 37.98 HOM
RF ABREU, BOBBY 35.52
RF BONDS, BOBBY 34.79
RF GUERRERO, VLADIMIR 34.76
RF SOSA, SAMMY 34.72
RF DAWSON, ANDRE 33.22 HOF HOM
RF CLARK, JACK 32.45
RF GILES, BRIAN 31.19
RF STAUB, RUSTY 31.18
RF SINGLETON, KEN 29.19
RF SUZUKI, ICHIRO 28.46
RF STRAWBERRY, DARRYL 26.59
RF CANSECO, JOSE 26.55
RF PARKER, DAVE 25.47
RF BAINES, HAROLD 25.40
RF O'NEILL, PAUL 25.22
I'm not claiming this as a true ranking of value... But I think it's a good starting point.
And Bobby Bonds and Sammy Sosa are practically tied (with Bonds slightly ahead). This consists of 3 WARs (fangraphs, baseball reference, baseball gauge), 2 WARPs (baseball prospectus and dan rosenheck (i think i just lazily used baseball reference WAR to add in seasons I didn't have for rosenheck's system) and WSAB from baseball gauge.
And ballot related, I voted last year for the first time under the handle Archimedez Pozo Principle. I've been revising my system towards more of a DanR salary estimator system, but using most of the uberstat systems (like lieiam) instead of just DanR's WARP. My top five will definitely be Bonds, Clemens, Piazza, Schilling and Biggio in that order. Sosa will probably fall somewhere in the top ten, if not #6, when I finish with the backlog. And Lofton may be on the ballot.
As it happens, I've been working on the outfield group of Sosa/Bonds/Lofton/Be Williams, using Dan R's WAR, BBRef WAR, Fangraphs, and BP. Right now I have them in that order, with Sosa coming in mid-ballot (behind Ba. Bonds, Clemens, Piazza, Schilling, Biggio, Cravath, and Buddy Bell, in that order). Bonds is very close in value and probably will come in 10-13. Lofton may or may not make the bottom of the ballot, and Bernie Williams is definitely not especially near the ballot. BBref does offer a case for Bobby Bonds over Sosa, but if one adjusts for the strike years Sosa inches ahead (of course, if you want to vote for Bo. Bonds, BPRO is VERY high on him. Who knows why?)
Has there been much discussion of the multiple flavors of WAR now available? When I stepped away, Dan R's WAR was clearly the best thing going, with WS and BP WARP having serious problems. What are the takes on the various comprehensive metrics?
Also, who is making the case for Buddy Bell? All the WARs support him as being very high quality. Of course, you have to accept that he was an outstanding defender, but all the systems agree that he was, so that seems as little subject to doubt as a fielding evaluation can get. I haven't reexamined pitchers yet, but Bell jumps out at me as the best of the backlog, yet he's down below Fred McGriff, and fellow third baseman Sal Bando made the top 10. What's up with Bell's case?
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