Hot Topics

1963 Ballot

1. Hank Aaron, Milwaukee Braves: 179 OPS+, 149 Runs Created, -5 fielding runs in RF, 10.0 WAR

2. Willie Mays, San Francisco Giants: 175 OPS+, 131 RC, +12 in CF, 10.2 WAR- even though WAR has Mays slightly ahead, I don't think that Mays' significant defensive advantage completely catches Aaron's better bat this year.

3. Sandy Koufax, Los Angeles Dodgers: 159 ERA+, 311 Innings Pitched, 10.8 WAR

4. Dick Ellsworth, Chicago Cubs: 167 ERA+, 290 IP, 10.1 WAR

5. Eddie Mathews, Milwaukee Braves: 146 OPS+, 106 RC, +14 3B, 8.3 WAR- after strong challenges from Boyer in '61 and Brooks in '63, Eddie is clearly the best third baseman in the majors this season

6. Bob Allison, Minnesota Twins: 151 OPS+, 113 RC, +17 RF, 7.5 WAR- I feel a little bad having the best player in the American League all the way back in 6th but I just couldn't bump him ahead of Mathews

7. Juan Marichal, San Francisco Giants: 133 ERA+, 321 IP, 8.1 WAR

8. Elston Howard, New York Yankees: 140 OPS+, 83 RC, +5 C, 5.4 WAR

9. Carl Yastrzemski, Boston Red Sox: 148 OPS+, 118 RC, +13 LF, 6.2 WAR

10. Johnny Callison, Philadelphia Phillies: 140 OPS+, 107 RC, +18 RF, 6.7 WAR

The next five:

11. Willie McCovey, 161 OPS+, 111 RC, +1 LF
12. Camilo Pascual, 149 ERA+, 248 IP
13. Dick Groat, 128 OPS+, 106 RC, +8 SS
14. Gary Peters, 150 ERA+, 243 IP
15. Vada Pinson, 142 OPS+, 113 RC, +1 CF

1) Hank Aaron - I have him pretty well out in front as the best ML player, which says something about this strong class.
2) Willie Mays - Easily the best center fielder of that season.
3) Dick Ellsworth - Not by much, but he noses out Sandford as the best pitcher of '63.
4) Sandy Koufax - Where did this guy come from?
5) Johnny Callison - Best ML right fielder.
6) Dick Groat - Best shortstop in the majors.
7) Eddie Mathews - Best third baseman yet again.
8) Elston Howard - Hey, our first ALer! Best catcher of '63.
9) Tom Tresh - ... and another ALer! Takes the Mick's spot in the Junior Circuit as best center fielder.
10) Vada Pinson - Still All-Star quality at this time.

Hi. It's Brock Hanke. Here's my final ballot, unless I get some completely unexpected free time and find something I haven't found yet. It didn't move much from my prelim, but there are a couple of changes. One great thing about this project is that it's hard to get way, way off, if you do any amount of due diligence.

1. Sandy Koufax - The more I looked at the World Series, the better it looked.
2. Hank Aaron
3. Willie Mays
4. Dick Ellsworth
5. Eddie Mathews - His lead in WAR over the next best third baseman is 8.3 - 5.1 = 3.2. That's huge.
6. Dick Groat - His WAR lead over the next best shortstop is 6.4 - 4.3 = 2.1. That's really big, if not huge.
7. Johnny Callison - I looked at his WAR in a context of NL outfielders, and he looks very good. But then I noticed that practically everyone near him was a black guy. I took those out (thanks to BB-Ref for posting pictures of people like Lee Maye), just to see what would happen, and Callison laps the remaining field like Eddie Mathews laps 3B. The next best white OF in the NL is Frank Howard, who is way down well beneath people like Curt Flood, whom no one ever thinks of as a contender for best OF. I have no real idea what to do with this information when comparing Johnny to AL outfielders, where Bob Allison leads, but does not dominate Kaline and Yaz. Does anyone know if it's generally true that, at this time, the AL had better WHITE OF, while the NL had all the black guys? It sort of makes sense, but I am very hesitant to apply it. I do believe that the percentage of NL OF who are black is higher than at any other position. Do any of the uberstats adjust for this, and if so, how?
8. Bob Allison - I wanted to look at his defense, It's very good, on a par with Callison's. Bob was a partial center fielder, and it shows.
9. Junior Gilliam - his lead over the next best second baseman is 5.0 - 4.0 = 1.0 That's big, if not really big. He gets versatility points from me because they count as "on the field" contributions as I interpret the phrase. Gets a little WS credit, but not like Tommy Davis. BTW, Elston Howard does not dominate catchers this well, much less like Mathews and Groat dominate theirs.
10. Gary Peters - A big surprise in hitting. In general, Peters wasn't a hitter, but he was in this particular year, and that's all we're looking at right now. I will admit that I found him after I posted the prelim, because he kept showing up on the uberstat lists. I finally decided that I had Camilo Pascual overrated and Peters underrated.

11. Would be Dick Radatz if the vote went to 11 guys.

- Brock

I use 7 different uber-stats (win shares, win shares above bench, WARP1 from baseball prospectus, WARP1 by dan r, and WAR from baseball reference, fangraphs, and thebaseballgauge). I use the league adjustment that nate the neptunian mentioned (that he gets from dan r's numbers) and a 10% catcher bonus. I do not give any postseason bonus. (The numbers I'm listing are just my method of ranking the players).

1- Sandy Koufax 9200 (yes, as stated this is without postseason)
2- Hank Aaron 9171
3- Willie Mays 9086
4- Dick Ellsworth 8350
5- Juan Marichal 7217
6- Eddie Mathews 7171
7- Johnny Callison 6971
8- Dick Groat 6843
9- Gary Peters 6799
10-Bob Allison 6708

11-Carl Yatrzemski 6430
12-Elston Howard 6366
13-Vada Pinson 6129
14-Camilo Pascual 6049
15-Willie McCovey 6043
16-Orlando Cepeda 6000
17-Earl Battey 5961 (i don't have bp# so this might change)
18-Tom Tresh 5708 (also missing bp#)
19-Dick Radatz 5657
20-Billy Williams 5543
**-Albie Pearson is actually at 5575 w/out bp# so he could easily make the list

1963 Ballot

1) Sandy Koufax - I have Koufax slightly ahead of Aaron before the postseason bonus of about 0.6 WAR
2) Henry Aaron - Another fantastic season from Henry Aaron.
3) Willie Mays - A full batting win behind Henry and his glove didn't make up the gap
4) Dick Ellsworth - MVP caliber year, very similar to Koufax for rate but 38.3 fewer IP including postseason
5) Dick Groat - Dan R's numbers like shortstops and Groat was the best SS in baseball in 63
6) Juan Marichal - Led the NL in IP, you don't need to hit if you throw shutouts
7) John Callison - Fantastic defense separates him from the next group of outfielders
8) Eddie Mathews
9) Gary Peters - Top AL pitcher
10) Bob Allison - Top AL position player, very difficult to separate him from Yastrzemski. Also could have voted for Pascual or Battey just on the Twins. Very close battle for the end of the ballot.

Also ran - Billy Williams, Elston Howard, Jim Gilliam, Dick Radatz

**-Albie Pearson is actually at 5575 w/out bp# so he could easily make the list

Pearson's WARP1 of 5.4 can be seen at the link.

@Dan G:
Cool! Thanks... I didn't realize I could get the numbers without a subscription.
Here's my adjusted 17-20:
17- Earl Battey 5899
18- Dick Radatz 5657
19- Tom Tresh 5597
20- Billy Williams 5543
(Pearson ended up at 5451 which slots him 22nd, also behind
Jim Maloney at 5500).

1963 Ballot

1. Willie Mays. The fact is that Mays was a better all-around ballplayer than Aaron and while it is tempting to pick Aaron, when all is said and done even 1963 wasn't an exception to the rule. 130 RBI vs. 103 is a fair number of RBIs but the underlying numbers are too close and defense is the tie-breaker.

2. Hank Aaron..586-.582 SA isn't enough of an advantage nor even .391-.380 OBA. Tempting but not quite enough.

3. Sandy Koufax. It pains me not to have Sandy #1. Back in '63 it was an article of faith that he was indeed the best ballplayer on the planet. What persuaded me was his 32 WS compared to 41 for Aaron and 38 for Mays.

4. Elston Howard. It was also obvious enough back in '63 that Ellie was indeed the best player in the AL and I personally cannot believe the WARP and WS numbers that he gets. I mean a catcher with a 141 OPS+, granted in 135 games. But 28-85-.287 versus, say, Callison's 26-78-.284? There ain't enough context between here and the moon to make Callison a better player.

5. Dick Groat. A ML-leading 43 2B, a .450 SA compared to Callison at .502. I'll take the SS. I mean, sorry to keep picking on Callison but geez.

6. Bill White. Once again the uber-numbers are just wrong. 27-109-.304, 106 runs, .360 OBA versus Callison's .339....

7. Dick Ellsworth.

8. Vada Pinson. Didn't make my top 15 on my prelim but I had just flat out mis-transcribed some of his numbers into my spreadsheet. His .347 and .514 compare favorably to you-know-who.

9. Bob Allison. That's Allison, without a "C" at the beginning. His .378 and .533 compare favorably with you-know-who.

10. Gary Peters. It pains me to have him ahead of Camilo Pascual, my all-time fave Twins pitcher, but there it is.

Close But No Cigar

11. Gilliam
12. Callison
13. McCovey
14. Cepeda
15. Mathews
16. Yaz
17. Kaline
18. Perranoski
19. Pascual
20. K. Boyer
21. Marichal
22. Killebrew
23. Ford
24. Tresh
25. Santo

4. Elston Howard. It was also obvious enough back in '63 that Ellie was indeed the best player in the AL and I personally cannot believe the WARP and WS numbers that he gets. I mean a catcher with a 141 OPS+, granted in 135 games. But 28-85-.287 versus, say, Callison's 26-78-.284? There ain't enough context between here and the moon to make Callison a better player.

Agreed. In fact, I don't think Allison was the second-best player in the AL either.

same as prelim, except I looked further into Callison, who took McCovey's spot.

1. WILLIE MAYS – Until Willie’s fielding at CF gets less advantageous, Hank will have to do better than a 179-175 OPS+ win while both almost never miss a game.
2. HANK AARON – Led the league in HR, RBI, R, SLG, OPS, OPS+, TB. I love this season. This is a perfect season. This is how great Hank Aaron was. And this is how great Willie Mays was. Glad I’m old enough to have seen them both play.
3. SANDY KOUFAX – Wait, here’s another perfect season, and a nice postseason bonus to boot. I will vote for pitchers No. 1 (though less likely post 1970s). But Mays and Aaron – couldn’t quite pull the trigger. But close.
4. DICK ELLSWORTH – Wow. Koufax would have needed the postseason bonus to beat him, except that Ellsworth only hit .096 himself. Tremendous year, though, and ERA+ leader.
5. ELSTON HOWARD – Huh, didn’t buy this AL MVP until I looked closer. 140 OPS+ in 135 games with a Gold Glove. That works for me.
6. EDDIE MATHEWS - Criminally underrated by history. Lead NL in Walks for 3rd straight season, with 124, and nobody noticed. Led league in OBP, and durable 3B. Top 10 MVP votes? Zero.
7. BOBBY ALLISON – Allison was the best hitter in his league, I think.
8. CAMILO PASCUAL – Best ERA+, IP combo, for me. Only other consideration for him will be 1959, much later in our process.
9. JOHNNY CALLISON - Had underrated him, but a very effective all-around season gets him on the ballot after all.
10. JUAN MARICHAL – Not a great year for hitters; I doubt I'll often have 4 Ps on the ballot as I go forward. This is a solid set of numbers, but a bigtime hitter who can field at all can have more value.

Sunnyday - Why so low on Marichal? Did Billy Williams just miss? Where's Radatz?

Marichal: In this particular year 2.41 and a WHIP of 1 just doesn't look that spectacular. Obviously, he could rate higher than #20, but he isn't top 10 for me.

B Williams: Santo only came out #25 and he was better than Williams.

I just wasn't all that blown away by Radatz at the time and he wasn't gonna be top 10. He is in the next 10 (#25-35), I suppose. His WHIP was about 1.1 which for a relief pitcher isn't all that impressive in this context.

1963 Ballot
I'm considering primarily rWAR, but I've modified it by replacing TZ with AFR, an average of DRA and SFR. I've also applied a standard deviation adjustment to account for the uneven effects of expansion. Lastly I include a postseason bonus.

1. Sandy Koufax. Without the postseason bonus, he’s third in a close race with Aaron, Ellsworth, and Mays; with it, he’s a clear #1. 329 IP of 161 ERA+ ball is tough to beat.
2. Hank Aaron. Edges Mays offensively, isn’t too much worse than him in the field, loses some on the positional differences, but gains it back with outstanding baserunning and reached-on-error prowess (+11 according to Sean Smith).
3. Dick Ellsworth. An outstanding, if fluky, year, with 291 IP and a 167 ERA+. Like Koufax, Ellsworth is hurt by inept batting.
4. Willie Mays. 2 through 4 are separated by just 0.8 WAR, and Mays ends up on the bottom due to his defensive down year (only +3 DRA).
5. Eddie Mathews. Outstanding hitting combined with a +16 AFR at a tough position make Matthews the best thirdbaseman in the majors and put him just below the top 4.
6. Dick Groat. Outstanding defense (+26 AFR) from a key position make him the best shortstop in the majors and add up to a position just below Mathews.
7. Juan Marichal. Another great pitching season, helped by being an adequate hitter for a pitcher (0.1 WAR).
8. Johnny Callison. In my prelim, I had Callison 2nd among the closely separated group of him, Mathews, Groat, and Marichal. I’ve since dropped Callison to the back of this group, since I believe that while he was a good fielder, his +34 DRA is too high.
9. Bob Allison. Solid season as the top player in the AL, helped by an outstanding +15 DRA.
10. Gary Peters. Good hitting (1.1 WAR) allow the AL Rookie of the Year to crack the bottom of my ballot.
11-15. Pascual, Drysdale, Williams, White, Cepeda.

It's the 321 innings that impresses me for Marichal. Only two other guys got close to his workload - Drysdale and Koufax.

Is the MMP supposed to be comparative in nature such as the HoM is in comparison to the HOF? If so, why is postseason credit allowed then?

Personally, unless in need of a tiebreaker, I can't give credit to a candidate who was fortunate enough to have better teammates. I know others here will disagree, however.

John - minor league credit is allowed according to the rules, why would we disallow postseason work?

John - minor league credit is allowed according to the rules, why would we disallow postseason work?

It's not really the same thing, though. For example, if Koufax had the misfortune playing for the Mets in '63, he wouldn't have had any chance at postseason credit. Again, the only difference between what he actually did with the Dodgers during the regular season and what he would have done with the Mets is the quality of teammates.

Double post.

Players in the playoffs play extra games. It's as simple as that for me. Not counting playoff performance is like penalizing players for winning.

Suppose a manager rests his best pitcher for the playoffs, skipping his final start and pulling him after 5 innings in the previous start. Should that pitcher lose a chance at an MMP to someone on a last place team playing only for counting statistics?

The rules allow many interpretations of seasonal merit as long as the judgement is made based on games played. I think that is a good thing.

Players in the playoffs play extra games. It's as simple as that for me. Not counting playoff performance is like penalizing players for winning.

I don't think they should be penalized either, except there should be a Postseason MMP instead to recognize their contributions beyond the regular season.

Players that do play for crap teams, however, do get sort of a penalty by some of the voters here, though.

Not really complaining, FWIW. I should have been around during the formation of the rules to have railed about it, that's all. :-)

A ballot. My reasons are partly visible in various posts of mine in the discussion thread. The reasons are pretty eclectic - there's not one overall system.

1. Hank Aaron
2. Willie Mays
3. Sandy Koufax
4. Dick Ellsworth
5. Eddie Mathews
6. Juan Marichal
7. Orlando Cepeda
8. Vada Pinson
9. Gary Peters
10. Camilo Pascual

11. Willie McCovey
12. Dick Groat
13. Elston Howard
14. Dick Radatz
15. Johnny Callison

My 1963 ballot:

1. Sandy Koufax
2. Willie Mays
3. Hank Aaron
4. Eddie Mathews
5. Dick Ellsworth

6. Bob Allison
7. Vada Pinson
8. Willie McCovey
9. Dick Groat
10. Juan Marichal

My 1963 ballot:

1. Sandy Koufax
2. Willie Mays
3. Hank Aaron
4. Dick Ellsworth
5. Eddie Mathews
6. Dick Groat
7. Juan Marichal
8. Elston Howard
9. Johnny Callison
10. Willie McCovey

1963 MMP Ballot
Used a combination of WAR, Win Shares above bench, OPS+, ERA+, IP and FIP with an adjustment based on league strength and league schedule length.

1. Hank Aaron - Very close between the first three players.
2. Willie Mays
3. Sandy Koufax - Best pitcher in NL
4. Dick Ellsworth - Very close to Koufax, but not quite.
5. Johnny Callison- Very impressive these last few years
6. Eddie Mathews
7. Vada Pinson - Offense and defense
8. Juan Marichal - Lots of IP at a very good rate
9. Dick Groat
10. Gary Peters - Best pitcher in AL
11. Orlando Cepeda
12.Willie McCovey
13. Elston Howard - Solid player
14. Bob Allison
15. Camilo Pascual

16-20 Dick Radatz, Carl Yastrzemski, Jim Gilliam, Billy Williams, Bob Friend
21-25 Earl Battey, Tom Tresh, Albie Pearson, Ron Santo, Jim Bouton

I'm a bit short on time, so no comments this week, but as always my vote is mostly based on the consideration chart I put into the prelim thread, with the occasional subjective tweak, and a bonus for catchers (which sneaks Howard into the top 10 this week). I considered Koufax for the top spot, since if I leave fWAR (which doesn't rank pitchers in this era) out of the chart he and Aaron are tied, but I'm surer of Aaron's value, so he won the tie breaker for me.

1) Hank Aaron
2) Sandy Koufax
3) Willie Mays
4) Dick Ellsworth
5) Eddie Mathews
6) Gary Peters
7) Johnny Callison
8) Juan Marichal
9) Dick Groat
10) Elston Howard
11) Bob Allison
12) Carl Yastrzemski
13) Camilo Pascual
14) Vada Pinson
15) Earl Battey
16) Willie McCovey
17) Orlando Cepeda
18) Jim Maloney
19) Bob Friend
20) Billy Williams
21) Dick Radatz
22) Albie Pearson
23) Tom Tresh
24) Ron Santo
25) Larry Jackson

Here's my ballot. I'm giving subjective "affirmative action" to hitters since this is such a pitcher-friendly environment.

1. Sandy Koufax
2. Hank Aaron
3. Willie Mays
4. Dick Ellsworth
5. Juan Marichal
6. Eddie Mathews
7. Johnny Callison
8. Dick Groat
9. Camilo Pascual
10. Gary Peters

Here is my ballot.

1963 MMP Ballot

1. Sandy Koufax
2. Hank Aaron
3. Willie Mays
4. Elston Howard
5. Dick Ellsworth
6. Orlando Cepeda
7. Tom Tresh
8. Johnny Callison
9. Willie McCovey
10 Eddie Mathews
11. Carl Yastrzemski
12. Tommy Davis
13. Vada Pinson
14. Gary Peters
15. Dick Radatz

2 hour warning

Was getting there DL...

1963 MMP Final Ballot - components to ranking include WAR, WARP, WS, OPS+/ERA+. Usual silly notes added in for fun. I switched positions 9 & 10 from the prelim, otherwise ballot spots unchanged.

1. Sandy Koufax – Batters hit .164 against him at home.
2. Willie Mays – Returned to being Willie Mays in 2nd Half of year (.362/.412/.709)
3. Hank Aaron – Led NL in R, HR, RBI, TB
4. Dick Ellsworth - 3-0, 3 CG vs. Braves
5. Eddie Mathews - Thrived batting in LF by going .323/.488/.598 in 42 games. Defense another story with 6 errors.
6. Juan Marichal - 321 IP, 25 Wins including 6-0 in September
7. Gary Peters – 19-6 2.17 ERA as starter, 0-2 4.34 as reliever
8. Johnny Callison - Late and close stats: .365/.465/.615
9. Bob Allison – Batting line in day games: pedestrian .242/.352/.401
10. Dick Groat – Hit over .300 every month except September

11. Elston Howard
12. Carl Yastrzemski
13. Vada Pinson
14. Camilo Pascual
15. Willie McCovey

I am in the process of developing a system that is more of a zero-sum calculation than traditional uberstats, but it is still very incomplete in details. However, I'm confident that the overall rankings it produces in this state represent a reasonable evaluation of merit. I tweak the rankings it produces slightly in order to take into account how easy it is to replace a player's production at a given position, and WPA/LI in high-leverage sequences of games. I also give post-season credit.

1) Sandy Koufax He tops my ballot by virtue of clutch performance during the season, and a strong post-season.
2) Hank Aaron My metric gives him a slight advantage over Mays, which theoretically would be cancelled out by the greater difficulty of replacing Mays. In this case (see Mays' comment), Aaron keeps his lead.
3) Willie Mays Yes, in the end I pushed Mays' ahead of the pitchers I had level-pegging with Aaron earlier. I was swayed by a closer look at replaceability and pitcher hitting. However, he can't beat Aaron because the Giants to some extent rose and fell by Mays' performance, and consequently he couldn't lift his team during the first two-thirds of July, which allowed the Dodgers to get away to a pennant.
4) Dick Groat I overlooked him when compiling my preliminary ballot, but he really put in a fine season for a shortsop in 1963.
5) Dick Ellsworth I put Ellsworth ahead of Marichal, but it could have gone the other way. Ellsworth's pitchiing in a tougher park carried him ahead of Marichal.
6) Juan Marichal
7) Elston Howard On similar grounds to my ranking Groat highly, I find Howard's exceptional batting numbers for a catcher highly meritorious. As a fielder, I find him harder to read. He certainly threw out a high percentage of baserunners, but I'm not sure about the rest of his catching game. Consequently, I may have him too high, but this genuinely represents my opinion as of today.
8) Gary Peters Another chap I overlooked first time round gains a ballot place here. Peters put in a very good year for a pitcher, and better than Drysdale's.
9) Eddie Mathews I entertained arguments that Mathews is just too low here, but in the end I went with putting him behind some very good pitchers, and Howard. Perhaps mentally I'm penalizing for a team whose underperformance may owe more to pitching than fielding and hitting.
10) Bob Allison As usual, I found the last spots on my ballot perhaps more trouble than they are worth. There are many good candidates for the last 3-4 spots, and ranking them is too difficult even to come up with a simile. At this point I often turn to WPA/LI, and so Allison beats out his close rivals Cepeda and Kaline. After them I probably would have put Drysdale, Willie McCovey and Bill White. I don't get the appeal of Johnny Callison, whom I'd rank behind Tom Tresh and possibly even the Dodgers' keystone combination of Gilliam and Wills.

Election is over - all ballots are in