User Comments, Suggestions, or Complaints | Privacy Policy | Terms of Service | Advertising
Page rendered in 0.3076 seconds
41 querie(s) executed
|
You are here > Home > Hall of Merit > Discussion
| ||||||||
Hall of Merit — A Look at Baseball's All-Time Best Sunday, June 12, 2005Buck LeonardEligible in 1955. John (You Can Call Me Grandma) Murphy
Posted: June 12, 2005 at 08:54 PM | 37 comment(s)
Login to Bookmark
Related News: |
BookmarksYou must be logged in to view your Bookmarks. Hot TopicsReranking First Basemen: Discussion Thread
(35 - 4:10pm, Jun 02) Last: bjhanke Reranking Shortstops Ballot (11 - 10:03am, Jun 01) Last: DL from MN 2024 Hall of Merit Ballot Discussion (118 - 4:10pm, May 30) Last: Kiko Sakata Cal Ripken, Jr. (15 - 12:42am, May 18) Last: The Honorable Ardo New Eligibles Year by Year (996 - 12:23pm, May 12) Last: cookiedabookie Reranking Shortstops: Discussion Thread (67 - 6:46pm, May 07) Last: cookiedabookie Reranking Centerfielders: Results (20 - 10:31am, Apr 28) Last: cookiedabookie Reranking Center Fielders Ballot (20 - 9:30am, Apr 06) Last: DL from MN Ranking Center Fielders in the Hall of Merit - Discussion Thread (77 - 5:45pm, Apr 05) Last: Esteban Rivera Reranking Right Fielders: Results (34 - 2:55am, Mar 30) Last: bjhanke 2023 Hall of Merit Ballot Discussion (376 - 10:42am, Mar 07) Last: Dr. Chaleeko Reranking Right Fielders: Ballot (21 - 5:20pm, Mar 01) Last: DL from MN Ranking Right Fielders in the Hall of Merit - Discussion thread (71 - 9:47pm, Feb 28) Last: Guapo Dobie Moore (239 - 10:40am, Feb 11) Last: Mike Webber Ranking Left Fielders in the Hall of Merit - Discussion thread (96 - 12:21pm, Feb 08) Last: DL from MN Syndicate |
|||||||
|
About Baseball Think Factory | Write for Us | Copyright © 1996-2021 Baseball Think Factory
User Comments, Suggestions, or Complaints | Privacy Policy | Terms of Service | Advertising
|
| | ||||||
Reader Comments and Retorts
Go to end of page
Statements posted here are those of our readers and do not represent the BaseballThinkFactory. Names are provided by the poster and are not verified. We ask that posters follow our submission policy. Please report any inappropriate comments.
1. John (You Can Call Me Grandma) Murphy Posted: June 12, 2005 at 09:29 PM (#1399605)Gehrig, Foxx, Greenberg, Terry, Charleston, JWilson, Leonard (ok, assumes)
In 1882 and 1885, we had:
Start, Anson, Brouthers, Stovey, Connor
Teams: 1933 Brooklyn Royal Giants, 1934-50 Homestead Grays
1933 No Data
1934 .330 for Homestead, 1b
1935 .332 for Homestead, 1b
1936 .260 for Homestead, 1b
1937 .356 for Homestead, 10 hr (3rd), 33 hr/550 (3rd), 8 2b (2nd), 2 3b (5th); 1b
1938 .396 for Homestead (2nd), 8 hr (2nd), 42 hr/550 (2nd), 1b, all-star
1939 .397 for Grays (3rd), 8 hr (3rd), 57 hr/550 (2nd); 1b, all-star
1940 .378 for Grays (3rd), 11 hr (1st), 27 hr/550 (4th), 21 2b (1st), 5 3b (1st); 1b, all-star MVP
1941 .294 for Grays, 9 hr (1st), 26 hr/550 (3rd), 6 2b (5th), 9 3b (1st); 1b, all-star
1942 .172 for Grays, 1b
1943 .321 for Grays, 6 hr (3rd), 11 hr/550 (4th), 20 2b (2nd), 11 3b (2nd); 1b
1944 .350 for Grays, 9 hr (2nd), 15 hr/550 (2nd), 23 2b (1st), 7 3b (2nd); 1b
1945 .365 for Grays (5th), 4 hr (3rd), 13 hr/550 (4th); 1b, all-star
1946 .265 for Grays, 19 hr/550 (5th), 4 3b (5th); 1b
1947 .419 for Grays, 36 hr/550 (2nd); 1b, all-star
1948 .395 for Grays (1st), 13 hr (1st), 45 hr/550 (1st); 1b
1949 no data
1950 no data
Career totals from Holway
779-2325, .335
79 hr, 15 hr/550 ab
10-24, .417 vs. major-league competition
Black Ink 22
Gray Ink 105
Career Totals from Macmillan 10th:
462 g, 1601 ab, 525 hits, 74 2b, 23 3b, 69 hr, .328 ba, .532 sa
I'll have MLEs in the next couple of days, estimated win shares within the week.
In summary
Leonard .335-79 HR-1 per 37/22-105 black-gray ink
Beckwith .352-80-27.5
Suttles .341-237-14-56/145 black gray ink
I'm sure somebody can explain these!
Moore .355 (mean .365)
Wilson .354
Beckwith .352 (mean .366)
Gibson .351
Suttles .341
Charleston .340
Torriente .336
Leonard .335
Stearnes .332
Bell .328
Wells .328
Suttles 237 HR
Gibson 224
Charleston 197
Stearnes 197
Wells 138
Wilson 94
Beckwith 80
Leonard 79
Bell 73
Torriente 53
Moore 50
Gibson 1 HR/13 AB
Suttles 14
Stearnes 20
Charleston 24
Beckwith 27.5
Wells 27.5
Leonard 37
Moore 37
Wilson 46
Torriente 48
Bell 69
Suttles 56 black ink/145 gray ink
Charleston 54/174
Leonard 22/105
Torriente .436 vs. major league competition
Leonard .417 (10 for 24)
Stearnes .378
Gibson .375
Wells .353
Bell .342
Suttles .341
Charleston .330
Beckwith .319
Wilson .295
Also, was homepark were the Grays in during this period? I can never remember if they were in PIT or WAS, so....: If they were playing some or all of their schedule in Forbes Field, that might explain the seeming lack of HR power, and the same would be even more true if they were in Griffith Stadium.
Gibson's big years were 1937 (21 HR, .462) and 1943 (22, .449). Leonard hit a total of 21 HR and .321 and .356. Gibson hit .351 to Leonard's .335 and 3X as many HR/AB. So at a glance I don't know about park effects.
But of course nobody was Josh Gibson except Josh Gibson. The real question is whether Leonard was really as good as Mule Suttles?
We'll have to wait for the MLE's. The 1920's guys have better raw numbers because offense levels were much higher in the 1920s.
Chris' numbers may disabuse me of this thought, of course...
Actually Leonard, like Scales and the great Jud, may end up looking a lot better than you think because his OBP is going to be very VERY high. Buck Leonard walked a lot, a real lot.
After the collapse of the Homestead Grays at the end of the 1950 season, Leonard played in the Mexican League from 1951 to 1953. In those three years, he played 227 games and walked 235 times (with only 35 strikeouts).
In other words, he walked more than once a game. The published stats from his Negro League days support the fact that he was walking a ton then too (very very low AB per game ratios).
Basically Leonard was an awesome fastball hitter. His basic batting strategy seems to have been to work the count, laying off breaking stuff out of the zone, while waiting for a fastball to crush.
I think he'll end up looking pretty good.
Mexico League 1951 to 1953, reduced to 154 Games:
G-AB-R-H-2B-3B-HR-RBI-BA-SA-SB-BB-SO
154 514 104 168 37 3 18 117 .326 .515 14 159 24
The walk data I have for Leonard from Cuba is very similar, though small sample size.
Thank you! I was just going to post asking if anyone had walk data from the Mexican League or the NeL for Leonard. The Riley biography mentions his high walk rates in Mexico, but it's good to have that confirmed by numbers and other anecdotal evidence.
Notes
1. For walks, I have used Mel Ott and Dolf Camilli as models. The MeL data provided by gadfly shows that Leonard had great plate discipline, but I don’t know how to translate the rates of early 1950s MeL into the NL of the 1930s and 1940s. I assume, therefore, that Leonard was at or near the top of his league in walks but does not exceed the best actual major-league players.
2. For playing time, I looked at Gehrig, Foxx, Greenberg, Terry, and Mickey Vernon as models. It’s pretty clear that first basemen at the top of their game played 150+ games a year unless they were injured. Leonard suffered a broken hand in 1942 which caused him to miss the East-West game and hindered him in the World Series, so I posit considerable missed playing time that season, but high durability elsewhere. All of Leonard’s slugging contemporaries left the game at a much younger age than he did. I’ve modeled his decline in playing time loosely on Mickey Vernon, who did play regularly past the age of 35 and who was of lighter build than the big sluggers. Leonard had more power than Vernon, but he was not a slugger on the Gehrig/Foxx/Greenberg/Mize model.
3. You may notice that Leonard’s slugging average and batting average rise in his final two seasons, at age 40 and 41. This is partly an artifact of regression: Leonard’s off-year in 1942 exercises an unusual downward pull 1940-1944, which I am tempted to excise by leaving it out of the regression formulas. The late years outside this pull balance out Leonard’s record somewhat. Also, offensive levels were rising at this time, so OPS+ may diminish the jump somewhat. There is a third factor surely at play here, however, which is the decline in quality in the Negro Leagues with the beginning of integration. Bill Byrd shows marked improvement from 1946 to 1948 while he was in the over-40 age bracket, just as Leonard does. The standard conversion factor probably overestimates these seasons somewhat. However, it should be noted that since these seasons (though not Leonard’s stats in particular) are part of the set of seasons used in calculating the conversion factor, this is another bit of evidence suggesting that the standard conversion factor may be slightly low for the rest of NeL history.
4. In all other respects, these MLEs follow the earlier ones. I look forward to seeing OPS+ numbers for Leonard, at which point I will begin work on batting win shares.
Year Team EqG PA BB Hits TB BA OBP SA 1934 Grays 126 529 77 148 210 .326 .424 .463 1935 154 647 96 166 223 .301 .404 .405 1936 153 643 98 165 270 .303 .409 .496 1937 151 634 98 170 264 .318 .424 .493 1938 152 638 99 185 305 .343 .445 .565 1939 154 647 103 183 312 .337 .443 .575 1940 154 647 105 177 291 .326 .436 .537 1941 151 634 105 145 244 .274 .394 .460 1942 85 357 58 65 92 .218 .346 .308 1943 154 647 107 146 217 .269 .390 .401 1944 152 638 108 157 222 .295 .414 .418 1945 140 588 92 157 207 .316 .422 .418 1946 135 540 81 131 197 .285 .392 .429 1947 120 480 72 143 221 .349 .447 .543 1948 100 400 60 118 201 .347 .445 .592 2081 8669 1358 2255 3477 .308 .417 .476-Second you have Chris's MLE's
-Third, in parentheses, you have pitchers-removed offense context. MLB for the 20s, then NL
-Fourth, you have AVG+/OBP+/SLG+
-Lastly, is the OPS+
Counting stats (+/- 2 for rounding?)
8669 PA
7318 AB
2256 H
3478 TB
Percentages
Leonard -- 0.308/0.417/0.475
Context -- (0.274/0.340/0.388)
Plusses -- 113/123/122
OPS+ = 145
Is he Edgar Martinez or Jaques Fournier with a glove?
Is he as good a hitter as Jud Wilson?
One could also say that he is like Goose Goslin, who also lost his home-run power to Griffith stadium, with a bit more plate discipline.
Looks HOM material to me. He'll probably be #1 on my ballot in 1955.
His best competition may be Ray Brown, who also looks awfully impressive on a quick glance.
1. Leonard
2. R. Brown
But, yes, I suppose I should shut up until the WS are in....and yes, Suttles is not that far behind.
This is just my best guesstimate for Leonard. I used David Foss’s OPS+ numbers and the usual method of comparing Chris's MLE OPS+ to MLB OPS+es. Given Leonard's strong defensive reputation, I used Bill Terry as a general proxy with a rate of 3 fws per 154 games.
I’d love some feedback from our translation experts. Someone let me know if these look wrong. Thanks!
The batting win shares are plausible. If one prorates Harmon Killebrew's (OPS+ 143) batting win shares to Leonard's PAs, one gets 298.7. If one prorates Eddie Mathews' (OPS+ 143) batting win shares to Leonard's PAs, one gets 337.6, so I'd guess that Leonard's total would fall somewhere between 295 and 340. Leonard and Mathews are higher OBP players, so that would suggest that Leonard should project more like Mathews. I'd have to go season-by-season to get a more precise estimate.
The fielding win shares look a bit high. I project 8.7 defensive innings per game played, which gives Leonard 18,104.7 defensive innings. If his fws rate were as good as Bill Terry's (2.28/1000, and A+ rate, among the best of all time), that would give him 41.3 fws. Given that Terry retired young and most of the players with similar rates by win shares also did so and that Leonard played past 40, I would project him more around 2.10/1000, which would give a career total of 38.0 fws.
Given that information, everyone should probably nick about .5 FWS per season off of my estimates.
Both hit over 500 HR, of course, with Harmon hitting an extra 60 HR. But Mathews hit more than 100 extra 2B and 3B, and amazingly both also have SA of .509. Mathews' .509 is incrementally higher, however, and Jeff Heath of all people squeezes between them on the all-time list. Mathews is 66th, Heath 67th and Harmon 68th (or was, as of the end of the 2003 season); there are a number of active players in the .510 range--Shawn Green, Bobby Abreu, Scott Rolen, Moises Alou--so the ranking could have changed a bit, but all 3 will still be at a nominal .509).
So my ballot will look like:
1. Brown
2. Ferrell
3. Jennings
4. Leonard
FWIW, if I were still doing my PHOM, Leonard would be inducted this year, as Wes and Hughie would have long ago been in (Hughie almost 50 years ago now!)
Not that this is a huge difference, but the context OBP was 4 points lower for Matthews while the SLG was 7 points higher. So while they amazingly enough have the exact same OBP and SLG, Matthews' OPS+ is slightly more OBP heavy than Killebrew's.
Guess it depends on what you consider peak. Brown beats Buck on 3-year and 5-year peaks if you ignore consistency. But keep in mind that Brown was erratic with his best seasons. Buck was not.
Brown's three best seasons were 108.2. Buck's were 95.9. But Brown's three best consecutive seasons were 92.0. Buck's were 95.9. Brown's five best consecutive seasons were 140.6. Buck's were 154.2.
IMO, Buck had the better peak (and Buck has the better 7 and 9 year peaks no matter how you measure).
As for Jennings, it will be hard to find someone with a better 3 and 5 year peak, but take it to 7 years and Buck is right there with him. Brown lags behind a tad. (Of course Hughie basically stopped right there, while Buck and Browning kept going for another 100 or so WS).
All of Ferrell's peaks and career measures are behind Buck and Brown.
I also do not compare pitcher WS or WARP directly to hitter; the pitcher will lose out every time. There has to be some adjustment upward, especially for career, when comparing pitchers to hitters, or candidly I wouldn't have a single non-Ferrell/Brown/Mendez pitcher on my ballot.
I also do not count consecutive peak at all, so that's not affecting my rankings.
Which is better:
Player 1:
WS:
15
22
22
32
32
32
15
Player 2:
32
15
22
32
15
32
22
They have the same career totals (170), and the same three year peak (96) and five year peak (140). Player 1 has a three year consecutive peak of 96 and Player 2 has a three year consecutive peak of 69. Player 1 has a five year consecutive peak of 140. Player 2 has a five year consecutive peak of 123.
IMO, Player 1 is better because consistency matters in baseball and you can count on player 1. Also, now that we know what an incredible amount of randomness is involved in pitching stats (see McCracken's DERA formula), and how little control the pitcher actually has, if Player 2's numbers are somewhat inconsistent from year to year, it seems like those random factors are a significant part of his numbers.
As for DERA, pretty sure WARP incorporates that to a degree, at least moreso than WS (which does so on the team pitching level, but not the individual level, and thus swings with luck among pitchers on a staff). Yet another reason WARP is superior.
Negro-League position players are generally going to look quite consistent in comparison to major-league players because their seasonal totals are regressed in the translations to try to get the general height of their peak correct.
Negro-League pitche3rs are generally going to look quite inconsistent in comparison to major-league players because their seasonal totals are _not_ regressed in the translations. I haven't regressed pitcher MLEs because (1) pitchers tend to have greater variance season-to-season than position players due to smaller sample sizes and greater frequency of injuries affecting performance and (2) I don't have any good ideas for how the regression should be handled.
But if you look at Leonard's regressed MLEs and say "consistent" and Brown's MLEs and say "inconsistent," much of what you are judging is what the translation system has determined that you will find.
I'd be interested in knowing more about how you are converting WS to WARP -- not for purposes of evaluating your player rankings, but because I am interested in the relationship between the two. Seems like if you derive WARP from WS you still have WS, just in another form (i.e., WS in WARP's clothing).
There is a straightforward relationship between Batting Win Shares and the hitting portion of WARP1. It seems to me that for position players, WARP differs primarily in three ways: (1) treatment of fielding, (2) season-length adjustment, which isn't significant during this era and (3) the timeline, which to my knowledge no one outside of the BP insiders knows the formula for.
By contrast, there seems to be very little consistency between pitching WS and the pitching portion of WARP1.
Anyway, just curious.
I do something similar for batters. Using our OPS+ estimates, fielding rep, etc., I try to find someone similar and adjust from there. For Buck, it, like most people in the thread, was Bill Terry. Somewhat better hitter, longer career, so he's above where Terry would be, but I still try to find a benchmark white player from our MLEs, and then move up or down.
(FWIW, Mackey's comp is Schalk; higher OPS+, much higher peak, shorter productive career; Schalk is in my top 50, Mackey is just off the ballot. Bell is, of course, Carey. Some players defy comparison, unfortunately...their rankings tend to be more fluid.)
Good question though...something I hadn't really fully thought about. To answer it as best I can, I use batting WS, and then WS for a basic career shape (Does he have a peak? How long's the productive career?), but lean just as much on the MLEs for thought in a WARP world.
Still missing a few seasons of data in the Negro Leagues database so the MLEs will be updated as new data is made available.
For those in the TL;DR camp, 82.6 estimated career WAR.
You must be Registered and Logged In to post comments.
<< Back to main