Hall of Merit— A Look at Baseball's All-Time Best
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Monte Irvin to the LF ballot
If you voted in the LF election, please let us know where you would slot Monte Irvin. Irvin was originally on the CF ballot, but later we decided LF was the more appropriate place for him.
Thanks!
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1. JoeD has the Imperial March Stuck in His Head Posted: September 27, 2008 at 04:50 AM (#2957915)Can anybody recommend some excellent books on the Negro Leagues? It's an area of the sport that any fan of baseball should be completely fascinated in, but I (like many others) am criminally undereducated with regards to. I'd love to change that.
I'm going to count both of those as ballots. (If either DL from MN or Mark Donelson object to that, he can post a revision.)
I've rigged a spreadsheet that will work with precisely that information, provided you voted in the LF ballot. This will work best if all 22 of the voters in that election post their placement of Irvin. It's not clear to me whether we will or won't count any brand-new ballots, but in any case, any brand-new ballot would have to include all 22 eligible players. (See the LF discussion thread for the names of the other 21.)
2 votes case, 20 to go.
I have no opinion on where to place Monte Irvin (meaning which outfield position to assign him). However, I'm about to go out of town again, for the last time this year, so if I'm going to place him among the left fielders, I'd better do it now. I took a look at the fine Irvin thread, thought about it for a bit, and decided to vote him 15th on my ballot, between Medwick and Minoso. The thread's comparison with Medwick was a real help, as they do turn out to look similar. I'm not sure Irvin was better than Minoso, but I'm pretty sure they were really close. - Brock
As a general introduction, I recommend Shades of Glory by Lawrence Hogan. Other excellent books that provide a good background include Baseball's Great Experiment: Jackie Robinson and His Legacy by Jules Tygiel, Beyond the Shadow of the Senators: The Untold Story of the Homestead Grays and the Integration of Baseball by Brad Snyder, and the now somewhat dated classic, Only the Ball Was White by Robert Peterson. Unfortunately, we're still waiting for the Hall of Fame to publish a comprehensive and accurate statistical encyclopedia. Until then, the best available reference books include The Complete Book of Baseball's Negro Leagues: The Other Half of Baseball History by John Holway, The Negro Leagues Book by Dick Clark and Larry Lester,</i> and The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues by James Riley. I'll also put in a plug for Gary Ashwill's excellent Web site, agatetype.typepad.com.
9) Billy Williams
10) Jimmy Sheckard
11) Monte Irvin
12) Willie Stargell
He's only a little behind Stargell as a hitter but much better defensively than Stargell. Like Stargell, he had some trouble staying in the lineup. Although they were very different players stylistically, that's his best comp. Williams bests him on durability, as he bests Stargell. Irvin vs. Sheckard was nearly a coin toss. I'm a little worried about Irvin's top season having been in Mexico, so I give the edge to Sheckard.
Buck O'Neil's I Was Right on Time,
Holway's Voices from the Great Black Baseball Leagues
both of those are nice oral histories essentially. I own Trouppe's 20 Years Too Soon, but haven't read it. I should add it to my pile of books to read.
And in the fiction area
The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars and Motor Kings by William Brashler is so much better than the movie.
The Vera Cruz Blues by Mark Winegardner may be the best piece of baseball fiction I ever read. This book is a great insight into the Mexican Leagues just after WW2.
If there was a BB HOM for fiction, well it would be right there,Bang the Drum Slowly, The Iowa Baseball Confederacy, The Universal Baseball Association, Inc., J. Henry Waugh, Proprietor , The Celebrant, If I Never Get Back , and probably one of Troy Soos' mystery books.
Oh, I also wanted to mention Dr. Tygiel's book is very good, but he was an academic, and it sometimes reads that way. It is info packed but not a pleasant read.
One other thing that you might notice as you read Negro League stuff, the guys that played back East are somewhat bitter (GENERALLY) about the experience, but the guys who played in KC and Chicago generally talk about how much they loved that part of their life. I think that is Buck O'Neil, he loved it, and I think he made everyone around him love it.
Not before Thursday.
For those eyeballing their placement of Irvin, I don't believe new MLEs will be very different from the current ones--one reason I didn't leap to doing new MLEs before I ventured my own placement of Irvin. But new MLEs will be more reliable and can serve as a basis for Dan's running Irvin through his system to calculate WAR, so I will get to them as soon as I can.
I have Irvin at #15, a nudge behind Kelley (I like the one-league high prime) and just ahead of Goslin
I'll put him 14th on my ballot, below Wheat and ahead of Medwick.
9 ballots cast, 13 to go.
Behind Minoso (what Monte did in short MLB seasons after age 30, Minnie did while playing full seasons after 30 -- just a straight comparison at what they accomplished at the same age), and ahead of Wheat.
Seems to short the fact that Monte Irvin played some infield throughout his 20s making him probably more valuable during that period even calling his bat even with Minoso.
Irvin's MLEs are a pain, because he has three different seasons in which he played in two different leagues with different competition levels, which have to be integrated before they can be converted to MLEs and put into the regression equations.
But they are almost done.
Monte Irvin MLEs, second edition
Age Year Team G PA Hits TB BB SB BA OBP SA OPS+
20 1939 New 75 301 83 126 25 0 0.301 0.358 0.456 117
21 1940 New 128 504 146 238 45 5 0.319 0.379 0.518 145
22 1941 New 141 556 173 281 49 21 0.341 0.399 0.554 166
23 1942* Vera 146 591 168 305 71 17 0.324 0.405 0.586 188
24 1943 Military Service
25 1944 Military Service
26 1945* New 30 120 33 52 9 0 0.302 0.357 0.467 128
27 1946 New 144 605 173 283 63 8 0.320 0.390 0.522 157
28 1947 New 150 630 164 282 92 8 0.305 0.407 0.524 146
29 1948 New 116 487 122 210 64 12 0.289 0.381 0.495 136
30 1949* JC 99 356 89 143 65 10 0.307 0.434 0.493 148
31 1950* NYG 128 512 135 245 77 5 0.310 0.414 0.563 154
32 1951 NYG 151 657 174 287 89 12 0.312 0.415 0.514 147
33 1952 NYG 46 137 39 55 10 0 0.310 0.365 0.437 120
34 1953 NYG 124 502 146 240 55 2 0.329 0.406 0.541 142
35 1954 NYG 135 512 113 189 70 7 0.262 0.363 0.438 108
36 1955 NYG 51 173 38 50 17 3 0.253 0.337 0.333 79
37 1956 NYG 111 387 92 156 41 1 0.271 0.346 0.460 116
career 1775 7030 1890 3140 842 111 0.308 0.389 0.512 144
1942* Veracruz in MXL; Also played for Newark
1945* Missed time in this season is due to military service; credit appropriate
1949* Jersey City in International League; also played for New York Giants
1950* Also played for Jersey City
Notes on conversions.
For 1942 MxL, conversion factors of .87/.76 were applied
For 1949-50 IL conversion factors of .93/.86 were applied
For 1939-48, regression to a 3-5 year mean was applied.
For 1949-50, minor league stats were converted to MLEs and added to major-league stats for those seasons to produce seasonal totals.
For 1951-56, totals are for major-league play only
I haven’t done estimated extra base hit totals. Since Irvin has a major-league profile, I assume that will provide the necessary information for estimated baserunning wins for his pre-ML seasons. His higher stolen base totals before WWII would very likely have been matched by higher totals of triples in those seasons. I would guess his base-running value was pretty consistent 1946-51; after that he was significantly hampered by ankle injuries.
I'm going to put Irvin at #13.
11. Kelley
12. Jones
13. Irvin
14. Magee
15. Keller
I'm around . . . I will vote on Irvin, but I was waiting for DanR's conversion of Chris Cobb's MLEs . . .
As for the regular ballot, I'll comment on that thread so as not to soil the Irvin thread . . .
Maybe Joe and John have email addresses for "all" voters, nearly?
1. T. Williams
2. Musial
--- (Henderson is not yet officially a HoMer) ---
3. Delahanty
4. Yastrzemski
5. Raines
6. Burkett
7. Simmons
8. Clarke
9. B. Williams
10. Irvin
11. Stargell
12. Magee
13. Sheckard
14. Wheat
15. Keller (Adding Irvin to the ballot breaks some ties)
16. Kelley
17. Goslin
18. Minoso
19. Jones
20. Medwick
21. Stovey
22. Kiner
It's still possible for the exact votes of Joe and Rusty to affect the Sheckard/Wheat/Keller/Kelley order.
--Joe
I place Monte Irvin 6th, with no other changes:
Inserting him between Yaz and Fred Clarke.
This makes my ballot:
1. Ted Williams (2.99)
Barry Bonds (2.70 through 2005)
2. Stan Musial (2.23)
Rickey Henderson (1.74)
3. Ed Delahanty (1.15)
4. Tim Raines (1.23)
5. Carl Yastrzemski (1.23)
6. Monte Irvin (1.24) - I'm using Dan's more conservative fielding numbers (see post 165 on the Irvin thread), and this drops him from 1.30 to 1.24 PA. I think Irvin's MLEs are still somewhat optimistic and open to a lot of judgement due to his fielding. You could easily justify nudging him ahead of Raines/Yaz, but I'm not ready to pull that trigger. It would be foolish to assume our metrics are precise to the 1/100th decimal place, to be honest, I probably shouldn't even list it, and should round them all off to 1.2.
7. Fred Clarke (1.14)
8. Jesse Burkett (1.05)
9. Billy Williams (1.05)
Manny Ramirez
10. Al Simmons (1.02)
11. Zack Wheat (.96)
12. Jimmy Sheckard (.95)
13. Minnie Minoso (.96)
14. Sherry Magee (.93)
15. Willie Stargell (.93)
16. Joe Kelley (.93)
17. Goose Goslin (.89)
18. Charlie Keller (.88)
19. Charley Jones
20. Harry Stovey
21. Joe Medwick (.85)
If Rusty Priske were to put Irvin 6th (the highest anyone had him - Dan R and Joe D had him 6th), then the vote would be:
1. T.Williams 484
2. Musial 462
3. Delahanty 429
4. Yastrzemski 414
5. Raines 387
6. Burkett 355
7. Simmons 349
8. Clarke 330
9. B.Williams 278
10. Irvin 261
11. Stargell 230
12. Magee 198
13. Sheckard 178
14. Wheat 177
15. Keller 174
16. Kelley 172
17. Goslin 167
18. Minoso 135
19. Jones 111
20. Medwick 98
21. Stovey 91
22. Kiner 86
And if Rusty were to put Irvin 16th (the lowest anyone had him - TomH had him 16th with bjhanke, whoisalhedges, and Howie Menckel having him 15th), then the vote would be:
1. T.Williams 484
2. Musial 462
3. Delahanty 429
4. Yastrzemski 414
5. Raines 387
6. Burkett 356
7. Simmons 350
8. Clarke 331
9. B.Williams 279
10. Irvin 251
11. Stargell 231
12. Magee 199
13. Sheckard 179
14. Wheat 178
15. Keller 174
16. Kelley 173
17. Goslin 168
18. Minoso 135
19. Jones 111
20. Medwick 98
21. Stovey 91
22. Kiner 86
With Rickey Henderson dead certain to be a 2009 HoM electee (unanimous first so far) it's fair to think about adding Rickey to this list. Most likely, he'd be a near-unanimous 3rd and place 3rd, with everyone from Delahanty on down sliding down one notch.
Since Barry Bonds is not yet HoM eligible, I won't talk about his placement.
It doesn't matter - I kept his prior vote, and in his prior vote, he did have Kiner last. The presumption here is that he inserted Irvin but didn't change anything else.
Would still like to see Rusty's final placement of Irvin before updating the final tally.
Sorry, I totally whiffed on this.
I'll go 12th.
1. T.Williams 484 1.00
2. Musial . . 462 2.00
3. Delahanty . 429 3.50
4. Yastrzemski 414 4.18
5. Raines . . 387 5.41
6. Burkett . . 356 6.82
7. Simmons . . 350 7.09
8. Clarke . . 331 7.95
9. B.Williams 279 10.32
10. Irvin . . . 255 11.41
11. Stargell . 231 12.50
12. Magee . . . 198 14.00
13. Sheckard . 178 14.91
13. Wheat . . . 178 14.91
15. Keller . . 174 15.09
16. Kelley . . 172 15.18
17. Goslin . . 167 15.41
18. Minoso . . 135 16.86
19. C.Jones . . 111 17.95
20. Medwick . . 98 18.55
21. Stovey . . . 91 18.86
22. Kiner . . . 86 19.09
I don't know if anyone else was tallying, so this isn't cross-checked. I can figure out how many votes of each type each candidate got, (Ted Williams and Musial are both easy), but I don't have an easy way to format that.
6th place: 3 votes
7th place: 2 votes
8th place: 0
9th place: 2 votes
10th place: 1 vote
11th place: 1 vote
12th place: 3 votes
13th place: 2 votes
14th place: 3 votes
15th place: 4 votes
16th place: 1 vote
It is now, OCF. Your numbers are correct.
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