tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-86994075936132038292024-01-31T17:27:03.794-08:00Baseball GreatnessA blog introducing readers to the book Baseball Greatness: Top Players and Teams According to Wins Above Average, 1901-2017, and including annual updates beginning in 2018.David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.comBlogger14125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-14342131792886537942021-04-20T16:53:00.000-07:002018-12-06T16:39:40.093-08:00<i>Baseball Greatness: The Best Players and Teams according to Wins Above Average, 1901-2017</i>, was published on March 1, 2018. It may be ordered <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Baseball-Greatness-Players-According-1901-2016/dp/1476663831">here.</a> Here are some pre-publication comments:<br />
<br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "amazon ember" , "arial" , sans-serif;">"Whatever you already think about measuring baseball greatness, Kaiser's tour de force will blow your mind…. In these days of websites and statistical black boxes and faith-based beliefs, we owe our gratitude to Kaiser, who shows all his work and doesn't flinch when the facts call for popping a few balloons." --Rob Neyer, author </span><i style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "amazon ember", arial, sans-serif;">Power Ball: Anatomy of a Modern Baseball Game</i><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "amazon ember" , "arial" , sans-serif;">"</span><i style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "amazon ember", arial, sans-serif;">Baseball Greatness</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "amazon ember" , "arial" , sans-serif;"> honors under appreciated all-time great players by better incorporating fielding value for everyday players (e.g., Jimmy Wynn and Keith Hernandez) and filtering out team effects on perceived pitcher value (e.g., Wes Ferrell, Luis Tiant, and Dave Stieb). But more than that, author and real-world historian David Kaiser gives baseball fans a new and sophisticated history of the game: how owners and front office managers have built (and failed to build) great teams; how rare it has been that team greatness has relied on great pitching; and much more." --Michael Humphreys, author of </span><i style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "amazon ember", arial, sans-serif;">Wizardry: Baseball's All-Time Greatest Fielders Revealed</i><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "amazon ember" , "arial" , sans-serif;">"The Sabermetric revolution in baseball analysis is no longer in its infancy and the basic principles are now embraced widely in the press, on the air, and by average fans. David Kaiser has done a fine job in clearly explaining the logic behind the calculations and has provided a very welcome synthesis across the various era of Major League Baseball. This book is recommended for those who wish to have a better understanding of the context of modern (and future) baseball analysis."--Dave Smith, founder, Retrosheet.org</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "amazon ember" , "arial" , sans-serif;">"Baseball's stately pace encourages discussions, with 'Who was better?' being a favorite topic. David Kaiser's nominations, making full use of Michael Humphrey's authoritative solution to the 'is it fielding or pitching' defensive dilemma, are presented in a delightful style." --Richard Cramer, Ph.D., founder, STATS INC.</span>David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-38177006243531714272021-01-14T05:32:00.002-08:002021-01-14T05:32:28.948-08:00Curt Schilling and PEDs<p> I have linked this post on the SABR List. It was part of the ongoing discussion about Curt Schilling's stats and his Hall of Fame candidacy, The moderators have refused to post it. The reason, evidently, is one that I mentioned below--that in the post I cite my book, <i>Baseball Greatness.</i> To repeat: I didn't cite it to "promote it," I cited it because it's the source of the data that I'm drawing on in this discussion. The data had been questioned <i>precisely because I was obeying the moderators' previous injunction not to mention my book anymore.</i> Citing your sources is what is called standard scholarly practice. If you agree that the moderators are imposing an absurd rule, please let them know. Thanks. </p><p><span face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: small;"><br /></span></p><p><span face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: small;">Kerry Keane initially tried to refute what I said by misquoting me. He claimed that I said Schilling was the only pitcher in MLB history who have never reached 4 WAA until he was 30. What I actually said was:</span></p><div dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></div><div dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">"Schilling is the only pitcher in MLB history who never reached 4 WAA until he was 30, and then did so in four more seasons."</div><div dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">The only one of the pitchers he mentioned who did reach 4 WAA 5 times (actually, more) beginning at age 30 was Phil Niekro, who, since his pitching relied on a particular skill, not strength, is not really germane to this discussion. </div><div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Dazzy Vance exceeded 4 WAA four times. I agree that he looks like a late bloomer, except for one thing: he didn't even have anywhere near a full season in the majors until he was 31. I'm trying to open up his minor league record on baseball-reference but none opens. If anyone can tell us where he was pitching all that time I'd appreciate it.<br /></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Then in a later post, Kerry wrote that he checked, and Schlling had 4 WAA when he was 25, making the issue moot. Addressing this point also allows me to bring something to raise a closely related issue.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">That may be what baseball-reference shows, but it isn't what my calculations for my book, <i>Baseball Greatness, </i>(And no, I didn't jiggle those calculations to hurt Curt Schilling, or to help or hurt anyone else.) All the numbers I quoted in the post are from that book, which explains, in great detail, how and why my calculations of WAA differ in key respects from those on baseball-reference. The reason I didn't say that in the post is that the moderators have in the past automatically blocked any post of mine in which I mentioned that book, on the grounds that members are only allowed to "promote"--that is, mention--books they have written once.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">I think this is, to put it mildly, a very questionable "rule." I spent several years writing that book, which developed new, very accessible measurements of player performance shedding new and different light on dozens of questions that have been debated, and will continue to be debated,. on this list. I didn't do it for the money, of which there was very little, but for fun, and to contribute to the broader enterprise of sabermetrics. I don't think Bill James would be forbidden from quoting from books of his if he were still posting on this list, and I don't see why anyone else should be either if the book contains data directly related to an ongoing discussion.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">A last point: the issues I am raising about certain players' performance aren't, for me, issues of "character." I am trying to identify players whose numbers suggest that they did not have the ability to put up the numbers they put up in their thirties without performance enhancements. I have said many times that I'm glad I don't have to vote on the case of Barry Bonds, whose record suggests that he was an overqualified Hall of Famer before he got into PEDs, but who then used them to rewrite the record books. That's a different kind of case.</div><span face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #888888; font-size: small;"><div><br /></div><div>David Kaiser</div></span>David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-28184839976906658272020-10-08T13:09:00.003-07:002020-10-08T13:09:26.342-07:00The 2020 update will be delayed<p> Because of a deadline on another large writing prospect--about football, this time!--the process of doing a 2020 update on for <i>Baseball Greatness</i> will be delayed, possibly until the new year. Of course, the unprecedently short season will make the process more complicated, and the results less significant, as well. Stay tuned!</p>David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-47738122048387291922020-03-28T06:15:00.000-07:002020-03-28T06:15:05.298-07:00The Runs Saved Controversy at BillJames.comThis month, in a new series of statistical analyses, Bill James introduced some new ideas (to most of his readers, anyway) about defensive measurements. His posts at BillJames.com and the comments can't be read if you haven't subscribed to the site, but I'm repeating a few excerpts for non-commercial use only (I hope he won't mind that), and in any case, this post is written mainly for other subscribers to the site. <br />
<br />
In the <a href="http://It%20is%20not%20a%20perfect%20and%20unassailable%20truth%20that%20Offense%20and%20Defense%20are%20perfectly%20balanced,%20that%20Scoring%20Runs%20is%20half%20the%20game%20and%20preventing%20them%20is%20half%20the%20game.%20%20%20It%20is%20not%20a%20perfect%20and%20unassailable%20truth,%20but%20it%20is%20a%20general%20and%20usable%20truth%20which%20can%20be%20validated%20in%20various%20ways.%20%20%20If%20offense%20and%20defense%20are%20equal%20then,%20on%20a%20"league"%20basis%E2%80%94understanding%20that%20the%20league%20is%20no%20longer%20a%20completely%20self-contained%20entity%E2%80%94but%20on%20a%20league%20basis,%20runs%20prevented%20are%20equal%20to%20runs%20scored.%20%20If%20there%20were%2011,449%20Runs%20SCORED%20by%20National%20League%20teams%20in%202019,%20there%20must%20also%20have%20been%2011,449%20Runs%20PREVENTED%20by%20National%20League%20teams%E2%80%94not%20perfectly,%20because%20the%20league%20winning%20percentage%20was%20not%20exactly%20.500,%20but%20we%20can%20adjust%20for%20that.%20%20The%20question%20is,%20who%20prevented%20how%20many%20of%20those%2011,449%20Runs%20that%20were%20Prevented%20by%20Defensive%20Performance/?">post that kicked off this controversy</a>, Bill wrote:<br /><br />"It is not a perfect and unassailable truth that Offense and Defense are perfectly balanced, that Scoring Runs is half the game and preventing them is half the game. It is not a perfect and unassailable truth, but it is a general and usable truth which can be validated in various ways. If offense and defense are equal then, on a "league" basis—understanding that the league is no longer a completely self-contained entity—but on a league basis, runs prevented are equal to runs scored. If there were 11,449 Runs SCORED by National League teams in 2019, there must also have been 11,449 Runs PREVENTED by National League teams—not perfectly, because the league winning percentage was not exactly .500, but we can adjust for that. The question is, who prevented how many of those 11,449 Runs that were Prevented by Defensive Performance?"<br />
<br />
In the comments section to that article, nine different people, including myself stated either that they did not understand this argument or that they did not agree with it. Several others said they did agree with it, but the majority of respondents certainly did not. <br />
<br />
Bill <a href="https://www.billjamesonline.com/rocks/?AuthorId=3">replied a few days later </a>with a long rant (there's really no other word) in another post, informing all of us who had questioned this conclusion, in essence, that he had done everything he could to help us understand this argument, about which he evidently had no second thoughts, and that if we didn't get it, it was our problem. He also described any "argument" or "challenge to my work" as an"asshole question" to which he wasn't going to respond, and disclaimed any interest in any opposing arguments that we might make.<br />
<br />
If Bill doesn't want to read this post of mine, that's his business. I am writing it for the other posters on his site whom he essentially ordered not to continue the discussion there. I think that the above statement is wrong, as is another follow-up statement he made in a later post that we will get to, and I want to explain why and solicit comments from other reasons on what they think.<br />
<br />
Let's start with some simple logic. Let's look at the paragraph above. First I want to clarify something that could be clarified better, which I have run into myself: the reason league runs scored don't equal league runs allowed nowadays is interleague play. One league always scores more runs than the other in interleague play, and that unbalances each league's totals. That's a minor point.<br />
<br />
But what about the statement that runs prevented must equal runs scored? That, it seems to me, is obviously wrong, for at least two reasons. The first is the simplest and most important. Runs allowed are not equal to runs prevented. Runs allowed are equal to RUNS NOT PREVENTED. That, to me, is so obvious that any further arguments are extra.<br />
<br />
Yet there are further arguments. Bill also argues that what he is trying to do is to disaggregate runs prevented in the same way that the runs created formula disaggregates runs scored. It is true that every run scored is scored as a result of hits, walks, stolen bases, and a few other miscellaneous things, and no runs would be scored in the absence of those contributing factors. But runs prevented or runs saved is not comparable in that respect, particularly with respect to fielders One could argue that it is comparable for pitchers, since they could indeed prevent every single run scored by the opposition by striking everyone out, or by inducing easy chances in the field. But for fielders it isn't true. There are very large numbers of runs that no fielder could prevent, which are scored thanks to walks, to home runs, or--critically--to balls in play which no fielder could possibly turn into an out. The offense is a factor in every run scored. The defense (the fielders) is not a factor in every run allowed--if the offense was good enough, there wasn't a damn thing the defense could do about it. (Come to think to think of it--the same argument does in a sense apply to pitchers as fielders. While pitchers could in theory strike everyone out or pitch nothing but no-hitters, no one has ever been that good, any more than any three outfielders have ever been good enough to turn every ball hit beyond the infield into an out. But that's a side issue.)<br />
<br />
Another fallacy in Bill's thinking emerges in a <a href="https://www.billjamesonline.com/saving_private_runs/?AuthorId=3">third, most recent post</a>. Analyzing the 2019 Houston Astros, Bill calculates that based on the league averages of runs scored/allowed, they could have been expected to allow 840.32 runs. He then says:<br />
<br />"The 'zero point' for them is twice that number. If they had allowed twice that number of runs, that would be 1680.64 runs allowed. They actually allowed only 640 runs, or 1040.64 runs less than they theoretically might have allowed, had they had zero talent on their pitching staff and in their defensive play."<br /><br />What Bill seems to be doing here is to find a baseline for calculating actual runs saved that is different from the average number of runs scored/allowed by every team in the league, a method which he repeatedly rejects. (And, for the record, a record which I, along with certain other sabermetricians, do use.) The selection of a "zero point" that is twice the park-adjusted league average, however, seems completely arbitrary. In fact, as one other commenter said on the first post, a team with zero defensive talent would never retire a batter and would allow an infinite number of runs. A team whose pitchers and fielders were half as good as an average team--that is, that walked twice as many men, struck out half as many, and allowed twice as many hits of all kinds--would, it seems to me (I haven't tried to do the whole calculation), allow twice as many runs as the average. That's a very bad team--I don't think there has ever been a major league team that bad--but it isn't an infinitely bad one, or a team with no talent at all.<br />
<br />
I am not going to comment on the way Bill has chosen to handle this controversy. I have said many times in print that I understand a great many things thanks to him, that his work has given me many hours of pleasure, and that the baseball books I have written never would have been written without him. I will say, however, that from my own experience in my own career as an historian--which is quite comparable to his career as a sabermetrician, as you can see if you want at ALifeinHistory.com--I know that no level of skill, no amount of work, can exempt anyone, in any field, from criticism, particularly if one's work is genuinely original. And no truly intelligent person should ever be afraid to admit that they might have been wrong, as Bill has many times in the past.<br />
<br />
Feel free to comment!<br />
<br />
<br />David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-17255050233965721822019-12-09T08:25:00.000-08:002019-12-09T08:56:35.866-08:00The Catchers in the Hall of FameThe unfortunate selection of Ted Simmons to the Hall of Fame yesterday has led me to do something I have never done before, a thorough comparison, using my standard methodologies, of all the catchers in the Hall of Fame, as well as a few that are not. I have decided to present the results.<br />
<br />
I must begin with a point I made in <i>Baseball Greatness:</i> there is far less variance in the ability of catchers than in the ability of players at any other position, and the greatest catchers in history have contributed much less to their teams' success than the greatest infielders, outfielders, and pitchers. My definition of a superstar season is 4 Wins Above Average (WAA), computed without position adjustments, and with Michael Humphreys's DRA to measure fielding contribution. For a first baseman or an outfielder to have an excellent chance of reaching the Hall, he needs 5 superstar seasons in his career. Quite a few infielders and pitchers have at least that many, and most infielders or pitchers, I believe, have at least 3. An all-time team based on the highest numbers of seasons of 4 WAA or more would include Ruth (17), Barry Bonds (17), and Speaker, Mays or Aaron (16 each) in the outfield; Gehrig (12) at first; Hornsby (11) at second; Wagner (10) at short; Mike Schmidt (11) at third; and a pitching staff of Clemens (12), Lefty Grove (10), Walter Johnson and Christy Mathewson (9), and Grover Cleveland Alexander (8). The catcher, however, would be Johnny Bench, with 3 such seasons.<br />
<br />
There are two reasons for this. First of all, although some great hitters have become catchers, the physical toll of catching is so great that none of them has been able to sustain year-to-year greatness the way other position players can, and they generally decline much more rapidly. Secondly, as defensive players, there is very little, in most eras, that catchers can do to create more outs than other catchers. They handle very few balls in play. A catcher with a great arm can create substantially more outs than his peers in eras that feature lots of base stealing, but those eras are relatively rare in baseball. Catchers, of course, always get credit for the brilliant handling of pitching staffs, but only when they happen to play on teams with good offenses that allow their pitchers to "win" lots of games. We now know that framing can create additional outs, but we will never have a statistical basis for judging its importance across the history of baseball.<br />
<br />
Because top catcher performance lags so far behind that of other positions, I can't even use the yardstick of 4 WAA--a superstar season--to identify the greatest catchers, as will become clear from the following table. Instead I have to add "star seasons" which I have defined as anything from 2 to 3.9 WAA. The following table includes all the catchers in the Hall of Fame based on 20th-century MLB performance, showing their total seasons with 4 or more WAA, with 3-3.9 WAA, and with 2-2.9 WAA.<br />
<br />
<br />
<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 360px;">
<colgroup><col style="mso-width-alt: 3697; mso-width-source: userset; width: 78pt;" width="104"></col>
<col span="4" style="width: 48pt;" width="64"></col>
</colgroup><tbody>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt; width: 78pt;" width="104">Player</td>
<td class="xl63" style="width: 48pt;" width="64">Over 4</td>
<td class="xl63" style="width: 48pt;" width="64">3-3.9</td>
<td class="xl63" style="width: 48pt;" width="64">2-2.9</td>
<td class="xl63" style="width: 48pt;" width="64">Stars</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Bench</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">9</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Carter</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">4</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">9</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Piazza</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">4</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">9</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Rodriguez</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">4</td>
<td class="xl63">4</td>
<td class="xl63">8</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Berra</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">4</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">7</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Dickey</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">4</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">6</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Cochrane</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">1</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">6</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Mauer</td>
<td class="xl63">1</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">6</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Freehan</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">5</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Munson</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">1</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">5</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Fisk</td>
<td class="xl63">1</td>
<td class="xl63">1</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">5</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Torre</td>
<td class="xl63">1</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">4</td>
<td class="xl63">5</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Bresnahan</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">1</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">4</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Hartnett</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">4</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Lombardi</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">1</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Campanella</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">2</td>
<td class="xl63">1</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Simmons</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
<td class="xl63">3</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Ferrell</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">1</td>
<td class="xl63">1</td>
</tr>
<tr height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">
<td height="19" style="height: 14.4pt;">Schalk</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
<td class="xl63">0</td>
</tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<div>
The four greatest catchers in history come from the Boom (Bench and Carter) and X (Piazza and Rodriguez) generations. Bench, one could argue, edges out Carter and Piazza, but only because he topped 4 WAA three times, while they did only twice. Yogi Berra was marginally superior to Bill Dickey, but not markedly so, as Bill James argued in his <i>Historical Abstract.</i> Tied with Dickey we find his contemporary Mickey Cochrane--whose best seasons were the best posted by any catcher until 1970--and not-yet-elibible Joe Mauer of the Millennial generation. While Yogi was indeed a great catcher, I pointed out in <i>Baseball Greatness</i> that he was never close to the best player in the AL in his three MVP seasons, and his last selection, in 1955, was truly absurd. Then, things get interesting.<br />
<br />
Of the four catchers with 5 seasons of 2 WAA or more, Fisk and Torre and in the Hall of Fame--Torre, I suspect, largely because of his managerial success--while Munson and Freehan are not. Fisk, whose best season was his rookie year, reached the Hall because he managed to perform at an <i>adequate</i> level for an extraordinarily long period of time, while Munson never got any serious consideration because of his early death. (It is interesting, by the way, that Fisk, Munson, and Bench all were born in the same year, 1947--as was the present writer, who entered this world on the very same day that Munson did.) Freehan will always be underrated because he played in a very low-offense era and his traditional statistics suffered accordingly. Torre was in fact a very valuable catcher, whose playing career includes an astonishing irony. He won the NL MVP in 1971 after the Cardinals moved him full-time to third base, where he hit .371 with 230 hits and 137 RBI. We now know thanks to Michael Humphreys, however, that he had one of the worst years in the history of baseball at third base, surrendering enough extra base hits to account for -36 runs, and thus, his total contribution to his team in that year was only 2.1 WAA. The real 1971 NL MVP, based on WAA, was Tom Seaver, who had his greatest season with 7.5 WAA, and the best position player was Roberto Clemente, with 5.1. Freehan and Munson, along with not-yet-eligible Mauer, are the greatest catchers not in the Hall, and had more impact on their teams' fortunes than many of the catchers who are. I would not have been unhappy if Munson had been elected this year.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Roger Bresnahan and Gabby Harnett represent the beginning and end of the Lost generation, in which they were indeed the most valuable catchers. Ray Schalk made the Hall of Fame because he was one of the honest White Sox in 1919--there really is no other explanation. Ernie Lombardi and Rick Ferrell were contemporaries of Cochrane and Dickey, but nowhere near as good. Lombardi is probably in because he won one batting title, and legend has it that the Veterans' Committee confused Ferrell with his brother Wes, who is one of the greatest pitchers <i>not</i> in the Hall of Fame. Roy Campanella's low place on the list is rather surprising. Uniquely among ballplayers, he won an MVP award in every one of his star seasons, even though he was never even close to being the MVP on his own team. He didn't reach the majors until he was 26 because of segregation, he had a lot of injuries and mixed very poor seasons in with his good ones. Like Munson, however, he had fallen below the star level for two seasons by the time that a tragic accident ended his career. And his three best seasons were better than Simmons' three best.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Ted Simmons, like Carlton Fisk, continued to catch for major league teams into his late thirties. That, not his peak performance, is his biggest claim to fame. He will not be the worst catcher in the Hall of Fame, but he is not in the class of the other three catchers from the Boom generation who preceded him (Bench, Carter, and Fisk), nor of another contemporary, Thurman Munson, who was on the same ballot.</div>
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David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-72484610186074905462019-11-06T08:09:00.002-08:002019-11-10T06:23:19.067-08:00The 2019 Veteran's Committee nominationsThe "Modern Baseball" division of the Hall of Fame Veterans Committee has just issued its ballot for 2020, composed in theory at least of players "<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">whose primary contributions to baseball came between 1970-87."</span> On the ballot are Dwight Evans, Steve Garvey, Tommy John, Don Mattingly, Marvin Miller, Thurman Munson, Dale Murphy, Dave Parker, Ted Simmons and Lou Whitaker. Do any of them belong in the Hall? I will try to answer this question.<br />
<br />
If you are reading this post you may well be familiar with the methodology of my book, <i> Baseball Greatness.</i> It identified a superstar season as a season of at least 4 Wins Above Average (WAA--<i>not</i> Wins Above Replacement, or WAR.) That figure defines the minimum performance by the MVP on a pennant winning team. Only a very small minority of teams have reached the world series without at least one player that good, and even now, it's quite difficult to reach post season play without one.<br />
<br />
What I found was that with respect to position players at least, Hall of Fame voters had a subjective understanding of this concept already which was reflected in the choices that they have made. The vast majority of players with at least 5 seasons of 4 WAA or more are in fact in the Hall of Fame. That includes 19 out of 29 with 5 such seasons, including 5 who are not yet eligible or only recently became eligible. On the other hand, out of 51 players with 4 seasons of 5 WAA, only 18 of them are in the Hall, and 7 of them (Eddie Plank Robin Roberts, Juan Marichal, Rube Waddell, Carl Hubbell, Sandy Koufax, and Jim Bunning) are pitchers. Of 54 players with 3 such seasons, 25 are in the Hall, and only five of them are pitchers. Hall of Famers with just 3 superstar seasons include Home Run Baker, Brooks Robinson, Lou Brock, Dave Winfield, Don Drysdale, Ron Santo, Orlando Cepeda, Tony Perez, Johnny Bench (the greatest catcher, by this measure, in baseball history), Andre Dawson, Alan Trammell, and Cal Ripken. Among the non-pitchers on that list, six of them are third basemen or shortstops--for whom overall standards have always been lower--while Brock and Winfield piled up some impressive lifetime totals without very many truly outstanding seasons.<br />
<br />
The figures for this year's candidates are as follows: Dave Parker and Don Mattingy had 4 superstar seasons, Dwight Evans had 3, Dale Murphy had 2, Thurman Munson 1, and Steve Garvey, Tommy John,Ted Simmons and Lou Whitaker had none. To me, this means, first, that none of these men is an overwhelming candidate, and only two or three of them are reasonable candidates whose qualifications match those of many members.<br />
<br />
Parker and Mattingly are the strongest candidates, but I doubt that I would vote for either one of them. Parker is a Boomer (b. 1951) and Mattingly is on the leading edge of Gen X (b. 1961.) Other Boomers with 4 seasons of 4 WAA or more who hare not in the Hall include infielders Buddy Bell and Bobby Grich--both outstanding fielders--and outfielders Jose Cruz, Willie Wilson, and Jesse Barfield. It's appalling that Grich is not on this year's ballot, and I don't think anyone should vote for Parker who wouldn't give a look to Cruz and Barfield, anyway, as well. (Fielding was also largely responsible for Wilson's superstar seasons.) The only Boomer outfielder in the Hall with 4 superstar seasons is Tony Gwynn, whose career was clearly superior to Parker's or Mattingly's. Dwight Evans and Dale Murphy rank behind Parker and I think are dubious candidates. (Incidentally, although Parker's teammate Jim Rice trails Evans in lifetime WAR--now a popular stat--Rice had 5 superstar seasons and was thus well qualified for Cooperstown.) Two of this year's candidates are catchers, who have one of the lowest effective standards for the Hall, but their records would also make them dubious choices. Thurman Munson did have one superstar season and four other star seasons of 2-3.9 WAA, but that ranks him below most of the catchers in the Hall. (His early death probably didn't affect his chances; when he died at 32, he was in the middle of his second average season.) Ted Simmons, meanwhile, had six star seasons for the Cardinals, putting him in about the same category. <br />
Lou Whitaker was often linked to his teammate Alan Trammell during his career, but he had no superstar seasons to Trammell's three. That, however, is not the whole story Any statistical guidelines will penalize one or two players who fall barely short of them. Whitaker is such a man. While he never topped 4 WAA, he topped 3 WAA 6 different times over a 15-year period, and he topped 2 WAA on 5 other occasions. He wasn't as good as Joe Morgan or Rod Carew, the greatest second basemen of his Boom generation, and I don't think he was as good as Bobby Grich, but he was much, much better than a number of other second basemen in the Hall of Fame, and I wouldn't be upset to see him get in.<br />
<br />
In his extraordinary 25-year career, Tommy John had 6 seasons over 2 WAA, two of which (in 1968-9, pitching for dreadful White Sox teams) topped 3 WAA. That's a significantly better record than Jack Morris's and quite comparable to Don Sutton, and Morris and Sutton have already been elected, but it's way below the real greats of John's Boom generation such as Jim Palmer, Tom Seaver, Steve Carlton, Bert Blyleven, and Nolan Ryan. It's also way below poor Dave Stieb, who had six superstar seasons--second to Blyleven in their generation--but who will never get any Hall of Fame consideration because he never won 20 games in a season. John owes his 288 wins (and 231 losses) to longevity. I would not vote for him but I wouldn't have voted for Morris either.<br />
<br />
Of the men on the ballot, Marvin Miller, who had more (and on the whole, better) impact on the game than any other executive except perhaps Judge Landis, is to me the obvious choice for inclusion. Most astonishing is the failure to put Keith Hernandez on this ballot. Although injuries cut his career short (his last full season was when he was only 33), he is by my measure one of the best players not in the Hall of Fame with 7 superstar seasons, thanks in part to his terrific fielding at first base. That figure ties him with Eddie Murray and Wade Boggs. He played for two pennant winners and he was the most valuable player on the 1986 Mets. He was a much better player than anyone on this ballot, and I wish some one could tell me why he has been ignored by both the BWAA and the Veterans Committee. He and Grich deserve election to the Hall more than any of the players on this ballot. Among them, I would be happiest were Mattingly to be selected. He was as valuable as Parker, but he took care of himself and avoided serious off-field problems, and thus had a longer career.<br />
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<br />David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-52698307710431529902019-10-20T08:37:00.000-07:002019-10-20T08:37:11.034-07:00The Update for the 2019 season<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
Five years ago, in 2014, American league
teams averaged 144 home runs and 677 runs scored.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This year they averaged 232 home runs and 791
runs scored.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s a 61% increase in
home runs per team, but just a 17% increase in runs scored. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Average team hits are almost identical—1410 to
1402— and the league batting average was .253 in 2015 and .253 again this year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Average doubles plus triples were 301 in 2014
and 314 in 2014.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus, the increase in
home runs corresponds quite closely to a decline of 93 in the average number of
singles. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Average slugging percentage has
increased accordingly, from .390 to .439. The OBP is up a little from .316 to .323,
because <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>walks have gone up to 528<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>per team from 473. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, 10% of hits were homers then, 16% of hits
are homers now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Strikeouts, however, are
up from 1216 per team to 1428.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Combining
212 new strikeouts with 88 new home runs, the average team puts 300 less balls
in play every season, or two less per game.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This makes sense: while the obvious alternative to a single is a ground ball
out, the obvious alternative to a home run is a strikeout.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
This very large increase in home
runs, however, can make traditional statistics even more misleading than
usual.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Homers are so plentiful that
hitting them has become a less valuable skill relative to the league.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>31 American Leaguers hit 30 or more home runs
in 2019. Remarkably and significantly, Jorge Soler, who led the league with 48,
earned just 3.3 WAA, a very valuable performance but short of the 4 WAA
superstar level.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Minnesota’s Max Kepler
hit 36 homers and earned 1.2 WAA; Gary Sanchez of the Yankees hit 34 (in 106
games!) and earned only 0.6.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jose Abreu
of the White House hit 33 and was an utterly average performer, and Rougned
Ordor of Texas hit 30 with -1.8 WAA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>8
of these 31 players earned less than 1 full WAA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
And thus, despite the escalating
home run totals, the shortage of superstar performances in the two leagues
continued.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In 2018 the AL had 9 such
performances of 4 WAA or more and the NL 7. This year the corresponding figures
were 10 for the AL—four of them with the same team!—and only 4 in the NL.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We now turn to the best teams in each league.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
Although their lineup was four
games better overall and their pitching four games worse, the Houston Astros in
2019 finished with essentially the same run differential as they had in
2018.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This time their luck improved, and
they won a full 107 games, one less than their projected 108.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once again their strongest offensive players
were Alex Bregman (6.4 WAA) and George Springer (4.7), and Bregman edged out Mike
Trout as the MVP of the AL, and indeed, of all baseball.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The lineup included three other stars: first
baseman Yuri Gurriel (3.7 WAA), DH Yordan Alvarez (a remarkable 3 WAA in just
369 plate appearances), and Jose Altuve (2.4)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Outfielder Michael Brantley, catcher Robinson Chirinos, and oft-injured
shortstop Carlos Correa were also above average.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On the mound, Justin Verlander (4.9 WAA) and
Gerrit Cole (4.3) were two of the top four pitchers in the American League, and
accounted for the entire positive value of the pitching staff.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thanks to Bregman, Springer, Verlander and
Cole, the Astros became only the eighth team since 1901 to have four genuine
superstars in the same season, the last being the 2001 Seattle Mariners.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
In a remarkable, injury-wracked
season, the New York Yankee lineup, with only four players with more than 120
games played, still earned +15 WAA and enabled the team to finish with 103
wins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>D.J. LeMahieu just missed
superstar status with 3.9 WAA, and second baseman Gleyber Torres (2), right
fielder Aaron Judge (3.1 in just 102 games), third baseman Gio Urshela (2.4),
and outfielder Mike Tauchman (2.1 WAA in just 82 games) were stars, while
several other players performed at an above average level.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The team’s fielding was average, but the
pitching staff contributed another +5 WAA, evenly divided between the starters and
relievers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While LeMahieu cannot be
expected to replicate his 2019 contribution, the team’s many injuries suggest
that they should be able to perform at least as well in 2020.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Yankees lost a very close ALCS to the
Astros in six games.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
Helped by three games worth of
luck, the Minnesota Twins, in an amazing turnaround from a sub-.500 2018,
became the third team in the league to top 100 victories with 101. Despite poor
fielding (-4 WAA), their lineup posted +9 wins in classic small market fashion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their best player, 38-year old DH Nelson
Cruz, earned only 3.6 WAA, but their top 16 players did not include a single
man worse than -0.5 WAA, while six of them earned more than 1.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Catcher Mitch Garver and outfielder Byron
Buxton, although each limited to less than 95 games, starred with 2.1 WAA
apiece, while poor fielding kept shortstop Jorge Polanco, second baseman
Jonathan Schoop and outfielder Eddie Rosario from stardom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The pitchers—whose contribution was somewhat
obscured by their fielders’ problems—earned a combined +9 WAA as well, led by
starters<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jose Barrios (2.1) and Jake
Odorizzi (2.5).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Luck seems to have
played a significant role in the overall pitching record, suggesting that the
Twins will give up more runs next year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On
the other hand, the team, which set a new season record with 307 home runs, had
8 players with 22 home runs or more—only one of which appeared in more than 137
games.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
A great deal went wrong for the
defending champion Boston Red Sox, who declined from 108 wins in 2018 to just
84, both times with -4 wins worth of Pythagorean luck.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>8 -1. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their lineup was almost exactly as valuable as
in 2018, with +8 WAA instead of +9.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While Mookie Betts and J. D. Martinez could not be expected to match
their amazing 2017 seasons, they still posted 5.3 and 3.4 WAA,
respectively.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In other bright spots, third
baseman Rafael Devers performed adequately in the field and hit very well,
finishing with 2.9 WAA at age 22, and catcher Christian Vazquez more than
rebounded from a terrible 2018, with 2.8 WAA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Shortstop Xander Bogaerts, however—a star in 2018—had a dreadful year in
the field, giving up -26 runs, and finished with just 1.7 WAA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Several second basemen once again cost the
team badly, the first basemen were average, and outfielder Andrew Benintendi
fell all the way to average after his excellent 2018 season.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Center fielder Jackie Bradley Jr. was below
average both at bat and in the field and cost the team -1.3 WAA again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The real disaster, however, was on the mound,
where a staff that earned +13 WAA in 2018 fell to average.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Starter Eduardo Rodriguez posted an excellent
3 WAA, but 2018 stars Chris Sale, David Price, and Rick Porcello were average
or (in Porcello’s case) worse. As a group the relievers were below
average.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The team now wants to cut its
payroll, but both Price and Sale have many years to run on long-term contracts
totaling $45 million a year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Another
2018 division winner, the Cleveland Indians, suffered a bizarre season. Their
omens were good, since they had won 91 games in 2018 despite -8 full games of
bad Pythagorean luck, and despite some injuries, their pitching staff led the
league again at +11 WAA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their lineup,
however, fell from +3 WAA to average thanks to wretched hitting, and their 93
wins left them short of a wild card.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
Only luck allowed Tampa Bay to beat
Cleveland for the wild card with 96 wins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The Rays’ lineup lacked a superstar but included outfielder Austin
Meadows (3.5 WAA), first baseman Ji-Man Choi (2.8), and second baseman Brandon
Lowe (2.3).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The rest of the lineup was
weaker—outfielder Tommy Pham was only average because of poor fielding--and
overall it was barely average.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their
pitching staff, however, earned a full +10 WAA, led by Charlie Morton (3.5
WAA), Yonny Chirinos (1.4), and relievers Emkilio Pagan, Tyler Glasnow, and
Oliver Drake (4.2 among them, in 187 innings pitched.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Three games worth of luck gave them an edge
over the Indians.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Oakland had much
better balance and won 96 games, one below their projection, with promise for
the future.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Great fielding produced tremendous
performances from shortstop Marcus Semien (6.3 WAA), third baseman Matt Chapman
(4.8), and first baseman Matt Olson (3.6), and star turns from outfielders Mark
Canha (3.2) and Ramon Laureano (2.5)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Alas, the lineup also included DH Khris Davis (-1.2) second baseman
Jurickson Profar (-2.3), and catcher Josh Phegley (-1.1) and overall it earned
only 11 WAA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A remarkably consistent
set of pitchers added +6 WAA more, even though only Liam Hendricks topped 2
WAA, with 2.1 in just 85 innings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While
their top players cannot be expected to do quite as well next year, Billy Beane
has often managed to find average ones to strengthen his weak spots.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With Houston to contend with, however, they
are unlikely to do better than another wild card birth and a 50-50 chance of
advancing.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
The American League had 10
superstars in 2019, including four Astros; the National League had only five,
including two Mets, top rookie Pete Alonso (5.3 WAA) and top pitcher Jakob
DeGrom (4.9).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Despite that one-two
punch, New York won only 86 games, far short of the playoffs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once again the Los Angeles Dodgers far
outshone the rest of the league, winning 106 games despite -2 games worth of
bad Pythagorean luck.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their lineup
improved its fielding from -4 WAA in 2018 to +2, and its overall performance
from +10 to a whopping +16.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Cody
Bellinger, the league MVP, led the way with 6.1 WAA, followed by second baseman
Max Muncy (3.6), third baseman Justin Turner (2.9), and John Pederson, Corey
Seager, Alex Verdugo, Will Smith, and David Freeze (about 1 WAA each.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their
pitching meanwhile held steady at +10 WAA, led by starters Hyun-Jin Ryu (a
near-superstar at 3.9 WAA), Clayton Kershaw (2.7), and Walker Buehler
(1.5).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the Dodgers fell to a much
weaker Nationals team in the NLCS.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
The Atlanta Braves improved their
2018 record from 90-72 to 97-65 for one reason: their Pythagorean luck earned
them an extra 5 wins, having cost them 2 wins the previous year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their lineup (+6 WAA) was a little better,
even though first baseman Freddie Freeman, now 29, fell off from 4.2 WAA to
2.2.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>21-year old outfielder Ronald Acuña
posted a fine 3.2 WAA, and new acquisition Josh Donaldson added 2.3.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Among the pitchers Mike Soroka, also 21, just
missed superstar status with 3.9 WAA in 175 innings, and starters Julio
Teheran, Max Fried and Dallas Keuchel contributed 4 WAA among them, although
the rest of the staff pulled the<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>moundsmen down to just +4 WAA overall.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The Washington Nationals began the campaign with a wise decision not to
sign the erratic Bryce Harper, who earned just 1.8 WAA in his first $11.5
million season with the Phillies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Third
baseman Anthony Rendon turned in a 4 WAA superstar season and 20-year old
sophomore Juan Soto posted a very promising 3.4, allowing the lineup to improve
slightly from +4 WAA to +5.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The pitchers
(+8) remained the strength of the team, with starters Stephen Strasburg, Max
Scherzer, Patrick Corbin and Anibal Sanchez posting a combined 11.9 WAA, the
best rotation in the majors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In this
case as in a number of others, the rest of the staff—a combined -4 WAA—pulled the
team down.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the NL wild card game the
Nationals rallied to beat the Brewers, one of the luckiest teams in recent
memory, who squeaked into the playoffs with just 89 wins—thanks only to a full
+8 games of Pythagorean luck.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then their
pitching allowed them to sneak beat the superior Dodgers in the NLDS, and they
swept the Cardinals quite easily in the NLCS.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
St. Louis won 92 games thanks
mostly to their fielding, which earned them a full +5 WAA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Second baseman Kolten Wong and shortstop Paul
DeJong saved +37 and +15 runs, respectively, allowing them to earn 1.4 and 4.6
WAA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One must ask whether those figures
owed something to the very effective use of infield shifts, and to a good deal
of luck, as well as to the skill of those two men.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Cardinals found their way to first place
in the NL Central despite very disappointing performances from veteran Matt Carpenter
(-2.4 WAA) and free agent acquisition Paul Goldschmidt (0.6).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yadier Molina (1.6 in 113 games) had another
good year behind the plate in limited duty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The pitching staff evidently was not quite as good as it looked thanks
to the fielding, and earned only +2 WAA overall.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Only starter Jack Flaherty (3.6 WAA) and
reliever Giovanny Gallegos (1.4) earned more than 1.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
After four consecutive seasons of
92 wins or more, including a 103-win world championship in 2016, the Cubs fell
to 84-78 and missed the playoffs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Among
their long-time leaders, Anthony Rizzo lead the lineup with just 2.7 WAA, while
Jason Heyward, Kris Bryant, and Kyle Schwarber fell to average—in Heyward’s and
Bryant’s cases, because of wretched seasons in the field.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The lineup earned just +3 WAA and the
well-balanced pitching staff +5—even though Kyle Hendricks led the staff with
just 1.9 WAA, trailed by Yu Darvish and Cole Hamels with 1.5 each.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
On the all-time list of Millennial
position players, only Mike Trout added to his total of superstar seasons,
posting his eighth consecutive one, with 6.5 WAA in just 134 games. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He has never been below 4 WAA in a full season,
but sadly, has appeared in postseason play just once.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ted
Williams also posted at least 4 WAA (and usually much more) in his first eight
seasons, and Trout is two shy of the all-time record of 10 in his first 10
years, set by Albert Pujols.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The other
great Millennials from the 1980s seem to be in the decline phase of their
careers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Robinson Cano has not added to
his four superstar seasons since 2016 (though that total would normally get a
second basemen comfortably into Cooperstown), Miguel Cabrera, with seven such
seasons, has been average for the last three years, and Joey Votto, who also
has seven, has been only a star, not a superstar, for the last two years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Josh Donaldson hasn’t added to his total of
four in the last three years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The very
unlucky Paul Goldschmidt—by this measure—posted his second 3.9 WAA season in
2018, to go with four other seasons comfortably over 4, but we have seen that
he slipped all the way to average in his first year as a Cardinal, even though
he is only 31.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Shin-Shu Choo had the
last of his four great seasons in 2014.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>David
Wright, whose career is over, and Andrew McCutchen, both seem to have burned
out very early, well short of Cooperstown.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Among younger Millennials born in the 1990s, Mookie Betts topped 5 WAA
for the third time in four years at age 26, and Matt Chapman, Alex Bregman, and
Christian Yelich all posted their second consecutive superstar seasons.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For the second year in a row, Aaron Judge,
sadly, was only a star because injuries cost him a good chunk of the season.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
Among the pitchers, Justin
Verlander posted his fifth superstar season (4.7 WAA) at the age of 36, while
Max Scherzer (3.7), while missing his sixth, posted a seventh consecutive
season with at least 3.7 WAA. Clayton Kershaw (2.7) posted at the star level
for the third consecutive year, but he, like Verlander and Scherzer, already
looks like a cinch for Cooperstown.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Jakob DeGrom posted his second consecutive superstar season.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If the Mets can take care of their weak
spots, DeGrom and Alonso should be able to lead them into postseason play in
2020.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<br />David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-44154555350032685732019-03-24T08:27:00.002-07:002019-03-24T08:27:36.005-07:00Review of Baseball GreatnessA discerning and gratifying review of <i>Baseball Greatness</i> appeared <a href="https://sabr.box.com/shared/static/bvc1awm6mxljduplsktg11yro7x2b1ox.pdf">in the September 2018 newsletter of SABR's Deadball Era Research Committee</a>. My thanks to T. S. Flynn.David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-11246558856901118082019-01-23T06:33:00.000-08:002019-01-24T06:02:11.906-08:00How valuable was Mariano Rivera?Yesterday, Mariano Rivera became the first player <i>ever</i> to be elected to the Hall of Fame unanimously, and on his first try to boot--something that players like Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Willie Mays, Henry Aaron, Mike Schmidt, and many others, failed to achieve. He was elected because he was (as we shall see) a very effective pitcher, who played what many people believe to be a key role for the New York Yankees for many years, during most of which they enjoyed extraordinary success. He certainly proved, over a long period of time, that he had Hall of Fame ability. Yet for reasons having nothing to do with his ability, he actually contributed extraordinarily few extra wins to his team over the course of his long career.<br />
<br />
The principle of <i>reductio ad absurdum</i> has solved a number of problems in mathematics, both theoretical and applied. Essentially, it suggests that if the logical extension of a premise leads to an absurd conclusion, the premise itself is false. For several decades now fans and writers have believed, and baseball organizations have acted as if, a pitcher who can reliably protect a lead of 1-3 runs for one inning (the ninth) plays a critical role in his team's success. In 2016, in a typically thorough and insightful presentation at the SABR Convention in Miami, Dave Smith of retrosheet.org proved that that assumption is false. An analysis of the career of Rivera--generally regarded as the greatest closer of all time--will confirm that conclusion in spades.<br />
<br />
After a year as the Yankees' set-up man in 1996--a year to which we shall return--Rivera was the Yankees' closer for 16 of the next 17 years. He was an extraordinarily effective pitcher for most of those seasons. In <i>Baseball Greatness,</i> I use the measurement of Wins Above Average to measure the value of all players, and by that measure, Rivera appears to be the best relief pitcher of all time. Only once did he ever come close to the 4 Wins Above Average figure that represents a superstar season, but no other reliever has ever pitched enough to reach that figure either. He exceeded 2 WAA in four out of five seasons from 2003 through 2008--seasons in which he pitched between 70 and 80 innings. No other reliever--including those from earlier eras who pitched well over 100 innings a year--has been over 2 WAA that many times. That means that if he could have pitched 220 innings, let's say, at the same rate of effectiveness, he would have earned about 6.5 or 7 extra wins for his team, which represents an outstanding season for any of the greatest pitchers in history, such as Lefty Grove or Bob Feller or Roger Clemens. I have no doubt that, given the chance, and if he could have stayed healthy for long enough, Mariano Rivera might have pitched his way into the Hall of Fame as a starter. But we will never know.<br />
<br />
Yet the New York Yankees, as it turns out, got remarkably little value, in terms of games won, out of this great pitcher. The reason is that, as a closer, Rivera only came into the game when the Yankees already had an overwhelming chance of winning it.<br />
<br />
I have not been able to find a thorough year-to-year record of Rivera's saves and blown saves, but <a href="http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/9718373/mariano-rivera-overrated-well-beloved-respected">an article by Jim Caple of ESPN</a> written on the eve of his retirement has good aggregate data. Rivera, he reports based on data from Elias, had 652 saves and 80 blown saves. That is a percentage of 89.1. Unfortunately, I don't know how many of the blown saves resulted in Yankee defeats. They obviously lost all the games on the road in which Rivera actually surrendered enough runs to lose the game, and the vast majority--around 90%--of the games in which he fell behind in the top of the ninth at Yankee Stadium. They should have won about half the games in which he allowed the other team to tie the game. I'm going to be generous, for reasons that will become apparent, and guess that the Yankees might have won 20 games in which Rivera had blown the save. That would mean that the Yankees won 92% of the games in which Rivera came into the game in a save situation.<br />
<br />
How would an average pitcher have done?<br />
<br />
Dave Smith's presentation provides some answers. Team winning percentages in games in which the team enjoyed a 1-, 2- or 3-run lead going into the ninth inning are extraordinarily consistent from 1912 to 2015. A 3-run lead gives a winning percentage of 97%, a two-run lead 93%, and a one-run lead, 84%.<br />
<br />
Now the Caple article does break down Rivera's <i>saves</i> into 1-run, 2-run, 3-run and 4-run situations, but it doesn't do the same, alas, for his <i>blown saves.</i> (Caple states, in effect, that even an entrance with a 4-run lead can result in a save, while Smith did not. I don't know where this discrepancy came from, but I'll count 3- and 4-run leads together for the next calculation.) I'm going to assume, generously I think, that Rivera blew 2/3 of his blown saves with a lead of just 1 run, and 1/3 with a two-run lead. Adding that estimate into Elias's figures for successful saves, we would find Rivera entering with a one-run lead 263 times, with a two-run lead 241 times, and with a 3- or 4- run lead, 226 times. Applying Smith's figures for success in those situations, we find that the Yankees with average 9th-inning pitching could have expected to win 664 of the of the 732 games that Rivera entered in a save situation, or 91% of them. With Rivera, we have estimated that they actually won 672 of them, or 92%. That's 8 extra games in 16 full-time seasons as closer--exactly one-half a game a year.<br />
<br />
Now as I have said, Rivera actually exceed 2 WAA a year four times as a closer--the most of any reliever--and he also exceeded 1 WAA on ten other occasions, implying that he was worth more than half a win a year to the New York Yankees. But he wasn't, <i>because the Yankees used him as a closer.</i> They used him in games in which <i>the rest of the team--</i>the hitter/fielders, starting pitchers, and other relievers--had already established a win probability of 91%. There was no way that he could improve on that probability very much, given the way that he was used. The same is true, obviously, for very other talented pitcher who is wasted as a closer. Rivera's most valuable year for the Yankees, ironically, w 1996, when he pitched 107 2/3 innings as a set-up man and earned 3.4 WAA, more than he ever did as a closer.<br />
<br />
There is, alas, another question that we really need to ask about Rivera and other closers. Rivera's best seasons as a closer, when he earned more than 2 WAA in four years out of five, occurred at ages 33-38. It certainly seems reasonable to assume that he managed to sustain that level of effectiveness at that age in part because he pitched only 70 innings a year. What we have shown, though, is that that reduced his value to his team to a very marginal level. Rivera was a very fine pitcher, in the very few innings that he pitched, for a very long time. But based on the actual number of wins that he and other closers contribute to their teams, none of them should even be considered for the Hall of Fame.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-20589734425364375392019-01-01T07:54:00.000-08:002019-01-04T08:34:57.431-08:00The election of Harold Baines to the Hall of Fame<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The selection of Harold Baines to the Hall of Fame has excited a great deal of comment, most of it negative, because so few people, apparently, have ever regarded him as a potential Hall of Famer. Once some one is in, of course, they are in forever, and there's no point ranting and raving about any mistakes that voters have made. Yet it is worthwhile, it seems to me, to ask a few questions that situate this choice within the pantheon of the Hall, and help place Baines accurately among baseball's greatest players. I shall focus on three questions:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">1. How exactly was Baines selected?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">2. How does Baines compare to broadly similar players already in the Hall?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">3. How does Baines compare to the other players who were on the ballot this year?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Baines was chosen by one of the subcomittees, one might say, of the old Veterans Committee. Called the Today's Game Committee, it "considers retired Major League Baseball players no longer eligible for election by the Baseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA), along with managers, umpires and executives, whose greatest contributions to the game were realized from the 1988-2016 era." The committee membership included Hall of Fame members Roberto Alomar, Bert Blyleven, Pat Gillick, Tony La Russa, Greg Maddux, Joe Morgan, John Schuerholz, Ozzie Smith and Joe Torre; major league executives Al Avila (Tigers), Paul Beeston (Blue Jays), Andy MacPhail (Phillies) and Jerry Reinsdorf (White Sox); and veteran media members/historians Steve Hirdt, Tim Kurkjian and Claire Smith. </span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The other players on the ballot were Albert Belle, Joe Carter, Will Clark, Orel Hershiser, and Lee Smith. Smith also won election.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">2. I am going to compare Baines's record to others using the method I developed in my book, <i>Baseball Greatness</i>. That method ranks players by the number of seasons of 4 or more Wins Above Average they had during their careers. For hitters like Baines, WAA is computed using the offensive numbers from baseball-reference.com, but substituting Michael Humphreys's DRA fielding statistics for the ones baseball-reference uses, and eliminating position adjustments, which tend to be arbitrary. These differences of approach help Baines. DRA shows him to have been a significantly better fielder than baseball-reference does in the early years of his career when he played the outfield, and baseball-reference routinely subtracts about 10 runs above average for DHs, which of course was what Baines was for most of his career. 4 WAA is my definition of a superstar season because it turns out that it defines how good you have to be to be the MVP on a pennant-winning team. The vast majority of pennant winning teams have had at least one player that good.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Now the number of seasons of 4 WAA or more that a player has does correlate reasonably well with lifetime totals, since a player who is great enough to have five such seasons (stand by for more explanation) will generally have a long career including a number of seasons in the 2-3 WAA range, as well. As it turns out, 5 seasons of 4 WAA or more has in practice been the definition of a solid Hall of Famer, according to the actual voting results. Of the </span>29 players with exactly five such seasons, 19 of them--Phil Niekro, Cy Young (1901 and later), Stanley Covaleski, Rod Carew, Jim Thome, Dazzy Vance, Harry Heilmann, Goose Goslin, Charlie Gehringer, Joe Gordon, Jackie Robinson, Hal Newhouser, Joe Morgan, George Brett, Jim Rice, Tim Raines, Ryne Sandberg, Harry Hooper, and Tom Glavine--19 players who are in the Hall of Fame. Three much older players from this group--Charlie Keller, Gil Hodges, and Wes Ferrell--are not in. The remaining 7 players with 5 WAA are Roy Halladay, Curt Schilling, Larry Walker, Mike Mussina, and Jim Edmonds, who are on this year's BWAA ballot, and David Ortiz and Clayton Kershaw, who are not yet eligible. On the other hand, of the 51 players in history with exactly <i>four</i> seasons of 4 WAA or more, only 17 of them are in the Hall of Fame--and many of them are pitchers, for whom the actual standards, by this method, tend to be a good deal lower.<br />
<br />
There are, of course, a good many players in the Hall of Fame who do not have even 4 seasons of 4 WAA or more, but the vast majority of them are catchers or middle infielders, and they are not, therefore, good comparisons to Harold Baines, who began his career as an outfielder and spent most of it as a DH.<br />
<br />
By this method, Harold Baines has no claim to the Hall of Fame, for the simple reason that <i>he never, in his whole career, had a season of 4 WAA or more.</i> Not one. Here are his annual WAA totals (I have combined the individual team totals for the several years in which Baines played for more than one team.)<br />
<br />
1980 -2.1 WAA<br />
1981 0.9 WAA (strike-shortened season)<br />
1982 0.8 WAA<br />
1983 1.3<br />
1984 3.5<br />
1985 2.2<br />
1986 2.4<br />
1987 0.5<br />
1988 0.6<br />
1989 2.5<br />
1990 1.3<br />
1991 2.1<br />
1992 -0.3<br />
1993 1.8<br />
1994 0.1<br />
1995 1.8<br />
1996 2.6<br />
1997 1.1<br />
1998 0.3<br />
1999 1.9<br />
2000 -0.8<br />
2001 -1.3<br />
<br />
In 21 years, Harold Baines never had a superstar season. He had 6 seasons of 2.0-3.9 WAA, all but one under 3 WAA, which I define in my book as "star seasons." He had five seasons of 1-1.9 WAA, making him a modest asset on a winning team, six seasons in which he was essentially average (from -0.9 to +0.9), and his last season was below average. For an outfielder/DH this is a very poor record for a Hall of Famer.<br />
<br />
Are there any outfielders in the Hall whose records are very comparable to Baines'? Yes, at least three. One, indeed, is indisputably worse than Baines, and ranks as a candidate for the weakest non-pitcher in the Hall of Fame. That is Lloyd Waner, who got lots of base hits, played in a high-offense era, and benefited from the glow emitted by his brother Paul, a genuine all-time great. Lloyd Waner also had a long career (18 seasons to Baines' 22) without ever having a season of 4 WAA or more, but his record is much weaker than Baines's. He topped 2 WAA only once (in 1931) and 1 WAA only four times. He was an average player, or worse, for nearly his whole career.<br />
<br />
It is interesting to compare Baines to some of the other weaker outfielders who have reached Cooperstown. Those most similar to Baines in terms of the length of their careers are Sam Rice (2404 games to Baines's 2830), Max Carey (2476 games), Zack Wheat (2410 games), and Heinie Manush (2008 games.) Rice was elected for a reason that apparently played a big role in Baines's selection as well: both of them finished their careers with close to 3000 hits, which has traditionally meant certain inclusion in the Hall of Fame. As it happens, Rice was also rather unlucky insofar as he did not reach the majors until he was 25 and had his first full season at 27. Nonetheless he played in 20 seasons, like Baines, but he was an outstanding center fielder, as it turns out, and he had much more impact on his teams than Baines did. He had one superstar season (5.6 WAA in 1920, when he saved a remarkable 37 runs in center field.) He was over 3 WAA five more times (compared to once for Baines), and over 2 twice more. He was a star, although not the MVP, on the Washington Senators' pennant winning teams of 1924-5. He is one of the weaker outfielders in the Hall, but he was significantly better than Baines was. Max Carey had three superstar seasons of 4 WAA or more and three more seasons over 3 WAA (he too was an outstanding outfielder.) Zack Wheat had three seasons in which he topped 5 WAA, and four seasons over 3 WAA. Manush's two best seasons are better than Baines's two best (4.7 and 3.5 WAA), but Baines's record is better than his after that. Outfielders with much shorter careers whose status as Hall of Famers is questionable include Chick Hafey, Ross Youngs, Earl Averill, Chuck Klein, and Hack Wilson. Hafey is the only one of that group without a superstar season and he was definitely a less valuable player than Baines. Youngs had two seasons over 4 WAA and three more over 2; Averill topped 4 WAA just once, and 3 WAA three times (his fielding hurt him badly; and Klein had three superstar seasons. Wilson, another fielder, never topped 4 WAA for a season, even in 1930, when he hit 56 homers and drove in 191 runs but cost the Cubs -33 runs in the field. He was over 3 WAA four times, however. Combs is one of many players who were elected to the Hall of Fame thanks to their teammates. He had a relatively short career with the Yankees--12 years, including 3 with less than 100 games--and he topped 4 WAA only once, in 1927, with 6, thanks largely to by far his best season ever in the field. He had three star seasons, and thus, with the exception of that one big year, he was not as good as Harold Baines. One could therefore argue that Baines ranks above Lloyd Waner, Chick Hafey,and Heinie Manush among outfielders in the Hall, but that's about it.<br />
<br />
Baines is, I believe, the first selection to the Hall who spent the vast majority of his career as a DH. Two other similar candidates are Edgar Martinez, who is on the ballot this year, and David Ortiz, who is not yet eligible. Both are in a completely different league than Baines. Martinez had an outstanding 7 seasons with 5 WAA or more, making him statistically overqualified for the Hall (although his career path, as I mentioned in an earlier post, raises some questions), and Ortiz finished his career with 5 such seasons. Indeed, it is an interesting question as to why, in the high-offense era of the 1990s, several AL teams were willing to play Baines as their regular DH even though he was contributing only marginally to their success.<br />
<br />
3. Among the players on this year's ballot, Albert Belle had much better Hall of Fame credentials than Baines did. Belle played only 10 regular seasons but he performed at a superstar level in 4 of them. That is not enough, as we have seen, to give him a better than 50% chance of reaching the Hall, but Belle was the MVP on the Cleveland Indians' dynasty of the late 1990s for several years. Lee Smith was elected as a closer--but no closer, including Mariano Rivera, has ever had 4 WAA even once. They do not pitch enough to have that much impact.<br />
<br />
The old Veterans Committee was responsible for most of the worst selections to the Hall of Fame, and the new committees look like they will do just as badly. They have failed to elect the players that the BWAA unfortunately ignored despite ample credentials, such as Charlie Keller (whose great career was shortened by injury), Gil Hodges, and Keith Hernandez, while adding some players whose credentials are weak. They do not seem to be in the least interested in any modern sabermetric measurements. But in an era where rationality is under attack on many fronts, this is not surprising.<br />
<br />
<br />David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-76849656551492616292018-12-05T06:38:00.000-08:002018-12-07T14:38:14.205-08:00The Hall of Fame ballot for 2019In addition to the annual season update, below, it occurred to me that it would be interesting to use my methods to analyze the current Hall of Fame ballot based on my methods. A little introduction, or refresher for those who have read <i>Baseball Greatness,</i> is in order.<br />
<br />
As many will recall, I defined a superstar season as a season of at least 4 Wins Above Average as I compute it. That, I found empirically, is the measure of how good you have to be to get an affirmative answer to the question, "If this guy were the best player on your team, is it likely that you could win the pennant?" To identify the greatest players I focused on <i>how many times</i> individuals had exceeded that threshold.<br />
<br />
It turned out that both I and several generations of Hall of Fame voters have agreed, interestingly enough, that the key number, particularly for hitters, is 5 such seasons. Very few players with 6 or more such seasons are not in the Hall of Fame, and a number of those who are not are Gen Xers tainted by steroid accusations, led, of course, by Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens. The 29 players with exactly five such seasons include Phil Niekro, Cy Young (1901 and later), Stanley Covaleski, Rod Carew, Jim Thome, Dazzy Vance, Harry Heilmann, Goose Goslin, Charlie Gehringer, Joe Gordon, Jackie Robinson, Hal Newhouser, Joe Morgan, George Brett, Jim Rice, Tim Raines, Ryne Sandberg, Harry Hooper, and Tom Glavine--19 players who are in the Hall of Fame--and<br />
Charlie Keller, Gil Hodges, and Wes Ferrell,. who are not in. This list also includes some people on this year's ballot, as we shall see.<br />
<br />
On the other hand, 51 players have exactly 4 seasons of 4 WAA or more, and most of them are not in the Hall. The 17 of them who are in the Hall are Eddie Plank, Robin Roberts, Juan Marichal, Frank Chance, Rube Waddell, Frankie Frisch, Carl Hubbell, Luke Appling, Arky Vaughn, Robin Yount, Lou Boudreau, Bob Feller, Ralph Kiner, Duke Snider, Sandy Koufax, Tony Gwynn, and Kiki Cuyler. Long-time eligibles (or players who normally would have been eligible) in this category include Nap Rucker, Hippo Vaughn, Jack Fournier, Art Fletcher, Minnie Minoso, Ken Boyer, John Callison, Tony Oliva, Jose Cruz, Bobby Grich, Buddy Bell, Luis Tiant, Dave Parker, Willie Wilson, Jesse Barfield, Don Mattingly, and Brett Saberhagen, as well as a number of Gen Xers on this year's ballot. Hall of Fame voters pay far more attention to lifetime totals than they do to peak value, which I am focusing on, but in the aggregate it does seem that both methods tend to reach the same conclusions more often than not.<br />
<br />
OK. Now it's time to rank the candidates on this year's ballot by seasons of 4 WAA or more. Here are the people most mentioned as possible candidates on this year's ballot.<br />
<br />
Barry Bonds<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 17<br />
Roger Clemens<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>12<br />
Edgar Martinez<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>7<br />
Todd Helton<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 6<br />
Larry Walker<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 5<br />
Mike Mussina<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 5<br />
Curt Schilling<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 5<br />
Roy Halladay<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 5<br />
Sammy Sosa<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 5<br />
Jim Edmonds 5<br />
Andruh Jones<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 4<br />
Lance Berkman<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>4<br />
Manny Ramirez<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>4<br />
Gary Sheffield 4<br />
Scott Rolen<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 3<br />
Fred McGriff<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 3<br />
Andy Pettite<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 2<br />
Jeff Kent<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 2<br />
Roy Oswalt<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 1<br />
Miguel Tejada<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 1<br />
Mariano Rivera<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>0<br />
Omar Vizquel<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span> 0<br />
<br />
Barry Bonds' 17 seasons of 4 WAA or more ties him with Babe Ruth for top on the all time list, and Roger Clemens' 12 tops the list for pitchers. We all know why they are not yet in the Hall of Fame, and I am glad that I don't have to cast a vote on either of those two.<br />
<br />
Moving down the list, it's fair to say that based merely on raw performance, Edgar Martinez and Todd Helton are overqualified Hall of Famers. With respect to Martinez, however, there is, I think, a catch. Martinez did not become a regular until he was 27, which is very late for a great player, and he had his first superstar season (5.1 WAA) when he was 29. He slumped badly during the next two seasons, and then, starting in 1995 when he was 32, he had six seasons of 4 WAA or more in seven years. No other great player has ever had his superstar seasons so concentrated in his late thirties, raising legitimate questions, in my opinion, about how Martinez managed it.<br />
<br />
Moving down the list, we find that Mike Mussina, Roy Halladay, and Curt Schilling have 5 seasons each of 4 WAA or more, which is more than Sandy Koufax or Juan Marichal, and appears to make them overqualified selections. This however also raises a broader question about Gen X pitchers. No less than eight of them (Clemens, Randy Johnson, Pedro Martinez, Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, and those three) had at least 5 seasons of 4 WAA or more, and that is <i>way</i> above any other generation. One is really forced to the conclusion that many of them managed to sustain peak performance for so long with the help of PEDs--but of course, there is no way of knowing exactly how many, or which ones.<br />
<br />
Larry Walker, Jim Edmonds, and Sammy Sosa also have 5 seasons each of 4 WAA or more, which normally would qualify them for Cooperstown, although Sosa, for obvious reasons, is unlikely to make it. Edmonds was also something of a late bloomer. The example of Sosa, however, raises a critical point about evaluating Gen X players. They played in one of the highest-offense eras in history. Sammy Sosa hit 609 home runs to Frank Robinson's 586, but Robinson had 11 seasons of 4 WAA or more to Sosa's 5. Robinson was a much more dominant player who did much more to help his teams win pennants. We will run into this problem as we move down the list.<br />
<br />
Thus, despite their often impressive lifetime totals of home runs and base hits, based on peak value and the contribution these players made to helping their teams win pennants, there is no compelling reason, in my judgment, why Gary Sheffield, Manny Ramirez, Lance Berkman or Andruh Jones should be in the Hall of Fame. Each of them topped 4 WAA only four times and as we saw above, most of the players from the past who had four such seasons are not in. Their lifetime totals also allow for some interesting comparisons. Manny Ramirez had 555 career homers to Reggie Jackson's 563, but Jackson had 9 superstar seasons (4 WAA or more) while Ramirez had only 4. Gary Shefiield's 509 homers rank between Mel Ott (511) and Eddie Murray (504), but his 4 superstar seasons trail Murray's 7 and Ott's 12. Jeff Kent, despite his home run totals, is not remotely comparable in his impact to second basemen like Rod Carew or Joe Morgan or Ryne Sandberg.<br />
<br />
During the last half century we have invented a new stat, the save, and a new role, the closer. Both have caught the imagination of the press and the nation, and thus, we have concluded that lifetime leaders in saves and distinguished closers belong in the Hall of Fame. Now Mariano Rivera, as it happens, was the best reliever ever based upon WAA, with many seasons in the 2-3 range, but it is simply impossible for a closer to have the same impact on his team's fortunes as a great starting pitcher or hitter. Still, he is going in. As for Vizquel, it turns out that he, like Rey Ordonez, was very overrated as a shortstop--not bad, but nothing spectacular--according to Michael Humphreys' DRA, and other measures. <br />
<br />
I shall look forward to the voting and will analyze the Veterans' Committee ballot if I can get information about who is on it.<br />
<br />
Meanwhile, I would also like to alert readers to the appearance of my autobiography, <i>A Life in History. </i>It combines a detailed account of my education and career as an historian (and sabermetrician!) with a commentary on what has happened to higher education over the last half century. More information and a link to order it are available <a href="http://alifeinhistory.com/">here.</a><br />
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<br />David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-25253150703261920732018-10-29T08:59:00.001-07:002018-10-31T17:38:29.805-07:002018 Season UpdateThis is the first annual update of my book, <i>Baseball Greatness, The Best Players and Teams according to Wins Above Average, 1901-2018.</i> Each update will include a survey of the successful teams of the season just past, and a progress report on the careers of our greatest players.<br />
<br />
Under rookie manager Alex Cora, the Boston Red Sox improved by a full 15 games, from 93 wins to 108, for three different reasons. Their superb pitching staff was nearly as good as in 2017, earning +13 WAA compared to +15 in the previous year. Although injuries limited Chris Sale to only 158 innings, he still managed to finish at the top of AL pitchers with 4.7 WAA. David Price added 2.6, Eduardo Rodriguez and Rick Porcello combined for 3 WAA more, and Hector Velazquez, Steven Wright, and Craig Kimbrel all had more than 1. Their lineup improved substantially from -3 WAA to +9, although its positive value was almost completely concentrated among four players. Mookie Betts finished with 8.1 WAA, giving him a 5.6 average over the last three years, and easily topping the American League. Free agent signing J. D. Martinez contended for a triple crown and finished with 6.8 WAA, by far the best year of his life, even though he had just moved to a stronger league. Last but not least, Xander Bogaerts improved his defense all the way up to average and finished with an excellent 3.2 WAA, while 23-year old Andrew Benintendi added 1.8. With those four players accounting for 20 WAA, however, the rest of the lineup cost the team -11 WAA. The biggest culprits were infielder Eduardo Nunez, disastrous at bat and in the field with -3.2 WAA; catchers Sandy Leon, Christian Vazquez, and Blake Swihart, who combined for -4.7 WAA; and utility man Brock Holt, -1.2 WAA in 109 games. Center fielder Jackie Bradley Jr. had an average year in the field and hit poorly, costing the team -0.9 WAA overall. First baseman Mitch Moreland and 21-year old third baseman Rafael Devers--who had a fine year in the field--were average. Last but hardly least, the team benefited from 5 games of Pythagorean luck. The Red Sox marched triumphantly through the post season, losing one game each to the Yankees in the ALDS, the Astros in the ALCS, and the Dodgers in the World Series. Jackie Bradley Jr. had three critical hits against the Astros, but manager Alex Cora held him out of two games in the World Series and fielded the team's strongest outfield of Benintendi in left, Betts in center, and Martinez in right.<br />
<b></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
The Houston Astros failed to equal or surpass Boston's record because they fell 6 games of bad luck behind their projected percentage and finished with 103 victories--a superior pennant winner--instead of 109. Although their hitting fell of badly from 2017, their fielding and pitching were much stronger, and their lineup earned +16 WAA while their pitching staff brought home another +12. Third baseman Alex Bregman, with 5.6 WAA, led the team, with center fielder George Springer (2.8) and 2017 MVP Jose Altuve (2 WAA, in part because of below average fielding), right behind. Josh Reddick, Carlos Correa (who missed about 1/3 of the season), and Marwin Gonzalez were average. On the mound, 35-year old Justin Verlander, acquired late in the 2017 season, earned a remarkable 3.8 WAA in 214 innings, and starters Gerrit Cole (3.1) and Charlie Morton (1.8) also performed well. Bad luck and an outstanding Red Sox peformance took them out of the playoffs in the second round, after they had made short work of the Indians in the first.<br />
<br />
The Yankees won 100 games with one game's worth of luck. That looked very similar to their performance in 2017 when they won only 90 games while projecting to win 100, but the team changed. Injuries plagued their lineup, which fell from +12 WAA to just +4. Their fielders, led by terrible performances from third baseman Miguel Andujar (-25 runs), center fielder Aaron Hicks (-18), outfielder/DH Giancarlo Stanton (-10 in limited outfield duty), and catcher Gary Sanchez (-12), dropped all the way from +3 WAA to -4. An injured Aaron Judge fell to 3.2 WAA in 112 games, remaining the team's best player, and Stanton earned only 1.2 WAA despite hitting 38 home runs. No other player reached star status, and Sanchez cost the team -2.2 WAA. Their pitchers on the other hand tied with Boston and Cleveland for the league's best with +13 WAA. This was a team effort: Luis Severino led the team with 3 WAA, six other pitchers had between 1 and 2, and only one pitcher was marginally below average. The Yankees could certainly challenge the Red Sox in 2019 if they remain healthier.<br />
<br />
After three sub-.500 years, Billy Beane's Oakland Athletics improved by 22 wins to finish with 97 and a wild card spot. They combined very poor pitching (-5 WAA) with the league's best lineup, earning +9 in the field and +11 at bat. One quarter of that value--5.7 WAA--came from one player, third baseman Mark Chapman, whose value was evenly divided between his hitting contribution and his remarkable +28 runs saved in the field. The lineup had four other stars: Marcus Siemen, the shortstop, with 2.9 WAA; DH Khris Davis, whose poor on-base percentage limited him to 3 WAA despite a league-leading 48 home runs; second basemen Jed Lowrie with 2.2 WAA, and first baseman Matt Olson with 2.2. Center fielder Mark Canha, a very versatile player, and left fielder Chad Pinder combined for 2.9 WAA , and catcher Jonathan Lucroy made up for terrible hitting with outstanding defense. Most of these players were in their mid to late twenties, suggesting that Beane might once again field a contending team for several years to come. This year, they lost to the Yankees in the wild card game.<br />
<br />
For the second year in a row the Cleveland Indians won their division thanks to a remarkable pitching staff. While its +13 WAA were only a little more than half of the hurlers' truly extraordinary performance in 2017, it accounted for most of the team's positive value, which projected to win 98 games rather than the 91 they actually recorded. Starters Trevor Bauer and Corey Kluber just missed superstar status with 3.9 WAA apiece and Mike Clevenger and Carlos Carrasco added 5.5 between them. Among the lineup, only shortstop Francisco Lindor, (3.7 WAA), third baseman Jose Ramirez (also 3.7), and outfielder Michael Brantley (1.6) had any positive value at all.<br />
<br />
<b>The National League</b><br />
<br />
<br />
Fresh off of a superb 104-win 2017 season, the Los Angeles Dodgers
survived the loss of their outstanding young shortstop Corey Seager for
nearly the entire season and -10 games worth of bad Pythagorean luck to
edge out the very fortunate Colorado Rockies for the NL West division
championship with just 92 wins. Although their defense cost them -4
WAA, outstanding hitting still left their lineup with +10 WAA. Third
baseman Justin Turner was the team's MVP with a remarkable 4.4 WAA in
just 103 games, including a superb +16 runs saved at third base, while
all-purpose infielder Max Muncy added 3.4 WAA in 137 games and young
center fielder Cody Bellinger turned in 1.4 more. The team apparently
benefited from several games worth of run luck, as well, and several
players, including outfielders Enrique Hernandez and Yasel Puig, hit
well but lost much of their value in the field. The pitchers turned in
another strong year with +10 WAA, with starters Kershaw, Walker Buehler,
Ross Stripling and Huyn-Jin Ryu earning from 2.9 to 1.9 WAA each. Reaching the World Series for the second straight season, they lost to the Red Sox in just five wild games.<br />
<i><br /></i>
Although the Milwaukee Brewers' Pythagorean projection trailed the
Dodgers by 10 games, they finished with the league's best record,96-67,
thanks to 4 games worth of luck. Their lineup contributed +6 WAA, +2 of
them in the field, and their pitches just +3. The lineup's three
major assets were right fielder Christian Yelich, who joined the team
after years as a star in Miami and earned 5.9 WAA, easily the league
MVP, at age 26; center fielder Lorenzo Cain, signed as a free agent, who
earned 3.1; and first baseman Jesus Aguilar, who earned 2.5. One-time
MVP Ryan Braun was now average, but with several below-average players
in the lineup, the Brewers could easily improve. On the mound, two
slightly above-average starters, Jhoulys Chacin and Wade Miley, and
relievers Jeremy Jeffress and Josh Hader were their only superior
pitchers. They did well to force the Dodgers to a seventh game in the
NLCS before bowing.<br />
<br />
The Brewers edged out the Cubs for
first place in an extra game. Despite excellent fielding, the Cubs'
lineup continued its decline from +22 WAA in 2016 to +13 WAA in 2017, to
+11 this year, +6 of it in the field. Two extraordinarily versatile
players, Javier Baez and Ben Zobrist, led the lineup with 3.5 and 2.3
WAA, followed by Anthony Rizzo with 2.1 and Kris Bryant, who missed more
than 1/3 of the season with 1.3. Jason Heyward was only average thanks
to his fielding, and shortstop Anthony Rizzo cost the team -1.1 WAA.
Starting pitchers Kyle Hendricks, Jon Lester and late-season pickup Cole
Hamels earned about 1 WAA each, but the staff overall had just +1 WAA.
The Cubs lost the wild card game to the very fortunate Colorado
Rockies, who won 91 games with the help of 6 full games of Pythagorean
luck.<br />
<br />
The 90-72 Atlanta Braves were the weakest of the
four division winners, with a +8 lineup and +4 pitching staff. The
lineup featured superstar first baseman Freddie Freeman (4.2 WAA) and
stars outfielder Ronald Acuna (2.3) and very promising second baseman
Ozzie Albies (2.2). Every other member of the lineup was at least
average. With the exception of ace Mike Foltynewicz (2.3 WAA) and
starter Annibal Sanchez (1.8), every pitcher on the Braves' staff was
average. They won one game against the Dodgers in the NLCS<br />
<br />
<b>General Observations and Great Player Updates</b><br />
<br />
The general shortage of superstar performances continued, as the two leagues had a total of only 16--a little more than one for every two teams--compared to 18 in 2017 Mookie Betts comfortably bested Mike Trout as the AL MVP with a remarkable 8.1 WAA, the highest total since Albert Pujols in 2004 and thus the best single season by a member of the Millennial generation. Among the pitchers, Chris Sale and Blake Snell of Tampa Bay posted identical 4.7 WAA seasons, the only superstar performances by AL moundsmen. The two most valuable NL players were pitchers Jacob de Grom of the Mets (6.6 WAA) and Aaron Nola of the Phillies (6.0), while Christian Yelich topped league hitters with 5.9. Only the Red Sox, with Betts, Martinez and Sale, had more than one superstar.<br />
<br />
Generation X did not come close to adding another superstar performance in 2018, suggesting that David Ortiz's 4.2 WAA in 2016 marked the close of their era of greatness. Older Millennials such as Josh Donaldson, Miguel Cabrera, and Joey Votto also fell far below that level, although Cabrera and Votto have already done more than enough to secure a plaque in Cooperstown. Robinson Cano's career took an untoward turn when he failed a drug test and was suspended for a good deal of the season. Mike Trout's 6.5 WAA gave him 7 consecutive superstar seasons, one shy of Ted Williams' record of 8 such seasons in his first 8 years. He is still only 26 and looks a very good bet to reach double digits. And Max Scherzer's 5.4 WAA tied him with Clayton Kershaw for five superstar seasons, nearly ensuring that he, too, will wind up in Cooperstown. Mookie Betts's remarkable season was only his second over 4 WAA but he will be only 26 next year and looks headed for a Hall of Fame Career. <br />
<br />
Here is the current table of Millennials of 4 or more seasons of 4 WAA:<br />
<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="border-collapse: collapse; mso-yfti-tbllook: 1056; width: 960px;"><colgroup><col span="3" style="mso-width-source: userset; width: 192pt;" width="320"></col></colgroup><tbody>
<tr height="49" style="height: 29.2pt; mso-height-source: userset;"><td class="oa1" height="49" style="height: 29.2pt; width: 192pt;" width="320"></td><td class="oa1" style="width: 192pt;" width="320"></td><td class="oa1" style="width: 192pt;" width="320"><table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="border-collapse: collapse; mso-yfti-tbllook: 1056; width: 960px;">
<colgroup><col span="3" style="mso-width-source: userset; width: 192pt;" width="320"></col>
</colgroup><tbody>
<tr height="49" style="height: 29.2pt; mso-height-source: userset;">
<td class="oa1" height="49" style="height: 29.2pt; width: 192pt;" width="320">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Player</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa1" style="width: 192pt;" width="320">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Seasons over 4 WAA</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa1" style="width: 192pt;" width="320">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Best Season,</span></div>
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> WAA</span></span></div>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody></table>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<br />
<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="border-collapse: collapse; mso-yfti-tbllook: 1536; width: 870px;">
<colgroup><col style="mso-width-source: userset; width: 206pt;" width="344"></col>
<col style="mso-width-source: userset; width: 147pt;" width="245"></col>
<col style="mso-width-source: userset; width: 169pt;" width="281"></col>
</colgroup><tbody>
<tr height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; mso-height-source: userset;">
<td class="oa1" height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; width: 206pt;" width="344">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Miguel<span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> Cabrera</span></span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 147pt;" width="245">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">7</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 169pt;" width="281">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">5.5(2013)</span></div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; mso-height-source: userset;">
<td class="oa1" height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; width: 206pt;" width="344">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Joey Votto</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 147pt;" width="245">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">7</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 169pt;" width="281">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">6.1(2011)</span></div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; mso-height-source: userset;">
<td class="oa1" height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; width: 206pt;" width="344">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Mike Trout</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 147pt;" width="245">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">7</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 169pt;" width="281">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">7.5(2012)</span></div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; mso-height-source: userset;">
<td class="oa1" height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; width: 206pt;" width="344">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Paul<span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> Goldschmidt</span></span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 147pt;" width="245">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">4</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 169pt;" width="281">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">6.8(2013)</span></div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; mso-height-source: userset;">
<td class="oa1" height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; width: 206pt;" width="344">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Shin-Soo<span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> Choo</span></span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 147pt;" width="245">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">4</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 169pt;" width="281">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">5.3(2015)</span></div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; mso-height-source: userset;">
<td class="oa1" height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; width: 206pt;" width="344">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Josh Donaldson</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 147pt;" width="245">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">4</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 169pt;" width="281">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">5.7(2015)</span></div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; mso-height-source: userset;">
<td class="oa1" height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; width: 206pt;" width="344">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Robinson Cano</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 147pt;" width="245">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">4</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 169pt;" width="281">
<div style="direction: ltr; language: en-US; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; mso-line-break-override: none; punctuation-wrap: hanging; text-align: center; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">5.6(2014)</span></div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; mso-height-source: userset;">
<td class="oa1" height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; width: 206pt;" width="344">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Clayton Kershaw</span></div>
</td>
<td class="oa2" style="width: 147pt;" width="245">
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<span style="font-size: large;">5</span></div>
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<td class="oa2" style="width: 169pt;" width="281">
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<span style="font-size: large;">5.6(2014)</span></div>
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<td class="oa1" height="46" style="height: 27.75pt; width: 206pt;" width="344">
<div style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-top: 0pt; unicode-bidi: embed; vertical-align: bottom; word-break: normal;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Max<span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> Scherzer</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">5</span></div>
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<td class="oa2" style="width: 169pt;" width="281">
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<span style="font-size: large;">5.4(2018)</span></div>
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See you next year! Comments welcome.<br />
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<b><br /></b>David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-18899421121925377392018-06-01T18:37:00.004-07:002018-06-01T18:37:51.808-07:00A new review<a href="https://fartheroffthewall.com/2018/04/21/day-21-of-30-baseball-book-reviews-for-2018-when-waa-wins-out-over-war-its-a-win-win-for-everyone-and-the-stats-appear-to-bear-that-out/">This excellent review</a> of <i>Baseball Greatness</i> was written by a Los Angeles blogger.David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8699407593613203829.post-22652858624737838702018-03-26T09:56:00.002-07:002018-03-26T09:56:29.190-07:00Podcast interviewTo listen to my podcast interview with Justin McGuire of <i>Baseball by the Book</i>, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/baseballbookpodcast/photos/a.632889600251669.1073741828.632138970326732/828384727368821/?type=3&theater">click here</a>. Be sure to click "show more" to see all options for accessing the podcast. Enjoy!<br />
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David Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05020082243968071584noreply@blogger.com0