Big Apple, Small WAR Numbers

A Wins Above Replacement (WAR) number of 8.2 or more is an excellent season number — that’s an MVP-level season performance.  But it’s not exactly rare.  From 1962 on, the Baseball-Reference Play Index shows 91 seasons by position players that rose to the 8.2 or more WAR level.  On average, that’s about two a year, and with two leagues picking MVPs — well, you can see why I described the 8.2 or over level as MVP-type performance.

OK, now how many of those 91 position player seasons of 8.2 WAR over the 1962-2012 period do you suppose have been produced by a position player for a New York City team?  Would you believe there have been only three such player-seasons?  In 1985, Rickey Henderson in his first year with the Yankees, at age 26, put together an awesome 9.8 WAR year (that was no fluke, as Rickey had another 9.8 WAR year, and grabbed the MVP award, with the A’s in 1990). And A-Rod has produced two seasons over 9 WAR for the Yankees: 2005 and 2007.  But that’s it.  Other than those three player-seasons, no Yankee position player from 1962 on has produced more WAR in a season than 7.8, achieved by Robinson Cano in 2010, Derek Jeter in 1999 and Bobby Murcer in 1972.

And then there are the Mets, whose top WAR position-player seasons ever are David Wright’s 8.1 in 2007, Carlos Beltran’s 8.0 in 2006 and Bernard Gilkey’s flukey 7.8 in 1996.  No other Met position player has topped 7.3 WAR in a season.  It is thus not surprising that no Met position-player has ever led the NL in WAR (baseball-reference version) in any season, which happens to be a timely fact because as of now, with a month left in the season, David Wright is actually leading the NL in b-ref WAR, having nudged ahead of the slumping Andrew McCutchen (.588 OPS in McCutchen’s last 21 games).

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pcg
pcg
11 years ago

How do the other 88 8.2+ WAR seasons since 1962 break down by market? Is it significant, or merely curious, that NY has just 3 of them? Or is it more significant simply because the NY teams are at/near the top of spending year after year and produce only 1/30th of the 8.2+ WAR seasons?

Brooklyn Mick
Brooklyn Mick
11 years ago

As I suspected, the number of players on New York teams isn’t realy all that unusual when viewed in a larger context. After looking at all franchises within the parameters of the search, I see that no team has more than 4 players with 8.2+ single season WAR, while 6 teams haven’t had a single player post an 8.2 WAR season. While a few surprises made the list (and a few surprises that didn’t), the most intersesting thing to me is that only 3 players accomplished an 8.2+ with multiple teams, they being Bonds (Pirates, Giants), Henderson (Yankees, Athletics), and… Read more »

Brooklyn Mick
Brooklyn Mick
11 years ago
Reply to  Brooklyn Mick

I *really* hate when I make typos!

Hartvig
Hartvig
11 years ago
Reply to  Brooklyn Mick

Two names that I was a little surprised not to see mentioned played together in high school

One was Daryl Strawberry. He was never really even close- maxing out at 6.1- partly because he never played much more than 150 games in a season, partly because of his defense and presumably partly because of drugs.

The other was Eric Davis in his incredible 1987 season where he hit 37 home runs, stole 50 bases, scored 120 runs and drove in 100. His WAR was “only” 7.7 because he managed to do all that in less than 130 games.

Voomo Zanzibar
Voomo Zanzibar
11 years ago
Reply to  Hartvig
RJ
RJ
11 years ago
Reply to  Brooklyn Mick

Neither Torre nor McGwire had 8.2+ WAR seasons with St Louis. They maxed out at 5.6 and 7.2 respectively due to horrible defense. The oWAR for those seasons did exceed 8.2.

Brooklyn Mick
Brooklyn Mick
11 years ago
Reply to  RJ

You’re absolutely correct RJ. I don’t know how/why I put them on the list.

Brooklyn Mick
Brooklyn Mick
11 years ago
Reply to  RJ

Also, Cash’s 8.9 WAR season with Detroit was in 1961, so the Tigers haven’t had a single position player with 8.2+ WAR since 1962.

Brooklyn Mick
Brooklyn Mick
11 years ago
Reply to  RJ

I missed Frank Robinson’s 1962 season of 8.4 WAR with the Reds. The Reds have (5) players with 8.2+ WAR seasons since 1962.

AlbaNate
AlbaNate
11 years ago

Didn’t Wright lead the NL position players in b-WAR in 2007 under its former configuration?

AlbaNate
AlbaNate
11 years ago

It looks like most of these high WAR seasons were produced by home-grown talent in their younger years. Not too many players produce such high WAR numbers after they enter free agency, which perhaps helps explain why a team as successful as the Yankees wouldn’t have more of these high WAR players.

Hank G.
Hank G.
11 years ago

If you go back another 10 years, you could add another 10 ≥ 8.2 WAR seasons from New York (5 for Mantle, 2 for Mays, 3 for Snider).

Voomo Zanzibar
Voomo Zanzibar
11 years ago

If you limit it to oWar

(which takes out the dWar stat that I’m arguing we’ve got to consider a work in progress)

the only players to achieve 8.2+ since 1990 who have not been linked to performance enhancing drugs (either confirmed or just libeled) are

9.0 1991 Ripken
8.8 1999 Jeter
8.7 1997 Larry Walker
8.3 2011 Kemp
8.3 2003 Pujols
8.2 1990 Rickey

Bonds 7 times
ARod 6 times
Sosa, McGwire, Piazza, Giambi each once.

I’m not trying to start a PED thread – just thought it would be an interesting sidenote…

MikeD
MikeD
11 years ago
Reply to  Voomo Zanzibar

How is Piazza linked to PEDs, but Pujols not?

Mike L
Mike L
11 years ago

The 1998 Yankees, who won 125 games, had no players with WAR at 8.2, but did have four players (Jeter, O’Neill, Bernie, and Brosius) between 5 and 7.5 They had an aggregate of 56 WAR, which would have projected to 108 wins. Their pythag was also 108 wins. I might make a slightly different argument about the Yankees than just that they are buying players right after their youthful peak. It’s also that they can afford to somewhat overpay for solid players who can contribute. On top of their big four, the 1998 Yankees had four other position players between… Read more »

Howard
Howard
11 years ago

The Yankees pythagorean win total you reference does not include the post-season so the actual win total should not either. For the regular season the Yankees won 114 games.

Jason Z
11 years ago

On Wednesday August 26, 1998 the Yankees lost their
fourth game in a row to fall to 94-36.

This was the longest losing streak of that season.

Eight different times that year the Yankees won
five games in a row or more.

Those eight winning streaks accounted for 62
of their 114 wins.