Alvin Dark, a star shortstop and a World Champion as player and manager, died Thursday. Obituaries ran in the S.F. Chronicle, the San Jose Mercury News, the N.Y. Times, and many others. Here is a stats-centric look at his baseball career.

Al Dark played 1,828 major-league games and amassed 43.1 Wins Above Replacement (WAR), or 3.82 WAR per 162 games. Not quite 200 retired modern players have both 40+ WAR and a rate per game as high as Dark’s. About half of those are in the Hall of Fame, with about a dozen more still on the ballot and another dozen yet to be considered. Players with very similar WAR totals and rates include:

• Rocky Colavito, 44.6 WAR, 3.92 per 162 G
• Ben Chapman, 41.3 WAR, 3.90 per 162 G
• Jimmy Sheckard, 42.1 WAR, 3.85 per 162 G
• Curt Flood, 41.7 WAR, 3.84 per 162 G
• Don Mattingly, 42.2 WAR, 3.83 per 162 G

(All stats herein built on data from Baseball-Reference.com.)

None of them is in the Hall of Fame.

Perhaps the most comparable shortstop in value was Phil Rizzuto (40.6 WAR, 3.96 per 162 G), elected by the Veterans Committee. Joining the Jints in 1950, Dark never quite reached the public stature of The Scooter or Pee Wee Reese, that might have made for a “Willie, Mickey or the Duke?”-type debate over shortstops in the Golden Age of NYC baseball. On defense, he was solid, not gifted; hard hitting was his calling card. But in the five years that all three were regulars in that market, 1950-54 — which, of course, excludes some peak years of all three, and catches the two HOFers in their later years — Dark rates a slight WAR lead among all shortstops:

Expanding the timeframe to 1946-57 — post-War, pre-exodus — takes in two years that Dark missed on the front end, and three that Rizzuto mostly missed on the back end. It also finds a generational transition, with just 11 shortstops logging 3,000 PAs (compared to 16 in the dozen pre-War years):

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With the 1948 Braves, Dark won the second Rookie of the Year Award, the last one covering both leagues, and ran a strong third in that MVP vote — just as he’d done the year before, his lone year in the minors. He hit .322 with 48 extra-base hits, ranking 2nd and 3rd among that year’s shortstops. It was a big lift over the three-headed SS monster that hit .241 with 22 XBH for Boston in ’47, and a big piece of their first pennant since 1914. Dark went just 4 for 24 as the Braves lost the World Series to Cleveland in six games, but he was over .400 in two Series trips with the Giants, for an overall .323 average in 16 Series games.

After 1949, Dark was dealt to New York along with Eddie Stanky, in a rare trade of a whole keystone combo. The Giants sent slugging outfielders Sid Gordon and Willard Marshall in that deal, clearing the way for an upcoming group of pasture-minders that would include Willie Mays. Dark, named team captain late in his first Giants season, would be linked with Mays throughout much of their baseball careers. Willie remembered him fondly: “It’s a sad day for me with all the help he gave me. He was such a mentor to me. A very nice man.”

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From 1920-60, only five shortstops had more team wins and a better percentage in their starts at short: The HOFers Rizzuto, Reese and Joe Cronin, and two dynasty stalwarts:

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Dark was the fourth shortstop to hit at least 14 HRs five times, after Cronin, Stephens and Joost. Before Cal Ripken came along in the ’80s, that club would admit just one more member, Ernie Banks.

He became a power hitter by exploiting the short foul lines in the Polo Grounds. Over his first two years, with the Braves, Dark batted .299, but with just 6 homers. In six full years in New York, he averaged 16 HRs, and led all Giants in Polo Grounds HRs, RBI (!), doubles, and extra-base hits. In those years, Dark hit 73 HRs at home, 23 away — the biggest homeward tilt of the 40 MLB men with at least 40 HRs. Here are the nine Giants regulars for 1950-55, ranked by greatest net OPS between home (H) and away (A); team leaders in bold:

The Polo Grounds wasn’t a great hitter’s park, overall. The 1950-55 Giants scored about 5% more runs per game at home, just below the NL average. To see how the park effects varied, note that Monte Irvin — a right-hander, like Dark — had a large deficit in home production over those same years. Irvin’s .916 road OPS ranked 6th out of 131 players with 1,500 PAs in that time, but his -.087 home net was 7th-worst.

But it was the right park for Alvin Dark. In his last five seasons, away from New York, he totaled just 24 HRs.

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In 1961, Dark stepped right off the playing field to manage the Giants. A better opportunity could hardly be dreamt: Besides the game’s most consistent great player in Mays, the Giants had young talent in spades and a brand-new park, but they hadn’t won yet. They went 85-69 in Dark’s debut, their best mark since 1954, then won the ’62 pennant with a 9th-inning rally in the third playoff game. They lost that Series — the only one in their first 44 years in San Francisco — on a 1-0 nail-biter in Game 7. Dark did not repeat in ’63, despite fielding four prime Hall of Famers (over 30 WAR combined from Mays, Marichal, McCovey and Cepeda), nor in ’64, despite the emergence of a fifth in Gaylord Perry and the usual Mays epic. The Giants led that race a week after the All-Star Break, but went .500 thereafter to finish 3 games back. A racist quote was attributed to Dark that summer (matching his reputation among some he managed), and he was fired at year’s end. Dark claimed the remark was quoted out of context, but he would later apologize personally to the black and (especially) Hispanic Giants who felt offended.

In 1966, Dark signed on as Charlie Finley’s latest skipper/scapegoat, lasting a season and two-thirds — the longest consecutive tenure by a 1960s A’s manager. A stint with Cleveland began well — 86-75, a mark they wouldn’t match in the next quarter-century — but went downhill fast.

Dark returned to the A’s in ’74, after Dick Williams concluded that even two straight champagne showers weren’t worth suffering Finley’s foibles. Dark completed their “three-peat” with a cast of veteran stars, and oversaw their fifth straight division crown in 1975, a streak unmatched until either 1996 or ’99, depending on your view of the ’94 strike year. But Boston upset the A’s in a playoff sweep, and Finley’s broom followed close behind. Dark, an outspoken Baptist, helped seal his fate with remarks on his boss’s moral fiber, telling his congregation: “He has accomplished things, and I give him credit on building up the ball club. But to God, Charlie Finley is just a very little bitty thing that’s lost, and if he doesn’t accept Jesus Christ as his personal savior he’s going to Hell.” (Green & Launius, Charlie Finley: The Outrageous Story of Baseball’s Super Showman.)

Dark’s last tilt at the wheel came as caretaker of the 1977 Padres, after John McNamara was dismissed. That team logged one of the worst pitching performances of modern times, with an 80 ERA+. Even the 1930 Phillies, infamous yielders of 7.8 runs per game, came in at 82. Only four teams since those ’77 Pads have fared as poorly in ERA+: the ’96 Tigers (80, 53-109), the ’97 Padres (79), the fire-sale ’98 Marlins (78, 54-108) and the 2005 Royals (80, 56-106). Dark’s last firing left him six wins shy of one thousand as a manager (994-954). He stands 62nd in career wins, but only 40 have more wins and a better percentage.

Given Dark’s playing career, it’s a little ironic that he never managed a middle infielder who hit over .290 or more than 10 HRs in a season. His 26 regulars at SS and 2B averaged 4 HRs, a .249 BA and 79 OPS+, along with 1.3 WAR and -0.8 Wins Above Average. Keystone play was among the few flaws on the 1961-64 Giants, where SS Jose Pagan, 2B Chuck Hiller and others averaged a 73 OPS+, 1.1 WAR and -1.1 WAA. It was an era of low-offense midfielders, but these were worse than most. Dark’s only charges who mustered a 100 OPS+ were SS Bert Campaneris (112 in ’74) and 2B John Donaldson (106 as a semi-regular for the ’67 KC A’s).

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In Dark’s 10 full years with the Giants, as player or manager, they won three pennants. Their other 41 seasons from 1938-88 produced no pennants.

In 1954, their only world title in a 76-year stretch (1934-2009), Dark hit in all four games of the sweep (7-17), including three hits and two runs in the 7-4 clincher. On the last day of the ’51 schedule, he had three hits with a double, a steal, and the deciding run in a 3-2 win that forced the playoff with Brooklyn. In that playoff finale, Dark’s leadoff hit in the 9th began the rally from 4-1 down.

In ’53, Dark had 126 runs, 23 HRs, 70 extra-base hits, and 316 total bases. The first remains a Giants SS record, while the others were topped in 2001 by Rich Aurilia.

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Dark’s Hall of Fame teammates (as a player) include Warren Spahn and Billy Herman in his first Braves tenure; Willie Mays and Hoyt Wilhelm with the Giants; Stan Musial with the Cardinals (also Wilhelm again); Ernie Banks and Billy Williams with the Cubs; Robin Roberts with the Phillies; and Spahn, Hank Aaron, Eddie Mathews and Red Schoendienst (for whom he was once traded) in his final tour with the Braves.

Dark’s passing leaves only two men alive from the ’48 Braves and from the ’51 Giants.

• The Braves are Clint Conatser, then a part-time rookie outfielder, now age 93; and Johnny Antonelli, now 84, then an 18-year-old bonus baby who got into four games, and later re-teamed with Dark on the ’54 Giants, winning the ERA crown.
• The Giants are Willie Mays, now 83; and Monte Irvin, 95 years young, one of 18 living players born before Babe Ruth left the Red Sox.
• The other surviving participants of the ’51 playoff finale are Dodgers pitchers Don Newcombe and Ralph Branca, both 88.

My late father, another Al, reminds me that Dark was a three-sport star at (now) Louisiana-Lafayette and at LSU while Dad was growing up on the bayou. Pro football wanted him, but he chose baseball and never looked back. “Baseball was my business and my life. I gave it all I had,” Dark once told the SF Chronicle. “I feel very fortunate. And very happy. God blessed me.”

Rest in peace.