This post is for voting and discussion in the 83nd round of balloting for the Circle of Greats (COG). This round adds to the list of candidates eligible to receive your votes those players born in 1906. Rules and lists are after the jump.
The new group of 1906-born players, in order to join the eligible list, must, as usual, have played at least 10 seasons in the major leagues or generated at least 20 Wins Above Replacement (“WAR”, as calculated by baseball-reference.com, and for this purpose meaning 20 total WAR for everyday players and 20 pitching WAR for pitchers). This new group of 1906-born candidates joins the eligible holdovers from previous rounds to comprise the full list of players eligible to appear on your ballots.
Each submitted ballot, if it is to be counted, must include three and only three eligible players. As always, the one player who appears on the most ballots cast in the round is inducted into the Circle of Greats. Players who fail to win induction but appear on half or more of the ballots that are cast win four added future rounds of ballot eligibility. Players who appear on 25% or more of the ballots cast, but less than 50%, earn two added future rounds of ballot eligibility. Any other player in the top 9 (including ties) in ballot appearances, or who appears on at least 10% of the ballots, wins one additional round of ballot eligibility.
All voting for this round closes at 11:59 PM EST Wednesday, January 28, while changes to previously cast ballots are allowed until 11:59 PM EST Monday January 26.
If you’d like to follow the vote tally, and/or check to make sure I’ve recorded your vote correctly, you can see my ballot-counting spreadsheet for this round here: COG 1906 Vote Tally . I’ll be updating the spreadsheet periodically with the latest votes. Initially, there is a row in the spreadsheet for every voter who has cast a ballot in any of the past rounds, but new voters are entirely welcome — new voters will be added to the spreadsheet as their ballots are submitted. Also initially, there is a column for each of the holdover candidates; additional player columns from the new born-in-1906 group will be added to the spreadsheet as votes are cast for them.
Choose your three players from the lists below of eligible players. The eighteen current holdovers are listed in order of the number of future rounds (including this one) through which they are assured eligibility, and alphabetically when the future eligibility number is the same. The 1906 birth-year guys are listed below in order of the number of seasons each played in the majors, and alphabetically among players with the same number of seasons played.
Holdovers:
Harmon Killebrew (eligibility guaranteed for 9 rounds)
Roberto Alomar (eligibility guaranteed for 5 rounds)
Luke Appling (eligibility guaranteed for 4 rounds)
Eddie Murray (eligibility guaranteed for 3 rounds)
Kevin Brown (eligibility guaranteed for 2 rounds)
Roy Campanella (eligibility guaranteed for 2 rounds)
Dennis Eckersley (eligibility guaranteed for 2 rounds)
Rick Reuschel (eligibility guaranteed for 2 rounds)
Luis Tiant (eligibility guaranteed for 2 rounds)
Richie Ashburn (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)
David Cone (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)
Don Drysdale (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)
Jim Edmonds (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)
Dwight Evans (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)
Wes Ferrell (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)
Minnie Minoso (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)
Graig Nettles (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)
Dave Winfield (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)
Everyday Players (born in 1906, ten or more seasons played in the major leagues or at least 20 WAR):
Joe Cronin
Joe Kuhel
Lloyd Waner
Jackie Hayes
Shanty Hogan
Woody English
Lyn Lary
Gus Suhr
Randy Moore
Rip Radcliff
Pitchers (born in 1906, ten or more seasons played in the major leagues or at least 20 WAR):
Si Johnson
Tommy Bridges
Willis Hudlin
Thornton Lee
Dick Coffman
Paul Derringer
Hank Johnson
Art Herring
As part of my blatant over the top campaign for Nettles, I am now willing to trade votes. You vote for mine, I’ll vote for yours.
He probably has more WAR than whoever you’re planning on voting for. Check it out. 68 WAR total over his career. More than all but a few players on this list.
During the 70’s, he was fourth in WAR for the decade (more than his Yankee teammate Reggie Jackson, btw), second in dWAR (ahead of B. Robinson, BTW–Belanger was first), and sixth in HR.
390 career HRs–only a few 3B ahead of him.
For those of you critical of his batting average: In the 1970’s not a lot of players hit home runs and for average. In the 70’s, Nettles and Mike Schmidt had .254 and .255 BA’s. Bet most of you are surprised it’s only .001 difference, eh?
More: He was the ONLY player in the 70’s to have both >30 oWAR and >20 dWar.
In the history of the game, only THREE 3B players have over 50 oWAR and 20 dWAR. Nettles is one of them.
2nd all time in 3B assists and double plays. 6th in total zone runs.
If you are old enough to remember his defensive play in the WS in the 70’s, you’ll remember shaking your head and exclaiming “wow” in disbelief at the plays he made.
Enough for now.
Just vote for Nettles. 🙂
Nettles, Buddy Bell, Sal Bando and Ken Boyer are all third basemen from the 1960s to 1980s who racked up career WAR between 60 and 70 and none of whom, I think it’s fair to say, were really widely thought of as quite up to the level of HOF-likely in their playing days. This has long led me to wonder who had or has it wrong — writers and fans of that era as they evaluated the third basemen of their time, or the current WAR calculations for the third basemen of that period?
All great players you listed, no doubt–but neither Bell, Boyer, nor Bando had anywhere close to 390 HRs.
At the time he retired, 1988, 390 HRs was 24th all time–a number which has since made made somewhat diminished by the use of PEDs. I think everybody in that pre-1988 top 25 list is in the HOF, but for Nettles and Kingmen.
By the way, those HRs also put him at number four all time for players with more than 80% of their games at 3B, behind only Schmidt, Matthews, and Beltre.
It’s kind of an odd 390 homers, though. Of the 137 guys in MLB history with at least 300 homers, Nettles has the very lowest SLG at .421, and the second-lowest OPS at .750 (ahead of only Gary Gaetti, who had 360 homers and a .741 OPS). Nettles does a little better with OPS+, where he has the ninth lowest OPS+ number of the 137 guys with 300 homers or more (he’s also 9th lowest among the 86 guys with between 300 and 400 homers).
I’m not necessarily disagreeing with the idea that there’s a good argument that Nettles belongs in the COG. I’m just playing a little devil’s advocate here to make sure some other sides of the discussion are articulated.
Among the four third basemen I mentioned above, the OPS+ numbers are Bando 119, Boyer 116, Nettles 110, Bell 109.
Harmon Killebrew
Dennis Eckerskey
Luke Appling
Rip Radcliff…
The first few paragraphs of this article are about a short-lived rule that prohibited the last year’s Pennant winner from making trades:
http://sabr.org/bioproj/person/c0f81271
Plate Appearances per Win Above Average
This is through both 7000 PA and 8000 PA.
PaWaa7000:
192.1 … Jim Edmonds
224.5 … Graig Nettles
224.9 … Jim Thome (last week’s winner)
236.2 … Eddie Murray
237.4 … Minnie Minoso
240.9 … Joe Cronin
254.4 … Harmon Killebrew
259.0 … Richie Ashburn
264.7 … Dwight Evans
287.0 … Roberto Alomar
288.6 … Dave Winfield
295.6 … Luke Appling (Appling gets better with age)
2860.0 .. Little Poison
______
PaWaa 8000:
228.6 … Jim Edmonds (7980)
235.6 … Jim Thome
245.4 … Graig Nettles
245.5 … Luke Appling
246.8 … Joe Cronin
250.5 … Eddie Murray
257.1 … Roberto Alomar
263.8 … Dwight Evans
270.8 … Harmon Killebrew
296.9 … Richie Ashburn
314.6 … Dave Winfield
Negative. Little Poison
Well, ladies and gentlemen, we have three rounds to clean up the backlog. In the next four rounds (inclusive of this one), there’re only TWO strong candidates coming on – Joe Cronin and Red Ruffing. That means we have four rounds to pare down the backlog a bit before we get to 1903, which has an argument as 1931’s equal (or perhaps better!) for the round with the largest number of high-quality COG candidates (Gehrig, Gehringer, P Waner, Cochrane, and Hubbell). That means we have the backlog, Cronin, and Ruffing, and only four spots for them before things start getting hairy. Choose wisely, my comrades. I, for one, am sticking with my votes from last round:
Luke Appling
Kevin Brown
Don Drysdale
Good luck to you all!
Brown, Tiant, Alomar
I’ve been thinking alot about Satchel Paige after a conversation many rounds ago about his eligibility. I think he should be in the CoG, and I think he should be eligible. He didn’t have 20 WAR in the majors, nor did he play ten seasons (although he played 5 seasons after debuting as a 41-year-old rookie). But the fact that he had a major league career makes it hard to vote this round without thinking of the fact that this is his birth year. We have debated the merits of compensation or punishment for various things, such as park adjustment (Larry Walker), PEDs (Bonds and Clemens were over the line of greatness anyway, Palmeiro, McGwire and Sosa were not), service time/playing through the war (Newhouser’s stock dropped below what one would think, guys like Gordon got some credit, guys like Slaughter were found a bit short despite it), and, of course, segregation. We have found Campy and Minoso (although Campy also gets credit for what could have been without his accident, I’m sure) worth taking a long, long look at, and Doby stuck around for a few ballots without getting a ton of traction (Monte Irvin has had a case made for him in Redemption, but hasn’t got broad support). Those guys all had careers that spanned the Negro Leagues and Majors, and are definitely borderline CoGers as their ceiling (some may have them above the borderline, but I’m summarizing the general consensus). Paige is a singular case, a slam-dunk in-the-conversation-as-best-pitcher-ever kind of guy. The ‘what if?’ factor is intriguing to think about, and it’s hard to transfer exact ‘credit’ over to evaluating how he would have done in the majors over a whole career without segregation, but I don’t think there are too many people who know about baseball history that will argue he’s not CoG worthy, as a talent over his whole career.
Anyway, I just had to get that off my chest about Paige. I get that I can’t vote for Josh Gibson or Oscar Charleston or Rube Foster, and I’m fine with that. It’s the fact that Paige has a Major League record that opens that door and makes it hard to think of voting in a round when I feel like I should be voting for him. I’m happy to take it up in the next redemption round, where there is a precedent for voting for guys who aren’t eligible through the main ballot. But I don’t actually know if I want to vote in the 1906 round if I can’t consider Satch.
I am as down on making special exceptions to the rules as I was when last we discussed it. The rules have been stable since we began this game, and that’s as it should be — ten or more seasons played or twenty or more WAR is required for consideration. I’ll grant that it’s not outside the realm of possibility that Paige could have met either or both of those requirements had circumstances been different, but the historical fact remains that circumstances were *not* different, and Paige does *not* meet the requirements. I see no basis for making a special exception for Paige; changing the rules whenever what actually happened does not comport with what people wish happened does not sit well with me.
I second what Darien said. And I’m completely unaware of prior special exceptions being made in the redemption round. Has this actually happened?
I have in the past taken the position that in a redemption round you can vote for anyone who has played in the majors and whose birth year fits within the parameters of a redemption round. That way if there really is strong support among voters to consider an “exception” to the 10 season/20 WAR rule there is an avenue to get such a player on to the main ballot.
But I continue to take the view that the COG is intended as an experiment in seeing how HHS voters value a cohort of players comparable to the group the BBWAA has considered over the years. That’s why the COG plan is to exclude players who played primarily in the 19th century, despite the fact that there were undeniably great players who played primarily before 1900. I don’t see any evidence that the BBWAA ever treated players whose primary accomplishments were in the Negro Leagues as within its bailiwick. I find it painful indeed (and this is Martin Luther King Day, no less) to be perceived as carrying forward in any way the apartheid that MLB practiced for so many years, and I would welcome an additional process that would add players whose main accomplishments were in the Negro Leagues to the Circle, but in a way that would be consistent with our over-arching experiment. That’s why I have previously suggested that if Paige or another primarily Negro League player is inducted via the redemption process we would increase the Circle limit of (what is now up to) 119 members (a number that tracks the number of BBWAA inductees) to reflect the induction of a member who was never really on the BBWAA’s
screen.
What all that means in terms of actual rules or instructions is, at the risk of sounding like Lyndon Johnson as he is portrayed in “Selma”, I would urge Satchel voters to be patient and vote for him in the next redemption round.
Of course, to play devil’s advocate, we’ve already elected Mariano Rivera, who will not be considered by the BBWAA for many years. Why make THAT exception, and not the other?
Frankly, it doesn’t make one iota of difference to me. It’s not like Satchel Paige needs the COG to validate his claims to being a great player; he’s better than a number of COGers, whether he’s in or not. That said, I understand and empathize with those who’d like to see his inclusion. If he’s on a ballot, he’ll absolutely have my vote. If he’s not, he won’t. And no matter which way it goes, he’s one of the 5 or so greatest pitchers of all time.
Dr D @22 –
The same is true of Thome and Griffey, but all three of them *will* be considered by the BBWAA when their respective times come, so it’s not really comparable to the Negro Leaguers in that regard.
What Horwich said.
Yeah, this: “I would welcome an additional process that would add players whose main accomplishments were in the Negro Leagues to the Circle, but in a way that would be consistent with our over-arching experiment.”
I’m with Dr. D’s last paragraph @22 there. Ultimately it doesn’t make that much of a difference to me if he’s included or not, he will have been the same player regardless. I just have a particularly soft spot for Satchel and do think that his case is quite singular in terms of making an exception. I guess I don’t see it as Darien puts is as ‘changing the rules whenever’, since this is a very particular exception, but maybe he has some other possible exceptions in mind that this would be opening the door to. If so, I’m curious what others think this may be opening the door to.
Either way, just wanted to drop my 2 cents about it. If I can vote for him in redemption, as I said above, I am happy to. To birtelcom’s point about whether the BBWAA had this discussion, it’s perhaps true that they didn’t (I’m not sure, I just don’t know), but I’m sure it would have to be the case that they did at some point, in order for there to be enough pressure that the dam did break eventually. If anyone has any links to stories of how the BBHoF decided to honour Negro League players, I’m interested. And it’s worth not overlooking that Satchel was the first Negro League player inducted, to my memory by a few years, singularly in 1971.
bells @66 –
Paige was indeed the first Negro League player elected, albeit not by a few years. The first Negro League committee’s selections were:
1971 Paige
1972 Gibson, Leonard
1973 Irvin
1974 Bell
1975 Johnson
1976 Charleston
1977 Dihihgo, Lloyd
@41 & 48
Yes, it’s true that the BBWAA WILL consider those players. However, we voted on Teddy Higuera (among others), who did not have 10 years of service time in MLB; we considered Willie Davis, who had 20 years of MLB service time and DESERVED to be considered, but never appeared on the ballot. The BBWAA did not consider either of those players. Perhaps it doesn’t matter that we considered Teddy Higuera, since he got no support from us and would’ve gotten none from the BBWAA. Perhaps it doesn’t matter that we considered Willie Davis, since he didn’t get elected. But regardless, we have not and will not be looking at the same crop of players, whether or not Satchel is included.
Bells – The BBWAA wouldn’t have considered Paige directly (or other Negro league stars) because they didn’t play 10 year in the majors.
The original idea was to have a separate “Negro wing” in the Hall but the idea was dropped about sufficient backlash.
Dr. Doom @71. This particular byway of the discussion is probably getting way too far off on a technical tangent, but:
–In my view, Willie Davis was considered by the BBWAA process. Just because he didn’t make that first cut nominating process to be included on a final ballot doesn’t mean he wasn’t considered.
–Yes, Higuera and others who met the 20+ WAR standard have been on our “eligible for the ballot” lists. I did accede to the concerns of some commenters early on that we should have an exception for the 20+ WAR guys who didn’t meet the 10-year minimum. And that has added some interesting names to a few of our balloting rounds. But I agreed to that approach being quite confident that none of the resulting exceptions was likely to come anywhere close to induction. Satchel Paige would be a whole other matter.
But again, if Paige gets enough support through the redemption process, we’ll include him on the main ballot; if he then wins induction, he’ll be in the Circle, and we will increase the ultimate number of COG inductees to “number of BBWAA inductees + 1”.
@8,
The main problem in considering Satchel Paige is “If Paige, why not ?? (EX: Oscar Charlton, Josh Gibson, etc…). We’ve considered NgL greats who lost considerable MLB playing time to the color line. But – they have met our 10 yrs/ 20 WAR threshold, such as Roy Campanella, Monty Irvin, and Don Newcombe.
Paige unfortunately falls into an ‘in-between’ category, his MLB career at the very tail-end of his career being only 5 years (6 if you count his token game in 1965 for KC) and 10.3 WAR.
I agree with several other people here who feel that we should stick by the 10 yrs/ 20 WAR threshold. While it is painful not to consider Paige (or Gibson or Charlton…), we are in essence trying to make the same number of selections as the BBWAAA has (119 now?), but correct their ‘mistakes’. Negro League selections fall outside our domain now. Perhaps after we have complete the COG process for eligible candidates?
There’s a reason slippery slopes are a type of logical fallacy. If we vote for Paige why not Charlston? If him, why not managers? If managers why not mascots? If mascots why not peanut vendors? If peanut vendors why not fans? It’s not logical to make arguments like this. We will draw the line in voting where we see fit as voters and that’s rather obvious.
Appreciate people’s thoughts here. Lawrence @78, I can see how folks can think that way, and that’s totally understandable. I just happen to draw my line at ‘he played in MLB, so it’s hard for me to ignore him, while it’s not nearly as hard for me to ignore someone like Charleston who never got the chance’. It’s really as simple as that for me, I don’t feel like being open to that makes me open to other things; like I said, he’s a special case for me.
So yeah, I definitely don’t want to turn this into a casually backhanded way of suggesting that people who see things differently than me are somehow supporting segregation in baseball and ignoring vital things, etc. To me that’s a distracting side issue. It’s more about what I consider the CoG project to be about, and obviously everyone’s interpretation about that is different, from the baseline of ‘who is worthy of being in’ to the technicalities of what type of career should be considered. All in all, I want to clearly state that I think birtelcom’s handling of things is really great – if an exception such as Paige gets traction through the Redemption Round, he will be recognized. Exceptions to a rule should demonstrate exceptional support, so that’s a fair compromise.
One clarification in response to David P @72, I know the BBWAA didn’t consider Paige because of the 10-year rule, but what I was trying to say was that I’d imagine there must have been uncomfortablity amongst some writers/voters about this, and discussions just like this one in between votes, that was part of the groundswell of pressure that led MLB to establish just such a process as they did (obviously pressure would also be from the public, etc). We are a different project, but I’m saying that it’s a parallel conversation – not knowing any history specifically, I think it’s reasonable to think that at least a few writers must have been bothered by the fact that Satchel was a) undoubtedly great, and b) played in MLB but was not eligible by the rules, and was therefore an exception that they didn’t know what to do with. I guess I’m just saying that the MLB decided to have a whole separate process for Negro League recognition, but as that’s not really our purpose, I’d love to see an exception for this one case of a ‘bridge’ player that undoubtedly belongs but wasn’t given enough time in MLB to statistically back that up.
I’m not surprised to read bells post, I’m just surprised I didn’t write it!
Paige isn’t just a Negro league star. That’s not fair to him to say. He pitched very well in the MLB for his age. One of the best ever. How many guys have double digit WAR age 41+? Not many. Appling ironically is one of the most famous success stories for guys in their 40s contributing. His 1949 season is legendary but how much WAR did he accumulate 41+? 8.6. We’re talking Randy Johnson level “in your 40s” pitching here, and rate wise he accumulated more value than even unit. Satchel Paige won baseball games in the MLB. Lots of them.
Negro league stats are stats to me. They’re flawed in different ways than other stats but they still exist. Paige to me is one of the great contributors of statistical baseball in some unique ways as well. He kept track of his own stats since few others could manage it. Distorted or not the longing for numbers to put his excellence into context carried far beyond the color line even in his own era. He was the king of integrated exhibition games, the champion of an entire league, an innovator on pitching in many ways, and he got off his rocker to show all you doubters what’s what.
I am not voting in 1906 out of protest and will vote for paige in the redemption round. I respect your position birtelcom and certainly don’t think you have any malice in you at all, but I just wouldn’t feel right voting without Paige.
Woody English had a .430 OBP for the 1930 Cubs, mostly batting 2nd (but sometimes lead-off). He and Kiki Cuyler both topped 150 runs thanks to Hack Wilson knocking them in all season. The 1930 Cubs are the only post-19th century team with two players over 150 runs (and Wilson was close to being a 3rd, with 146 of his own). Of course, without English’s .430 OBP and Cuyler’s .428, Wilson never gets a chance to set the RBI record, so it was a mutually beneficial relationship.
And yet with all that, the Cubs didn’t even score the most runs in the league. They had 998, 2nd to the Cardinals and their 1004. Yup…1930, everybody.
@10,
Using B-R’s ‘Neutralized Batting’ feature, Kiki Cuyler’s 1930 season goes from:
Actual 1930 Cubs (5.74 R/G) :
155 Runs, 134 RBI, .355 BA
to
Neutralized to the 2014 Cubs (4.07 R/G):
111 Runs, 100 RBI, .308 BA
That’s still excellent, but not nowhere as dominant as his actual 1930 line looks. Just another reminder that extreme run environments need to be adjusted accordingly.
Alomar, Appling, Winfield
Killebrew, Eckersley, and Cronin.
Cronin, Reuschel, Ashburn
Killebrew, Cronin, Alomar
This year’s tidbits.
1. Joe Cronin’s 11 seasons of 30 doubles and 90 RBI trails only Stan Musial with 13, and Lou Gehrig and Albert Pujols with 12. Among shortstops, who has the second-highest total of such seasons? Miguel Tejada
2. Joe Kuhel scored 90 runs for the 1944 Senators despite fewer than 150 hits and ISO no better than .100. Who is the only Senator/Twin since with such a season? Roy Smalley
3. Lloyd Waner is the only HOF position player with negative WAA. Waner began his career as the only pre-expansion live ball era player with 150 games in each of his first three seasons. Who was the first expansion era player to do the same? Chris Speier
4. Paul Derringer is one of 18 pitchers since 1901 with 80 starts, a 105 ERA+ and a W-L% under .450 over his first four seasons. Who are the other two of that group who, like Derringer, finished with 2500 IP and a .500 W-L%? Steve Rogers, Burt Hooton
5. Si Johnson’s 22 losses for the woeful 1934 Reds led the NL, but was only one more than teammate Paul Derringer. No team since has had two 21-game losers on its staff. What is the last team with two 20-game losers? 1973 White Sox (Wilbur Wood, Stan Bahnsen)
6. Thornton Lee’s best season came at age 34 for the 1941 White Sox, logging 300 IP and leading the AL in CG, ERA, ERA+ and WHIP. Who is the only expansion era pitcher who, like Lee, pitched 300+ innings in his only 250 IP season? Jim Colborn
7. Tommy Bridges’ 13 straight seasons (1931-43) with 90 strikeouts is a Tiger record, a distinction he shares with Mickey Lolich. His .584 career W-L% is also a Tiger record for 250+ decisions, but a mark that is destined to be eclipsed next season by Justin Verlander who, like Bridges, has posted a season (or two) leading the AL in starts, wins and strikeouts. Who are the other two Tigers to do this? Mickey Lolich, Hal Newhouser
8. Willis Hudlin posted 8 seasons with 125 IP including 15 starts and 10 relief appearances. Who is the last pitcher to post 5 such campaigns? Danny Darwin
9. Dick Coffman was the first pitcher to start a career with 9 seasons that included at least two starts and one decision, but without ever compiling a winning record. Which pitcher has the longest streak of such seasons to begin a career? Mike Morgan
10. Jackie Hayes followed Eddie Collins as White Sox second basemen with two seasons of 25 doubles and 75 RBI. Who is the only such Sox second baseman since? Jorge Orta
11. Shanty Hogan leads all catchers in career BA, OBP and SLG as a Giant (min. 500 games caught for the G-men). Who is the only other such catcher to bat .300 for his career as a Giant? Chief Meyers
12. Lyn Lary is the last Indian to play every inning of a season (1937) at shortstop. The season before, he started every game at shortstop for the Browns. Who are the other two players with consecutive seasons playing every game at shortstop for two different teams? Miguel Tejada, Everett Scott
13. Woody English and Kiki Cuyler each scored over 150 runs for the 1930 Cubs, the only team with two such players. That season English slugged .500 despite fewer home runs than triples. Who is the only expansion era player to have such a qualifying season while collecting fewer than 200 hits? Chuck Knoblauch
14. Hank Johnson had two seasons with a shutout, but with H/9 exceeding 11.5. Who is the only such expansion era pitcher? Blue Moon Odom
15. Gus Suhr was the first player with four consecutive seasons (1933-36) of double-digit home runs and at least as many triples. Who is the only player since to match that feat? Stan Musial
16. Art Herring’s career was revived by wartime necessity after 9 seasons spent almost exclusively in the minors. He is the only pitcher with 400 IP before age 30 and 250 IP after age 35, but with 50 starts and fewer than 800 IP overall. At age 39 in 1945, Herring recorded two shutouts in only 15 starts, the oldest Dodger with such a season. Who is the oldest pitcher on any team with as many shutouts in so few starts? Satchel Paige
17. Rip Radcliff led the AL with 200 hits in 1940. Who is the only other player to lead the AL with 200+ hits in his first season as a Brownie? Heinie Manush
18. Randy Moore is one of a handful of live ball era players with 2000 career PA and a career strikeout total lower than career OPS+. Which such player had the most career strikeouts? Lefty O’Doul
Additional tidbits:
Joe Cronin, on 6-17-43, hit a PH home run in each game of a DH. They were both 3 run shots. Two days earlier he had hit another such HR. On 8-12-43 he hit another giving him 4 3-run PH HRs in less than 2 months.
Lloyd Waner, in 1943, had 234 PA without a SO,the most in such a season. The only other players with more than 100 PA in such a season are Bill Rariden with 108 PA and Johnny Sain with 104 PA.
Only others with searchable PH homers in both ends of a twinbill
– Hal Breeden 7-10-73
– Tony Gonzalez 7-4-61
Many others have done so in consecutive team games, most recently by Dioner Navarro on Apr 12-13, 2013.
Cronin is the only searchable player with four 3-run PH home runs in a season. The last player to do that three times in the same season was the Padres’ Archi Cianfrocco, with his 3 shots (a grannie and two 3-run blasts) coming in a 7-week period in 1995. Despite those heroics, Cianfrocco was mostly a bust as a pinch-hitter with no other homers and a .178/.221/.315 slash in 78 career pinch-hit PAs.
Rip Radcliff question: George Stone with 187 H in 1905.
Oops. Left out something in the question.
Should be only other player to lead the AL with 200+ hits in first season with the Browns.
Your low-hanging fruit specialist is here to take the easy ones!
Tommy Bridges: Besides Bridges and Verlander, Mickey Lolich and Hal Newhouser led the AL in W, GS, and SO.
Si Johnson: I’m going to say it was the 1962 Mets, with Al Jackson losing 20 and Roger Craig losing 24(!!!!!).
Rip Radcliff: Heinie Manush also led the AL in hits in his first year with the Browns.
Joe Cronin: Well, Hones Wagner had eight such seasons; I’m realizing as I type this that I didn’t actually check to see whether or not he was a SS all those years. Cal Ripken, Jr. had 6 such seasons, so maybe that’s the answer. Or maybe I should keep checking – let me know.
Lolich and Newhouser is correct, as is Heine Manush.
There is a more recent team than the ’62 Mets with two 20-game losers.
Three of Wagner’s 30/90 seasons were at positions other than SS. Ripken is not the answer either.
Joe Cronin question: Miguel Tejada
Tejada is also the the answer to the Lyn Lary question, along with Everett Scott.
Both correct, RC.
I’m guessing you used your own “enhanced” P-I to answer the second question.
Actually I used the BR PI. I had to do some manual searching. After I did my search I realized that Scott can be guessed. Most of know about his 1300+ consecutive game streak and that he was a SS. Then just check his BR home page to check his teams.
Right.
I didn’t know how many there would be (if any) so my method was more mechanical. Involved sorting spreadsheets to check for different teams in consecutive seasons of 150+ or 160+ games, and then checking whether those games were all of the games in that season.
Knowing ahead of time that there were only two players made my job much easier.
The answer to the Woody English question is Knoblauch, who did it in 1996. That’s a great what-if-sports season, IIRC.
Knoblauch is the one. But, you’ve lost me on the what-if angle?
Or, are you meaning what if the Twins hadn’t traded away Knoblauch?
There’s a website, whatifsports.com, where some leagues let you build a team on a budget using player-seasons from all of baseball history. Knoblauch’s 96 season was one of the best, because it gave you great hitting, speed and defense but was less expensive than the top notch years from Morgan and such because of the lack of HR power.
That makes sense.
Thanks for enlightening me.
Oh man I haven’t played WIS in ages. Do you still play it? Is it still fun if so?
I actually was considering jumping back in during the lull between MLB & NFL seasons coming up here.
Gotta have fantasy sports fix, but I’m not so desperate as to watch basketball…
brp, haven’t played in ages, but I assume it would still be fun unless they’ve made big changes.
Actually, a lot of the old pitching seasonal records came from a league I created. I fabricated the worst possible offense, made everyone draft it, and then they had a budget on which to draft the greatest pitching staff possible. The offenses were so bad that you had guys with 400+ K seasons and ERA’s in the low 0.00’s. I wonder if those records have held up, or since been surpassed/scrubbed.
The team with two 20 game losers is the 1973 White Sox, with Wilbur Wood (24-20) and Stan Bahnsen (18-21). So they actually combined for a 42-41 record, and both had ERA+’s over 113.
That 1973 team also has the answer to another question, the Jackie Hayes one. Jorge Orta is the other White Sox 2B with multiple seasons of greater than 25 doubles and greater than 75 RBI.
Absolutely correct, CC.
BTW, are you a cursed Clevelander because the Indians pulled off the masterstroke of trading away CC?
Nah, had this screen name since around 2003 on the old ESPN message boards. Didn’t even realize I would also be called CC.
Answer to @14, the Hank Johnson question: Dennis Lamp, 1980, with an honorable mention shoutout to a pitcher named phil Huffman, who pitched for the expansion Blue Jays in 1979, had a record of 6-18, era of 5.77 in 179 IP, 11.4 h/9 innings, an era+ of 75, a K/BB ratio of .82 (not a typo) and a bWAR of -1.8. he then disappeared until a two game call up for baltimore in 1985. Fun fact for Huffman–his one shutout was a one hitter on August 27, 1979, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/TOR/TOR197908270.shtml.
Lamp’s 1980 season is indeed one with a shutout and an 11.5 H/9. But so are 35 other seasons since 1961 by 34 other pitchers. The trick is to find the one pitcher who did that twice.
Thanks for the story on Huffman. His rookie season was indeed an odd one, with 31 starts, 11 of them quality starts and 12 disasters (more RA than IP), what I called a “Jekyll and Hyde” pitcher in a post I made here a long time ago. At least Huffman started off on the right foot, winning his first two decisions.
Incidentally, 30 starts in a debut season by a 21-or-younger pitcher has happened only 27 times since 1901, with Huffman’s 75 ERA+ and 18 losses the second worst marks in the group. Two HOFers (Bender, Sutton) are in those 27 and two notable flameouts (Gooden, Nolan) plus four actives (Sabathia, Porcello, Cahill and Brett Anderson). One of those 27 was a teammate of Huffman’s; Jerry Garvin also lost 18 for Toronto in the Blue Jays’ inaugural season two years earlier, logging 244 IP and 12 CGs in a season that started 5-0 (Garvin has the distinction of owning a .328 career W-L%, the lowest mark among single franchise pitchers with 600 career IP).
Doug, I’m missing something. 35 occurrences of pitchers with qualifying seasons? Or are we not discussing qualifying seasons?
Didn’t mention qualifying seasons, so no, that wasn’t a criterion.
It was Blue Moon Odom.
yes, those are non-qualifying seasons. Lamp might be the only one to have done it in a qualifying season.
It was Odom, as a 19 year-old in 17 IP in 1964, and in 77 IP split between three clubs in his next-to-last season in 1975. Those 17 IP in 1964 came from 5 starts; Odom had an 84 game score in his shutout and an 88 total game score for his other 4 starts (ouch!).
The others to do this in a qualifying season since 1961 are Frank Baumann (1961), Rick Waits (1981), Larry Sorensen (1982) and Brian Anderson (2004).
Joe Kuhel question: Roy Smalley
Smalley is the one.
Since Kuhel’s season in 1944, there have been only 23 more with 90 runs on fewer than 150 hits and ISO of 0.1 or less. Most were in the 1945-49 and 1975-90 periods, including 4 times by Eddie Stanky and twice each for Snuffy Stirnweiss, Vince Coleman and Tom Goodwin.
Among these post-war seasons, the fewest hits were 121 by Omar Moreno in 1978, and the fewest walks were 42 by Rudy Law in 1983.
Lloyd Waner question: Chris Speier
Speier is the one.
As Waner is the only pre-expansion player with 150 games in each of his first 3 seasons, Hideki Matsui is the only expansion era player with 160 games in his first 3 campaigns (and Eddie Murray is the only other player with 160 in his first two years).
Paul Derringer question: Steve Rogers and Burt Hooton
Correct.
Those two both finished with just under 2000 IP after their fourth seasons (Derringer had over 2500 more IP). Of the remaining 15 in the group (80 starts, 105 ERA+, under .450 W-L% in first 4 seasons), only two had 1000 more IP.
There are four currently active pitchers who make the group, one (Matt Cain) who has already passed 1000+ IP since his fourth season, another (Matt Garza) who should do it this year, and a third who is pitching well (Doug Fister). The fourth is Justin Masterson who, like Cain, struggled last year.
Thorton Lee question: Jim Colborn
Randy Moore question: Lefty O’Doul with 143 OPS+ and 122 SO. He had almost as many HR as SO, 113.
Willis Hudlin question: Danny Darwin
All correct, quiz master Richard!
I’ve updated the original comment with the quiz answers.
Killebrew, Cronin, Campanella
Completely Consistent Capital Consonants.
Appling, improving with age…
Shortstops, WAR Leaders, Age 20-24
38.6 … Alex Rod
34.3 … Arky
27.9 … Ripken
23.2 … Fregosi
20.1 … Travis Jackson
…
-0.6 … Luke Appling
_____
Shortstops, Age 25-29
42.4 … Alex Rod
39.2 … Banks
31.4 … Boudreau
30.4 … Yount
30.2 … Trammell
…
22.1 … in 20th Place – Appling
_____
Shortstops, Age 30-34
48.2 … Honus
32.2 … Ozzie
28.5 … Wallace
27.4 … Fletcher
27.1 … Ripken
…
22.5 … in 12th place – Appling
_____
Shortstops, Age 35 – 39
32.0 … Honus
18.9 … Ozzie
17.3 … Lucius Appling (this is while missing Two Years to the War)
15.2 … Bill Dahlen
13.7 … Aparicio
13.5 … Pee Wee
13.4 … Omar Visquel
_____
SS, age 40+
13.2 … Appling
11.7 … Honus
Nobody else above 0.8
Appling, Edmonds, Cronin
Killebrew
Ashburn
Tommy Bridges
Luke Appling, Rick Reuschel, Kevin Brown
Very deep crop of pretty talented newcomers but Cronin is the only one I feel is deserving of consideration for the COG. As of this moment he’s in my “in” column, but only by the thinnest of margins. But there are also 5 guys on the bubble who are in my “very possibly” column that I could still be convinced are more deserving. It appears that the new guy smell is giving Cronin all of the support he needs to stay on the ballot and possibly enough to even get off the bubble so for the moment I’m going to pass so as to prevent his being selected over someone I feel is more deserving and to try and keep around someone I’m still trying to make up my mind about.
My vote (which I may revisit at a later date depending on how the voting is going)
Appling, Campanella, Ferrell
Priceless! “New guy smell” in reference to someone born 109 years ago! Thanks; you’ve made my night.
Alomar, Minoso, Ashburn
Alomar, Murray, Winfield
Harmon Killebrew, Dennis Eckersley, Dave Winfield
Appling, Ashburn, Minoso
Luke Appling
Graig Nettles
Joe Cronin
Harmon Killebrew, Dennis Eckersley, Luke Appling
Appling, Nettles, Evans
oops- that was me (for tabulating purposes)- I was rushing and missed the usual capitalization
Same ballot as last time: Appling, Tiant, Evans
Nettles, Cronin, Campanella.
Appling
Brown
Killebrew
Alomar – Ashburn – Murray
Appling, Killebrew, Eck
Nettles, Cone, Murray
Most Wins Above Average, excluding negative seasonal totals:
Appling 44.2
Brown 43.3
Reuschel 40.6
FerrellW 40.1
Thome 39.8
Cone 39.1
Edmonds 38.0
Tiant 37.5
Cronin 37.3
Alomar 37.1
Nettles 35.7
Drysdale 35.3
Evans 34.9
Eckersley 34.3
Ashburn 33.9
Murray 33.7
Killebrew 33.0
Winfield 31.1
Minoso 30.6
Campanella 19.2
Cronin wouldn’t embarrass the circle, and Waner had those batting averages, but I’m going back to the usual three:
Appling, Brown, Eckersley
Alomar, Miñoso, Nettles.
Mexican Pacific League Semifinals update: After splitting the first two games in Culiacan, Aguilas de Mexicali won back-to-back walkoff, extrainnings thrillers to put the series 3 to 1. They won game three, 2 to 1 in 10 innings and game four 3-2 in 14 innings.
On game 5, Culiacan used 5 pitchers to blank the Eagles (Aguilas) 2-0. Former Padres farmhand Juan Oramas started the game and just allowed four hits in 5 innings. For the Aguilas, Red Sox minor leaguer Marco Duarte was even better, he gave up two hits in 5 innings.
Game six was back in Culiacan, where another low scoring game took place. Game 2 starters Horacio Ramirez for Mexicali and Arnold Leon for Culiacan each allowed six hits, but Culiacan´s offense crossed the plate twice in the second and once in the fifth, giving the Tomato Growers all the runs they would need as the final score was Culiacan 3, Mexicali 1.
Last night, game seven started well for the Aguilas. 2-run HR in the first by former Pirates catcher Humberto Cota and solo shot by Veteran Minor Leaguer John Lindsey. Culiacan came back with 3-run Homeruns in the bottom of the 2nd by former Padre and Dodger Oscar Robles and in the 3rd by Issmael Salas (Cubs MILB) to put the game 6 to 3.
With their backs against the wall,m losing 8 to 3, and considering how good Culiacan´s pitching was in the last few games, a comeback was highly unlikely. But this is baseball after all. The Aguilas scored 3 in the fifth and 1 in the eight to get closer.
In the top of the ninth, Closer Oscar Villarreal (D-Backs, Braves) retired the first two batters. Then, Mexicali´s top post season hitter Dave Sappelt (Cubs) came to bat. After fouling off four 3-2 pitches…fastball right down the middle…he swings…fly ball…left field..GONE! Game tied! Stadium quiets. I jump up and down, wake up my kids with all the screaming.
Extra innings. More heart break. After the Aguilas left runners in scoring position in the top of the 11th, in the bottom part, current Braves Minor Leaguer, cleanup hitter Joey Meneses leads off with a two-base hit. Mexican League veteran Sergio Gastelum, pinch hitting for Russel Branyan bunts towards third base, where pitcher Francisco Rodriguez (one of six Mexicali-born players ever to play in MLB), fields it cleanly but his throw ends up in right field. Game over, series over, dream over.
Former Commissioner said it right: It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. Except for us it doesn´t end when the chill comes, it starts during the fall and goes thru the winter. But it does break your heart….
Total heartbreaker. Ouch. Sorry to hear about it. It sounds like an AMAZING series, though. When the dust settles and the pain fades away, I’m betting you’ll remember it for what it was: a highly competitive, very exciting series. But for now, you have my condolences!
Cronin, Appling, Eckersley
Cone
Edmonds
Nettles
Wednesday AM update, through brp @84, the 29th vote:
15 (51.72%) – Luke Appling
9 (31.03%) – Harmon Killebrew
8 (27.59%) – Joe Cronin
7 (24.14%) – Roberto Alomar, Dennis Eckersley
6 (20.69%) – Graig Nettles
5 (17.24%) – Richie Ashburn, Kevin Brown
3 (10.34%) – Roy Campanella, Minnie Minoso, Eddie Murray, Dave Winfield
2 (6.90%) – David Cone, Jim Edmonds, Dwight Evans, Rick Reuschel, Luis Tiant
1 (3.45%) – Tommy Bridges, Don Drysdale, Wes Ferrell
Appling begins the week with a very strong showing, Cronin polls well as a ballot newcomer, and we continue to struggle to separate these pitchers from one another. Just another reg’lar ol’ week in the life of COG voting.
Appling and Cronin, despite being very different types of players, look superficially similar at first glance, the virtues of each corresponding to the lesser abilities of the other. Appling had one of the longer productive careers in baseball history. Cronin’s productive career consists of eleven years. Appling was a better fielder and baserunner, Cronin hit for more power. The fact that Cronin scored and drove in more runs, however, is in great measure attributable to the fact that he played on far better teams, teams that provided far more scoring opportunities and runners to drive in. Appling’s OBP is actually higher than Cronin’s.
Why is it that Appling seems the better player overall? It isn’t simply career vs. peak, I would say, even though, in terms of WAR, four of Cronin’s five best years were consecutive while Appling’s WAR was 5.1 in both 1933 and 1949.
I don’t personally think JAWS is very accurate, but JAWS ranks Appling’s career 9th and Cronin’s 16th among shortstops. That’s my impression, too, more or less, but I’d like to come up with a better argument and more convincing statistics.
Thoughts?
If he’s the 16th best SS all time, he probably doesn’t belong in the COG. But Appling’s 9th best probably does. If we are just basing it on JAWS.
Maybe.
At least there would be 15 SS ahead of Cronin to consider.
Two of those ahead of Cronin we likely won’t consider for a while – A-Rod and Jeter.
Three of those ahead of him we might not consider – still not quite sure which players will make the cut when it comes to 19th/20th century players, but Davis, Dahlen, and Wallace all rank ahead of him.
He’s only a shade behind the 15th guy, Boudreau, and we already elected him.
Every SS we have had a chance to elect ahead of him we have, except Appling (who is doing well in voting). The only other one, besides the 3 19th/20th century guys I mentioned above, that we will certainly get to vote on is definitely going to be elected (Wagner).
We already elected the guy right behind Cronin (Pee Wee).
Cronin has a virtually identical JAWS score as Nettles, despite Nettles being 12th among third basemen. Which should help your arguments for Nettles.
Shortstop is probably the deepest position talentwise. Cronin is in 16th with 55.2 JAWS.
Pudge Rod is 3rd for C with 54.0. (Yes, catchers are a special case)
Palmeiro is 11th for 1B with 55.2.
Utley is 13th for 2B with 55.3.
Nettles is 12th for 3B with 55.1.
Raines is 8th for LF with 55.6.
Lofton is 9th for CF with 55.7.
Gwynn is 14th for RF with 54.9. (Somehow Musial is on the RF list which makes no sense)
It’s not going to be an equal split among positions – we’ve already passed on Billy Williams, Stargell, and Medwick among LFers. They are all in the top 16.
The guys around 15th-20th in RF are Dewey Evans, Reggie Smith, and Winfield.
In CF Edmonds is in 14th place – we’ve passed on Willie Davis, Jimmy Wynn, and Vada Pinson (15th-17th place). We’ve passed on Dawson in 12th place.
I doubt any 3B below Nettles gets serious consideration, other than Home Run Baker. The killer Bs are all clustered in the 14th-16th spots (Boyer, Bell, Bando) with Dick Allen in 17th.
While JAWS may be flawed, it’s probably the best predictor of where we as a group have drawn lines for position players, despite the many different approaches to ranking players. Joe Gordon in, Willie Randolph out, and everyone else above Gordon in at 2B except for Alomar (and the 5 guys we have yet to vote on – Frisch, Gehringer, Lajoie, Collins, and Hornsby). At LF Raines and (possibly) Goslin in, Billy Williams out. It’s like that for almost every position. The only player who is really defying that is Killebrew – at 1B, Greenberg and McCovey in, Murray on the bubble, McGwire and everyone below him off the ballot, except for Killebrew.
That’s really interesting about JAWS. Someday, when I have time, I’ll check our inductees against the Hall of Stats. I’d imagine a high correlation there, as well.
OK, I couldn’t help myself.
I started looking at the HOS, and it’s WAY messier than what you’re describing with JAWS, according to how we’ve voted. So it seems JAWS is the better comp for our thinking. Good to know!
I’m guessing that many advanced stats will correlate well with our voting (particularly for position players) – straight up WAR probably does a pretty good job.
I’m not sure if JAWS has any adjustments for time served in the military or for players who played on both sides of 1947. I think that is where the biggest discrepancies come in, though even then they are not huge discrepancies (Alomar being on the outside right now while Gordon is in, same with Greenberg and Murray – though the guys on the outside right now are only a spot or two ahead of the guys in the COG, according to JAWS).
For RP we are doing pretty well – Rivera in, Eck on the ballot, top two relievers. Though outside the top few spots the RP rankings are funny – Kerry Wood ranks 11th by JAWS, but that’s almost entirely based on his career as a SP.
It’s mostly with SP that we disagree with JAWS. Koufax and Ford, who were probably the two most discussed candidates, are our lowest ranking COG members by JAWS (I think – well, Dickey and Berra, but they’re catchers, and Rivera). I think those are the only 5 players we have elected with JAWS below 50. Killebrew, who gets a lot of love, would be the 6th.
And we rarely reject players above 55 (except for Palmeiro and Newhouser who I think are the only two eligible players above 55 who are not in the COG or on the ballot). I think Ferrell is the highest rated JAWS player on the ballot at 58.3.
It’s interesting to me that according to the way you describe this that SS is the deepest position talent wise. I would have guessed first base or an outfield position.
One thing about JAWS is that they make no adjustment for pre-1893 pitchers so many modern pitchers will rank lower on their list than the do in the Hall of Stats (which does make adjustments)
And one reason there are fewer high ranking players at first base is that a number of players who played a lot of first- like Ernie Banks, Rod Carew & Stan Musial- we more valuable during the time they spent at their original positions. Same thing- in reverse and to a lesser extent- goes in center field. A lot of guys started their careers there- Barry Bonds, Al Kaline & Andre Dawson- but then for various reasons moved to left or right fairly early on in their careers.
Hartvig – the issue with Koufax and Ford isn’t the pre-1893 guys (who we probably won’t vote on), but the guys like Saberhagen, Stieb, Sutton, Appier, Finley, Hershiser, Bucky Walters, Tommy John, Tanana, Wilburs Wood and Cooper – all of whom rank above Koufax.
Toss in Langston and Gooden, both of whom (along with the others above plus more recent pitchers like Hudson, Santana, Sabathia, Pettitte, and Buehrle) rank above Ford.
Drysdale, Kevin Brown, Reuschel, Tiant, and Ferrell are all closer to the borderline of the pitchers we have elected (that borderline being pitchers like Palmer, Marichal, and Feller – it’s a pretty tough standard – with Smoltz being the next lowest SP above Koufax and Ford, though still above all the pitchers I mentioned who aren’t currently on the ballot, plus slightly above David Cone, who is).
There are 26 pitchers between between Smoltz, at 54.2 JAWS, and Koufax, at 47.5, and only 4 of them ever pitched before 1893. I would guess that other than Cone, those pitchers have little chance of being elected to the COG (and even Cone is probably a longshot). There are also a number of post-1893 pitchers between Marichal, 57.5 JAWS, and Smoltz, but many of them have a chance at being elected.
Artie, if we were to just go on WAR, we wouldn’t have all that much to occupy ourselves with. Koufax had a tremendous, even historic, peak, and people mentally adjust because of early retirement due to injury. Ford has superior “traditional” stats, and WAR overcompensates (in my view) for his team’s defensive prowess, using metrics that are admittedly inexact. I wouldn’t say either is an inner circle HOF or COG. But I wouldn’t have much regret over voting for either of them over many of the pitchers on your list.
Mike L – my comment isn’t meant to say what’s right or wrong, only that it’s not the pre-1893 pitchers who are causing a “breakdown” between our voting and JAWS.
Koufax and Ford, and possibly Smoltz though I think over time he’ll become the “bottom” of our list according to JAWS (by which I mean more pitchers between Marichal and him will be elected to the COG) are essentially the only two players who we have voted into the COG in spite of their JAWS rankings. I understand why they were voted in. And yet, through all the different ways in which people make votes, it’s still basically these two unique careers – and the JAWS rankings. There seem to be no unique position player careers – I can’t really think of a position player comparable to Whitey Ford, and I would guess Sisler to have the closest case to Koufax, but I don’t figure Sisler will get much love.
As for Killebrew, he’ll be the puzzler to me if he makes it. I’d take Sisler over Killebrew.
@157.
Sisler’ll get some love.
Darned sinusitis.
The two halves of Sisler’s Career:
4572 PA
47.9 WAR
4440 PA
6.6 WAR
_______
Voomo – it wasn’t until I bought a book on great first basemen that I realized Sisler’s career had the two halves you mention. I used to think of him as one of those “got in on the gawdy numbers once the live ball era took off” guys (which is why I think he will have some issues collecting votes), but I view him much differently now. I wonder if he would look better if he retired after the illness/injury (however it is classified), much like Koufax did.
Through age 29, Sisler (47.9) ranks 38th in career WAR among position players. There are 60 players with 45+ WAR. On that list of 60 there are some (but not many) players who we as a group have passed on: Cesar Cedeno (49.2), Vada Pinson (47.7), Medwick (47.0), and Fregosi (45.9). But of that subset of 60 players Sisler ranks 54th in PAs (4572), while Cedeno (6051), Pinson (6851), Medwick (5902), and Fregosi (5902) rank 24th, 4th(!!!), 30th, and 28th. Per PA he’s actually closer to Frank Thomas, Schmidt, Banks, Reggie, and DiMaggio than the 4 players we’ve passed on.
I think he’ll be an interesting case.
Cronin has a nice peak. The nyear averaging method gives him a 4.91 score, higher than Thome. Over a 4 year period he averaged over 7 WAR, that’s pretty rare. Over 7, down to 5.6 WAR but holds 5 WAR all the way out to N=12. That gives him a pretty respectable peak. It scores Appling at 4.92 basically because he was able to average 4 WAR over 19 seasons but he does have a nice cluster of good years 1935-37 which helps support his case. That’s also not using any war correction for either guy. I typically think that RBAT numbers are inflated during the war but Appling missed basically two seasons as a productive shortstop. I’m inclined to think even weighting peak extremely highly, certainly the Nyear average weights it more than JAWS or similar, Appling > Cronin
But I still think Cronin beats out Alomar and Murray, certainly the rest of our offensive players. I’m not sure if I’d put him ahead of Campanella who I have a pretty strong correction for…
Appling is one of 2 players with 3 qualifying seasons with a .300+ BA at age 40+. He is also the only player with at least 2 seasons of 150+ hits at age 40+.
NSB – One thing many people don’t realize about Cronin is that he voluntarily stepped aside as the starting shortstop after the 1941 season. He was coming off a 138+, 5.1 WAR season so he could clearly still play. He was the team’s manager at the time, so he actually benched himself. The point being that he likely would have 70+ career WAR had he not decided to focus on managing.
Considering the year Pesky had, it looks like Cronin made the right move.
Aha! Didn’t know this about Cronin.
Player Manager for the Senators at age 26.
26!
And won the Pennant that very year, as a 7.2 WAR shortstop.
Stepped aside at age 35 for a 23 year old rookie named Johnny Pesky.
So at least it makes sense.
Pesky batted .331 and played D.
But! Pesky left for the War the following year (gone for 3).
Cronin does not take his job back.
He gives it to league-average Skeeter Newsome.
Voomo:
Your comment gives no indication that you’re aware of the companion fact: Bucky Harris at age 27 became the player-manager for the 1924 Senators, who won the pennant and the World Series. As a player, Harris wasn’t close to Cronin, but as a manager he worked the AL circuit until 1956, missing only 3 years, and made the HOF, more for longevity than performance, although his record was dragged down by two later stints with the Senators in their “First in War, First in peace, Last in the American League” incarnation.
Interesting trivia about Joe Cronin: He married Clark Griffith’s niece at the end of the 1934 season, went on his honeymoon, and came back to find that he’d been sold/traded to the Red Sox by his uncle-in-law. The details aren’t as hard-boiled as the outline—it was a big step up for Cronin financially and Griffith got a huge payout for the sale, $250,000 plus Lynn Lary, journeyman shortstop.
Bring back the Player/Manager!
WAR Leaders as Player/Manager (since 1897)
This is for seasons in which they were Manager for a full year or the Majority of the year. Does not include, for example, Cy Young in 1907, when he managed for 6 games. And (among others like this) I’ve not included Tris Speaker’s 1919, when he managed only the last 61 games.
61.4 … Fred Clarke
51.6 … Lou Boudreau
47.2 … Tristam Speaker
40.6 … Joe Cronin
35.0 … Napoleon Lajoie
31.7 … Tyrus Cobb
29.2 … Rogers Hornsby (7 partial seasons as p/m)
27.1 … Jimmy Collins
26.9 … Frank Chance
22.6 … Bill Terry
21.2 … Fielder Jones (54 Rfield)
18.6 … John McGraw
17.9 … Mel Ott
16.1 … Fred Tenney
12.5 … Clark Griffith
11.4 … Deacon McGuire
11.4 … Mickey Cochrane
10.5 … Buck Herzog
10.4 … Dave Bancroft
9.7 … Patsy Donovan
9.7 … Roger Bresnahan
9.5 … Miller Huggins
9.2 … Eddie Collins
8.2 … Joe Kelley
7.8 … Joe Tinker
7.6 … Kid Nichols
6.2 … Bucky Harris
5.4 … Gabby Hartnett (included ’38 – won pennant (44-27))
4.7 … Bill Carrigan
4.5 … Jimmy Dykes
4.1 … Jake Stahl
4.1 … Frankie Frisch
3.9 … Jimmy Callahan
3.4 … Charlie Grimm (included ’32 – won pennant (37-18))
3.2 … Johnny Evers
2.8 … George Sisler
2.2 … Hal Chase
2.1 … Marty McManus
1.7 … John Ganzel
1.6 … Hugh Duffy
1.6 … Leo Durocher
Appling, Murray, Cronin
Luke Appling, David Cone, and the great Paul Waner
wait, just realized…….that’s not Paul, that’s his subpar brother Lloyd……….CANCEL THAT
REAL VOTE: Luke Appling, David Cone, Joe Cronin
appling, nettles and cronin
I’ve been doing some reading about Joe Cronin and found some interesting things that I thought I’d share.
1) He’s the only person to hold each of the following 4 positions – player, manager, general manager, league president. He held each of these for 10+ years.
2) He’s the first person to play in the AL All Star game for two different teams.
3) He was directly or indirectly responsible for the Red Sox trading away Pee Wee Reese (I never knew that Reese was originally in the Red Sox organization).
According to Wikipedia, Cronin knew he was scouting his replacement and deliberately undersold Reese’s talents so the team would him. The SABR version is that he simply wasn’t impressed by Reese and that the trade haunted Cronin for years.
4) As I mentioned above, he voluntarily stepped aside and gave his shortstop job to Johnny Pesky despite the fact that he was coming off a “138 OPS+, 5.1 WAR, 11th place MVP finish” season. I’m pretty sure this is unprecedented.
5) The biggest black mark in Cronin’s career is the failure of the Red Sox to sign any African American players while he was GM. This, despite the fact that they had first crack at both Jackie Robinson and Willie Mays. Hard to know how much influence Cronin had in this vis a vis Tom Yawkey.
6) Countering #5 above, as AL President, Cronin hired the first black umpire (seven years before the NL did the same).
7) Cronin helped write the DH rule, even though he was personally opposed to it.
8) Even though he and Jimmie Foxx didn’t see eye-to-eye (likely due to Foxx’ drinking), Cronin offered Foxx employment and financial assistance in his later years.
9) Connie Mack had the following to say about Cronin: “Oh, my yes, Joe is the best there is in the clutch. With a man on third and one out, I’d rather have Cronin hitting for me than anybody I’ve ever seen.”
Clutch hitting data for Cronin is incomplete but BR shows him with a 1.052 OPS with RISP from 1940-45 and 1.156 with a runner on 3rd and less than two out.
I think Wikipedia has the Reese story wrong. Per Bill James New Historical Abstract (page 598)the story is that Tom Yawkey (Sox owner) purchased a minor league team (Louisville Cardinals)with two other guys. Yawkey bought the team because Reese was on the roster and figured he would get to keep Reese. However the other owners forced a sale of Reese to the highest bidder and Yawkey refused to bid for his own player so he went to the Dodgers. Reese was never considered Boston property because the minor leagues worked far differently back then.
Thanks Chris C. I actually tracked down a newspaper article from 1940 that states the following:
“The Red Sox did pass up Reese and let the Louisville Colonels sell him to the Dodgers for a fancy price. Tom Yawkey, owner of Boston, also has a one-third interest in Louisville and could have had Reese if he had exercised his option. But the Sox owner, told his partners at Louisville, Donnie Bush and Frank McKinney, to sell Reese. Cronin did advise against purchasing Reese – but not for the reason being rumored on the Southern circuit.”
The article goes on to explain that Cronin preferred Dom DiMaggio and that he didn’t want both DiMaggio and Reese because he was concerned that they were the same type of player (good field, no hit).
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2206&dat=19400329&id=8GEzAAAAIBAJ&sjid=QNgFAAAAIBAJ&pg=2801,5613784
I don’t think Bill James’ version of the Reese affair is correct. From everything I have read, Yawkey bought the team for the express purpose of getting Reese. The Sox sent Cronin to scout Pee Wee, and Reese made a couple of errors in the field that day. Cronin concluded that Pee Wee was too small and tiny to play SS in the majors, he convinced the team owner that his opinion was right, and Yawkey eventually sold the rights to Reese to the Dodgers for $35,000 and 4 players to be named later.
Rob Neyer included this trade in his book about baseball’s biggest blunders and goes into detail about what went down. He includes excerpts from Mark Armour’s book on Cronin. Armour is also the author of Cronin’s SABR bio, so I’m going to trust Neyer and Armour’s take on this. Decide for yourself:
https://books.google.com/books?id=nGZ9CyVWkmQC&pg=PA108&dq=joe+cronin+pee+wee+reese&hl=en&sa=X&ei=U3XEVOXhL_f8sAS-uYKQCA&ved=0CB8Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=joe%20cronin%20pee%20wee%20reese&f=false
https://books.google.com/books?id=6-bcAOWuTg4C&pg=PA50&dq=joe+cronin+pee+wee+reese&hl=en&sa=X&ei=U3XEVOXhL_f8sAS-uYKQCA&ved=0CCUQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=joe%20cronin%20pee%20wee%20reese&f=false
No one can know whether or not Cronin was speaking from the heart when he talked to Yawkey about Reese, but I think asking Joe to go scout his own potential replacement just highlights the type of conflicts of interest involved in being your own manager and why it is probably not a great idea.
Consider baseball’s last player-manager experiment. A belief still persists to this day that Pete Rose hurt the Reds by playing himself over Nick Esasky at first base when he was chasing Cobb’s hits record, although Esasky proved to be a bust and really hadn’t done anything to win the job outright over Rose.
Whatever went down with Reese and Cronin, the story still has legs. I have little doubt that Boston fans never let Cronin forget about it, although I am not convinced that Boston would have fared any better in the ’40s with Pee Wee (Neyer makes this point also in the link above.) Boston got excellent production that decade from Johnny Pesky and Vern Stephens.
Campanella, Minoso, Evans
Edmonds, Cronin, Winfield.
Murray
Cone
Edmonds
Appling to win
Minoso and Drysdale to show (up on the next ballot)
Reuschel, Tiant, Brown
Ferrell, Drysdale, and Nettles
finally some Ferrell support!
He’s gone wild.
After we populate the COG, I vote to revote the MVP and Cy Young awards. I was looking at Chuck Knoblach’s 1996 campaign, and I saw that Juan Gonzalez won the MVP with a 3.6 WAR.
@120,
The 1996 AL MVP vote was a real shocker to me, as after about the All-Star break I just thought that it was _obvious_ that A-Rod was the clear MVP. By WAR, Gonzalez is 15th of 19, and Griffey just edges out A-Rod (he finished a somewhat distant 4th).
WAR didn’t exist in 1998. Neither did defensive stats, really.
A lot of guys had beastly years, and Juan’s counting stats were right up there.
And the MVP vote is as much about the narrative.
The Rangers were 3.5 games back on Sept 6th… and caught the Angels.
And they sealed the deal by beating them Anaheim five times in a row. Gonzales contributed in all five games.
And in September:
.384 / .426 / .687 / 1.113
The 47 HR and 144 RBI looked pretty good too.
’96 was also the Rangers’ first postseason appearance, after over 30 years of existence. I remember that being part of the MVP narrative for Gonzalez as well.
@123,
There were plenty of people at the time who thought that giving Juan Gonzalez the AL MVP over A-Rod was a terrible decision. Even though WAR hadn’t been created yet, there were still many people using more advanced statistical methods (‘sabremetrics’) of baseball analysis than mainstream stats, and they explained in detail why he was a poor choice for MVP.
@123,
There were plenty of people at the time who thought that giving Juan Gonzalez the AL MVP over A-Rod was a terrible decision. Even though WAR hadn’t been created yet, there were still many people using more advanced statistical methods (‘sabermetrics’) of baseball analysis than mainstream stats, and they explained in detail why he was a poor choice for MVP.
Voomo: We’re talking about 1996, not 1998. In 1996 Gonzalez’s 47 HR/144 RBI did not stand out that much because there were a total of 5 AL players with 140+ RBI and 8 with 40 + HR. His low WAR is due to a relatively low number of batting runs which is due to a low value of wOBA which in turn is due to a low number of BB. Also in terms of fielding runs he was near the bottom of the league.
Ah.
That’s different.
The Rangers led the division the whole season.
Juan was 5th in WAR on his own team.
And here’s his September slash:
.245 / .272 / .473 / .745
Juan Gone also only played 134 games that year. That’s the type of games played number from an MVP that you would expect from a catcher or a guy who was just dominating the league that year. Here’s the position-player MVPs with under 140 games played (non-strike years) since 1980:
2010 Hamilton — 133 G, 8.7 WAR
2009 Mauer — 138 G, 7.8 WAR
2003 Bonds — 130 G, 9.2 WAR
1990 Rickey — 136 G, 9.9 WAR
1980 Brett — 117 G, 9.4 WAR
I don’t know how to work the play index to check this out, but I wouldn’t be surprised to find that a significant percent of the position player MVPs in the last 50 or 60 years:
1. Were on a division winning team; AND
2. Led the team in HRs, RBI, or both.
I would guess at least 30-40 percent.
Gonzalez was that guy in 1996.
Joseph @ 133 –
I looked at all the MVP winners from 1969-present. I left out 1981 and 1994, and all 6 pitchers who won the MVP. That left 83 position player winners, including both of the 1979 NL co-MVPs.
Of those 83, 60 played for division or wild card winners (72%). 43 of them played for division/wild card winners and led their team in HR, RBI, or both (52%).
This has been more pronounced in the AL, where 23 of 39 non-pitcher MVPs have been on playoff teams & led their team in HR, RBI, or both (59%). In the NL it’s 20 of 44 (45%).
From 1993-98 (omitting ’94) every AL MVP was on a playoff team and led their team in both HR and RBI, and from 1993-2007 (again omitting ’94) 11 out of 14 AL MVPs met those criteria.
David @ 135.
Thanks for all that work! It looks like that might explain at least part of the reason Gonzalez won.
Mo – I made a similar suggestion a few months ago. Would definitely be a fun project!
Re: alternate choices for the MVP, actually there are some interesting options already in play.
The Sporting News chose MVPs from 1929 through 1945. In 1929, when the AL offered no award, SN chose Al Simmons to pair with the NL winner Hornsby. In 1930 the SN award stood alone, and Joe Cronin and Bill Terry were the awardees. From 1930 to 1945, the SN award failed to correspond to the BBWAA award several times:
1931: AL, Lou Gehrig, not Lefty Grove, and NL, Chuck Klein, not Frankie Frisch
1934: AL, Lou Gehrig, not Mickey Cochrane
1935: NL, Arky Vaughan, not Gabby Hartnett
1944: AL, Bobby Doerr, not Hal Newhouser
1945: AL, Eddie Mayo, not Hal Newhouser, and NL, Tommy Holmes, not Phil Cavaretta
Some observations about this list: Most of us would go with the choice of Vaughan over Hartnett(1935) in Vaughan’s big season, and either Klein or Terry over Frisch, with his 101 OPS+ in 1931. Also, I’d guess, the choice would be Holmes’s remarkable 1945 season over Cavaretta’s, which was also pretty good. I’d personally take Gehrig’s triple crown in 1934 over Cochrane’s backstopping, but that’s a closer call. Doerr over Newhouser in 1944 isn’t a bad call either, but Dizzy Trout had the best record in the league. The puzzler here is Eddie Mayo over Newhouser in 1945, even given the fact that by then the Sporting News had Instituted a “Player of the Year Award” and Newhouser was the 1945 recipient. Finally, it’s interesting that SN agreed with the BBWAA in honoring Marty Marion in 1944 as the NL MVP. Marion must have done truly impressive things in the field to deserve the accolades, despite his ordinary batting stats.
Other than the 17-year run of the SN MVP award, there are several venues designating a Player of the Year, notably those of SN mentioned above and Baseball Digest, which, notable picked Andre Dawson as their guy in 1987, another controversial MVP choice, seen in retrospect.
And that, to me, would be the main problem with trying to re-chose MVPs—retrospect. The soufflé of a major league season doesn’t stay risen very long, and the dry statistics left in the pan, despite the arguments of WAR true believers, for instance, are only a part of what was once quite a different dish. Though not recently, Ted Williams’ 1947 second place finish has been argued as a great injustice here, although an examination of the voting indicates that he only received 3 first place votes out of 24, suggesting that his impact on the voters, who had given him the award the previous year, after all, left something to be desired despite the gaudy stats. What was it? The stats won’t tell us.
Killebrew, Ashburn, and Winfield
Too bad Tommy Bridges couldn’t hit.
Innings Pitched per Win Above Average
IpWaa:
80.3 … (3256) Kevin Brown
81.4 … (2899) David Cone
93.1 … (3548) Rick Reuschel
101.0 … (3486) Luis Tiant
104.6 … (2825) Tommy Bridges
107.4 … (3286) Dennis Eckersley
110.1 … (2621) Wes Ferrell
120.0 … (3432) Don Drysdale
154.4 … (2331) Thornton Lee
_____
Through the season closest to each Innings Pitched threshold…
IpWaa 1500:
72.8 … Rick Reuschel
76.6 … Wes Ferrell
88.8 … Dennis Eckersley
89.6 … Don Drysdale
90.4 … Luis Tiant
98.1 … David Cone
98.4 … Thornton Lee (and then went downhill)
136.5 … Tommy Bridges
168.7 … Kevin Brown
_____________________________
IpWaa 2000:
67.1 … David Cone
71.9 … Rick Reuschel
73.0 … Wes Ferrell
76.8 … Luis Tiant
96.5 … Kevin Brown (now there’s an improvement)
99.7 … Don Drysdale
108.6 … Dennis Eckersley
130.1 … Tommy Bridges
______________________________
IpWaa 2500:
68.5 … David Cone
74.8 … Rick Reuschel
79.2 … Kevin Brown
84.4 … Luis Tiant
86.8 … Wes Ferrell
104.7 … Don Drysdale
108.1 … Dennis Eckersley
110.3 … Tommy Bridges
_________________________________
IpWaa 3000:
76.1 … Kevin Brown
81.4 … David Cone (2899)
84.4 … Rick Reuschel
85.2 … Luis Tiant
96.1 … Dennis Eckersley
104.6 … Tommy Bridges (2825)
115.9 … Don Drysdale
__________________________________
IpWaa 3500:
92.6 … Rick Reuschel
120.0 … Don Drysdale (3432)
Killer, Murray, Appling
Cone, Killebrew, and Waner
Killebrew, Cone, Nettles
Welcome to the COG voting, E.H.
Brown, Ferrell, Drysdale
Brown, Ferrell, and Drysdale
Here’s a link to the Circle of Greats results post for the induction of Ernie Banks: http://www.highheatstats.com/2014/04/cog-1927-vote-results-banks-deposit-secured/#more-20453
Murray, Reuschel, Winfield
Minoso, Appling and Dw Evans
Murray, Alomar, Appling
It’s been a busy week, so I haven’t updated as much as I’d like to have. Here’s a Sunday AM update, through JamesS @151, the 46th ballot (by my count):
22 (47.83%) – Luke Appling
13 (28.26%) – Harmon Killebrew
12 (26.09%) – Joe Cronin
9 (19.57%) – Graig Nettles
8 (17.39%) – Roberto Alomar, Eddie Murray
7 (15.22%) – Kevin Brown, Dennis Eckersley
6 (13.04%) – Richie Ashburn, David Cone, Minnie Minoso, Dave Winfield
4 (8.70%) – Roy Campanella, Don Drysdale, Jim Edmonds, Dwight Evans, Rick Reuschel
3 (6.52%) – Wes Ferrell, Luis Tiant
1 (2.17%) – Tommy Bridges, Lloyd Waner
I feel the need to make this PSA: the Waner on the ballot is not Paul, but rather drastically inferior Lloyd. That is all.
Perhaps it’s because a lot of the late voters haven’t voted yet, or maybe I’m misreading the situation, but there doesn’t seem to be as much enthusiasm (so far, anyway) for trying to keep ALL the holdovers on the ballot. Last round, it seemed like some voters went to great lengths. This round, we sit halfway through the week, with about 2/3 of our ballots cast, and Richie Ashburn, David Cone, Minnie Minoso, Dave Winfield, Don Drysdale, Jim Edmonds, Dwight Evans, and Wes Ferrell run the risk of falling off the ballot, while Rick Reuschel, Roy Campanella, and Luis Tiant risk losing half of their accumulated eligibility. We’ll see how the 2nd-half voters handle that (in addition to any vote-changers).
Also, while the race for the winner is not interesting (Appling’s got it locked up, barring something totally heretofore unseen), the struggle for 25% is an interesting one. Killebrew and Cronin are right near the edge of picking up a 10th and a 2nd round of eligibility, respectively. As usual, a lot of things still to be determined in the last day, even when the election itself is not really in doubt.
For the 1906 election, I’m voting for:
-Dave Winfield
-Eddie Murray
-Roberto Alomar
Other top candidates I considered highly (and/or will consider in future rounds):
-Cronin
-Appling
-Eckersley
-Killebrew
-Brown
-Reuschel
-Tiant
-Cone
-Evans
-Nettles
-Ashburn
-Drysdale
-Edmonds
Campanella, Evans, Tiant
Cronin
Appling
Nettles
Here’s the ranking of players on the ballot (holdovers plus newcomers over 50 WAR) according to my methodology, which gives a cumulative ranking on 4 ‘advanced’ measures (those being WAR, WAA+, JAWS and WAR/WAR*162G, or *250IP – see previous posts or ask me for fuller explanation). So if a player has a cumulative ranking of ‘4’, it means he is ranked #1 in all of these categories; if he has a ranking of ’80’, he’s 20th out of 20 in each.
Appling 4
Reuschel 12
Brown 12
Tiant 28
Cronin 30
Alomar 33
Nettles 34
Cone 35
Ferrell 36
Drysdale 36
Murray 40
Evans 46
Ashburn 46
Edmonds 48
Eckersley 51
Winfield 60
Killebrew 64
Minoso 70
Bridges 73
Campanella 80
I noted in my first comment on this thread that it was hard to think of voting this round without being able to vote for Satchel Paige. That said, I understand the process and why he’s not included here, and I’ve already spent some time this week doing some statistical research to make my case for him in redemption. Plus if one of these holdovers fall off, they’re more of a danger to him in the next redemption. Plus, I like many of these holdovers, and am shocked to see so little support for candidates I see as very deserving of being on the ballot, like Farrell and Tiant. Appling is going to win, so this is all strategy:
Farrell
Tiant
Drysdale
I’m going to do another vote update, because we have exactly 50 votes as of bells @163, and I love presenting the percentages with no decimals. So here you go:
23 (46%) – Luke Appling
13 (26%) – Joe Cronin, Harmon Killebrew
10 (20%) – Graig Nettles
9 (18%) – Roberto Alomar, Eddie Murray
7 (14%) – Kevin Brown, Dennis Eckersley, Dave Winfield
6 (12%) – Richie Ashburn, David Cone, Minnie Minoso
5 (10%) – Roy Campanella, Don Drysdale, Dwight Evans, Luis Tiant
4 (8%) – Jim Edmonds, Wes Ferrell, Rick Reuschel
1 (2%) – Tommy Bridges, Lloyd Waner
Nettles may be making a run at 25%, and Cronin and Killebrew are struggling to hang on to that extra round.
As for 10%, the folks at 5 & 6 votes are there now, but still will need another vote or two to reach the mark by the end of the round. Edmonds, Ferrell, and Reuschel are really struggling.
@157,159;
Sisler’s pre/post-illness performance splits are similar to Ernie Banks’ shortstop/first baseman splits – he went from being an all-time great to being just another decent player – a bit above average, but not really All-Star quality, let alone a HOFer.
Ernie Banks:
As yet there haven’t been any comments here about his recent demise, so I’ll make the effort.
Banks was the first shortstop who was a genuine power hitter. I haven’t tried to find the HR record for the position prior to 1955, probably Cronin’s 24 in 1940, but in 6 years, starting with 1955, Banks passed the 40 mark 5 times. Again, I haven’t researched this, but I’d guess he was the first live-ball era shortstop to lead the league in HRs, and he did it twice—really three times, but in 1959 Eddie Mathews got some extra games in the Braves-Dodgers playoff and broke the tie he had with Ernie.
Banks’s two MVPs are, to me, incontestable, despite the fact that Mays outpoints him slightly in WAR for 1958. That year the Cubs had no one and they finished fifth, no one but Banks. Same in 1959.
The rap on Ernie is that after 1960 he was just ordinary, but that isn’t how I see it. He had five years of WAR 2.4 or better through 1968, ages 30-37, and 18.9 total. He wasn’t the Ernie of yore, but he was above average most of the time. How many average players put up 19 WAR between 30 and 37? How many good players do?
Beyond that, he was Ernie Banks his whole life. Read any of the obits for what that means.
Good stuff, nsb.
I have a post on Ernie to be published on Tuesday.
Vern Stephens was the first live-ball era SS to lead either league in HR (albeit in 1945). Also, Stephens hit 39 HR in 1949, which was likely the record for a SS pre-Banks (Play Index seems to be down at the moment, so can’t confirm).
David:
Forgot about Stephens. He also lead the AL in homers with 24 in 1949. But, to make my final point again, Stephens was a very good player, but ages 30-37 he put up 5.4 WAR. Ernie’s 18.9 don’t seem that shabby in context.
I don’t think anyone discounts Banks as a great player because of his 30s. The issue is just that he was basically Mays or Aaron in the 50s. If he sticks with them through the 60s, he’s every bit as inner-circle as they. The thing is, though, he didn’t. Whether it was the wear-and-tear of SS or just how he was built or something, Banks didn’t hold up like those greats among greats.
It very much reminds me of Albert Pujols. In his three years as an Angel, he has a 128 OPS+, and he still plays better-than-solid defense. But everyone treats him as “done” because he’s not the hitter he once was. It’s sad, but it’s natural, since we just naturally deal with the decline of greats poorly.
I’m finding some of these ballots harder, as we get a greater backlog of players that I always saw as very good, but not necessarily first-rank HOF stars. I’m sticking to my backup plan–the player I think is the best, and then I’ll fill in.
Appling, Alomar, Tiant
The spreadsheet showing the voting numbers for past COG rounds (since round 38) has gotten somewhat unwieldy. So I’ve created a fresh spreadsheet that I’ll use to record the votes for rounds 83 (this one) and after: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1kWBuLPn-x9xfVrU8YD976Fg063h81eVll9YAYlnoF7M/edit#gid=0
This is the second time I’ve done such a shift, so now there will be three spreadsheets all together, one showing rounds 1 to 37, one for rounds 38 through 82 and the new one for round 83 and after.
In order to minimize the degree to which those who are interested need to refer back to the older sheets, I’ve carried over to the new sheet some summary information from the older sheets. When you first look at the new sheet, you will see all the holdovers currently on the Round 83 eligible list, plus the born-in-1906 guys (newly eligible for Round 83) who have thus far appeared on at least one ballot in the current round. For each current holdover, I’ve carried over the following summary information:
–how many rounds he has been on the eligible list over the first 82 rounds, going all the way back to Round 1
–specifically which rounds he has been on the eligible list over the first 82 rounds, going all the way back to Round 1
–how many total votes have been cast for him over the first 82 rounds, going all the way back to Round 1.
None of these counts include redemption round appearances or redemption round votes; only regular induction rounds and votes are counted.
After the list of all the current holdovers, if you keep scrolling down the new spreadsheet page a bit, you will come to a list of all 82 current Circle inductees, in order of their induction, from Round 1 to 82. Next to each inductee is information similar to the information for the current holdovers: number of rounds eligible through induction, the specific rounds of eligibility though induction, and the total votes received through induction.
Information you will need to back to the older summary spreadsheets to get will include any information about votes for guys who dropped off the ballot between Rounds 1 and 82 but were not inducted, and of course the specific vote totals for each candidate in each specific round.
Vote:
Wes Ferrell
Eddie Murray
Graig Nettles
When Eddie Murray retired he was
7th in RBI
9th in Hits
15th in Home Runs
And played 21 years without controversy.
Edmonds, Reuschel, Tiant
Winfield, Murray, Killebrew
Ferrell
Ashburn
Winfield
I am not voting yet, but am announcing my intention to keep the following players on the ballot (or from losing a round) if possible to help any other strategic voters:
Ashburn, Cone, Minoso
Campanella, Drysdale, Evans, Tiant, Ferrel, Reuschel.
I’m willing to let Edmonds go as I have about a half dozen guys out but ahead of him on my personal list.
I’m considering Brown Eck and winfield to be safe for now, and my secondary consideration will be to get Nettles or Cronin an extra round if all my in/borderline guys are safe.
My last priority will be a vote for Appling who I think is best on this ballot.
I’m torn about Killebrew. At this point, I think I might rather see him get in so his votes can get distributed elsewhere. He just keeps racking up rounds because his supporters are so emphatic. Even though I put him in the same class as Edmonds (not a bad selection, but far enough below my line I don’t anticipate ever voting for him), it seems that he is hurting other candidacies by drawing so many votes, and if he doesn’t get in, it looks like he will be on the ballot till the end.
By quick count it seems like the bubble looks like this:
6 – Wes Ferrell, David Cone, Minnie Minoso
5 – Roy Campanella, Don Drysdale, Dwight Evans, Jim Edmonds, Rick Reuschel
Everyone else at 7 or higher. 55 votes. Unless there are fewer than 5 voters or almost all voters vote strategically, something is going to give.
re: Killebrew, I’ve said before that I just don’t get it. But arguments have been made, and if he gets elected, so be it. I think he’ll get in for one of the 3 rounds we have left before 1903… he’s had too many near misses where another candidate just pipped him, but the picks are getting less obvious.
Killebrew certainly has had unusually high levels of support.
Traditionalists can cite his 573 HR, high walks, and wholesome image in their arguments. Those favoring WAR measurements may feel he’s one-dimensional and more middle-of-the-pack HOF (just not truly “great”).
One reason he has done so well is the relative scarcity of COG-level talent born in the 20’s/10’s/00’s (he dropped off the ballot in 1934 when Clemente/Gibson/Kaline hit at once and Murray/Allen fell with him – the three 1B split the voters too much). In 1929, Murray and Killebrew were redeemed together just after Mantle/Mays/Mathews had left the ballot. Since then, 1918 and 1907 were the only 2 really strong ballots for newcomers, and by then the voters were accomplished at strategic voting.
Murray seems to be the better all-around 1B (WAR 68.3 for Murray, WAR 60.3 for Killebrew) but 3000 hits and his consistency are not providing enough “wow” factor to separate him from Killebrew. Thome, who is more similar to Killebrew in style of play, has 72.9 WAR. Edmonds has virtually identical WAR to Killebrew, but is not that popular. In fact, 14 others on this ballot have more WAR than Killebrew (some are in the HOF, some not).
As far as hurting other candidates goes, since he was redeemed in 1929, we’ve only dropped Ashburn (who just came back), Newhouser (who might return later), Doby, Wilhelm, Kiner, Medwick and Dean. Most of these probably would not make the top 120 anyway. Killebrew has gained additional rounds that probably should have gone to others first, but it was mainly from having more people accept him as the 3rd best candidate, and poor consensus on others. 1903 will test our ability to keep everyone around, to be sure.
I cannot bring myself to support Killebrew over Murray, though. It will be interesting to see where votes go once the backlog lessens a bit.
Eddie Murray vs Harmon Killebrew
Steady Eddie easily beats Killer in every counting stat except for Home Runs.
Of course, Murray had almost 3000 more plate appearances.
7th all-time vs 90th all-time.
Over his last 3000 (3053) PA, covering six years, Murray is credited with 3.8 WAR.
Killer was replacement level for his last three years, (1041 PA)
Murray was consistently above average from ages 21-34.
9125 PA
63.2 WAR
396 Rbat / -7 Rbaser / 59 Rfield
Killer was consistently above average from ages 23-36
8512 PA
60.7 WAR
502 Rbat / -22 Rbaser / -71 Rfield
Here’s their best WAR years:
7.1 … 6.4
6.6 … 6.2
5.6 … 5.9
5.2 … 5.7
5.1 … 4.9
4.9 … 4.7
4.4 … 4.3
4.2 … 4.2
4.1 … 4.2
3.8 … 3.1
3.7 … 3.1
3.2 … 2.8
3.2 … 2.8
2.4 … 2.5
2.0 … 0.5
1.6 … 0.2
1.2 … 0.0
1.1 … -0.1
Murray’s played in High School with Ozzie Smith.
Killebrew is the best player to ever come from Idaho.
_____
This comparison illustrates for me one of the philosophical questions inherent in this exercise, namely:
What is Great?
Or, what is greater:
To be Very Good at Everything, or
To be Great at one thing and average otherwise?
The one thing that Killer was great at was the sexiest and arguably most valuable thing – putting the ball over the fence.
Here’s a situation – say you knew you could field a 4 WAR player at every position.
And you could choose: all well rounded, above average players, or
players who derived most of their value from one item in the toobox?
(Yes, i know that if you got 4 WAR out of every position you’re in good shape no matter what, but…)
Player A isn’t going to cause losses because of holes in his game. But
Player B is more likely to win games because of that one hit/run/throw that stands out.
???
____
Reuschel, Cone, Evans
Reminder: Today’s the last day for the 1906 COG voting.
An all “save my favorite on-the-bubble OFers” ballot:
– Jim Edmonds
– Dwight Evans
– Saturnino Orestes Armas (Arrieta) “Minnie” Minoso
Drysdale, Edmonds, Dewey Evans
I’d vote for Campy over Edmonds, but he’s got a round to spare.
so it looks like campy’s at 5, Farrell, Drysdale and Reuschel at 6, with everyone else safe. 58 votes, so if there are no more or 1 more, Campy loses a round and that’s it. But if we get 2 or more votes and no one votes for the guys at 6, Reuschel loses a round and the other guys are gone. Tense moments for the bubble boys…
bells, I think your math was off a bit. 58 votes, + 2 more = 60… which makes 6 votes enough. My (admittedly unofficial) count has Ferrell with exactly 6, and the rest of the legitimate candidates at 7+, with the exception, as you noted, of Campanella, who will move onto the bubble. So that means with 0, 1, OR 2 votes (from the time you posted), the 6-vote guys would be okay.
As for my final tally, I had Killebrew coming in one vote shy of 25% (he had 14). Cronin, though, got exactly 15/60 votes, giving him a bonus round of eligibility. And, of course, Appling coasted in with 25/60 votes.
I believe we have a split round coming up next in 1905 (since 1907 was split, and then we had 1970 and 1906). The top player in the first of those two should be Indian Bob Johnson, a longtime Philly A who really knew how to take a walk, even back before it was popular. He is possibly a legitimate COG candidate, but won’t get much love next to the “name” players we have on the ballot… plus arguably his best season came at age 38 in 1944, and you have to be a little skeptical about that. The second round of the split will feature Red Ruffing, The Mrs. Butterworth to Wes Ferrell’s Aunt Jemima… or vice versa or something (that’s a riff on a joke from The Office, if anyone’s familiar). Wally Berger is also a mildly intriguing candidate in the upcoming round. There’s no one remotely interesting, except maybe Chuck Klein, who I expect will get little-to-no support, coming in 1904.
Nonetheless, the forthcoming candidates are a fairly underwhelming group. So let’s figure out how to clear out this backlog!
I’m actually not counting 1970 when I schedule the split votes, so 1905 will be a regular vote and then 1904 will be the split vote.
Aha! I see. I didn’t know that. Good to know. Thanks.
Cronin, Brown, Reuschel.
Appling, Cronin, Drysdale
Yeah I realized my math mistake just before I read your comment. Forgot that 61 was the magic number, not 60. Regardless, everyone’s alive! Should be 3 interesting rounds before a REALLY interesting round.