Todd Helton says goodbye to Coors Field

I was able to stay up and watch the Rockies home finale Wednesday night. In an otherwise unremarkable season, they wrapped up with a very nice tribute to Todd Helton. Helton is sneaking out of the league this week in the shadow of the retirement of Mariano Rivera. His departure probably deserves more attention than it is getting. Then again, getting less attention than he deserves is sort of the perfect way to send off Todd Helton, who has spent his entire career in mile-high obscurity. 

A couple years back, I wrote about evaluating the first baseman who played mainly between 1990 and 2006 (with the arbitrary cut-off of having played 1000 first-base games in that time). At the time, it was in the context of evaluating the careers of Jeff Bagwell, Mark McGwire, and Rafael Palmeiro. I have the numbers in this computer but haven't updated the active players, but in general there hasn't been a lot of movement from where things stood at that time. Then, it came out with Jeff Bagwell as a clear Hall of Famer. By my (invented) standard, Bagwell and Thomas were dead even as the best of the era, with Thome third and Palmeiro fourth. Fifth was Todd Helton, ahead of Mark McGwire, Fred McGriff, Jason Giambi, and others who seemed to get quite a bit more attention. 

Helton's career was a sabermetric dream. He didn't compile huge counting stats, with "only" 2518 hits and 369 home runs, neither of which place him in the top 70 of all time. Despite that, he is 26th all time in on-base percentage and 36th in slugging. His 1334 walks are 35th all-time, and three times he led the National League in Times on Base. He rankes 16th all-time in doubles with 592, retiring with a huge lead as the active leader. 

From 2000 to 2004, Helton was one of the best in the game. He had a rWAR higher than 6.0 in each of those years, with a five-season total of 37.4, higher than the five best seasons of some slam-dunk Hall of Famers, like Frank Thomas. He followed that up by leading the National League in OBP in 2005, but his power was starting to slip, never to return. After compiling a .643 SLG from 2000-04, he dropped to .534 in 2005, and never surpassed .500 again. He remained a difficult out, posting a .416 OBP in his age-35 season (2009).

A pet theory of mine is that players who peak early in their careers do worse in Hall of Fame voting. It makes sense - a marginal Hall of Famer seven years removed from being a dominant player is going to be fresher in the minds of voters than one 15 years removed. When Helton is eligible in 2019, he will be 15 years past his elite best. Add in the fact that his greatness didn't come in the traditional statistical categories and the natural bias against Coors Field sluggers having inflated stats, and Helton's chances are remote.

That's ok though. Helton has a new ranch, a new horse, and he gets to be remembered as the definitive player in the still-young life of the Rockies franchise. He was one of the few Rockies who played well in their only World Series appearance, and got to say goodbye to the Coors fans on Wednesday with a home run. He had a remarkable, memorable career, and baseball is better for having had him as one of its stars. 

Johan Santana's no-hitter is a good reminder that he's awesome

As just about all of you already know, Johan Santana threw the first no-hitter in New York Mets history this past Friday. It was also the first no-hitter of Santana's excellent career. While no longer considered one of the ace pitchers in the game, Santana has been fantastic in his comeback this year. He only has three wins because of the sometimes-anemic Met offense, which had, until Friday's gem allowed Santana to fly somewhat under the radar, he now has a 2.38 ERA (6th in NL), 68 strikeouts (8th), a 1.029 WHIP (8th), and is the only pitcher in the majors with two complete games. He ranks tied for fifth (with fellow Met R.A. Dickey) in Baseball-Reference's WAR calculation.

Johan Santana (Credit: slgckgc)

Perhaps it's hard to imagine because of all the other stuff that went on around him during his time in Queens, but the trade for Santana may have been the best the Mets have ever made. Compare Santana, with a 2.80 ERA (144 ERA+) in 668 innings, giving him a 16.4 WAR, to David Cone, with his 3.13 ERA (113 ERA+) in 1209.1 innings, good for a 9.6 WAR. The theft of Cone from the Royals was cited by the MLB Network's Prime Nine program (not necessarily a bastion of objective analysis, but certainly an idea of the general consensus) as the 8th most lopsided trade in all of baseball history. Objectively, the Santana trade was better for the Mets.

Of course, we don't always consider these things objectively. The Mets were an elite team when Cone pitched for them, and Cone was a workhorse, pitching 200+ innings in each of the years he was in the rotation. Meanwhile, Santana got a huge contract and spent a bit of time on the disabled list, during a time when lots of Mets signed big contracts and spent time on the disabled list. It seemed like he was viewed as part of the problem more than part of the solution, which was unfair - it wasn't Santana's fault that Jason Bay broke down.

With a WAR over 50.0, two Cy Young Awards, and now a no-hitter, Santana may very well be the most difficult decision for the Hall of Fame of any active player. With only 136 wins and only two with more than 16, he doesn't have the traditional statistics voters tend to look for, so it's my guess that he won't get in. Still, no eligible player with two Cy Young awards has ever missed out on the Hall. It's hard to imagine Santana having enough left in the tank to get the 64 wins he'd need to reach 200, but it was also hard to imagine Santana carrying a 2.38 ERA through two months of the season. 

With that in mind, since he doesn't have the traditional stats, and HOF voters are far behind season-award voters when it comes to advanced stats, it's going to take a great narrative to get Santana into the Hall. With a no-hitter as part of a season that sees the Mets, improbably, in first place two months into the season, maybe he's getting that chance.

Photo Credit: By slgckgc on Flickr (Original version) UCinternational (Crop) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Bill James: "I think Dwight Evans is a Hall of Famer"

I wanted to link to yesterday's article at Grantland where Bill James advocated putting Dwight Evans in the Hall of Fame. Evans was my favorite players as a child, so the pro-Evans appreciations in recent years are pretty enjoyable for me. Unlike a lot of James's contributions "Win Shares" have not really caught on, for a variety of reasons, and the article is a bit verbose (as James has a tendency to be), but the argument is strong, I think. Pretty amazing to think that Evans, who fell off the ballot in his second year, could now be thought of as a Hall of Fame candidate, but that's why there are rules in place to enable us to re-evaluate players. Guys whose value came in things other than the standard Triple Crown stats can take awhile to be appreciated. That's why it took so long to get Ron Santo in the Hall.

A couple more thoughts:

1. I have trouble believing Evans will get to the Hall anytime soon. However, the Red Sox really should retire his number. You can make a fairly strong case that Evans is the third greatest player in Red Sox history, behind Ted Williams and Carl Yastrzemski. Let's get his #24 up in right field.

2. I hope James follows up his Evans piece on an even more neglected player, who, like Evans, was a star in the 80's who got underappreciated because his value wasn't in home runs and batting average. Lou Whitaker only hit .300 twice and never once drove in 100 runs. However, he retired with a career WAR close to 70 on the strength of a high OBP and great defense. By scoring and preventing runs, Whitaker played a big role in making Jack Morris a Hall of Fame candidate.

Hall of Fame post revisited

A couple weeks ago, I wrote a post regarding the Hall of Fame, specifically regarding the candidacies of the prominent first basemen on the current ballot: Jeff Bagwell, Rafael Palmeiro, and Mark McGwire. While I generally felt good about the final result - definitive yes to Bagwell, debatable yes to Palmeiro, debatable no to McGwire - one of the methods I used to measure sort of bugged me, so I wanted to take a chance to re-examine and update my results.

Initially, I measured the number of seasons each of the players had with a WAR over 10, 8, 5 and 3. I used these values because they seem like good cutoff points. Why, though? I'm not sure, really, and as I re-read my post, they just seemed too... arbitrary. Of course, the whole process is a bit arbitrary. Drawing the line from what makes a Hall of Famer and what doesn't is ENTIRELY the preference of the person making that choice. If you're a "small Hall of Fame" voter, and believes that the Hall should only be for the Ruth/Mays/Aaron/Williams types, and you vote that way consistently, that's fine. As long as someone puts thought and effort into their methodology and is consistent with their standards, then that's all I can ask for.

However, "consistent" shouldn't mean "unchanging" in this case. As new information becomes available, of course it should be considered. The case I've used a few times this year is regarding Mike Fast's work at Baseball Prospectus regarding catcher defense. If we discover new information, we should use it. At the same time, if a methodology is developed for rating players, and a flaw is found in that, it's ok - in fact, it's necessary - to change it.

So I went back through my study, and realized these WAR season scores were just TOO arbitrary. Why was I drawing the lines where I was? No reason - they just seemed like good places to draw lines. However, with only one season of a first baseman having a 10+ WAR in our study, maybe that's too arbitrary? So I decided to put every season of our 25 players back into a spreadsheet, and instead of WARs of 10, 8. 5 and 3 as dividers, I'd use percentiles - the 99th, 90th, 75th and 50th.

This isn't perfect. It includes seasons at the beginning and end of careers when players weren't regulars or ended up stopping play. Still, it is BETTER. "Meliora" - that's what we're shooting for, right Yellow Jackets? If we can do better, then we should, even if better still isn't perfect.

Once completed, we're left with 396, sorted by WAR. the 99th percentile is 8.8, the 90th is 5.9, the 75th is 4.1 and the 50th is 2.0. These are still technically arbitrary cutoffs, of course - they're just drawn where they are for a reason.

Player	99	90	75	50	SUM
Thomas, Frank	0	6	9	15	30
Bagwell, Jeff	1	5	11	13	30
Thome, Jim	0	5	9	13	27
Palmeiro, Rafael	0	3	8	14	25
Helton, Todd	1	5	7	12	25
McGwire, Mark	0	3	9	11	23
Clark, Will	1	2	6	12	21
Giambi, Jason	1	4	6	8	19
McGriff, Fred	0	2	6	10	18
Olerud, John	0	2	6	10	18
Grace, Mark	0	0	5	12	17
Delgado, Carlos	0	2	4	10	16
Lee, Derrek	0	0	3	7	10
Joyner, Wally	0	0	1	9	10
Vaughn, Mo	0	0	3	6	9
Galarraga, Andres	0	0	2	6	8
Konerko, Todd	0	0	1	5	6
Martinez, Tino	0	0	2	4	6
Clark, Tony	0	0	0	4	4
Segui, David	0	0	0	4	4
Casey, Sean	0	0	0	3	3
Karros, Eric	0	0	0	3	3
Morris, Hal	0	0	0	3	3
Young, Kevin	0	0	1	2	3
Snow, JT	0	0	0	2	2

Compare this to our chart in our original post - Frank Thomas, who had no 8+ WAR seasons, had six where he's in the 90th percentile - he now gets credit for that. To me, this is just a more sensible measurement.

This changes our final results so slightly that my conclusions are the same. Thomas, Bagwell and Thome are still the definite choices, arguments can be made for Palmeiro and Helton, and McGwire and Giambi are, again too far off:

Player	H	HR	TB	TOB	WAR	10-peark	3-peak	5 Best	Seasons	TOTAL
Thomas, Frank	3	4	3	2	2	2	4	4	1.5	31.5
Bagwell, Jeff	7	7	5	4	1	1	2	1	1.5	32.5
Thome, Jim	8	1	2	3	3	3	6	5	3	43
Palmeiro, Rafael	1	3	1	1	4	6	10	9	4.5	51.5
Helton, Todd	5	11	7	6	6	4	3	3	4.5	67.5
McGwire, Mark	18	2	10	13	5	7	7.5	7	6	90.5
Giambi, Jason	15	8	9	9	9	5	1	2	8	93
McGriff, Fred	2	5	4	5	10	11	9	10	9.5	95.5
Clark, Will	10	15.5	13	11	7	9	5	8	7	106.5
Olerud, John	9	17	14	7	8	8	7.5	6	9.5	110
Delgado, Carlos	12	6	8	10	12	10	11	11	12	128
Grace, Mark	4	21	12	8	11	12	13	12	11	137
Galarraga, Andres	6	9	6	12	15	18	15	14	16	156
Lee, Derrek	14	13	15	16	14	13	14	15	13.5	169.5
Joyner, Wally	11	19	17	14	13	15	18	16	13.5	175.5
Konerko, Todd	13	10	11	15	16	17	17	18	17.5	182.5
Vaughn, Mo	19	14	19	18	17	14	12	13	15	192
Martinez, Tino	16	12	16	17	18	16	16	17	17.5	199.5
Casey, Sean	20	24	21	21	19	19	21	19	22.5	243.5
Clark, Tony	24	18	22	23	20	21	20	20	19.5	247.5
Karros, Eric	17	15.5	18	20	23	22.5	22	21	22.5	250.5
Snow, JT	21	20	20	19	22	20	24	22	25	259
Morris, Hal	23	25	24	24	21	24	25	23	22.5	274.5
Segui, David	22	23	23	22	24	22.5	23	24	19.5	275
Young, Kevin	25	22	25	25	25	25	19	25	22.5	288.5

Who knows - I may change this even more as I move on. But for now, I feel like it's an improvement over my previous results.

Reevaluating the Bagwell, McGwire and Palmeiro candidacies

The Hall of Fame results will be announced today at 2:00. The votes have long been in and counted, so this piece is, in some ways, past history. All indications are that Barry Larkin will be the only player elected by the BBWAA. Larkin is a deserving Hall of Famer, but it seems strange that, following the greatest offensive era in baseball history, a shortstop with only 198 home runs will be the only one inducted.

Perhaps, though, it’s not so odd. After all, if everyone was hitting for ridiculous power numbers, it is easiest to appreciate someone with a great all-around game like Larkin or Roberto Alomar, last years induction.  It’s been hard to rate the power hitters of the past era because they lack historical context. I’m not sure whether or not hitting 40 home runs is more impressive when everyone else is doing it. I’m largely sure that it’s not a whole lot *easier.* What I am confident in, however, is that it’s much less valuable. If the 40 home run hitter becomes a free agent in an era when everyone is hitting at that level, finding a replacement is easier. It also draws attention to all of the other things a baseball player can do – defense, baserunning, drawing walks, getting base hits.

In the past, I’ve advocated the Hall of Fame candidacies of Jeff Bagwell, Rafael Palmeiro, and Mark McGwire. However, a lot of people who I consider to be pretty smart are leaving at least those last two off of their ballots. I thought a thorough investigation as to what a Hall of Fame level production from a first baseman during the offensive era should look like.

Now, naming it the offensive era may seem like a cop-out to avoid calling it the “steroid era.” After all, steroids (or suspicion of steroids) is a huge element in keeping Bagwell, Palmeiro, and McGwire out of the Hall of Fame.  My take is the same as it’s always been – players need to be compared to their contemporaries. It’s impossible to know, for certain, who was using. MLB failed to put testing and penalties in place. I think it’s unfair to punish individual players – particularly the BEST individual players – after the fact. That said, it IS fair to measure  players against the bloated accomplishments of their contemporaries. Comparing Mark McGwire to Willie McCovey doesn’t fly. He needs to be compared to Bagwell, Thomas, Thome, and the other great sluggers of his era. That, I think, is what makes people so mad- they love to compare players across eras, and now they can’t. Therefore, I think “offensive era” works – it identifies both the high level of offense in the 90’s and early Aughts as well as how offended people seemed to be by it.

For this quick study, I considered anyone who played at least 1000 games at first base between 1990 and 2006. If this dating seems arbitrary, it is, in some ways. I needed a start date and an end date. Extending this to 2007 would have added quite a few more players who might not really be identified with the offensive era – Pujols, Fielder and Teixeira, specifically. My study gave me 26 players:  Jeff Bagwell, Sean Casey, Tony Clark, Will Clark, Carlos Delgado, Andres Galarraga, Jason Giambi, Mark Grace, Todd Helton, Wally Joyner, Eric Karros, Paul Konerko, Derrek Lee, Travis Lee, Tino Martinez, Fred McGriff, Mark McGwire, Hal Morris, John Olerud, Rafael Palmeiro, David Segui, JT Snow, Frank Thomas, Jim Thome, Mo Vaughn, and Kevin Young. I then eliminated Travis Lee because he failed to reach 10 years of service time. This left me 25 players to compare, and it made it easy to see why voters may be reluctant to vote for Palmeiro and McGwire – a question of whether they were significantly more valuable than their contemporaries.

I started out by comparing their career based on hits, home runs, times on base, total bases, and bWAR. (I prefer B-R’s WAR to FanGraphs for long term value. FanGraphs may have more predictive value, but that’s not helpful when comparing past players):

Player	Years	G	PA	H	HR	BA	OBP	SLG	TB	WAR	oWAR	dWAR
Bagwell, Jeff	1991-2005	2150	9431	2314	449	0.297	0.408	0.540	4213	79.9	76.3	3.6
Thomas, Frank	1990-2008	2322	10074	2468	521	0.301	0.419	0.555	4550	75.9	83.2	-7.3
Thome, Jim	1991-PR	2485	10127	2287	604	0.277	0.403	0.556	4595	71.4	75.1	-3.7
Palmeiro, Rafael	1986-2006	2831	12046	3020	569	0.288	0.371	0.515	5388	66	61.9	4.1
McGwire, Mark	1986-2001	1874	7660	1626	583	0.263	0.394	0.588	3639	63.1	66.7	-3.6
Helton, Todd	1997-PR	2054	8725	2363	347	0.323	0.421	0.550	4028	59.9	50.1	9.8
Clark, Will	1986-2000	1976	8283	2176	284	0.303	0.384	0.497	3562	57.6	56.5	1.1
Olerud, John	1989-2005	2234	9063	2239	255	0.295	0.398	0.465	3530	56.8	47.1	9.7
Giambi, Jason	1995-PR	2103	8509	1948	428	0.281	0.404	0.525	3641	53.7	61.7	-8
McGriff, Fred	1986-2004	2460	10174	2490	493	0.284	0.377	0.509	4458	50.5	53.2	-2.7
Grace, Mark	1988-2003	2245	9290	2445	173	0.303	0.383	0.442	3565	47.1	39.3	7.8
Delgado, Carlos	1993-2009	2035	8657	2038	473	0.280	0.383	0.546	3976	44.2	48.7	-4.5
Joyner, Wally	1986-2001	2033	8115	2060	204	0.289	0.362	0.440	3133	34.2	28.9	5.3
Lee, Derrek	1997-PR	1942	7963	1959	331	0.281	0.365	0.495	3444	31.1	29.9	1.2
Galarraga, Andres	1985-2004	2257	8916	2333	399	0.288	0.347	0.499	4038	26.7	29.5	-2.8
Konerko, Paul	1997-PR	1998	8163	2024	396	0.282	0.358	0.500	3592	25.9	29	-3.1
Vaughn, Mo	1991-2003	1512	6410	1620	328	0.293	0.383	0.523	2894	25.8	30.4	-4.6
Martinez, Tino	1990-2005	2023	8044	1925	339	0.271	0.344	0.471	3349	25.7	19.6	6.1
Casey, Sean	1997-2008	1405	5644	1531	130	0.302	0.367	0.447	2267	15.8	12.9	2.9
Clark, Tony	1995-2009	1559	5120	1188	251	0.262	0.339	0.485	2196	11.7	12.1	-0.4
Morris, Hal	1988-2000	1246	4443	1216	76	0.304	0.361	0.433	1732	10.8	10.7	0.1
Snow, JT	1992-2008	1716	6553	1509	189	0.268	0.357	0.427	2407	10	12.8	-2.8
Karros, Eric	1991-2004	1755	7100	1724	284	0.268	0.325	0.454	2922	9	10.6	-1.6
Segui, David	1990-2004	1456	5449	1412	139	0.291	0.359	0.443	2145	7.9	11.9	-4
Young, Kevin	1992-2003	1205	4351	1007	144	0.258	0.324	0.438	1708	5.1	1.5	3.6

As you can see, while Palmeiro is at or near the top in many counting stats, he finishes only fourth in WAR, contributing to the perception of him as a player who was good for a long time, but rarely great. Jeff Bagwell, on the other hand, has the highest WAR of this group, though a shorter career (700 games fewer than Palmeiro) left him lagging in the counting stats. McGwire, fifth in WAR, stands out only in the home run category. His low finishes in hits, total bases and times on base feeds into the perception of him as the anti-Palmeiro: a player who was fantastic a his peak, but also had very poor years and fell off very quickly. Finishing behind contemporaries Andres Galarraga in times on base, behind Jason Giambi in total bases, and behind Eric Karros (?!) in hits certainly doesn’t scream “Hall of Famer.”

Of course, Hall of Fame isn’t chosen entirely on overall career value, there is also peak value to consider. Jim Rice, despite middling career totals, was recently elected for who he was at his best. (As a Bostonian, I’ve caught some flak for pointing out how tenuous this claim was.) Do Bagwell, Palmeiro and McGwire measure up when considering peak performances? To find out, I’ve measured our 25 players by their WAR in their best 10 and 3 year peaks, and by their best 5 seasons overall:

Player	Years	WAR	oWAR	dWAR
Bagwell, Jeff	1992-2001	65.7	61.2	4.5
Thomas, Frank	1991-2000	58.0	65.0	-7.0
Thome, Jim	1995-2004	53.2	55.8	-2.6
Helton, Todd	1998-2007	52.8	45.7	7.1
Giambi, Jason	1997-2006	48.7	54.2	-5.5
Palmeiro, Rafael	1990-1999	48.1	41.2	6.9
McGwire, Mark	1990-1999	47.0	49.8	-2.8
Olerud, John	1993-2002	46.9	39.6	7.3
Clark, Will	1986-1995	43.9	43.2	0.7
Delgado, Carlos	1997-2006	41.6	44.9	-3.3
McGriff, Fred	1987-1996	39.8	39.4	0.4
Grace, Mark	1989-1998	37.3	31.1	6.2
Lee, Derrek	2000-2009	28.9	28.8	0.1
Vaughn, Mo	1992-2001	26.8	29.0	-2.2
Joyner, Wally	1988-1997	25.0	21.2	3.8
Martinez. Tino	1995-2004	22.8	18.5	4.3
Konerko, Paul	2002-2011	22.3	24.6	-2.3
Galarraga, Andres	1992-2001	18.0	21.1	-3.1
Casey, Sean	1998-2007	15.9	12.8	3.1
Snow, JT	1997-2006	12.0	12.6	-0.6
Clark, Tony	1996-2005	11.8	13.0	-1.2
Karros, Eric	1994-2003	11.7	11.3	0.4
Segui, David	1993-2002	11.7	13.2	-1.5
Morris, Hal	1990-1999	10.9	10.6	0.3
Young, Kevin	1994-2003	5.9	3.2	2.7

By best 10-year stretch, Bagwell remains #1 overall, by a significant margin. Palmeiro and McGwire fall to 6^th and 7^th respectively, falling behind Helton and Giambi. McGwire maintains a .1 WAR advantage over John Olerud.

Player	Years	WAR	oWAR	dWAR
Giambi, Jason	2000-2002	26.3	26.7	-0.4
Bagwell, Jeff	1996-1998	23.1	21.7	1.4
Helton, Todd	2000-2002	21.8	18.3	3.5
Thomas, Frank	1991-1993	21.7	23.4	-1.7
Clark, Will	1987-1989	21.1	19.5	1.6
Thome, Jim	2001-2003	20.0	21.2	-1.2
McGwire, Mark	1996-1998	18.6	21.5	-2.9
Olerud, John	1997-1999	18.6	15.7	2.9
McGriff, Fred	1988-1990	17.6	16.0	1.6
Palmeiro, Rafael	1991-1993	16.8	15.0	1.8
Delgado, Carlos	2000-2002	15.6	17.3	-1.7
Vaughn, Mo	1996-1998	14.7	15.5	-0.8
Grace, Mark	1995-1997	14.4	11.5	2.9
Lee, Derrek	2003-2005	12.4	12.2	0.2
Galarraga, Andres	1996-1998	12.1	13.0	-0.9
Martinez,. Timo	1995-1997	11.0	9.5	1.5
Konerko, Paul	2009-2011	10.6	10.9	-0.3
Joyner, Wally	1986-1988	10.0	9.2	0.8
Young, Kevin	1997-1999	9.6	6.8	2.8
Clark, Tony	1997-1999	8.4	8.1	0.3
Casey, Sean	1998-2000	7.9	6.6	1.3
Karros, Eric	1997-1999	6.8	6.8	0.0
Segui, David	1996-1998	5.9	6.1	-0.2
Snow, JT	1997-1999	5.7	5.8	-0.1
Morris, Hal	1994-1996	5.3	5.1	0.2

By best 3-year stretch, Bagwell’s 1996-1998 finishes second to Giambi’s sublime 2000-2002. It’s easy to forget how dominant Giambi was during those years. Palmeiro’s 10^th place ranking does little to dissuade the notion that he was a good player for an exceptionally long period who was rarely elite. However, McGwire finishing in 7^th does put a dent in his claim to having a short but transcendent peak.

Player	WAR	oWAR	dWAR
Bagwell, Jeff	39.7	37.7	2.0
Giambi, Jason	36.9	38.3	-1.4
Helton, Todd	36.7	31.4	5.3
Thomas, Frank	35.5	38.0	-2.5
Thome, Jim	33.0	34.4	-1.4
Olerud, John	32.1	28.0	4.1
McGwire, Mark	31.7	32.3	-0.6
Clark, Will	30.4	28.8	1.6
Palmeiro, Rafael	30.0	26.3	3.7
McGriff, Fred	27.5	25.2	2.3
Delgado, Carlos	27.1	28.6	-1.5
Grace, Mark	23.2	19.4	3.8
Vaughn, Mo	22.2	22.6	-0.4
Galarraga, Andres	20.7	21.2	-0.5
Lee, Derrek	20.0	19.7	0.3
Joyner, Wally	18.0	16.6	1.4
Martinez, Tino	17.1	13.6	3.5
Konerko, Paul	16.7	18.5	-1.8
Casey, Sean	13.8	10.8	3.0
Clark, Tony	12.8	12.7	0.1
Karros, Eric	11.8	11.4	0.4
Snow, JT	11.3	11.8	-0.5
Morris, Hal	10.9	11.0	-0.1
Segui, David	10.4	11.1	-0.9
Young, Kevin	9.7	6.8	2.9

Finally, by 5 best seasons, Bagwell is back to the top. Palmeiro finishes 9^th, right behind old rival Will Clark. McGwire, though, is stuck in 7^th. His five best seasons not only fall behind Bagwell, Thomas and Thome (who seem, by the measures I’ve brought in, to be the three strongest candidates), but also Jason Giambi, Todd Helton and John Olerud. If the five best seasons of McGwire’s career don’t measure up to the five best seasons of Olerud’s, it becomes very hard to consider McGwire as someone whose best seasons demand he be placed into the discussion for Cooperstown.

After running through the WAR summations, I decided to look at the individual seasons these 25 players had. Specifically, I would total how many seasons each had with a WAR over 10, 8. 5 and 3:

Player	Years	10+	8+	5+	3+	SUM
Bagwell, Jeff	1991-2005	0	3	9	13	25
Thomas, Frank	1990-2008	0	0	8	11	19
Thome, Jim	1991-PR	0	1	5	12	18
McGwire, Mark	1986-2001	0	0	7	10	17
Olerud, John	1989-2005	0	2	6	9	17
Palmeiro, Rafael	1986-2006	0	0	4	12	16
Helton, Todd	1997-PR	0	1	6	8	15
Giambi, Jason	1995-PR	1	2	4	8	15
McGriff, Fred	1986-2004	0	0	3	9	12
Delgado, Carlos	1993-2009	0	0	4	8	12
Clark, Will	1986-2000	0	1	1	9	11
Grace, Mark	1988-2003	0	0	1	9	10
Vaughn, Mo	1991-2003	0	0	2	5	7
Galarraga, Andres	1985-2004	0	0	2	4	6
Lee, Derrek	1997-PR	0	0	1	4	5
Joyner, Wally	1986-2001	0	0	0	4	4
Konerko, Paul	1997-PR	0	0	1	3	4
Martinez, Tino	1990-2005	0	0	1	3	4
Casey, Sean	1997-2008	0	0	0	3	3
Snow, JT	1992-2008	0	0	0	2	2
Karros, Eric	1991-2004	0	0	0	2	2
Young, Kevin	1992-2003	0	0	0	2	2
Clark, Tony	1995-2009	0	0	0	1	1
Morris, Hal	1988-2000	0	0	0	1	1
Segui, David	1990-2004	0	0	0	0	0

While it might again seem arbitrary to add these up in the way I have, it proves useful – 4 points for a transcendent type season, 3 for an MVP-level performance, 2 for an All-Star level, and 1 for one that is quite good but not great. Bagwell shines here again, with three seasons of 8+ WAR, and thirteen (in a fifteen year career) of 3+. With twelve seasons of a WAR over 3.0 but only four over 5.0, Palmeiro again fits the description of being often very good but rarely great. McGwire, on the other hand, had seven seasons where he surpassed a 5.0 WAR, but none over 8.0.

Quick time out. In order to agree with my methodology, you are agreeing to putting a lot of trust into B-R’s WAR calculation. I understand that it is constantly being tweaked. Perhaps in five years our perceptions will change, the algorithm will be adjusted, and McGwire or Palmeiro’s best seasons will appear even better. Isn’t that the reason  a player is given 15 years on the Hall of Fame ballot? Perceptions change over time. Another study as comprehensive as Mike Fast’s research into catchers may come along. Until then, we can only use the resources that we have. With that in mind, I’ve made a simple summation of the 25 players ranking in all of the categories discussed. Overall WAR ranking has been quadrupled – everything else is considered equally:

Player	Years	H	HR	TB	TOB	WAR	10-peark	3-peak	5 Best	Seasons	TOTAL
Bagwell, Jeff	1991-2005	7	7	5	4	1	1	2	1	1	32
Thomas, Frank	1990-2008	3	4	3	2	2	2	4	4	2	32
Thome, Jim	1991-PR	8	1	2	3	3	3	6	5	3	43
Palmeiro, Rafael	1986-2006	1	3	1	1	4	6	10	9	6	53
Helton, Todd	1997-PR	5	11	7	6	6	4	3	3	7.5	70.5
McGwire, Mark	1986-2001	18	2	10	13	5	7	7.5	7	4.5	89
Giambi, Jason	1995-PR	15	8	9	9	9	5	1	2	7.5	92.5
McGriff, Fred	1986-2004	2	5	4	5	10	11	9	10	9.5	95.5
Olerud, John	1989-2005	9	17	14	7	8	8	7.5	6	4.5	105
Clark, Will	1986-2000	10	15.5	13	11	7	9	5	8	11	110.5
Delgado, Carlos	1993-2009	12	6	8	10	12	10	11	11	9.5	125.5
Grace, Mark	1988-2003	4	21	12	8	11	12	13	12	12	138
Galarraga, Andres	1985-2004	6	9	6	12	15	18	15	14	14	154
Lee, Derrek	1997-PR	14	13	15	16	14	13	14	15	15	171
Joyner, Wally	1986-2001	11	19	17	14	13	15	18	16	17	179
Konerko, Paul	1997-PR	13	10	11	15	16	17	17	18	17	182
Vaughn, Mo	1991-2003	19	14	19	18	17	14	12	13	13	190
Martinez, Tino	1990-2005	16	12	16	17	18	16	16	17	17	199
Casey, Sean	1997-2008	20	24	21	21	19	19	21	19	19	240
Karros, Eric	1991-2004	17	15.5	18	20	23	22.5	22	21	21	249
Clark, Tony	1995-2009	24	18	22	23	20	21	20	20	23.5	251.5
Snow, JT	1992-2008	21	20	20	19	22	20	24	22	21	255
Morris, Hal	1988-2000	23	25	24	24	21	24	25	23	23.5	275.5
Segui, David	1990-2004	22	23	23	22	24	22.5	23	24	25	280.5
Young, Kevin	1992-2003	25	22	25	25	25	25	19	25	21	287

With that, I have my rankings of the 25 first basemen of the offensive era. While they may be imperfect, I feel pretty good about them. Bagwell and Frank Thomas are tied at the top, with Bagwell’s peak value and Thomas’s offensive consistency matching up. Jim Thome sits a solid third. Without question, I would advocate that these three deserve enshrinement without question. The writers are doing a disservice by not voting for Bagwell.

Rafael Palmeiro’s exceptional durability put him at the top of three of our four counting stats. That can’t be easily overlooked. Tim Raines has been a favorite candidate of the statistical community. His supporters love to quote that he was on base 3977 times, 22 more than Tony Gwynn. Palmeiro was on base 4460 times. That ties him with Paul Molitor for 18^th all-time, ahead of Wade Boggs, Cal Ripken and Joe Morgan. It’s 200 more than Frank Thomas, his closest among contemporary first basemen. If we’re giving Raines credit for getting on base so much, we have to do the same for Palmeiro. His lead over his contemporaries in total bases is even more impressive. At 5388, he totals nearly 800 more than Jim Thome.  So, while he was never one of the elite, dominant forces in the game, none of those around him proved to be as good for as long. With that in mind, I would vote for Palmeiro as well. Still, as he was only the 4^th best first baseman of his era, I won’t begrudge the voter who disagrees.

With insufficient counting stats, Mark McGwire’s only claim to the Hall of Fame rests with the argument that he had a very short, but very dominant peak. My research suggests that wasn’t the case. To vote for McGwire, I’d also have to back Jason Giambi, who has a similar career value and a higher peak, as well as Todd Helton, who also had a higher peak and a better overall statistical profile.

It appears Helton will have an interesting case in a few years. After a down 2010, he had something of a bounce-back season in 2011. However, he still appeared in  only 124 games. In order to sway voters, he’ll need to get to some significant statistical milestones as Palmeiro did – but he appears to lack Palmeiro’s durability. It appears he’ll fall short of 3000 hits, 400 home runs, 5000 TB, and will finish somewhere near 4000 times on base. The only counting category he seems poised to finish in the top 20 all-time is doubles. That probably won’t be enough.

In conclusion: no to McGwire, yes to Palmeiro, and a big, fat resounding yes to Jeff Bagwell.

Mike Napoli, Hall of Famer?

One of my favorite articles written in the past few years comes, not surprisingly, from Joe Posnanski. In The Hall of Could Have Been, Joe discusses several players who might be described as "alternate universe" Hall of Famers - guys who might be in the Hall today if their careers had taken slightly different turns. He leaves out discussion of guys whose career was cut short by injury or interrupted by war, and focuses on those players who just didn't catch their breaks.

Some were obvious - Bert Blyleven's case, for example, and he fortunately did finally gain induction this year. Fred Lynn's statistical dropoff after leaving Boston has also been much-discussed. Others, less so. The Matt Stairs reference really piqued my interest at the time. His career numbers were so far short of a Hall of Famer, I'd never thought of him that way. I discussed this in an earlier post, and it's worth pointing out that Stairs' career home run rate was higher than that of Jim Rice.

In the last few months, while he was dominating the American League, I thought about Mike Napoli. I mentioned that in my World Series preview. With his performance the last two nights, Napoli stands a great chance of winning the World Series MVP Award if the Rangers hold on to win. In light of these occurrences, I'd like to make a bold pronouncement.

If he hadn't spent his 20's playing for a manager that didn't value his offense, Mike Napoli would be headed for the Hall of Fame.

Who are the best hitting catchers of all time? Yogi Berra, Johnny Bench and Mike Piazza. (Josh Gibson, too, but we don't have enough statistical information on him).  Through age 29, Berra homered once every 21.9 at bats, Bench every 19.3, Piazza every 15.6, playing in the greatest offensive era of all time. Mike Napoli? At 15.7, he is the slightest tick behind Piazza, a player with similar defensive difficulties to Napoli who nevertheless got a chance to play because, well, you'd either have to be an idiot or Mike Scioscia to not want a guy who could be a reasonable facsimile of a catcher and hit a home run once every 15.6 at bats. Sure, Piazza hit for a much higher average than Napoli, and Berra and Bench were vastly superior defensive players. But it's not like those three are borderline Hall of Fame guys. Bench was elected, on 96.4% of ballots cast, in his first year of eligibility. Berra had to wait until year two, because voters in the 1960's and 70's did things like that - Joe Dimaggio didn't even get in on his first year. Piazza might have to deal with ridiculous steroid allegations, but on the numbers alone, he'd be in the Hall upon eligibility in 2013.

Let's look at Napoli's career numbers:

Year	Age	Tm	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
2006	24	LAA	325	268	47	61	13	0	16	42	51	90	.228	.360	.455	.815
2007	25	LAA	263	219	40	54	11	1	10	34	33	63	.247	.351	.443	.794
2008	26	LAA	274	227	39	62	9	1	20	49	35	70	.273	.374	.586	.960
2009	27	LAA	432	382	60	104	22	1	20	56	40	103	.272	.350	.492	.842
2010	28	LAA	510	453	60	108	24	1	26	68	42	137	.238	.316	.468	.784
2011	29	TEX	432	369	72	118	25	0	30	75	58	85	.320	.414	.631	1.046
		Total	2236	1918	318	507	104	4	122	324	259	548	.264	.359	.514	.873

What do you notice? First off, the guy homers a LOT. He also strikes out a lot, leading to some batting averages that some people wouldn't be thrilled with, but overall that's pretty amazing production from the catching position.

For comparison's sake, let's take a look at the guy Mike Scioscia often preferred to play, Jeff Mathis.

Year	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
2005	3	3	1	1	0	0	0	0	0	1	.333	.333	.333	.667
2006	63	55	9	8	2	0	2	6	7	14	.145	.238	.291	.529
2007	195	171	24	36	12	0	4	23	15	49	.211	.276	.351	.627
2008	328	283	35	55	8	0	9	42	30	90	.194	.275	.318	.593
2009	272	237	26	50	8	0	5	28	22	73	.211	.288	.308	.596
2010	218	205	19	40	6	1	3	18	6	59	.195	.219	.278	.497
2011	281	247	18	43	12	0	3	22	15	75	.174	.225	.259	.484
Total	1360	1201	132	233	48	1	26	139	95	361	.194	.257	.301	.557

Mathis gets bagged on a lot. I'm sure he's a nice guy and a fine defensive catcher, but the guy is an automatic out. It's hard to picture any manager other than Mike Scioscia giving a hitter like this half the playing time over a five year period. I'm not sure how bad Napoli would have to be defensively and how good Mathis would have to be to make up for the difference in their offensive production. I'm pretty sure it would involve Mathis framing every single pitch so that Angel pitchers never threw a ball, and Napoli using the Bob Uecker knuckleball approach on every single pitch, simply waiting until it stopped rolling to pick it up to toss it back to the pitcher. Even then, it would be close. If Napoli has a lower batting average than you'd like, how can you take a guy who has a lower career OBP than Napoli's batting average? The difference has become more pronounced in the last two years, with Mathis compiling an OPS+ of exactly 37 in both seasons. I'm not the biggest plan of OPS+, but THIRTY-SEVEN? Over 499 plate appearances? In his last 499 plate appearances, Mike Napoli has 33 home runs! His home run total is almost as high as Mathis's OPS+! These numbers are mind boggling.

So, let's move to an alternate universe. One in which Mike Napoli is not within the clutches of Mike Scioscia, and his manager instead notices that he's managing the best power hitting catcher in the world. Said manager gives Napoli 550 plate appearances per year. Let's recalculate his stats, based on that, shall we? I've left his rookie 2006 season intact, and pro-rated every season since.

Note: Because of rounding, some of the calculated seasonal rate stats will vary slightly from what they were in reality. 

Year	Age	Tm	Lg	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
2006	24	LAA	AL	325	268	47	61	13	0	16	42	51	90	.228	.360	.455	.815
2007	25	LAA	AL	550	458	84	113	23	2	21	71	69	132	.247	.356	.443	.799
2008	26	LAA	AL	550	456	78	124	18	2	40	98	70	141	.272	.379	.583	.963
2009	27	LAA	AL	550	486	76	132	28	1	25	71	50	131	.272	.350	.488	.838
2010	28	LAA	AL	550	489	65	116	26	1	28	73	45	148	.237	.317	.466	.783
2011	29	TEX	AL	550	470	92	150	32	0	38	95	74	108	.319	.416	.630	1.046
				3075	2627	442	696	140	6	168	450	359	750	.265	.363	.515	.878

Hmmm. We now have a player who has seasons of 40 and 38 homers, twice has 90+ RBI, and has 50 extra base hits for four consecutive years. Let's compare that to some other Hall of Fame catchers through their age 29 seasons.

Year	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
Fake Napoli	3075	2627	442	696	140	6	168	450	359	750	.265	.363	.515	.878
Johnny Bench	6304	5554	824	1491	294	21	287	1038	655	941	.268	.343	.484	.827
Mike Piazza	3482	3119	511	1038	148	4	200	644	330	493	.333	.396	.575	.972
Carlton Fisk	2825	2491	411	710	120	23	114	376	272	405	.285	.360	.489	.849
Gary Carter	5025	4422	608	1190	224	22	188	688	485	597	.269	.342	.457	.799
Yogi Berra	4333	3964	646	1175	177	37	181	790	332	179	.296	.354	.497	.851

Unsurprisingly, Napoli is second in slugging percentage. Perhaps more suprisingly, he's also second in on-base percentage, assisted by a comparatively high walk rate. It should be noted that Bench, Piazza, Carter and Berra have a sizable lead in counting stats, even over alternate universe Napoli, simply because they got earlier starts. All except Piazza were big prospects (especially Bench), and Piazza got immediate playing time once he made it to the big leagues.

So, I decided to take the our alternate universe Mike Napoli and calculate some of his similarity scores based on the baseball-reference.com version. Here's what I came up with for players through age 29. 

Note: These may be incomplete, since I was running through the players based on the similarity scores of other guys. There were about 100 players that I calculated similarity scores for, and probably 100 more that I looked through. Least similar player that I ran a score for? Bobby Doerr.

1. Javy Lopez (919)

2. Gabby Hartnett* (907)

3. Charles Johnson (905)

4. Carlton Fisk* (904)

5. Matt Nokes (886)

6. Gus Traindos (885)

7. Toddy Hundley (8801)

8. Del Crandall (881)

9. Gene Tenace (876)

10. Ramon Hernandez (876)

Ok - so of the top 10 comparable players, only two are Hall of Famers. Interesting to note, though, that these comparability scores are all so far off. Of this group, only Lopez had a home run rate better than every 20 at bats. Napoli, of course, is under 16. Also, I don't care for how B-R uses batting average, rather than OBP, in their calculation. Let's swap that out.

1. Gabby Hartnett* (929)

2. Carlton Fisk* (921)

3. Javier Lopez (919)

4. Victor Martinez (890)

5. Charles Johnson (887)

6. Gene Tenace (885)

7. Earl Battey (867)

8. Todd Hundley (862)

9. Gus Triandos (859)

10. Mike Piazza^ (855)

*Dave Nilsson rated an 898 on the first list, and a 910 on the second, if you put his position as a catcher. He only played about 1/2 his time up to his age 29 season as a catcher, and very little in the last few years. I decided to use a weighted position scale, which dropped him out of the top 10, but it's likely that some would include him.

So we lose Nokes, Crandall, and Hernandez and replace them with Martinez, Battey and Piazza. Hartnett and Fisk move up to 1-2. The underrated Tenace moves up to 6th. This is a pretty impressive group of comparables. Among these players, only Piazza has more home runs. Only Piazza and Hartnett have a higher SLG. 

To conclude, while Alternate Universe Mike Napoli isn't quite a slam dunk "I'm only 29 and I'm surely headed to the Hall of Fame" case that Johnny Bench was, his career lines up nicely with some guys who did make it. Real-life Mike Napoli has no such luck. 

Still, out of Mike Scioscia's doghouse, Napoli has gotten a real opportunity to shine. Again, the power hasn't been a surprise - he's always hit for power. Arguably more rewarding has been the plaudits Napoli has earned on defense. Most metrics seem to agree with the Ranger coaching staff that Napoli has been improved behind the plate. And for Scioscia, shouldn't that be more damning than anything else? I mean, it's one thing to overemphasize defense over offense - it's quite another to be considered a master instructor, and than have a former player improve mightily from the moment he escapes. If Scioscia's tyranny kept Napoli out of the Hall of Fame, it's fair to imagine that Napoli's emergence might do the same to Scioscia - once considered one of the best managers in the business, his reputation has taken a hit this year.

In the end, while it will always be interesting to consider the career arc of Alternate Universe Mike Napoli, what's really thrilling is seeing the real life version finally make the impact we knew he was capable of. Now we can all live Napoli Ever After.

Tables were made using TABLEIZER!

Johnny Damon, Milestones, and the Hall of Fame

As you may have heard, last week Johnny Damon collected his 500th double. In doing so, he became just the 11th player all-time to compile 500 doubles, 100 triples, 200 homers, and 2,500 hits, joining George Brett, Lou Gehrig, Goose Goslin, Rogers Hornsby, Willie Mays, Paul Molitor, Stan Musial, Babe Ruth, Al Simmons and Robin Yount. Those other 10 players are in the Hall of Fame, so there have been quite a few articles about how joining this group enhances Damon's Hall of Fame candidacy. What it really means is that Damon is the worst player all time with 500 doubles, 100 triples, 200 homers, and 2,500 hits. By a pretty good margin.

That shouldn't be taken as an insult, of course. None of the players on that list are of the "borderline" Hall of Fame variety. All of them were fantastic, all are among the greatest of all time. What makes this statistic sort of fluky is the fact that, on their own, none of these milestones are especially impressive. Ok, maybe that's not fair - all of them are extremely impressive in the grand scheme of baseball history. None of them, though, put you into the top 50 of all time in their category.

Furthermore, I feel very comfortable calling Damon the "worst" of these players, since he ranks 11 out of 11 in all four categories.

	H	HR	2B	3B
Damon	2646	223	500	102
Brett	3154	317	665	137
Gehrig	2721	493	534	163
Goslin	2735	248	500	173
Hornsby	2930	301	541	169
Mays	3283	660	523	140
Molitor	3319	234	605	114
Musial	3630	475	725	177
Ruth	2873	714	506	136
Simmons	2927	307	539	149
Yount	3142	251	583	126

So, I suppose the analysis is that, while previously, only elite players had passed the determined threshold in all of the categories, Damon is the first player of his type to do so - a good player with a well rounded offensive game that was able to contribute in a variety of ways but was historically dominant in none.

To further illustrate the point, I've ranked each 11 player by what percentage they surpassed each mil

	H% over	HR% over	2B% over	3B% over	TOTAL
Ruth	14.92%	257.00%	1.20%	36.00%	309.12%
Mays	31.32%	230.00%	4.60%	40.00%	305.92%
Musial	45.20%	137.50%	45.00%	77.00%	304.70%
Gehrig	8.84%	146.50%	6.80%	63.00%	225.14%
Brett	26.16%	58.50%	33.00%	37.00%	154.66%
Hornsby	17.20%	50.50%	8.20%	69.00%	144.90%
Simmons	17.08%	53.50%	7.80%	49.00%	127.38%
Goslin	9.40%	24.00%	0.00%	73.00%	106.40%
Yount	25.68%	25.50%	16.60%	26.00%	93.78%
Molitor	32.76%	17.00%	21.00%	14.00%	84.76%
Damon	5.84%	11.50%	0.00%	2.00%	19.34%

This is, of course, a very crude way of calculating greatness. First of all it favors the home run hitters - four players on here more than doubled the 200 HR milestone, while nobody comes close to doubling Damon's total in another category. In general, taking a random milestone and finding out how much a player surpassed it by is going to favor the players who surpassed said milestone by a very significant margin. My counterargument to that is it's fairly crude analysis to consider Damon among these greats because he passed the same milestones. Damon is only more than 6% beyond one of these milestones. Every other players is at least 30% above in one of the categories with the exception of Robin Yount - who is 15% above in all four, and more than 25% higher in three of the four.

Yount, it seems, is the closest thing to a comparable player to Damon, in that he also didn't dominate any one way. He did, however, remain very productive well into his 30's, surpassing all of them significantly, getting to 3142 hits, 251 HR, 583 2B and 126 3B. So I think it's fair to consider Damon a poor man's Robin Yount, which is pretty darn good.

If Damon gets to 3000 hits, my guess is that he'll get to the Hall of Fame. He's never been one of the dominant players in the game, but he has been a very good player for a long time, and, at 350 hits away from 3000 with zero defensive value left, he's going to have to continue to be a useful hitter through 2013 to have a shot. While there are better players not in the Hall - Tim Raines specifically comes to mind - Damon would be far from the worst player to gain enshrinement.

As it is, even if he finishes short of 3000 hits and the Hall, being remembered as a lesser-value Robin Yount who played a crucial role on two World Series champions is a legacy I think most players would be happy with.



Credit: Table made using TABLEIZER as always.

Barry Stanton? Explain Yourself.

Hall of Fame voting will be announced later on Wednesday. I try not not get too riled up over this, because there will be some votes that make little sense. But this... is awful. Barry Stanton, listed as an ESPN News Editor, submitted the worst Hall of Fame Ballot of all time.

ESPN released the votes of those who are in their employ here. It's a little bit hard to follow who voted for whom, so a fellow named Jason at IIATMS was nice enough to make a grid of it.

At this point, anyone voting for Jack Morris and not Bert Blyleven is just being difficult. But that's hardly the worst of the Barry Stanton ballot. Yes votes on Jack Morris, Edgar Martinez, Don Mattingly, Tino Martinez, and BJ Surhoff. You read that correctly, Tino Martinez and BJ Surhoff.

No votes on Jeff Bagwell, Roberto Alomar, Blyleven, Barry Larkin, Alan Trammell,, not to mention the steroid issue with Mark McGwire and Rafael Palmeiro. McGwire and Palmeiro have been discussed in depth, but the rest of this is just silly. This isn't simply a difference of opinion - voting for the Hall of Fame is something that most voters take very seriously. Stanton either does NOT take his duty seriously, or he isn't competent to judge baseball players. Either way, ESPN should be embarrassed to have someone like this on their payroll.

Before tonight, I'd never heard of Stanton - Craig Calcaterra gives some background here - but he should be run through the wringer for his gross negligence.

Oakland A's/Hall of Fame

Other than the usual steroid crud, it's been a fairly quiet few weeks. The big exceptions have been Billy Beane's decision to blow up the Oakland A's, trading his best hitter and best position player within about three weeks, and revamping his farm system in the process, along with the upcoming Hall of Fame vote. I'll go over both.

As for the A's trades, it's an aggressive maneuver by Beane. He identified that the core of his team was not strong enough to compete with the Angels in the West, or whoever comes out of Sox/Yankees/Tigers/Indians as the wild card, and wasn't going to be for some time. Some poor personnel decisions, and some poor drafting had left the A's with a mediocre, injury-prone big league club, and very little in their own system to fix the problem.

The first mistake, though one just about anyone would have made, was identifying Eric Chavez as man to build the organization around. It made sense a few years ago - at 24, he was already the best defensive player in baseball, and was coming off back to back 30 home run seasons. He looked like a guy who was going to spend most of the decade as an MVP candidate. Instead, he's spent time on the disabled list in three of the past four seasons and, despite setting a career high with 68 extra base hits in 2005, never made that leap to the elite superstar that a lot of people thought he would. In the past two years, his batting average has dropped into the .240's as all sorts of health issues have come up. It's strange to think that he's still only 30, and even stranger that he's never been an all-star. There's probably some level of comeback left in him, but it's not as the franchise cornerstone.

The Chavez deal wasn't really the killer, though. Ever since Moneyball, Beane has done some very un-Moneyballish things, like signing Mark Kotsay and Scott Hatteberg to extensions, and of course, the killer Jason Kendall deal. Even worse, his ability as a brilliant manager of the amateur draft has eluded him. Ever since the famed Moneyball draft produced Nick Swisher and Joe Blanton in the first round, he's had some tough luck. Their 2004 draft, so highly rated at the time, did not pan out. Landon Powell, Danny Putnam and Richard Robnett are all first rounders who have not made an impact, and 2005 #1 Cliff Pennington seems to be able to draw walks, but do little else. Huston Street and Travis Buck seem like quality picks, but in all, the A's had zero prospects rated by baseball America as A or A-, and only one, Daric Barton, as a B+ (though I'd have Barton higher than that).

They were able to pick up three B+ prospects for Danny Haren in Carlos Gonzalez, Brett Anderson and Chris Carter (along with a B-), and two B+ guys for Swisher in Gio Gonzalez and Faustino de los Santos (along with a C+). As of today, five of the A's top six prospects, and seven of the top twelve, have come to the organization in the past two weeks. Not content to putter around mediocrity, the A's have completely revitalized their system by trading two non-elite players. They probably won't win more than 65 games this year. Most of the guys they traded for need some seasoning in the minors. Now, though, instead of having very little in the way of guys able to step in over the next two to four years, They have a solid half dozen.

As far as the Hall of Fame...
I'd be a bit shocked if Goose Gossage doesn't make it in. My guess is that Jim Rice will also make it. As a Bostonian, I suppose I'm expected to join the crowd and tout Jim Rice as "one of the most feared hitters of his generation." However, it simply wasn't true, and he's really nowhere near a Hall of Famer. I don't want to hear any of the "pre-steroid era" bullplop, 382 homers just isn't enough for a guy who is making his run to the Hall as a power hitter. Darrell Evans, Dwight Evans, Andres Galaragga and others are nowhere near the Hall, despite the fact they hit more homers than Rice AND contributed on "the defensive side of the ball," to steal a catchline from football.

If Rice was so feared, why was he 33rd in baseball during his 10 year prime in intentional walks? He had only four seasons of 30 or more home runs, one of 40 or more. The dominance of his 1978 season is overstated - it certainly wasn't rare to hit 46 homers in the "pre-steroid era." George Foster hit 52 in 1977. Dave Kingman hit 48 in 1979. The simple matter is that if Rice had only five years that were near great, which is fine if you are a very good player for several years more, Rice had maybe three good years beyond that. Rice only finished in the top ten in his league in OPS+ only five times, and his home/road splits are incredibly skewed, showing he gained more of an advantage from Fenway than even most of his teammates. I included Rice among my "yes" votes last year, and I really have trouble figuring out why. I think I watched Baseball Tonight too much that week.

The issue here with Rice (and the support for Don Mattingly) is that, because he played in the big market, he's getting all kinds of press support. If Rice and Mattingly had played for Seattle and Houston, respectively, both would've been lucky to make it past the 5% marker.

Take Tim Raines, for example. It's Raines first year on the ballot, and how many people know that he was on base more times, for his career, than Tony freaking Gwynn? If Raines had been a New York Yankee in the 1980's, rather than a Montreal Expo, forget the Hall of Fame plaque, he'd have a Manhattan skyscraper named after him. He'll be lucky to get 30% of the vote.

Bert Blyleven was 3rd alltime in strikeouts when he retired, he's 5th now, and voters who leave him off their ballot are essentially morons. Their argument that "he didn't make enough all-start teams" is vomit-inducing. Great, you subjectively underrated him when he was still playing, so that makes it ok to do the same now?

Voting for Jack Morris and against Bert Blyleven should result in losing your voting privelages. Joe Sheehan makes the argument about Morris better than I can right here. He pretty much did an ungodly amount of reasearch to put to rest the "Morris had a high career ERA because he pitched to the score" myth. Read it.

I loved Andre Dawson, growing up, and I have his starting lineup figure on my desk, but outfielders with .323 career OBPs really aren't Hall of Famers. He does have over 400 career homers and 300 career steals though, and was a great defensive player early on, making him a much better choice than Rice.

I'm close on Alan Trammell, but still leaning towards no. The career totals just aren't there, and I'm not sure that he was better than Davey Concepcion, who is on the same ballot.

Don Mattingly wasn't as good for his career as Mark Grace or Keith Hernandez. Yes, he was amazing before the back problems, but if we're going to start putting in guys who would've been Hall of Famers without getting hurt in, let me know when Mark Prior is eligible. The similarities between his supporters and Rice's are uncanny, right down to that one excellent season (Rice in '78, Mattingly in '86).

I'm still in the yes category on Dale Murphy. 398 career homers, legit top notch defense, and a peak that was just as good at the plate as the aforementioned Mattingly and Rice.

I'd vote for McGwire, but he's not going to get in, because he's only a great player because of steroids. You know, like Chris Donnels and Manny Alexanders steroid-aided borderline Hall of Fame legacies.

So there you have it. Yes votes for Gossage, Blyleven, McGwire, Murphy, Raines.

Go Redskins.