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Post by sansterre - Milwaukee Brewers on Feb 28, 2018 14:43:55 GMT -5
What, another giant project from Sansterre? No way!
The Destination:
The destination on journeys like these matter. You can make a metric that measures all manner of things. The goal here is to figure out a stat-based rating system to evaluate the Hall-worthiness of players that is better than JAWS (sacrilege I know). But how to weigh everything in the balance?
Before I go forward I have a few things I want to make clear about priorities. I don't care about winning teams. A 10 WAR player on a terrible team is better than an 8 WAR player on a World Series team, that should be obvious. I don't care about awards. A 10 WAR player is the same quality player, whether they were the best player in the league or 3rd best. We're pretty much just looking at WAR here.
The False Start - Championship Probability:
I started out with an interesting idea. I figured that a player's value was determined by how much more likely they made winning a championship by being on their team. Seems intuitive, right? After all, teams are in it to win it. If one player helps their team win the title more than another, they're clearly better. So how to go about figuring this out?
Step 1:
I grabbed the record of every team since 1901 and recorded how close they came to winning a World Series that year (win World Series, lost World Series, lost CS, lost DS, lost wildcard, didn't make playoffs). With those 2500-odd data points I turned each record into an expected probability of winning the championship.*
Step 2:
I wrote a program to Monte Carlo this sucker. First, I'd ask how good the season in question was (in WAR). Then I'd do the following 10,000,000 times:
a) randomly put the player on a team from history, or more accurately their record. Most teams are close to average so the player might be on an 81-win team, but they could end up with an outlier like the 2001 Mariners, the '06 Cubs or the '10 Browns.
b) the team's record/quality is then adjusted for the player. We assume that the team had a normal starter in their position (2 WAR), so if I put a 0 WAR player on an 81 win team, the team drops to 79 wins, because implicitly the 0 WAR player replaced a 2 WAR starter. Putting a 10 WAR player on an 81 win team bumps them to 89 wins. Etc.
c) simulate a 162 game season, where the team has a chance of winning each game directly proportional to their record/quality. A 97.2 win team has a 60% chance of winning each game (97.2 / 162 = 0.60). Accordingly the team could be lucky or unlucky depending on how the season plays out.
d) once the season is done I'd look at the wins that team won and look up on the table the championship probability for that many season wins. I'd record that percentage and add it to the total.
At the end I'd spit out the average championship increase (per season) that that quality of player would be worth for that season.
Pretty cool right?
The Problem:
It spits out numbers that are pretty proportional to WAR figures themselves. ie, a 2 WAR season is almost half as good as a 4 WAR season is almost half as good as an 8 WAR season. I had expected the above method to show that great players are disproportionately valuable when compared to average players. But they were not.**
This is disappointing. Because while I actually believe this method approximates true player value pretty well it doesn't approximate Hall of Fame value very well.
How so?
Consider a player who plays for 20 years, each year putting up a 4-WAR season. Based on this method he's got a 50% chance of personally winning his team (by virtue of his presence) over the course of his 20-year career. I don't know if this sounds good to you, but it's really good. A player who throws up 8 WAR per year for 8 years would not expect to contribute as much. But we all know a player who threw up 8 WAR for 8 years would probably make the Hall; they'd probably have multiple Cy Youngs / MVPs along with 8 All-Stars and whatnot. But a player that never went above 4 WAR? With no hardware? He's pretty unlikely to make it in. (Or a different way of phrasing the thought exercise: who is more likely to make the Hall, a player who put up 3 WAR every year for 20, or a player that put up 6 WAR every year for 9? There's no universe where the 3-WAR player makes it. But it's not too hard to imagine the 6 WAR player doing so (Ducky Medwick is pretty comparable).
This is a long way of saying that I don't think the Hall of Fame is designed to celebrate players who contributed the most to their teams. Good players with long careers have no shot at the Hall. The Hall is designed to celebrate players who were great, preferably dramatically great, even if only for a few years. You'd have a way easier chance of arguing Sandy Koufax into the Hall than David Wells, even though the two are pretty comparable in probability contributed. So this method, even though it's super cool (to my mind), it is not a good Hall of Fame evaluation metric.
* Seasons with less than 162 games had records converted into what they would have been given the modern season length.
** The issue was starting record. For an 81-win team, an 8 WAR player is worth 4.77 times as much as a 4 WAR player, because the jump from 83 to 87 wins is massive in championship expectancy (83 win teams have a 0.4% chance of winning a title, vs. a 1.7% chance at 87 wins). But for a bad team, (say, 65 wins) it really doesn't matter whether you pick up a 10 WAR shortstop or a 1 WAR shortstop; if you're below 83 wins you pretty much have 0 shot. And the same holds for great teams. If you're already a 110-win team, you're almost guaranteed an extremely probable path to the championship. Adding a 10 WAR player on top of your existing juggernaut (turning you into an 118-win team) doesn't help terribly much; you're still a 1-seed. And in the playoffs it's pretty random. So generally, a disturbing amount of the time, teams are what they are and the addition of a great player doesn't change too much.
Plan B; Hall Rating:
So, based on what I learned above I considered what the new system would be built on. But first, a detour to point out the flaws of JAWS.
JAWS: JAWS is just an average of a player's total WAR and their 7-year peak WAR. It's an effort to balance career achievement and peak performance. It has two major flaws to my mind. The first is the 7-year peak part. I get the idea but it's pretty arbitrary. What's magical about 7 years? Why not 8, or 6? And the second is that it still values counting numbers, by which I mean a player playing an extra 5 seasons at 1.5 WAR a pop helps their JAWS score, but no part of those seasons demonstrated greatness in any way. Why celebrate a player for being below average?
Here are the Rules for my Hall Rating:
1) We care about WAR 2) We don't care about your 'peak'. 5 WAR is exactly as valuable whether it's in your 4th best, 7th best or 10th best season. 3) We don't care about anything below average. We don't care if a season is 1.5 WAR, 0.5 WAR or -2 WAR. Exactly how below average a season is doesn't matter, we're ignoring all of it. We're acting like there is no difference between Koufax having the career he did have and Koufax pitching for another 10 years at 1 WAR per year. It may affect their counting stats (gag me) but it doesn't have anything to do with how great they were.
So mechanically? It's pretty simple. Just give players credit for every WAR in a season above 2, and ignore everything else.
A player with a 2 WAR, 3 WAR and 8 WAR? Hall Rating of 7 (0 + 1 + 6). A player with a 1 WAR x 2, 2 WAR x 3, 3 WAR x 2, 4 WAR x 2? Hall Rating of 7 (0 + 0 * 3 + 1 * 2 + 2 * 2). A player with 20 different 2-WAR seasons? Hall Rating of 0 (0 * 20).
How does it play? Usually it just ranks players by total WAR (generally) but it skews heavy toward wanting big seasons. Players with a lot of low (2-5) WAR seasons (Cap Anson or Carlton Fisk leap to mind) drop a lot compared to JAWS. And players with great seasons that didn't play long get a big bump compared to JAWS (Koufax, Johnny Mize, Hank Greenberg).
So that's Hall Rating for you.
Coming up:
Position by Position rankings of the PBL's all-time players retired players, and perhaps a taste of the HoF class of 2045.
PS: Thank you all for reading my many long-winded posts about whatever happens to interest me at the time. I appreciate it.
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Post by Texas Rangers on Feb 28, 2018 15:15:06 GMT -5
If I see a post from Sansterre and it's longer than one or two paragraphs, I hit the "like" button before I even read further. The same goes for Colorado and the Mets.
This is absolutely wonderful and I can't wait to see the greatest PBL players. Prediction-- Aaron Hicks is going to look really good as his peak was Mt. Everest high and I have still not been convinced that any of the great hitters (Vasti, Kono, Gian Guzman etc) were better than him. Tim Lincecum and his sixteen consecutive seasons above 5.3 WAR might end up pretty high too, on account of his 130 WAR.
I love this
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Post by sansterre - Milwaukee Brewers on Feb 28, 2018 17:29:03 GMT -5
For all of these lists I'm ignoring anyone below a Hall Rating of 20. Too small a fish.
Furthermore, I'm only listing players listed in the PBL retired players database. Only people that retired since the league started count. Bear in mind that OOTP WAR and Baseball Reference's WAR are different. Ivan Rodriguez has a Hall Rating of 38.8 with Baseball Reference's WAR, but only 20.9 with OOTP's WAR. I expect the difference arises chiefly from fielding, but that's a guess. So don't get too bogged down in comparing any of these numbers to BBR numbers. We're primarily working from OOTP here.
Catchers:
13. Ivan Rodriguez: 20.9 HOF 2017, 1 MVP, 13 Gold Gloves, 14 All-Stars, 106 OPS+ * Without a doubt the big gap here is that Ivan Rodriguez was, arguably, the best defensive catcher of all-time. I just don't think that OOTP appreciates that fully in its stats.
12. Brian McCann: 23.2 6 All-Stars, 120 OPS+ * Solid bat, four 5+ WAR seasons, retired fairly young at 35.
11. Max Stassi: 25.9 2 All-Stars, 7 Gold Gloves, 101 OPS+, Career 344/395 hitter * Weak bat but never injured, great glove played a long time, had a four year stretch where he was 5+ WAR each year
10. Anthony Garcia: 29.3 2 All-Stars, 1 Gold Glove, 105 OPS+, 164 ISO, Career 350/396 hitter, fell off of HoF Ballot in 3 years * Played for ten different teams, Saw a million pitches, finished in the top 10 in strikeouts eight times, the top 10 in walks six times, had one monster season in 2021 where he batted 302/424/521 with 8 WAR.
9. Ivan Jaramillo: 30.2 7 All-Stars, 121 OPS+, 179 ISO, Career 352/462, Fell off HoF Ballot in 2 years * Had three 6+ WAR seasons, great bat
8. Carlos Santana: 32.6 4 All-Stars, 119 OPS+, 165 ISO, Career 370/445, Fell off HoF Ballot in 2 years * Walked a ton, had an extreme peak with 9.2, 6.7, 5.7, 5.5 and 5.5 WAR
7. Robert Benson: 37.6 Hall of Fame 2044, 5 All-Stars, 1 Silver Stick, 1 Ring, 133 OPS+, Career 319/528, Inducted first year * 11 different 4+ WAR seasons, Monster power (led league in HR twice), Top 10 in SLG eleven times. If the bastard had been able to walk at all he'd have been a great (he had more seasons with less than 20 walks than seasons with more than 20 walks). Should he have been a first ballot Hall of Famer? Probably not, but he does have extreme power which voters historically love.
6. Bryan Anderson: 45.6 Hall of Fame 2032, 6 All-Stars, 132 OPS+, Career 385/464 * Great all-around hitter, eight Top 10 RC/27 finishes, from 2013 to 2024 he never dipped below 4 WAR
5. Martin Lemus: 46.8 Hall of Fame 2041, 7 All-Stars, 128 OPS+, Career 367/464, inducted in the fourth year * Great hitter with a long career, ten top 10 AVG finishes, top 10 RC/27 five times
4. Matt Wieters: 50.2 Hall of Fame 2040, 5 All-Stars, 2 Gold Gloves, 131 OPS+, Career 362/506, inducted in the seventh year * Wieters didn't play as long as Lemus but was a slightly better fielder and his peak was considerable. From 2013 to 2019 his WAR was 6.3, 7.1, 6.2, 6.3, 7.3, 7.2, 7.5, 5.8. That's 37.7 Hall Rating right there.
3. Joe Mauer: 56.4 Hall of Fame 2024, 1 MVP, 4 Gold Gloves, 10 All-Stars, 133 OPS+, Career 406/475 * The guy had eleven 5+ WAR years. Long career, strong and long peak.
2. Jae Yun Kim: 64.9 Hall of Fame 2036, 1 MVP, 10 All-Stars, 139 OPS+, Career 363/508, inducted first year * This guy would be the best catcher of all-time were it not for the next person on this list. But seriously. 11k plate appearances is unprecedented. And while 139 OPS+ may not seem glitzy, it would put Kim 2nd on the all-time catcher hitting list, just behind Mike Piazza and just ahead of Gene Tenace. So combine the 2nd best hitting catcher ever (well, 3rd after this next guy) with the most plate appearances for a catcher ever and what do you expect?
1. Bryce Harper: 88.8 Hall of Fame 2041, 16 All-Stars, 2 Gold Gloves, 142 OPS+, Career 371/518, inducted first year * Yeah, everything I just said but more. Tied with Mike Piazza for best OPS+ for a catcher ever. But add on 14k plate appearances . . . seriously, what the hell? Between the ages of 20 and 44 he threw up about 600 PAs per year. His peak was ferocious but scattered, with 3 seasons above 9 WAR, 3 in the 8-9 range, 3 more in the 7-8 range, 5 in the 6-7 range . . . Harper was a freak. I'm not saying a better hitting catcher couldn't come along (although it's not likely). But this level of hitting + this kind of durability? I'm saying right now that Harper is the best catcher the PBL will ever see. And I don't think it'll be close. The gap between him and Kim (who let's be honest, is fantastic) is as big as the gap between Kim and #7 Robert Benson (well, almost). You know how some Hall of Famers are just freakishly better than others? Harper is that good. Harper's 88.8 Hall Rating is actually better than Lou Gehrig's rating of 84.1. When I compile the top PBL players of all-time in order, there's no way Harper isn't in the top 10 (of batters).
Reflection:
Robert Benson got into the Hall in his first year of eligibility. Lemus on his fourth. Yet Lemus is considerably higher in Hall Rating. What gives? Well first off Lemus has an extra thousand plate appearances. That helps. But let's compare seasons.
7+ WAR: Benson 1, Lemus 1 6-7 WAR: Benson 3, Lemus 2 5-6 WAR: Benson 2, Lemus 3 4-5 WAR: Benson 5, Lemus 8 3-4 WAR: Benson 0, Lemus 1 2-3 WAR: Benson 1, Lemus 3
It's just hard to look at that and see Lemus as not being obviously better. Benson has only two things going for him. A slightly better peak and really gaudy HR numbers. One of Bill James' axioms is that Hall voters favor players that are great at one thing over really good at many and it shows with Benson. He's the best slugging catcher of all-time (after adjusting for era) but the guy couldn't take a pitch to save his life. And it made him a worse player. Is he Hall-worthy? Probably. Above 30 Hall Rating is a discussion, above 35 is reasonable and about 40 you're having to figure out how to rationalize keeping them out. At 37 he merits induction. But first ballot? Perhaps excessive.
Contenders:
Manny Cabrera is at 37 Hall Rating right now, which will merit him strong consideration for the Hall. No big peak, but 7 different 5+ WAR years. 8.4k PA with a 112 OPS+. Good player.
Jason Wilson is probably going to eclipse Kim as the 2nd best catcher in history, with a 65.3 Hall Rating so far. Only 9.5k PAs, and his 139 OPS+ is no better than Kim's. But Wilson led the league in WAR six times. Six times. And won three MVPs. His peak had three 7s, four 8s and an incredible 10.7 WAR year in 2033 for the Yankees, when he hit 330/444/658 with a 206 OPS+. How many catchers have ever had an OPS+ above 200? The answer is zero. By a lot. Heck, even Harper topped out at 179. The other players to ever that put up a 206 OPS+? Barry Bonds, Ty Cobb, Lou Gehrig, Mickey Mantle, Babe Ruth. And Wilson is a catcher. Harper has certainly had the best career for a catcher ever. But Wilson almost certainly has had the best season by a catcher ever.
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Post by sansterre - Milwaukee Brewers on Feb 28, 2018 22:56:45 GMT -5
First Basemen:
16. Terry Whisl: 20.5 5 All-Stars, 1 Ring, 10.6k PA's, 131 OPS+, 369/457, fell off ballot first time
15. Tony Shelton: 22.7 4 All-Stars, 9.6k PA's, 135 OPS+, 363/478, fell off ballot first time
14. Derrek Lee: 23.1 2 All-Stars, 3 Gold Gloves, 8.9k PA's, 132 OPS+, 371/505
13. Miguel Cabrera: 25.5 Hall of Fame 2034, first ballot, 7 All-Stars, 13.1k PA's, 127 OPS+, 367/494 * A curious induction, clearly inspired by his counting stats. With 13.1k PA's, 560 home runs and 1995 RBI's came fairly easily, but you can see he was actually a worse overall hitter than the prior three first basemen. How many 6+ WAR seasons does this Hall of Famer have? Zero. And only three in the 5-6 range. He played a looot of seasons and got a looot of plate appearances. Cabrera (at least the PBL version) is a perfect example of a compiler. Over 21 seasons he literally averaged 3 WAR per. Of course he had some above and some below, but this is not a great player in anything besides persistence. Imagine a player putting up 288/367/494 and 27 homers every year from first for 3 WAR. Are you happy to have him? Sure. He's a strong bat and holds down that spot well. If you have him for 21 years at that rate your team will surely benefit. But he's nobody you'd brag about. You should want to brag about Hall of Famers on your roster. 25.5 Hall Rating is damned low.
12. Francisco Gonzalez: 25.9 1 MVP, 5 All-Stars, 7.6k PA's, 134 OPS+, 392/476, fell off ballot in 2nd year * Francisco Gonzalez is a weird bird. He had a really short career (compared to others), but his WAR holds up. Except that it's propped up by the fact that he played in Colorado his entire career. That said, his high walk rate benefited from no park effects. He had an eight year stretch where his WAR varied between 3.6 and 6.8. Everything outside of that stretch was mediocre.
11. Pedro Chavez: 28.2 1 Silver Slugger, 4 All-Stars, 10.3k PA's, 135 OPS+, 350/494, only received 15% on first ballot * Hit for a lot of power, leading the league in slugging twice and home runs once, top 3 in WAR three times. Chavez' career was strange in that it opened strong, putting up three 4+ WAR years starting as a 24 year-old rookie. He peaked around 28, slowed down over the next eleven years and then fell off the map.
10. Mark Teixeira: 29.7 3 All-Stars, 3 Gold Gloves, 11k PA's, 133 OPS+, 383/505, fell off after first ballot * Had a long career. Had four 5 WAR seasons, two 4 WAR and six 3 WAR.
9. Sean Hanson: 31.8 1 MVP, 6 All-Stars, 10.9k PA's, 137 OPS+, 346/509, around 60% after three ballots * Decently long career, more notable for its peak of 7.6 WAR at age 27. After that he had a 6 WAR and two 5s. He's not particularly different than Teixeira; he's a slightly better hitter and had a more dramatic peak. I don't know that he's Hall-worthy even with his 507 home runs. Of course given the choice between Hanson and Cabrera I'd take Hanson in a second.
8. Lance Berkman: 34.7 6 All-Stars, 8.5k PA's, 148 OPS+, 404/536 * Berkman is the exact sort of player that Hall Rating loves. Shorter career, sure, but he's a notably better hitter than the prior players (at 148 OPS+ we're in Jim Thome / Willie McCovey territory). And his career, aside from his first and last seasons, is all above 2 WAR (and excepting his age 36 season is all above 3 WAR). His peak isn't exceptional (one 7, two 6's, two 5's) but the sheer density of 3's and 4's make him a very solid player. No wasted fluff on this career.
7. Kwan-cheol Nang: 38.3 1 MVP, 1 Silver Slugger, 6 Gold Gloves, 4 All-Stars, 11.4k PA's, 128 OPS+, 7 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 4, 4 WAR x 4, not yet voted on * What an interesting player. He's the worst hitter so far (except Cabrera - sorry, I'm going to keep ragging on him) but his glove has been worth 92.6 ZR over his career. He's honestly like a duplicate of Keith Hernandez, except not quite as good with a glove but with a much longer career. With ten seasons over 4 WAR (and two above 7) he had a strong career. Yeah, sure, his candidacy would be enhanced if his glove had been sub-par but he'd hit an extra 50 home runs to get above 500, but nobody's perfect (even if the two have a similar run value).
6. Todd Helton: 40 Hall of Fame 2024, 5 All-Stars, 3 Gold Gloves, 10.2k PA's, 146 OPS+, 419/535, 7 WAR x 4, 5 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 5 * Sure he benefited from Coors, but adjusted for park effects he still more or less hit like Lance Berkman, but for an extra 1.7k plate appearances. Four seasons above 7 WAR is pretty damned impressive. He's already in the Hall and you won't get an argument from me about anyone above 40 Hall Rating.
5. Jeff Bunyan: 40.1 1 MVP, 1 Rookie of the Year, 6 All-Stars, 2 Rings, 13k PA's, 143 OPS+, 390/492, 5 WAR x 5, 4 WAR x 4, 3 WAR x 6, not yet voted on * Bunyan is kind of the anti-Helton. Both great hitters, Bunyan played a lot longer but with much less of a peak. No seasons above 6 WAR (his MVP season in 2028 was weirdly for a 4.9 WAR year) but he had fifteen seasons all above 3 WAR, nine of those above 4 WAR. Jeff Bunyan was like a metronome, reliable for 4 WAR every year and a ton of hits. He actually has the highest batting average of any player that started after 2011 and has the 5th most hits. He never disappointed, nobody was ever sad to have him. He will probably get elected and he will deserve it, but he's lacking the peak that some of his competitors will have.
4. Jim Thome: 40.6 5 All-Stars, 10k PA's, 147 OPS+, 401/549, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 4, 4 WAR x 5, 3 WAR x 2, was not elected * Thome's lack of voting weirds me out a little bit. The guy hit 586 home runs, that's generally enough to receive inclusion. But the guy had a solid career, a nice peak with nine seasons in the 4-6 WAR area and two in the 6-8 area . . . I don't really know why you wouldn't vote for him. Except for the fact that, for better or for worse, the ballot has been kind of loaded with his type of player and it may be hard for him to stand out. Still. Thome was very good for a good length of time. It's sad that he didn't get in, though not a travesty.
3. Prince Fielder: 46.3 3 MVP's, 8 All-Stars, 11.6k PA's, 151 OPS+, 401/537, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 4, 5 WAR x 5, 4 WAR x 2, 3 WAR x 4, elected first year * Led the league in home runs 3 times, in walks 5 times, in RC/27 5 times, in ISO twice . . . A really, really good hitter. 5 seasons above 6 WAR is damned good, as is 10 seasons above 5 WAR. But the sad truth is that batting was his only strength. The guy was a terrible (how's this for irony) fielder and poor baserunner. By the end of his career he was a perpetual DH. Really nice hitter, no-doubt Hall of Famer, but his fielding keeps him from being as good as it seems like he ought to have been.
2. Gian Guzman: 59.4 5 MVP's, 10 All-Stars, 1 Gold Glove, 14k PA's, 153 OPS+, 404/530, 7 WAR x 4, 6 WAR x 4, 5 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 2, 3 WAR x 2, first ballot * Guzman has a claim to be the best first baseman in PBL history; why he isn't ranked so here will be discussed in the next entry. Look at that resume. 5 MVP's, 10 All-Stars, 8 different years all above 6 WAR . . . That's the real deal. So why does Hall Rating have him as being only slightly better than Joe Mauer? Because while he did have a fairly monstrous 8-year peak, his performance really falls off after that. Take away Prince Fielder's top 8 years and he still has 8 years above 3 WAR. Guzman only has 5. Hall Rating basically sees Guzman has having an excellent peak and a surprisingly weak roster of strong years after that. He was still a rightly-elected first-ballot Hall of Famer.
1. Albert Pujols: 64.0 4 MVP's, 1 Rookie of the Year, 3 Gold Gloves, 10 All-Stars, 8.8k PA's, 177 OPS+, 428/616, 9 WAR x 1, 8 WAR x 2, 7 WAR x 3, 6 WAR x 4, 5 WAR x 2, 4 WAR x 2, first ballot * JAWS thinks Guzman is better (75.5 vs. 72.4) but Hall Rating obviously thinks Pujols is much better. And it's not hard to see why. Pujols has the better peak (Guzman's top 8 years are 77776666, Pujols' top 8 are 98877766 with two 6's left over). What makes Guzman better in JAWS' eyes is that mound of sub-3 WAR years that pad his resume. Pujols has no 3 WAR seasons listed because he didn't have any. He has no 2 WAR seasons listed because he didn't have any. He had fourteen seasons all between 10 and 4 WAR and that was about it. That's why his OPS+ is so high; he retired at 33 before he could slip (Gehrig is the only first baseman with a higher OPS+, at 179). Who helped their teams more over their whole career? Almost certainly Guzman; he had almost eight seasons more to contribute in. But who was greater? Look at Pujols' peak. Guzman can't touch it or even come particularly close. We're talking about a player who averaged (assuming 162 games played) a 7-WAR year every year for 13 seasons. Pujols is the greatest first baseman the PBL has ever seen.
Prospects:
Herb Griffith and Alvin Raymond are both going to be on this list, but probably not terribly high and their both well into the twilight of their careers. Terrence Henderson would have a 48.9 Hall Rating right now (good enough for 3rd all-time at the position) and is likely going to keep adding on to that number. I don't think that Henderson is going to catch Guzman or Pujols, but I think he'll make a good show of it (it would take something like four more 5 WAR years, something possible but not probable).
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Post by craigWhiteSox on Mar 1, 2018 11:02:13 GMT -5
I agreed with everything up until the point where you said Pujols was the best shortstop in PBL history. 😉
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Post by sansterre - Milwaukee Brewers on Mar 1, 2018 11:44:48 GMT -5
I agreed with everything up until the point where you said Pujols was the best shortstop in PBL history. 😉 #shame! #shame! #shame! Fixed. Thanks
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Post by sansterre - Milwaukee Brewers on Mar 2, 2018 11:18:31 GMT -5
Predictably I decided after starting this list by position that I'd prefer to do a countdown with the top 100 PBL players of all-time. Disclaimer, relievers aren't in here anywhere. I couldn't figure out how to balance them and I finally gave up. Try not to hate me. So without waiting: PBL All-Time Player Rankings, 81-100
#100 (#40 SP) Josh Beckett, 2001-2016, BOS Hall Rating 29.8, 2 All-Stars 2562 IP, 84 FIP-, 1.0 / 2.7 / 8.0, 6 WAR x 3, 5 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 4, 3 WAR x 1 #99 (#39 SP) Johan Santana, 2000-2014, MIN Hall Rating 29.8, 1 Gold Glove, 2 All-Stars 2449 IP, 84 FIP-, 1.0 / 2.8 / 8.6, 7 WAR x 3, 5 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 2, 3 WAR x 3 #98 (#38 SP) Cole Hamels, 2006-2023, PHI Hall Rating 29.9, 3 All-Stars 3195 IP, 90 FIP-, 1.0 / 2.6 / 7.1, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 1, 3 WAR x 8 #97 (#37 SP) Mario Soto, 2037-present (31 years old), ATL Hall Rating 29.9, 1 Cy Young, 3 All-Stars 1573 IP, 71 FIP-, 0.7 / 2.2 / 8.7, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 3, 5 WAR x 3 Mario Soto is a guaranteed Hall-of-Famer, potential meteor strike notwithstanding. Being at 30 Hall Rating by 31 is fantastic. Furthermore Soto never gets injured and hasn't seen a ratings drop yet. His floor is the Hall. But if he keeps piching at this level for another 5-10 years . . . I'm saying right now that there is a 25% or so chance that Soto will finish his career as the 5th or 6th best pitcher in PBL history. #96 (#15 C) Tomas Lugo, 2037-present (31 years old), LAD Hall Rating 30, 1 MVP, 3 Silver Sluggers, 6 All-Stars, 2 Rings 4195 PA, 151 OPS+, 286 / 395 / 499, 9 WAR x 1, 7 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 4, 4 WAR x 1, 3 WAR x 1 Lugo has made it to 30 just as fast as Soto, but he lacks Soto's upside. Lugo's already seen significant ratings drops and is not as injury resistant. Lugo will have a great career, he'll make the Hall and he'll climb this list, but there are some serious limits to how good his career can be.#95 (#36 SP) Jason Simmons, 2021-2041, ATL Hall Rating 30.1, 3 All-Stars, 23.7% HoF Voting so far 3274 IP, 85 FIP-, 0.7 / 1.7 / 6.6, 5 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 8, 3 WAR x 3 Always good, never great. #94 (#14 C) Ivan Jaramillo, 2018-2033, MIL Hall Rating 30.2, 7 All-Stars 7500 PA, 121 OPS+, 282 / 352 / 462, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 4, 3 WAR x 1 #93 (#35 SP) Zach 'Crow' Porter, 2030-present (38 years old), LAA Hall Rating 30.5, 3 All-Stars 3005 IP, 82 FIP-, 0.7 / 3.3 / 8.9, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 4, 4 WAR x 4, 3 WAR x 1 Porter's still going but his fastball is sinking beneath the horizon. In a getting worse way, not in a forkball kind of way. He might have a few decent years left but at 38 he's very unlikely to get much higher on this list. Which means he will likely not make the Hall. Which makes me a little sad. He and I had some good times.#92 (#5 RF) Bobby Abreu, 1996-2011, PHI Hall Rating 30.8, 1 Gold Glove, 2 All-Stars 9255 PA, 133 OPS+, 295 / 397 / 481, 6 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 3, 4 WAR x 3, 3 WAR x 4 #91 (#34 SP) Neftali Feliz, 2009-2027, CHN Hall Rating 30.9, 4 All-Stars 3189 IP, 87 FIP-, 0.9 / 3.6 / 9.0, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 6, 3 WAR x 6 #90 (#10 3B) Scott Rolen, 1996-2016, PHI Hall Rating 31.0, Rookie of the Year, 8 Gold Gloves, 5 All-Stars 8112 PA, 130 OPS+, 287 / 373 / 494, 6 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 2, 4 WAR x 4, 3 WAR x 3 OOTP clearly doesn't take into account fielding that happened before the game was created. Because Rolen's ZR is not taken into account with his WAR at all. I guarantee it. Not related to this project really, but I'm sayin'. #89 (#7 LF) Jorge Hernandez, 2029-2044, NYA Hall Rating 31.1, 1 MVP, 1 Gold Glove, 1 Silver Slugger, 4 All-Stars, 1 Ring, not yet voted on 6809 PA, 137 OPS+, 272 / 379 / 469, 7 WAR x 2, 6 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 1, 3 WAR x 3 Listen to this age 24-29 stretch: 4.4, 7.7, 7.9, 6.7, 6.7, 5.2. Damned good right? That's 24 Hall Rating in only six years. Surefire Hall of Famer. Didn't happen. He accrued 7 more rating the rest of his career. So what gives? Injuries and rating drops. He had two more decent seasons but after that he only got above 350 PA twice the rest of his career. Tragic. But it happens. #88 (#33 SP) Francisco Alvares, 2021-2041, NYA Hall Rating 31.2, 1 All-Star, 1 Ring, 28.4 HoF Voting so far 4195 IP, 93 FIP-, 0.9 / 1.4 / 5.4, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 2, 4 WAR x 2, 3 WAR x 8 The ultimate compiler. He's #3 on the Innings Pitched leaderboards, #2 if we're not counting Greinke. But he has (I'll bet) the worse FIP- of any pitcher on this list. He didn't pitch terribly well, just a lot. That counts for something, but it doesn't make for greatness.#87 (#5 SS) Jose Reyes, 2003-2019, NYM Hall Rating 31.4, 5 All-Stars 9118 PA, 112 OPS+, 287 / 355 / 427, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 3, 4 WAR x 3, 3 WAR x 1 #86 (#32 SP) Dave 'Buttermilk Tommy' Bean, 2029-2044, MIA Hall Rating 31.6, 6 All-Stars, not yet voted on 2639 IP, 81 FIP-, 0.7 / 2.2 / 7.9, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 3, 4 WAR x 4, 3 WAR x 2 Really good all-around pitcher, basically Josh Beckett if Beckett were just a tiny bit better. Good career. #85 (#31 SP) Jon Lester, 2006-2021, BOS Hall Rating 31.8, 2 Cy Youngs, 2 All-Stars 2902 IP, 86 FIP-, 0.9 / 3.0 / 7.7, 6 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 4, 4 WAR x 1, 3 WAR x 2 #84 (#11 1B) Sean Hanson, 2022-2039, TOR Hall Rating 31.8, 1 MVP, 6 All-Stars, 58.6% HoF Voting so far 10920 PA, 137 OPS+, 286 / 346 / 509, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 2, 4 WAR x 4, 3 WAR x 3 You may have noticed that nobody in this bloc (81-100) is in the Hall. You may also notice that of everyone being voted on (in this bloc) Hanson is receiving the most votes by far. Nobody else even sniffed 30% and Hanson's almost at 60%. So what gives? Sure, he had a really good age 27 season (7.6 WAR, 52 HR, 653 slugging and an MVP) and hit over 500 home runs over his career. But look at those WAR numbers above and compare him to the players he's around. Is he really that much better? Or at all better? I don't buy Hanson for the Hall, but fortunately I think if voters were going to vote him in they'd have done it by now.#83 (#9 3B) Rob 'Racehorse' McCoy, 2031-present (36 years old), NYA Hall Rating 32.0, 4 Silver Sluggers, 2 Gold Gloves, 7 All-Stars, 1 Ring 7977 PA, 118 OPS+, 273 / 348 / 436, 6 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 3, 4 WAR x 2, 3 WAR x 3 What an interesting player. Quality glove, quality bat, quality career. His OPS+ is a little low for a third baseman hoping for the Hall but it's not a deal-breaker. He's 36 which means he's got time to pad his resume. His age 33-36 seasons have been 6.5, 2.0, 2.5 and 5.7 WAR so he's clearly still capable. His contact dropped a bit at age 34 bit his power and patience remain excellent for an 2B/3B. The real concern are his injuries; he's wrecked. He's been able to stay fairly healthy over the last five years but you never know when things are going to go sideways. A few more decent seasons should make a case for him; a few strong seasons could get him in. We'll see how it goes. #82 (#5 CF) Carlos Beltran, 1998-2013, NYM Hall Rating 32.1, Rookie of the Year, 3 Gold Gloves, 5 All-Stars 8996 PA, 122 OPS+, 279 / 356 / 484, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 5, 4 WAR x 3, 3 WAR x 2 #81 (#4 SS) Jimmy Rollins, 2000-2019, PHI Hall Rating 32.1, 1 MVP, 2 Gold Gloves, 4 All-Stars 12206 PA, 107 OPS+, 275 / 333 / 439, 6 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 3, 4 WAR x 4, 3 WAR x 1
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Post by sansterre - Milwaukee Brewers on Mar 3, 2018 20:47:30 GMT -5
PBL All-Time Player Rankings, 61-80 #80 (#30 SP) Pedro Vargo, 2022-2036, COLHall Rating 32.4, 5 All-Stars 2852 IP, 85 FIP-, 0.9 / 1.7 / 6.9, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 3, 4 WAR x 5, 3 WAR x 2 Not dominant but consistently strong for a long time. Great control, features one of the lowest BB/9 of any pitcher on this list. #79 (#13 C) Carlos Santana, 2010-2024, CLEHall Rating 32.6, 4 All-Stars 8201 PA, 119 OPS+, 280 / 370 / 445, 9 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 3, 4 WAR x 3, 3 WAR x 2 #78 (#29 SP) Tommy Hanson, 2009-2025, PITHall Rating 32.7, 2 All-Stars 3052 IP, 85 FIP-, 0.8 / 3.0 / 7.9, 5 WAR x 3, 4 WAR x 5, 3 WAR x 6 #77 (#28 SP) Daniel Tuttle, 2014-2028, MIAHall Rating 32.8, 1 Cy Young, 1 All-Star 2832 IP, 85 FIP-, 0.7 / 2.7 / 7.2, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 4, 4 WAR x 3, 3 WAR x 5 Fits the profile of higher volume pitchers at this level: high IP but with a FIP- around 85. #76 (#2 2B) Chase Utley, 2003-2018, PHIHall Rating 32.9, 1 Gold Glove, 4 All-Star 7148 PA, 128 OPS+, 277 / 377 / 476, 8 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 4, 5 WAR x 2 #75 (#8 3B) Israel Hinojosa, 2019-2037, SFHall Rating 33.2, 1 MVP, 1 Gold Glove, 7 All-Stars, 17.3% HoF Voting so far 10030 PA, 122 OPS+, 255 / 344 / 455, 7 WAR x 2, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 2, 4 WAR x 2, 3 WAR x 3 I feel like Hinojosa has a better argument for the Hall than the 17.3% suggests. He had a nice peak, a mountain of All-Stars and an MVP. He's as good a hitter as Scott Rolen and Paul Molitor were (122 OPS+ all) but is not as good. Rolen was a defensive wizard (6th best fielding 3B all-time) where Hinojosa was only good (28th all-time or so). And Molitor had a notably onger career where Hinojosa started late, only getting really rolling until he was 25. I don't think Hinojosa belongs in the Hall. I just want to give a shout out to a really strong player.#74 (#27 SP) Javier Vazquez, 1998-2016, NYYHall Rating 33.7, 2 All-Star 3800 IP, 91 FIP-, 1.2 / 2.6 / 7.7, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 5, 3 WAR x 2 #73 (#12 C) Eric Harrison, 2028-2045, CARHall Rating 33.7, 2 Silver Sluggers, 5 All-Stars, not yet voted on 9750 PA, 124 OPS+, 268 / 339 / 462, 8 WAR x 1, 7 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 2, 4 WAR x 4, 3 WAR x 4 Hit with patience and power but was never strong at making contact. When the hits fell he was one of the best in the league; his peak is pretty high. But 124 OPS+ is a little low for a Hall of Fame catcher and he stopped being able to field catcher reliably by age 39. I think he's outside the Hall, but only just.#72 (#26 SP) Ubaldo Jimenez, 2006-2027, COLHall Rating 33.8, 1 All-Star 3592 IP, 89 FIP-, 0.7 / 3.4 / 7.0, 5 WAR x 5, 4 WAR x 6, 3 WAR x 2 #71 (#25 SP) Phil Jackson, 2015-2029, NYYHall Rating 33.8, 3 All-Star 2685 IP, 82 FIP-, 1.1 / 2.7 / 10.0, 7 WAR x 2, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 2, 4 WAR x 3, 3 WAR x 3 Classic pitcher in the power / flyball mode. Allowed a lot of home runs but averaged more than 10 k/9 for his career. At his peak was dominant. From age 24 to 34 his WAR was: 5.1, 6.3, 7.4, 7.7, 4.8, 3.3, 3.8, 2.9, 4.6, 5.1, 4.0. Not the best, but very good. And at age 35 his fastball died, his K/9 dropped by more than 3 and his career ended inside of two years. So close. #70 (#3 SS) Hanley Ramirez, 2005-2020, SDPHall Rating 33.9, Rookie of the Year, 7 All-Stars 9681 PA, 133 OPS+, 297 / 384 / 488, 7 WAR x 3, 6 WAR x 4, 5 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 1, 3 WAR x 1 #69 (#10 1B) Lance Berkman, 1999-2013, HOUHall Rating 34.7, 6 All-Star 8543 PA, 148 OPS+, 296 / 404 / 536, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 2, 4 WAR x 3, 3 WAR x 3 #68 (#4 CF) Casey Williams, 2030-2042, NYYHall Rating 34.7, 6 Silver Sluggers, 1 Gold Glove, 6 All-Stars, 1 Ring, not yet voted on 7453 PA, 133 OPS+, 292 / 342 / 497, 8 WAR x 3, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 1, 4 WAR x 1 Also known as Aaron Hicks Lite. His peak was off the chart; from age 26-30 his years were: 6.9, 8.8, 7.9, 8.5, 8.4 (these rank as 3rd, 2nd, 1st, 2nd and 2nd in the AL for those years). By the end of his age 31 season he was already at 33.2 Hall Rating; it was all in the bag. And then it all went bad. He'd never walked a lot but, unlike most hitters, the older he got the less he walked. He also started striking out a little more, making worse contact in play and his power started to go a little. None of these was a big change but they combined to drop him from 8.4 WAR to 4.6 WAR at 31, to 2.6 at 32, to 2.9 at 33 to 0.4 at 34 and 35. For a five year span he and Jason Wilson were the two best players in the AL. In terms of greatness, he has it. Everyone following the league in those years knew who Casey Williams was. He just has nothing to show besides that five-year peak. Hall Rating says he's not quite there. His seven year peak is the 9th best among CF in MLB history and everyone above him is in the Hall (or is Mike Trout). But there is simply nobody whose value is so nonexistant outside of their best seven years. Casey Williams is unprecedented. And if people wanted to induct him for being the best in baseball for five years I think they could do worse.#67 (#11 C) Mike Preston, 2027-2044, BALHall Rating 35.2, 1 Silver Slugger, 5 All-Stars, 1 Ring, not yet voted on 9010 PA, 122 OPS+, 255 / 337 / 468, 6 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 4, 4 WAR x 4, 3 WAR x 3 Extremely reliable, gave Baltimore a lot of good years. From 2029-2039 he was over 4 WAR ten times. Though his power and patience hung around through his old age he suffered the fate the ends the career of most catchers; he lost the ability to catch and had to become a 1B / DH. And once he did his value was pretty much over. He's over 35 Hall Rating so that means he's worth a serious look. He is not a sexy candidate. His peak is relatively low compared to others in this tier and he's only the 11th best catcher in PBL history (in 35 years). These factors combined suggest he's not a good bet for it. Just don't forget his quality of career. Thirteen years straight between three and seven WAR from behind the plate. Tell me you wouldn't love to have that on your team. Even if he is forgotten by the voters of the Hall, he'll be remembered by the fans of Baltimore, and the World Series title he caught for them.#66 (#3 CF) Ricardo Aranda, 2015-2028, PITHall Rating 35.3, 3 Gold Gloves, 4 All-Stars 9063 PA, 115 OPS+, 260 / 332 / 465, 8 WAR x 1, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 3, 5 WAR x 2, 4 WAR x 2 Think of him as Casey Williams' counterpart. They weren't identical; Williams did more with his bat where Aranda contributed more than 180 runs with his glove over his career (187.7 to be exact). Aranda started hot out of the gate with a 5.2 WAR rookie season at age 23 (didn't win Rookie of the Year, curiously) and threw up outstanding seasons every year until age 31. And his career died immediately after, a product of escalating strikeout rates and poor success with balls in play. His fielding stayed strong, but there's only so long you can stay productive in the league without the ability to OPS over 740. Like Williams, would have been a sure-thing Hall of Famer if he'd been able to keep his performance going even a few years longer. He gradually fell off the ballot in 2034, suffering no doubt from poor counting stats (in the PBL, only 9k PA hurts) and how much of his value came from his defense. How much came from his defense you ask? Simply put, by ZR Aranda is the 2nd best fielder in PBL history. #65 (#9 1B) Herb Griffith, 2030-present (37 years old), BALHall Rating 35.7, 2 MVPs, 1 Gold Glove, 3 Silver Sluggers, 6 All-Stars, 2 Rings 9332 PA, 141 OPS+, 272 / 376 / 495, 8 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 4, 4 WAR x 2, 3 WAR x 3 In real life only two first basemen have hit twice the home runs that they've hit doubles: Mark McGuire and Harmon Killebrew. Like those two Herb Griffith swings for the fences each time, generating far more flyballs than line drives. Even in his age 37 season he hit 37 home runs, but only 12 doubles. A bit of a disappointing career given what he started as. Griffith came out of nowhere to finish 2nd in the Rookie of the Year voting; by age 24 he was a 8/10/9 monstrosity, hitting 334/431/552 for 8.9 WAR and an MVP. By age 26 he'd helped the Padres to a World Series victory but he was already beginning to slip. Through age 29 he remained a strong hitter but not to the extent he had been. Even now, at 37, he can't hit much above 250 but he draws so many walks and hits so many bombs that he still has value. Will he make the Hall? He could; he's pretty similar to both Willie McCovey and the aforementioned Killebrew, both of whom are in. As the 9th best 1B in the last 35 years, he's not a sexy option. He will have had a great career. But like so many people at this tier it's hard not to look at his career and wonder. #64 (#24 SP) Jimmy 'Weasel' Smith, 2029-2044, PITHall Rating 35.8, 2 Cy Young, 6 All-Stars, 2 Rings, not yet voted on 2365 IP, 74 FIP-, 0.7 / 1.5 / 7.9, 8 WAR x 1, 7 WAR x 1, 6 WAR x 3, 5 WAR x 3, 3 WAR x 2 Sheesh, 2300+ IP with a FIP- below 75? Nice! Jimmy Smith had a weird career. Though breaking into the majors full-time at 23 he flew below the radar, posting a 3.1 WAR year with only 88 innings (!). That set up his 6.5 WAR age 27 season and so began a streak of dominance few have matched. From that moment on he did not slip below 5 WAR again for reasons of quality. Jimmy Smith may not have been the best pitcher of his era but he was famous for giving hitters nothing, allowing neither home runs nor walks. In the end Smith was defeated, but not by opposing hitters. In 1939 he signed a four-year 88.7 million dollar contract with Boston. Five innings into his first game he tore his UCL. He came back and pitched three great seasons: 6.3, 5.8 and 6.7 WAR at ages 33, 34, and 35 respectively. In 2043 he was injured no less than fifteen separate times. When he did pitch his strikeout rate was way down, to 4.4 k/9. The next year he tore his labrum and never recovered from it, retiring at the end of the season. Was it a mercy that we never had to see Smith try and defend that mound without the ability to strike anyone out? I don't know. When all is said and done he put up eight seasons above 5 WAR. If he'd been able to stay just a tiny bit healthier he'd have been fantastic. To Smith's credit he didn't hang around and try and squeeze out a few more dollars. He saw the writing on the wall and bowed out. I confess to a soft spot for Jimmy Smith. If I have a spare vote this year he'll get it. #63 (#7 3B) Adrian Cardenas, 2010-2030, LANHall Rating 36.2, 7 All-Stars, 29.9% HoF voting so far 10306 PA, 126 OPS+, 283 / 358 / 475, 6 WAR x 3, 5 WAR x 3, 4 WAR x 3, 3 WAR x 2 Adrian Cardenas is not doing well in HoF voting so far and its understandable; he's not a sexy pick. He's another one of those guys that threw up a lot of 5 & 6 WAR years in his prime but did so from a fielding position so his hitting numbers don't look gaudy. With an OPS+ of 126 he's better than most 3B and many in the Hall. He had a strong career and slowly faded out. But he was one of the best in his time.#62 (#23 SP) Martin Perez, 2012-2034, LAN, Hall of Fame in 2040Hall Rating 36.3, 1 Cy Young, 1 Gold Glove, 9 All-Stars 4719 IP, 96 FIP-, 1.0 / 2.6 / 7.1, 6 WAR x 1, 5 WAR x 4, 4 WAR x 5, 3 WAR x 4 Our first person on the list to make the Hall and I can't say I'm super happy with it. His Hall Rating isn't terrible. But it's hard to give a ton of love to a player who only broke 6 WAR once. He pitched a ton; that's not in doubt. But a 96 FIP-? That pretty much means that, over his career, he was only 4% better than his league. That's not terribly inspiring. So how can we explain his induction? Well, first off, the counting stats. He pitched for 4700 innings, which means he compiled a lot of numbers. He broke 300 wins, which would be impressive if wins weren't a dumb stat. He threw 3700 strikeouts (7th in PBL history) which would be sexy except that it took him forever to do it (and also, counting stats are dumb). But the real issue is his ERA. ERA+ shows him as 16% better than his league, where FIP- shows him as only 4% better. What gives? The short answer is BABIP. His BABIP was criminally low, 275 for his whole career. This is relatively unprecedented, even for a pitcher that played for the Dodgers for so long. There are pitchers who have pitched above 3k innings who have shown the ability to keep their BABIP low, but here they are: Orlando Perez (273 BABIP, 6.5 K/BB) and Danny Hayes (273 BABIP, 7.5 K/BB). If Martin Perez' low BABIP is a product of skill then he should definitely be in the Hall. But BABIP is not really a skill, at least not for players with K/BB south of 3. I'm more inclined to say that he was more lucky than good in that. And even still he's on the fence for the Hall, at least according to my rating. So I guess there are worse things. But I hate compilers. It's a prejudice of mine. Forgive me.#61 (#22 SP) Roy Halladay, 1998-2017, TORHall Rating 36.7, 1 Cy Young, 6 All-Stars 3101 IP, 88 FIP-, 0.9 / 2.1 / 6.2, 7 WAR x 3, 6 WAR x 2, 5 WAR x 2, 4 WAR x 2, 3 WAR x 1
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Post by earlweaver on Mar 4, 2018 1:24:30 GMT -5
the countdown is utterly fantastic!! I've slowly scrolled down reading every word!! Amazing!!!
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Post by Texas Rangers on Mar 4, 2018 2:46:31 GMT -5
I dragged Martin Perez to 300 wins when he was in Toronto, wins are indeed a dumb stat but he's still the only player in PBL history to get to 300 wins and once I saw he was thisclose I endeavored to get him across the finish line. The guy was a (slightly built) horse--he threw at least 218.2 innings for seventeen consecutive seasons, never missing a start for nearly two decades. While he only broke 6 WAR once, he did lead the league in pitching WAR twice in his prime. Martin Perez was the PBL's Tom Glavine.
That he threw so many innings with that BABIP means that he had to be extremely lucky for an extremely long time, near two decades of luck. That luck only ran out when he got to Toronto and his velocity fell apart. We don't have line drive or popup statistics, just ground ball percentage. Perhaps Martin Perez got a lot of pop flies/induced very weak contact in some way? I recall reading an article a few years back positing that the rules of BABIP may not apply to every single pitcher (see knuckleballers, Mariano Rivera, Matt Cain pre-injury). Roughly 650 innings of that massive amount of innings came at the end of his career when he was running on fumes and limping to 300 wins, which certainly effected his K/BB ratio. In his best days he was safely above 3 K/BB most seasons.
Basically what I'm saying is that Martin Perez was a treasure, a weird outlier in terms of durability and BABIP, and should thus be in the Hall of Fame even though a number of guys ranked below him on the top 100 were better than him in their prime and also how dare you now I hate your list.
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Post by MetDaMeats on Mar 4, 2018 7:22:12 GMT -5
Also, I'm a little confused at how a player can be "lucky" for 20 years. I mean, luck, by definition is supposed to be something that happens at random beyond anyone's control. If it occurs for several decades doesn't that just make it a skill?
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Post by earlweaver on Mar 4, 2018 10:40:46 GMT -5
#64 and #65 were traded for each other when they were in there 20's!
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Post by sansterre - Milwaukee Brewers on Mar 4, 2018 10:49:07 GMT -5
I dragged Martin Perez to 300 wins when he was in Toronto, wins are indeed a dumb stat but he's still the only player in PBL history to get to 300 wins and once I saw he was thisclose I endeavored to get him across the finish line. The guy was a (slightly built) horse--he threw at least 218.2 innings for seventeen consecutive seasons, never missing a start for nearly two decades. While he only broke 6 WAR once, he did lead the league in pitching WAR twice in his prime. Martin Perez was the PBL's Tom Glavine. That he threw so many innings with that BABIP means that he had to be extremely lucky for an extremely long time, near two decades of luck. That luck only ran out when he got to Toronto and his velocity fell apart. We don't have line drive or popup statistics, just ground ball percentage. Perhaps Martin Perez got a lot of pop flies/induced very weak contact in some way? I recall reading an article a few years back positing that the rules of BABIP may not apply to every single pitcher (see knuckleballers, Mariano Rivera, Matt Cain pre-injury). Roughly 650 innings of that massive amount of innings came at the end of his career when he was running on fumes and he was limping to 300 wins, which certainly effected his K/BB ratio. In his best days he was safely above 3 K/BB most seasons. Basically what I'm saying is that Martin Perez was a treasure, a weird outlier in terms of durability and BABIP, and should thus be in the Hall of Fame even though a number of guys ranked below him on the top 100 were better than him in their prime and also how dare you now I hate your list. Rofl. As you should. I do concede that DIPS hurts flyball pitchers, as they have higher home run rates but lower BABIP (and DIPS punishes HR, but does nothing with BABIP). And as you say, he pitched a loooot of innings. Not that that makes his BABIP being luck impossible, just less probable. Either way. Whether he made the Hall for having a special skill to control his BABIP a bit, or for being just a cosmic fluke, either one merits enshrinement, if for different reasons. I love your story. My favorite part of this project is discovering the history of different and players and teams that I didn't know.
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Post by Texas Rangers on Mar 4, 2018 11:20:45 GMT -5
I clearly don't hate your list I'm HERE FOR IT!
This is one of my favorites and didn't involve me, I was reminded when looking at the catchers list. Joe Mauer was Twins #3 hitter and still one of their best players. They made the playoffs. Mauer retired at the end of the regular season to become the team's color analyst before the playoffs. Twins GM-- "WTF?!!?" There was no way for Derek to reverse it. It's one of the weirdest, funniest moments in PBL history.
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Post by sansterre - Milwaukee Brewers on Mar 4, 2018 11:32:33 GMT -5
Also, I'm a little confused at how a player can be "lucky" for 20 years. I mean, luck, by definition is supposed to be something that happens at random beyond anyone's control. If it occurs for several decades doesn't that just make it a skill? Yes, and yet we have to remember that this is a programmed game. And we *know* that this game is not coded for BABIP to be a skill for pitchers. Only some things affect BABIP: 1) The count. Balls put in play when the hitter is behind in the count go for outs more often. Balls put in play when the hitter is ahead in the count go for hits more often. Pitchers with great K/BB ratios tend to be ahead in the count a lot and so get a break for their BABIP (like Orlando Perez and Danny Hayes). 2) Groundball / flyball. Groundball pitchers have higher BABIP, flyball pitchers have lower. 3) Fielding. A better defense behind the pitcher means lower BABIP (in fact, in a causal statistics sense, half of BABIP is caused by ZR). Based on 2045, every +3.4 of ZR drops your BABIP by a point. Which doesn't sound like a lot, but knowing that a +35 ZR (which is plenty doable, if not easy) gets you a 10-point drop in BABIP counts for a lot. 4) Park effects. In fact, over a random sampling of Dodgers' seasons (13 of them) their team BABIP has been 13.5 points lower than league average. The first and second are 'skill'. The third and fourth are not. My personal guess is that Perez' BABIP success is mostly produced by playing in Dodger Stadium for 3500 innings, and somewhat produced by being a flyball pitcher and generally playing in front of good defenses in LA (I'm guessing on that one, it's a lot of data to compile). That said we can dismiss Perez' skill for controlling his BABIP and still treasure him for being such an outlier historically. Such players always add to the discussion.
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