The 25 worst seasons for a batter/defender

Brian Giles batting about 2 weeks before the end of his playing career / Icon SMI

Yesterday we saw that Brian Giles had one of the very worst seasons as a defender of all time. That 2009 season of his, though, is not quite the worst overall for a batter who also played defense.

Rk	Player	PA	Rbat	Rfield	WAR/pos	Year	Age	Tm	G	BA	OPS	Pos
1	George Wright	393	-37	-5	-4.0	1985	26	TEX	109	.190	.483	*98/D
2	Brian Giles	253	-15	-26	-3.9	2009	38	SDP	61	.191	.548	*9
3	Vic Harris	235	-14	-16	-2.4	1974	24	CHC	62	.195	.549	*4
4	Quinton McCracken	226	-19	-8	-2.3	2003	32	ARI	115	.227	.547	987/D
5	Bob Uecker	221	-17	-16	-2.5	1967	32	TOT	80	.150	.461	*2
6	Frank O’Rourke	216	-32	-5	-2.9	1912	18	BSN	61	.122	.325	*6/5
7	Tuck Stainback	211	-16	-8	-2.2	1941	29	DET	94	.245	.585	79/8
8	Doug Strange	201	-24	-1	-2.3	1998	34	PIT	90	.173	.433	5/43
9	Dud Lee	201	-25	-8	-2.2	1921	21	SLB	73	.167	.446	64/5
10	John Black	201	-23	-3	-2.2	1911	21	SLB	54	.151	.374	*3
11	Mike Shannon	193	-13	-14	-2.1	1970	30	STL	55	.213	.562	*5
12	Bob Lillis	178	-11	-12	-2.0	1966	36	HOU	68	.232	.528	*46/5
13	Luis Pujols	169	-17	-9	-1.9	1978	22	HOU	56	.131	.413	*2/3
14	Darnell Coles	165	-14	-8	-1.9	1984	22	SEA	48	.161	.455	*5/D7
15	Dave Rosello	161	-13	-13	-2.2	1974	24	CHC	62	.203	.502	*46
16	Paul Blair	160	-18	0	-1.7	1979	35	TOT	77	.152	.443	*87/9
17	Tommy Brown	160	-17	-10	-1.9	1944	16	BRO	46	.164	.400	*6
18	Billy Smith	159	-8	-12	-1.7	1975	21	CAL	59	.203	.515	*6/3D5
19	Ron Hansen	159	-10	-8	-1.6	1971	33	NYY	61	.207	.514	*5/46
20	Pat Rockett	157	-18	-14	-2.7	1978	23	ATL	55	.141	.366	*6
21	Marv Rickert	154	-17	-1	-1.6	1947	26	CHC	71	.146	.420	7/938
22	Jackie Gutierrez	152	-17	-7	-1.8	1986	26	BAL	61	.186	.414	*4/5D
23	Andy Anderson	152	-20	-6	-1.9	1949	26	SLB	71	.125	.376	*6/45
24	Luis Lopez	151	-15	-12	-2.1	1996	25	SDP	63	.180	.478	*64/5
25	Tony Martinez	151	-17	-5	-1.8	1963	23	CLE	43	.156	.368	*6

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 2/1/2012.

These players, ranked by plate appearances, all had negative WAR at least -0.01 * PA In other words, they all generated about one win below replacement level per 100 plate appearances.

I included their runs from batting and from fielding so we could get a sense of where the negative contributions were. The only non-negative number on the list is Paul Blair’s fielding runs at zero.

Some random observations:

#9 Dud Lee–well with a name like that, duh–of course he’s on the list
#20-21 Rockett and Rickert
#23-24 consecutive alliterations
#13 Pujols is on the list. (OK, not that Pujols.)
I’d never heard of #17 Tommy Brown. He was done in the majors at age 25, but that was already his ninth season!

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Hartvig

12 years ago

Of course Bob Uecker is on the list. Pat Rockett was completely new to me. Not a name you’re likely to forget. Tuck Stainback was a bit of a surprise. I had heard of him but was only vaguely familiar- journeyman, outfielder, once played for Detroit- but looking closer just how do you fashion a 13-year major league career with 2 plus offensive seasons (0.2 oWAR in ’34 and 0.5 in ’38) and 1 plus defensive season (0.1 in 1940)? I suppose the war might account for a few of those years but otherwise he seems like the luckiest AAAA… Read more »

Dr. Doom

12 years ago

Speaking of that George Wright season, I’m really used to seeing it in a pair with Jerry Royster’s 1977. Not seeing Royster’s infamous -32 RBat and -25 RField season was a pretty big shock to me, though I guess he did have 491 PAs. Really, what’s more shocking is that Royster parlayed that “success” into 11 more years in the majors as basically a replacement-level player (4.5 WAR the rest of the way); perhaps more shocking is that he later became a HITTING COACH, which led to one of the longest (if not THE longest) interim-managing stints of all-time (147… Read more »

Frank Clingenpeel

12 years ago

Reply to Dr. Doom

I keep forgetting about that George Wright; in fact, I have been trying to forget his “contributions” for three and a half decades now.

12 years ago

I mentioned this yesterday in the “Hawpe comments” but Giles player page shows his 2009 season as -4.1 WAR. Any idea why the play index shows it as -3.9?

Richard Chester

12 years ago

Reply to Ed

@3
Ed: The best thing to do is to go to baseball-reference and report it via feedback to Neil or Sean. I found a similar error a couple of weeks ago. Neil said they would look into it but he has not gotten back to me yet.

Author

Andy

12 years ago

Reply to Ed

There are a lot of such discrepancies between WAR listed on player pages and what comes up in the PI. I don’t know why but I suspect its an additive-rounding thing.

Richard Chester

12 years ago

Reply to Andy

The error that I found has nothing to do with additive-rounding.

Editor

John Autin

12 years ago

Reply to Ed

Ed, I think that particular error is specific to 2009, though I don’t know why.

Richard Chester

12 years ago

Tommy Brown is the youngest player to hit a home run.

Richard Chester

12 years ago

Reply to Richard Chester

And also the youngest to steal home.

Doug

12 years ago

Reply to Richard Chester

Tommy Brown started with the Dodgers as a 16 year-old in 1944. He was one of 8 teenagers on the Dodgers that year, including such recognizable names as Ralph Branca, Cal McLish and Gene Mauch. Brown was the youngest of this bunch and played the most, getting 160 PAs in 46 games. Those Dodgers also had 6 other players aged 20 or 21 including Howie Schutlz, their starting first-baseman. They got four teenagers into their game with the Phillies on June 18th, and had a starting infield against the Reds on Sep 28 with a combined age less than 85… Read more »

Doug

12 years ago

Reply to Doug

The Dodgers actually used that same, ultra-young, starting infield 11 times coming down the stretch in 1944.

Steven

12 years ago

I saw Bob Uecker’s final home run. July 23, 1967 at Busch Stadium. Over the wagon gate in left field. One of the thirty or forty greatest moments that afternoon in Major League Baseball.

Hartvig

12 years ago

Reply to Steven

Perfect. Uecker. Comment.

We do need to get the “liked” button back.

Kahuna Tuna

12 years ago

Reply to Hartvig

I’ll second that, and not only for the occasional quip. Some of the comments here are very insightful and reflect very good, very thoughtful statistical work. I’d like to be able to express appreciation even if I don’t have anything else to add via a separate post.

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Andy

12 years ago

Reply to Kahuna Tuna

Ask and ye shall receive. I have installed a ‘like’ button although it doesn’t include a total cumulative count on ‘likes’ for each author–couldn’t find a plugin for that.

Still, though, I expect everybody to ‘like’ this comment right now! Try finding another blog where the admin listens to feedback so quickly.

Steven

12 years ago

Mike Shannon’s season in 1970 was abbreviated due to a kidney ailment that nearly cost him his life. He missed a lot of games in the first half of the season, tried to play, but just didn’t have it anymore and retired at the end of the year.

Author

Andy

12 years ago

I am loving the formatting on this new blog.

Frank Clingenpeel

12 years ago

Reply to Andy

You can add my vote to your approval. MUCH easier to navigate!

BryanM

12 years ago

Reply to Andy

Me, too! As I understand it, WAR includes base running contributions as well — are any atrocious base runners in the list/ I gotta believe that Uecker’s r bat + r field seriously understate his suckitude; he ran like a man trying to catch a bus to his own funeral.

Paul E

12 years ago

How about Paul Blair? Horrible hitting at the tail end of his career but still a decent defender. I believe Blair was another one of those guys who got hit in the noggin’ and just never recovered psychologically and always had a timid “bucket-foot” approach at the plate

Chris A.

12 years ago

I have always loved the name Quenton McCracken. Too bad he was a forgettable ballplayer.

12 years ago

Just noticed that Tommy Brown was only 16 when he had his season of “suckitude”. So I guess he deserves a mulligan. Not sure what his story is – can’t seem to find a Wikipedia page on him – but he was obviously a wartime signing.

Editor

John Autin

12 years ago

Reply to Ed

Ed, did you read Tommy Brown’s “Bullpen” page?
http://www.baseball-reference.com/bullpen/Tommy%20Brown

12 years ago

Reply to John Autin

Thanks! Surprised that Wikipedia doesn’t have a page on him though I may have overlooked it.

Editor

John Autin

12 years ago

That Luis Pujols ’78 season is seared into my brain in the form of his Strat-O-Matic card — the worst I can recall for a semi-regular player.

Kahuna Tuna

12 years ago

Reply to John Autin

Two of the twenty worst OPS+ seasons for position players with 150 or more plate appearances have occurred in the past four years: Brandon Wood, Angels, 2010, OPS+ of 6; Tony Peña, Royals, 2008, OPS+ of 7.

DaveR

12 years ago

Reply to John Autin

My buddy and I were discussing the players one day back then, and I mentioned he wouldn’t make the Hall because of his name.

Frank Clingenpeel

12 years ago

Is it just my PMS {that’s “pre-mature senility} kicking into play here, or is there some significance in the fact that there is not a single representative from a first year expansion team on this list?

Paul E

12 years ago

Reply to Frank Clingenpeel

FCP:
The advantage of an expansion team lies in the fact no one expects them to contend…in the event your drafted player stinks, you replace him after 200 PA or 60 games with another soon-to-be part-time player who never accumulates enough time, either, to be truly atrocious?

Editor

John Autin

12 years ago

Reply to Paul E

Paul E — I was in the process of writing up the same concept, when I double-checked the list above and noticed that most of them don’t have more than 200 PAs, either. So I don’t think that’s the explanation.

Editor

John Autin

12 years ago

Reply to Frank Clingenpeel

Frank, it may just be a coincidence based on the threshold Andy set of minus-0.01 WAR per PA. Here are some expansion players who came close to that standard:
— 1969, Ron Clark, Seattle Pilots, -1.8 WAR in 188 PA.
— 1977, Dave McKay, Toronto, -2.1 WAR in 298 PAs.
— 1977, Pedro Garcia, Toronto, -1.1 WAR in 141 PAs.
— 1998, Brent Brede, Arizona, -1.8 WAR in 238 PAs.

12 years ago

I would say it’s two things. Expansion seasons represent a very small percentage of the total number of baseball seasons. So the chances that an expansion team having one of the 25 worst players is quite small. Second, there are plenty of expansion teams that haven’t had the worst record for their particular season. So while the ’62 Mets were horrible, that’s not true of all expansion teams. Speaking of the ’62 Mets, I’m not sure why Gus Bell isn’t on the list above. He had a -1.6 WAR in only 115 plate appearances. Both Marv Rickert and Ron Hansen… Read more »

Editor

John Autin

12 years ago

Reply to Ed

Ed, those Gus Bell numbers are just for his time with the Mets. He was also with the Braves in ’62 and hit well, so his total for the year was -1.0 WAR in 343 PAs.

Kahuna Tuna

12 years ago

Reply to John Autin

I’ve e-mailed B-Ref several times asking them to put some kind of indicator on the team-season pages when a player has played for another big-league team during that season. I’m sure it’s a lot of work, but I’ve never heard back from them that they’re considering doing it. IMO it’s a major weakness of the site.

12 years ago

Reply to Kahuna Tuna

Yeah, I agree. I’m pretty good at noticing those things on the player page, but it’s impossible to see on the team page.

Editor

John Autin

12 years ago

It occurs to me that the rate of -1 WAR per 100 PAs is so bad as to be virtually unsustainable for a full season. Either by regression to the mean (Bill Bergen never had such a season, and the worst WAR by a batting-title qualifier was -3.8), or by loss of opportunity (a team would pull the plug before year’s end), it’s very hard to end up with a full season anywhere near that negative rate. Jerry Royster (1977) and George Wright (on the list) are tied for the worst season bWAR at -4.0. Royster had 491 PAs, so… Read more »

Author

Andy

12 years ago

Reply to John Autin

JA that’s a good point. It occurred to me while writing the post that this is sort of a list of good decisions by teams and/or players–in other words to stop something when it’s really poor. I don’t recall if it was the Padres or Giles who pulled the plug in his final season, but it was clearly the right thing to do. Even though Giles would likely have regressed toward the mean for the rest of the year (following your point), his numbers were going to be bad.

Luis Gomez

12 years ago

Reply to Andy

He was injured most of the time, so most Padres fans were glad he wasn’t in the lineup. Raised a lot of questions (mostly from angry fans) when the year before the Padres management exercised their option and kept him another year.

Darien

12 years ago

Excellent “random observations” on this one.

Dr. Remulak

12 years ago

Great defender Paul Blair must have lost a couple steps by age 35 to put up a 0 in dWAR.

Steven Page

12 years ago

I saw most of Pat Rockett’s season in Atlanta. He came up as a “can’t miss”, but just seemed overwhelmed at the plate and in the field. He eventually was replaced by journeyman Darrell Chaney, to the great relief of the Atlanta faithful (all 1200 of us at the time).