Circle of Greats 1963 Ballot

219 Replies

This post is for voting and discussion of the sixth round of voting for the Circle of Greats, which adds players born in 1963. Rules and lists are after the jump.

As always, each ballot must include three and only three eligible players. The one player who appears on the most ballots cast in the round is inducted into the Circle of Greats. Players who fail to win induction but appear on half or more of the ballots cast win four future rounds of ballot eligibility. Players who appear on 25% or more of the ballots, but less than 50%, earn two years of extended eligibility. Any other player in the top 9 (including ties) in ballot appearances (or who appear on at least 10% of the ballots) wins one additional round of ballot eligibility.

All voting for this round closes at 11:59 PM EST on Saturday, January 26th, while changes to previously cast ballots are allowed until 11:59 PM EST Thursday, January 24th.

If you’d like to follow the vote tally, and/or check to make sure I’ve recorded your vote correctly, you can see my ballot-counting spreadsheet for this round here: 1963 COG Vote Tally . I’ll be updating the spreadsheet periodically with the latest votes. Initially, there is a row for every voter who has cast a ballot in any of the past rounds, but new voters are entirely welcome — new voters will be added to the spreadsheet as their ballots are submitted. Also initially, there is a column for each of the holdover players; additional player columns from the born-in-1963 group will be added as votes are cast for them.

Choose your three players from the lists below of eligible players. The holdovers are listed in order of the year through which they are assured eligibility, and alphabetically when the eligibility year is the same. The 1963 birth year guys are listed in order of the number of seasons they played in the majors, and alphabetically among players with the same number of seasons played.

Holdovers:
John Smoltz (eligible through 1958)
Tom Glavine (1960)
Mike Mussina (1960)
Curt Schilling (1960)
Craig Biggio (1961)
Larry Walker (1962)
Barry Larkin (1962)
Roberto Alomar (1963)
Kenny Lofton (1963)

Everyday Players (born in 1963, ten or more seasons played in the major leagues):
Fred McGriff
Shawon Dunston
Edgar Martinez
Pat Borders
Bobby Bonilla
Mark McGwire
Paul O’Neill
Ken Caminiti
Mike Stanley
Dante Bichette
Lance Johnson
Walt Weiss
John Cangelosi
Cecil Fielder
Mike Devereaux
Mariano Duncan
Lenny Dykstra
Mike Greenwell
Darrin Jackson
Ron Karkovice
Jose Oquendo
Luis Polonia
Bip Roberts
Dale Sveum
Daryl Boston
Jim Leyritz
Matt Nokes
Craig Shipley
Damon Berryhill
Mark Carreon
Felix Fermin
John Marzano

Pitchers (born in 1963, ten or more seasons played in the major leagues):
Randy Johnson
David Wells
Terry Mulholland
David Cone
Jeff Fassero
Jeff Brantley
Eric Plunk
Norm Charlton
Ed Nunez
Rich Rodriguez
Bruce Ruffin
Chris Bosio
Doug Henry
Mark Leiter
Scott Bankhead
Tony Castillo
Marvin Freeman
Rich Monteleone

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Brandon

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, John Smoltz, Barry Larkin

Insert Name Here

11 years ago

I think the Paul O’Neill link is broken…

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Insert Name Here

Yes, I tried both b-ref’s automatic linker and a hand created link, but they won’t seem to work. You can go to the O’Neill page yourself though — the page itself seems to work.

Mike HBC

11 years ago

I’m finally dropping my Smoltz/Glavine ballot, though don’t be surprised to see it return soon (since I’m assuming Randy will win here, and there isn’t a single new candidate I care to vote for come ’62 or ’61).

I’m going with Big Unit, Smoltzy, and John Marzano… I mean Barry Larkin. I have most certainly never heard of John Marzano.

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Randy Johnson
Curt Schilling
Larry Walker

In spite of all the discussion on the other thread, I’m still stumping for Walker here. I’d rather see us get a rightfielder at this point than have the 3rd (or 4th or 5th) best pitcher on the ballot get another vote.

Insert Name Here

11 years ago

As I usually do, I’m going to make an initial vote based on my method for determining the top three (using primarily WAR/162 games during a series of 5+ “peak” seasons, along with a series of tiebreakers), and make any strategic changes later. Additionally, I am not considering PED users such as Mark McGwire. That said, and after running my method on all these players I end up with: 1. Randy Johnson (8.1 WAR/162 during 13-yr peak of 1993-2005) 2. Curt Schilling (7.3 WAR/162 (raised after adjustment for relief season) during 6-yr peak of 2001-06) 3. Larry Walker (6.6 WAR/162… Read more »

Insert Name Here

11 years ago

Reply to Insert Name Here

I’m making a last-chance strategic change, as I have done before, and hoping it is noticed in the remaining hour or so before the vote-change deadline. It’s a shame that Kenny Lofton is about to be dropped here, so I’m to “go down with the ship” for him (as so many here claim to be doing for Alomar, although it appears that he’s getting through) by dropping Randy Johnson, now that I can’t be the one blamed for preventing his unanimity. So, my final vote: Curt Schilling, Larry Walker, Kenny Lofton. I also considered throwing McGriff in for one of… Read more »

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Insert Name Here

I’ve got your change. And even if I missed it tonight, it’s the time you submit your comment, not the time I catch it, that counts.

bstar

11 years ago

Reply to Insert Name Here

Not to copycat, inh, but I was thinking of the same move a few days ago when I saw Lofton’s low vote total. I don’t see much of a distinction between all those guys with 10-16 votes and Lofton. In fact, Lofton would have been my fifth pick in this round.

So as not to completely mimic inh’s move, I’ll switch out my vote for Schilling and go with my final three as: RJ, Glavine, Lofton.

e pluribus unum

11 years ago

I think Johnson is inevtable, and I’m sticking with Smoltz. As for my third vote, although I’m a little hesitant to go with all pitchers and Larkin and Walker are particularly tempting, I’m moving off Mussina (my last round #3) and going with Schilling. My reasoning? Well, far from being put off by ideology and its bold expression, I can’t help but think that any guy who can flog a sock for $100K – $1M has to be the ultimate expression of the American Dream, at least one night’s experience of it. Donald Trump couldn’t carry his laundry, and people… Read more »

Mike

11 years ago

Smoltz
Glavine
Randy Johnson

11 years ago

Shawon Dunston: 1814 games, 18 seasons… 9.1 WAR. Ouch. 1.3 WAR produced in last ten years of career. Double ouch.

brp

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

But come on:

11 years ago

Reply to brp

I know, I just never realised quite how badly WAR treats him. And he could have been a ridiculously unlikely hero for SF in 2002, hitting the go-ahead home run in game six of the WS before certain unfortunate and not to be spoken of events took place.

Anyway, never fear Duston fans, it appears his identically named son is in the Cubs farm system, hitting at Papa Dunston-esque averages.

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

Does WAR treat Dunston badly? Or was Dunston just a bad player. His BB/K rate is the 2nd worst in MLB history, behind only Miguel Olivo. His walk rate is the 7th worst in MLB history. And he was a poor fielder. About the only thing he did well was run the bases (despite a poor stolen base %). Obviously he was “better than replacement”, particularly in his early years, but he was never very good.

11 years ago

Reply to Ed

Perhaps I phrased that poorly. I agree with you that Dunston was bad, but, to play devil’s advocate, his oWAR of 18.3 in his first 13 seasons suggests a below average player, even a poor one, but not a abysmally awful one. He gets killed on fielding value though.

To reiterate, I am with you on this. His career WAR/162 is less than 1…

bstar

11 years ago

Reply to Ed

Yeah, Dunston is third-worst all-time for shortstops in fielding runs at -93. Second worst is Chris Gomez at -114, then a precipitous drop to El Capitano at -231 (to save some face for Jete here, he does have 2500+ games played at the position).

brp

11 years ago

Reply to Ed

No, he wasn’t, but he was still part of that Cubs infield that defined my formative baseball-fan years, so he’s always got a soft spot for me.

Dunston was never terrible but he probably shouldn’t have been an every-day player for years on end, either.

11 years ago

Reply to Ed

Through their age 28 seasons, Shawon Dunston had more WAR than… Randy Johnson.

Michael Sullivan

11 years ago

Reply to Ed

“(to save some face for Jete here, he does have 2500+ games played at the position).”

there’s also the part where the list of players who’ve produced more career offensive value from the 6-hole is as follows:

Honus Wagner.

That’s it. That’s the list.

The only others who are even close are Arky Vaughan and A-rod (who admittedly would certainly have surpassed Jeter if he had stayed at short).

bstar

11 years ago

Reply to Ed

Michael, I wrote that to ensure people didn’t get the idea that Jeter is BY FAR the worst fielding shortstop ever. I was trying to downplay the fact that Jeter has more than twice as many negative fielding runs than any other shortstop. It was not an attempt to put him down.

I’m a fan of his also.

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

Still the Cubs’ only #1 overall draft pick, Shawon Dunston (Sr.) is closest in career WAR among #1 overall picks to Ron Blomberg, the #1 overall pick in 1967 (Yankees), whose career WAR was 8.6.

oneblankspace

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

Sha-won was playing third base for the Cardinals at the last Major League game I saw before I left St Louis. With the bases loaded and a 1-0 Cardinal lead in the 7th, he came in to field a bunt. He then threw to third base. The umpire called it fair as it rolled down the line, and two runs scored on the play — actually 3 when I look it up.

Later that game, he reached base, but was doubled off. I think he had passed second base on a flyout to right field.

http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1999/B05140SLN1999.htm
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SLN/SLN199905140.shtml

David Horwich

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Larkin, Glavine.

Dartboard choices after RJ (with an ever-expanding dartboard). I can’t justify Glavine over the other holdover pitchers on analytic grounds, but he was a personal favorite.

Mike L

11 years ago

Randy Johnson first, and then using INH’s methodology (bent a little to my own preferences), Larkin and Mussina. I pick Larkin over Walker because I mentally discount Walker just a bit for his Colorado years and as Larkin and Walker’s WAR per/162 is an identical 6.5 over 12 years, I’ll give Larkin the nod. As for Mussina over Schilling, I acknowledge Schilling’s peak is higher (7.3 WAR/162 over 6.0/162), but Mussina’s peak is over 12 years, while Schilling’s, even adjusted for the relief year, is over six. To my way of thinking, Mussina has greater value because he sustained a… Read more »

Insert Name Here

11 years ago

Reply to Mike L

Interesting thoughts, Mike. I’ll admit that as a Red Sox fan, I have a bit of a personal preference for Schilling over Mussina (at least in terms of their baseball careers), although I actually dropped Schilling last round as a strategic measure to support both Larkin and Walker, although I tend to support Walker over Larkin because it seems that Walker gets less support (probably for the same reason that you prefer Larkin).

Luis Gomez

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Roberto Alomar, Larry Walker. Some side notes. 1. Is it just me that, whenever I read a former player´s name, an image of some of his baseball cards just rush to my head. 2. Two things I remember the most about Larry Walker. The first is a laser he threw to first from right field, to nail a batter and deny him a base hit. The other, seeing him batting right-handed against fellow candidate Randy Johnson. 3. Speaking of Johnson, that poor bird in Arizona… unbelievable. 4. I truly believe Edgar Martinez belongs in the actual Hall of… Read more »

11 years ago

Reply to Luis Gomez

Regarding point 5, congratulations Luis! Looks like you’ve got a tough matchup coming up, how do you fancy your chances?

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Luis Gomez

Congrats — nice to see some real, live baseball excitement. MLB.com’s play-by-play for yesterday’s big Game 7 win by the Aguilas is here: http://mlb.mlb.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?gid=2013_01_20_mxcwin_gsvwin_1&t=g_log&sid=l132

Luis Gomez

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

The highlights from that game is here: lmp.com.mx

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Luis Gomez

By the way, Circle of Greats inductee Mike Piazza played for the Aguilas (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/11/sports/baseball-leiter-back-in-loss-and-so-is-seo.html)

Editor

John Autin

11 years ago

Reply to Luis Gomez

¡Felicidades!

Luis Gomez

11 years ago

Reply to John Autin

Muchas Gracias a todos! RJ, the Ciudad Obregon Yaquis is Mexicali´s next opponent. They are the two-time defending Champions, and won the Caribbean Series in 2011. They are a great team, even though they finished the season in 4th place overall, while Aguilas came at 2nd. The pitching ace of the Yaquis rotation is current Royals starter Luis Mendoza, the closer is Baltimore´s Luis Ayala, and have very consistent lineup with former major leaguers Alfredo Amezaga and Barbaro Canizares. Mexicali´s lineup includes former or current Major Leaguers, SS Yunieski Betancourt, OF Ruben Rivera, Closer Oscar Villareal, SP Jorge Campillo and… Read more »

Hub Kid

11 years ago

Reply to Luis Gomez

Huzzah for championship baseball in January!

Alex Putterman

11 years ago

Johnson, Mussina, Glavine

Phil

11 years ago

Johnson, Glavine, and, for the last time, Alomar.

Nash Bruce

11 years ago

Edgar Martinez, Randy Johnson, and Alomar(somewhat due to the fact that because he is about to walk the plank).
Man oh man did I want to give Gar’s vote to McGriff though. Nice long 7-8 ish year peak. Does anyone still remember the mad scramble to pick him up when the Padres were trying to dump him in ’93?
I feel as though McGriff is generally remembered as a steady compiler but there was definitely a ‘Wow’ factor associated with him, for quite awhile.
(Plus he played the field……)

Tom

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Edgar Martinez, Mike Mussina

Jeff Harris

11 years ago

Randy Johnson
Smoltz
Schilling

bstar

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Curt Schilling, and Tom Glavine

Baltimorechop

11 years ago

Larkin randy schilling

koma

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Craig Biggio, Mike Mussina

Raphy

11 years ago

Randy Johnson
Tom Glavine
Barry Larkin

Dr. Remulak

11 years ago

Craig Biggio, Curt Schilling, Randy Johnson

BryanM

11 years ago

Unit, bloody Sock, Booger– the last choice could as well have been Larkin Biggio or Mussina; The top two are clear, at least in my mind ; there have been some suggestions that Walker benefitted from the Coors effect, and that’s true – but his WAR supposedly adjusts for that – might be not enough of an adjustment, might be too much, but I’m convinced that his speed and defense are both underestimated – indeed , I see #5 #9 and #2 as positions that are hard to fill with good defense and good offense with 12 and 13 man… Read more »

11 years ago

1) Randy Johnson 2) Roberto Alomar – Still don’t understand his lack of support relative to other candidates. 3) Edgar Martinez – Perhaps an odd choice since I wasn’t happy about the Frank Thomas selection. But here’s the thing. I really don’t see much difference between Thomas and Martinez. Same position, same league, same time period. Thomas has a bit more WAR, but it took him 1,400 more PA’s to get that little bit extra WAR. So I’m confused about the lack of support for Edgar viz a viz the support Thomas received. If Thomas deserves election to the Circle… Read more »

Artie Z

11 years ago

Reply to Ed

Thomas had about 1400 more PAs than Edgar – 1401 to be exact. That’s about two full seasons. I’m ignoring defense for the moment – I don’t think anyone will argue that Edgar’s 600 games in the field (mostly at 3B) is much different from the almost 1000 that Thomas played at 1B as neither was a defensive wizard. Thomas hit 212 more HRs than Edgar, scored 275 more runs, and drove in 443 more runs in those two extra seasons. He walked 384 more times. Cut those numbers in half to represent a full season and that’s quite a… Read more »

11 years ago

Reply to Artie Z

Artie Z – The issue as I see it is that you and Lawrence only want to count the areas where Thomas was better than Edgar and ignore the rest. Thomas was definitely a better hitter than Edgar, no doubt. But the advantage wasn’t that great. Thomas has a career OPS+ of 156, Edgar’s is 147. But baserunning and fielding are also important. Both were poor baserunners but Edgar was slightly “less poor” than Thomas. As for fielding, Thomas was a horrible first baseman while the defensive stats show that Edgar was actually a decent 3rd baseman. WAR shows it… Read more »

Lawrence Azrin

11 years ago

Reply to Ed

Ed, I think that you are downplaying the difference in career OPS+; Martinez’s 147 places him 48th all-time, while Thomas’ 156 places him 22nd (including ties), much more rarefied territory. If you compare peak OPS+ for Artie Z’s #39 above, Martinez’ 1995-2001 of 164 would be about 500th for a single-season, while Thomas’ 1990-1997 of 182 is 160th-170th. I realize that this is comparing apples/oranges, but I am trying to make the point that Frank Thomas’ peak was considerably more “elite” than Edgar Martinez’. As you say, defense/baserunning narrows the margin ,but I think Frank Thomas still has a clear… Read more »

11 years ago

Reply to Lawrence Azrin

That could be Lawrence but what’s most important is overall contribution and things like WAR and Adam’s Hall of Stats shows very little difference between the two.

Artie Z

11 years ago

Reply to Lawrence Azrin

Some further explanation as to why I think Thomas was more dominating: To look at some other stats, look at the page for win probability added. Throughout Thomas’ peak years there is black ink all over the place — batting runs, batting wins, WPA, WPA/LI, RE24, REW. Edgar has some black ink, but it’s concentrated in 1995 (with a WPA win in 1996). From 1990-1997 I think one can make a very convincing argument that Frank Thomas was the dominant offensive player in the game. I don’t think one can make that argument about Edgar during his peak. I did… Read more »

11 years ago

Reply to Ed

Strategic vote change time. As great as Randy Johnson is, I prefer Maddux and don’t want Johnson to beat his %. So I’m dropping my Johnson vote in favor of Mussina.

Mike HBC

11 years ago

Reply to Ed

Greg Maddux is my favorite baseball player of all-time, and along with Shaq, one of my two favorite athletes ever.

With that said- and, obviously, you’re free to have a different opinion- I don’t give a crap what percentages people get in with, just who gets in. If Randy gets more support than Mad Dog, well, good for him. They’re both among the greatest pitchers ever, and they’ll both win induction in this little exercise. Nobody will remember who got what level of support- it’s completely irrelevant.

The Diamond King

11 years ago

Randy Johnson
John Smoltz
Mark McGwire

It’ll be interesting to see if I’m the only McGwire vote…

Lawrence Azrin

11 years ago

Compare their peaks – I don’t think Martinez can match Frank Thomas from 1991-1997, which contains most of his “HOF-type” seasons. It’s more than just comparing WAR; Thomas was clearly the best all-around AL hitter those years, with many people putting him in nearly the same category as Ted Williams.

Lawrence Azrin

11 years ago

Reply to Lawrence Azrin

My #29 was in reply to Ed’s #26.

11 years ago

Reply to Lawrence Azrin

True Lawrence but many people on this site use WAR as a guide for their choices and their “WAR Peaks” are basically the same. Each has 8 seasons of 5+ WAR. Thomas’ best WAR was 7.0, Martinez’ was 6.7. Thomas was in the top 10 for WAR for position players 6 times, Martinez 7 times. I just don’t see a difference between them.

BryanM

11 years ago

Reply to Lawrence Azrin

Frank was clearly a better hitter, a liability at first and an awful baserunner — Edgar was no Ozzie Smith, but he fielded a harder position competently for a few years , and was a little better runner – I make it a tie.

latefortheparty

11 years ago

Randy Johnson
Larry Walker
Curt Schilling

Johnson is head and shoulders above the rest of this class. Not that he needs it, but I’ll point out that Walker has the best WAR, WAR7, JAWS and Hall of Stats rating among the position players, LoDo be damned. Schilling is in a WAR/WAR7/JAWS dogfight with Mussina and Glavine in which any one of them could be declared best. I’ll be interested to see how David Cone does since Bret Saberhagen, who has similar WAR and Hall of Stats score, was one and done.

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Edgar Martinez, Larry Walker

DanFlan

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Edgar Martinez, Smoltz

Matt Taylor

11 years ago

Randy Johnson. Biggio. Mussina.

brp

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Craig Biggio, Edgar Martinez.

Artie Z

11 years ago

Picks:

Randy Johnson, Barry Larkin, and … I’ll stick with Roberto Alomar.

Thinking this will be about as anticlimactic as the Maddux vote.

Doug

11 years ago

Johnson, Martinez, McGriff

Brent

11 years ago

R. Johnson, Alomar and Larkin

T-Bone

11 years ago

R. Johnson, Smoltz, Glavine

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

For those who wish to look back at the overall voting record for the various candidates over the previous rounds of Circle of Great balloting, there’s now a Circle of Greats Vote Summary available here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AklDUJiangSrdF8tMHg2Yi0ycVBVOWx6OGJCeXU1TVE#gid=0. Sheet1 in this document shows raw vote totals for each round. Sheet2 shows the same votes in terms of the percentage of the ballots on which each player appeared during the round. I’ll update this page after each round.

Bells

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

Hmm, is there some restriction on this sheet that is not on the yearly ones? I have had no trouble accessing those, but this link directs me to a page to request access to the file.

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Bells

Sorry — should be working now.

Bells

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

Yes it is, thanks! Good to have an overview.

Editor

Bryan O'Connor

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

Piazza, Maddux, and Bonds stand out here as First Ballot Greats. I’ve never been a fan of the “first ballot Hall of Famer” distinction, since several players can get be elected in any given year and there are no rules guiding voters to treat first-ballot guys any differently. In the CoG, on the other hand, we had a choice between Piazza, Bagwell, and Thomas, and while all three ultimately got in, Piazza deserves some kind of distinction. It seems likely that we’ll have more First Ballot Greats than guys like Bagwell and Thomas, but with a handful of top-112 guys… Read more »

GrandyMan

11 years ago

1) Johnson: No explanation necessary. 2) Schilling: In past rounds, I have snubbed Schilling in favor of Mussina. The two are pretty close in WAR, so my decision was based mostly upon the personal prejudices that come with coming of age as a Yankees fan, in addition to my suspicions about Schilling’s late-career peak. However, further research has revealed three things that have compelled me to include him here: a) It is actually quite unlikely that Schilling juiced. His outspokenness on the issue leaves him with little to gain and, theoretically, everything to lose. b) I previously ignored his playoff… Read more »

11 years ago

Johnson, Biggio, McGriff

Gary Bateman

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Roberto Alomar, Mike Mussina

Lawrence Azrin

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Craig Biggio, Roberto Alomar

I’m going down with the ship on Alomar.

11 years ago

Reply to Lawrence Azrin

Lawrence – We may disagree re: the relative merits of Thomas vs. Martinez, but I’m with you on Alomar. And it looks like Artie Z. is on the sinking ship as well.

Lawrence Azrin

11 years ago

Reply to Ed

Ed,

I do agree with you that Martinez was not a truly wretched fielder; rather, that he was moved to DH exclusively after 1994 because he kept getting seriously hurt playing the field. If he could’ve played third base most of his career at 3rd and not keep getting hurt, his rep might’ve similar to Chipper Jones, a decent fielder and truly great hitter (Jones’ OBA/SLG are close to Martinez).

OTOH, Frank Thomas truly WAS a wretched fielder; his real position, like Harry Heilman, Babe Herman, Greg Luzinski, and Ralph Kiner before him, was “hitter”.

Nadig

11 years ago

Larry Walker, Curt Schilling, Randy Johnson

Hub Kid

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Curt Schilling, David Cone

An all pitching ballot, I couldn’t resist the first two as a combo, since they are in the “greatest 1-2 pitchers ever” discussion from those few seasons in Arizona. David Cone reminds me that I forgot to pull for Bret Saberhagen in the last round. Like Sabe, another very good pitcher with more than a few hints of greatness, I think.

John Z

11 years ago

Sort of a pedestrian ballot for 63′. But still no love for the Crime Dog? I’m not saying he deserves tons of votes here, but he deserves to stick around for a few more rounds. Even the 1 trick pony McGwire has 2 votes as of the time i write this. (and) what is it with all this love for Schilling?? I just don’t get it, a post season stud sure but (3) twenty win seasons and another (7) good seasons does not make a “circle of great” IMO. Anyway enough chatter, and the wife is telling me it is… Read more »

11 years ago

Reply to John Z

Some arguments that have been made for Schilling (in comparison to other pitchers on the ballot):

– Greater peak: http://www.highheatstats.com/2013/01/circle-of-greats-1964-ballot/#comment-47453
– Greater rWAR/162 games: http://www.highheatstats.com/2013/01/circle-of-greats-1964-ballot/#comment-47597

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

…continued…

– Compares favourably by ranking systems such as Hall of Stats and JAWS: http://www.highheatstats.com/2013/01/circle-of-greats-1965-ballot/#comment-46782
-Greater peak and total number of great sesons by fWAR: http://www.highheatstats.com/2013/01/circle-of-greats-1965-ballot/#comment-46797

bstar

11 years ago

Reply to John Z

John Z, such are the perils of judging a man by the number of 20-win seasons he had.

But is 3 20-win seasons for Schilling really a bad/unworthy number? We have to consider the context of the era Schilling pitched in. Especially in the second half of his career, 20-win seasons were becoming more of a rarity due to teams giving the #5 man in the rotation more starts than in the nineties.

Looking at the era spanning Schilling’s career (1988-2007), only Tom Glavine with 5 and Roger Clemens with 4 have more 20-win seasons than Curt.

11 years ago

Reply to bstar

Not to mention his years spent playing on a Phillies team that finished above .500 once between 1992 and 2000, a problem Glavine, Smoltz and co never had to encouter.

John Z

11 years ago

Reply to bstar

Bstar and RJ you both make valid efforts to persuade my judgement of Schilling and I like Schilling I really do the only thing I am saying about Schilling is this, There is much love for this man and he was arguably the 6 or 7 best pitcher during his era behind household names like Randy Johnson, Roger Clemens, Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, John Smotlz, and Mike Mussina, that would make Schilling #7 during his era but it could be argued that he is on par or just under par with the likes of David Wells, Kevin Brown and Pedro… Read more »

bstar

11 years ago

Reply to John Z

I would personally rank Schilling higher on a list of pitchers in his era. Looking at it from a numerical perspective, here’s the ranking for rWAR, JAWS, and Hall of Stats for the seven pitchers you mentioned plus Kevin Brown and Pedro Martinez (Pedro doesn’t make your top 7 for this past era?). So we’ve got nine pitchers: Player name rWAR rank/JAWS rank/HOS rank = avg rank -R Clemens 1 / 1 / 1 = 1.0 -G Maddux 2 / 2 / 2 = 2.0 -R Johnson 3 / 3 / 3 = 3.0 -PMartinez 4 / 4 / 4… Read more »

11 years ago

Reply to John Z

I can understand to an extent the argument that if a player is completely overshadowed by is contemporaries then he is less deserving of induction here. But fundamentally I think the arguments that I linked to are attempting to show that Schilling was in fact better than Glavine and Smoltz and definitely ahead of Brown, Cone and Wells.

Further, the era Schilling played in featured an unusual amount of pitching talent; Clemens, Maddux and Johnson are among the top nine players in career pitching WAR. Schilling wasn’t as good as those guys, but then again, not many players are.

John Z

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

I like your argument, it broadens my perspective when judging Schilling’s career. At this point I still have to respectively agree to disagree at this point, after your argument I went to BBREF to sort of try and find someone who had such a weird career curve, Schilling was either one of the best of the best or the worst of the worst, one year he would have 20 wins in 36 games and then the next season he goes down to 8 wins in 24 games and then gets traded and finds another 20 win season and a bloody… Read more »

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

A lot of Schilling’s “down” seasons are explicable by injury and as bstar pointed out above, win totals don’t do justice to Schilling, partly because of frequent injuries and partly for spending many years on an awful Phillies teams that simply didn’t do much winning. With respect to his seemingly topsy-turvy career, let’s take a look at that 2003 season, where due to injury he only started 24 games and won 8, having won 23 games the year before. He actually improved his ERA from the previous season to 2.95 and posted a career ERA+ best of 159. His SO/BB… Read more »

Mike L

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

Stepping into Schilling argument, I would say his career stands on its own, and he’s probably going to make the “real” Hall of Fame. That being said, i”m leery of arguments that try to enhance his chances by excusing the blemishes, since I see that as a slippery slope easily applied to any player. His erratic performance, whether caused by injury or not, is just as much a part of his record as the highlights, and those down years were more than one. We just got through a discussion of Edgar Martinez, who gets demerits for not playing the field-because… Read more »

bstar

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

Cherry-picking a little here, but Curt Schilling has a 9 consecutive-year streak with a WAR of 4.7 or more and a 9 consecutive year streak with an ERA+ over 120.

How is that an up and down career?

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

Mike L, I’m not trying to give him credit for starts missed due to injury, more trying to point out that just because he only made twenty-something starts in a year and only got single-digit wins, it doesnt mean he performed badly. In 1996, 1999 and 2003 he only made 26, 24 and 24 starts respectively, but still accumulated 4.7, 4.7 and 5.8 WAR. I’m not assigning him any extra credit here, just saying that these partial seasons aren’t nearly as bad as they look at first glance going by starts or win totals or somesuch. To your point about… Read more »

John Z

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

Ok, so i strategically waited until the last hours of the 63′ ballot, Schilling will garner 31 votes or just under 1/3 of the votes. Schilling had a nice career and an amazing post season career, but 31 votes out of 70 just does not cut it for me as a member or future member of the Circle of Greats. As someone mentioned earlier, due to the weak ballot in 61′ Schilling could slip into the Circle of Greats, but does he really belong there with the likes of Maddux, Johnson, Clemens, Carlton, Seaver, et al? The 51′ ballot will… Read more »

Hartvig

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

Even at this level we’re still going to have some stratification of talent. I’m guessing almost anyone on this site could pretty quickly rattle of candidates for the dozen best pitchers in history. But if we’re going to follow the Hall of Fame ratio of position players to pitchers it’s going to be roughly 80/30. And by the time you get to number 30 you’re really going to have to think hard about who’s better than who. Yes, everyone probably agrees that Cy Young, Walter Johnson, Christy Mathewson and Pete Alexander belong but what about Three-finger Brown? How does he… Read more »

Nick Pain

11 years ago

The Big Unit, The Big (s)Chill, The Big gio.

ATarwerdi96

11 years ago

Randy Johnson, Curt Schilling, John Smoltz

Editor

Dalton Mack

11 years ago

Randy Johnson
Curt Schilling
Kenny Lofton

Bells

11 years ago

Reply to Dalton Mack

I was wondering if/when Lofton would get some love. I think he might run out of luck on this ballot, although I suppose with all the ballot extensions people may opt to vote for him instead… but I think his time on the ballot may be at an end, for now.