Circle of Greats 1951 Balloting

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This post is for voting and discussion in the twenty-first round of balloting for the Circle of Greats. This round adds those players born in 1951. Rules and lists are after the jump.

The new group joins the holdovers from previous rounds to comprise the full group eligible to receive your votes this round. The new group of 1951-born players must, as always, have played at least 10 seasons in the major leagues or generated at least 20 Wins Above Replacement (“WAR”, as calculated by baseball-reference.com, and for this purpose meaning 20 total WAR for everyday players and 20 pitching WAR for pitchers).

Each submitted ballot, if it is to be counted, 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 that are cast win four added future rounds of ballot eligibility. Players who appear on 25% or more of the ballots cast, but less than 50%, earn two added future rounds of ballot eligibility. Any other player in the top 9 (including ties) in ballot appearances, or who appears on at least 10% of the ballots, wins one additional round of ballot eligibility.

All voting for this round closes at 11:00 PM EDT on Sunday, June 16, while changes to previously cast ballots are allowed until 11:00 PM EDT Friday, June 14.

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: 1951 COG Vote Tally . I’ll be updating the spreadsheet periodically with the latest votes. Initially, there is a row in the spreadsheet for every voter who has cast a ballot in any of the past rounds, but new voters are entirely welcome — new voters will be added to the spreadsheet as their ballots are submitted. Also initially, there is a column for each of the holdover players; additional player columns from the new born-in-1951 group will be added to the spreadsheet as votes are cast for them.

Choose your three players from the lists below of eligible players. The nine current holdovers are listed in order of the number of future rounds (including this one) through which they are assured eligibility, and alphabetically when the future eligibility number is the same. The new group of 1951 birth-year guys are listed below in order of the number of seasons each played in the majors, and alphabetically among players with the same number of seasons played.

Holdovers:
Tony Gwynn (eligibility guaranteed for 13 rounds)
John Smoltz (eligibility guaranteed for 6 rounds)
Lou Whitaker (eligibility guaranteed for 6 rounds)
Alan Trammell (eligibility guaranteed for 5 rounds)
Tim Raines (eligibility guaranteed for 4 rounds)
Craig Biggio (eligibility guaranteed for 3 rounds)
Roberto Alomar (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)
Eddie Murray (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)
Ryne Sandberg (eligibility guaranteed for this round only)

Everyday Players (born in 1951, ten or more seasons played in the major leagues or at least 20 WAR):
Dave Winfield
Dwight Evans
Dave Parker
Buddy Bell
Alan Ashby
Cesar Cedeno
Jeff Burroughs
Jim Sundberg
Dan Driessen
Bill Madlock
Derrel Thomas
Jim Wohlford
Joel Youngblood
Al Cowens
Alan Bannister
Rick Burleson
Bucky Dent
Jim Essian
Bob Bailor
Doug Flynn
Larry Milbourne
Joe Nolan
Ken Reitz
Leon Roberts
Tony Scott
Rennie Stennett
Benny Ayala
Dave Roberts
John Stearns
Mike Vail

Pitchers (born in 1951, ten or more seasons played in the major leagues or at least 20 WAR):
Bert Blyleven
Rich Gossage
Mike Flanagan
Greg Minton
Andy Hassler
Dick Ruthven
Vern Ruhle
Dennis Leonard
Dan Spillner
Glenn Abbott
John D’Acquisto
Frank LaCorte
Sid Monge
Don Stanhouse
Eddie Solomon

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Insert Name Here

11 years ago

Using my method of peak WAR/162, there is a healthy lot of newcomers worthy of HOF status this round, but I end up with the same vote as last round (unless I make any strategic changes later). Initial vote, same as last round: 1. Alan Trammell (6.4 WAR/162 during 1980-90) 2. Ryne Sandberg (6.2 WAR/162 during 1984-92) 3. Craig Biggio (5.8 WAR/162 during 1991-99) Once again, I’m pulling for Trammell all the way, but there are many newcomers sprinkled among my ranking of HOF-worthy candidates, all of which (along with “bubble boys” Alomar, Murray, and Sandberg) I’d like to see… Read more »

Rocco

11 years ago

Reply to Insert Name Here

Link to the other Dave Roberts, born 1951: http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/r/roberda06.shtml

Rocco

11 years ago

Dwight Evans, Buddy Bell, Bert Blyleven

--bill

11 years ago

Blyleven, Gossage, Smoltz

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to --bill

The Pitcher’s Ballot.

Mike

11 years ago

Gwynn
Winfield
Sandberg

Chris C

11 years ago

Biggio, Raines, Dwight Evans. Apologies to Blyleven.

latefortheparty

11 years ago

I guess we’ve reloaded. That said, I’m only offering one newby:

Bert Blyleven
Lou Whitaker
Alan Trammell

A special shout out to Cesar Cedeno.

brp

11 years ago

Reply to latefortheparty

I’m just going to copy this vote –

Blyleven
Whitaker
Trammell

Sorry Ryno…

Phil

11 years ago

Gwynn, Winfield, Alomar.

Dr. Remulak

11 years ago

Winfield, Gwynn, Biggio.

Andy

11 years ago

Gwynn
Winfield
Sandberg

Nadig

11 years ago

Blyleven, Gwynn, Raines.

T-Bone

11 years ago

Sandberg
Blyleven
Evans

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

The guys born in 1952 appeared just three times on the 115 ballots cast during the two 1952 rounds. In contrast, the 1951 birth year guys have already appeared 14 times on the first 11 ballots cast.

Hartvig

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

This is a really difficult ballot- I don’t view any of the newcomers except for Blyleven as being any better than any of our holdovers but I can also see the case for Bell, Evans & Winfield. I think it comes down to do you give a chance to someone who might just be a tiny, tiny bit less qualified (at least in my eyes) than the every-so-slightly more qualified one who’s already had a dozen or more bites at the apple to no avail? When you get down to those final 10% or so of spots in the circle… Read more »

Artie Z.

11 years ago

Blyleven, Raines, Murray

ATarwerdi96

11 years ago

Tony Gwynn, Bert Blyleven, Eddie Murray

bstar

11 years ago

Shout-out to Larry Milbourne. Well, not him specifically, but his legendary 1975 Topps card.

Andy covered it here: http://www.baseball-reference.com/blog/archives/7455

What is he holding? Eddie Gaedel’s fungo bat? A bat version of U.L. Washington’s toothpick? His son’s little-league weapon of choice?

And are those sideburns or mutton chops? Is the facial hair alone what made this man look like the baddest man on the planet?

So many unanswered questions…

Jeff Hill

11 years ago

Gwynn, Raines, Smoltz

Still can’t believe Tony frekin’ Gwynn hasn’t make the cut.

michael Sullivan

11 years ago

Reply to Jeff Hill

Why not? Is he really clearly better than anybody who’s made it so far? COG is a hard cut. Players who are absolutely solid for the HOF can be borderliners here. Everybody on the holdover list is basically a borderliner. Gwynn is still about 4th or 5th on my ranking of the holdovers. He probably deserves it, but when all is said and done, there are gonna be a dozen guys who you can say probably deserve it, who get left out, and that’s assuming we don’t make any egregious selections. Because the difference between #100 and #124 is not… Read more »

Jeff Hill

11 years ago

Reply to michael Sullivan

Am I crazy here or are Boggs and Gwynn errily similar statistically. Gwynn is a better defensive player than DWAR gives him credit for because he’s an outfielder where Boggs gets extra for being at 3rd. Both players played in 2440 games. Both players were 100 AB’s from eachother(9288/9180). Gwynn > Boggs in SLG, Avg, hits, HR, RBI, triples and SB. Boggs > Gwynn in doubles, runs, BB, OB%, and has more K’s Boggs has 8 Gold GLoves, Gwynn has 5 Gwynn is a 15 time all star, Boggs 12 Boggs has 8 Silver Slugger awards, Gwynn has 7 Both… Read more »

Editor

Bryan O'Connor

11 years ago

Reply to Jeff Hill

Gwynn’s got a decent case for the CoG, and I suspect he’ll be there very soon. That said, he wasn’t Wade Boggs. Boggs had a .27-point OBP advantage on Gwynn. That’s 490 more times on base while using 18 more outs. That more than offsets Gwynn’s 6 additional extra base hits and his speed advantage (b-r gives Boggs 35 more batting runs and Gwynn 31 more baserunning runs). But it’s the defense that really makes a difference. Gwynn was a very good fielder early in his career and a very bad one later (netting to 6 fielding runs), all at… Read more »

Jeff

11 years ago

Reply to Bryan O'Connor

Anyway Gwynn improves playing in Boston vs. San Diego and Boggs statistics reverse in that same regard? Just wondering…opinions on that please.

Also, is it me or are players such as Dwight Evans, Buddy Bell and Dave Parker costing Mr. Gwynn enshrinement here? That’s 15 votes putting Gwynn one ahead of the current leader Blyleven. And for some reason Blyleven and Gwynn were only voted on the same ballot 6 times out of 57. Interesting…

mosc

11 years ago

Reply to Bryan O'Connor

If you really like WAR, you love Blyleven and hate Gwynn on this ballot. Hence they tend to be in opposite camps. There seems to be some very WAR focused people on here…

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Bryan O'Connor

Certainly there is a correlation between some voter tendencies here and WAR numbers. But correlation does not necessarily indicate causation. WAR is the product of a certain set of concepts that are also shared by some commenters here. The broad notion, for example, that Blyleven was an all-time great became a common observation among many sabermetrics followers before WAR was invented. The conclusion that Gwynn was a level or two less valuable than Boggs, because while they were hitters of comparable value Boggs played the more demanding fielding position and was also a better defensive player at his position than… Read more »

bstar

11 years ago

Reply to Bryan O'Connor

I am constantly amazed at your ability to phrase things so beautifully, birtelcom. Great response.

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Bert Blyleven
Alan Trammell
Ryne Sandberg

…and here come the big names. Good luck to the guys on the backlog. It’s gonna be a heckuva ride from here on out.

11 years ago

Reply to Dr. Doom

’50 looks pretty clear for someone on the backlog. So does ’48. Might as well add Schmidt’s name to the red list now. He’s in.

Joel

11 years ago

Blyleven
Murray
Sandberg

opal611

11 years ago

For the 1951 election, I’m voting for:
-Bert Blyleven
-Tony Gwynn
-Ryne Sandberg

Other top candidates I considered highly (and/or will consider in future rounds):
-Biggio (Hopefully only temporarily off ballot)
-Alomar (Hopefully only temporarily off ballot)
-Smoltz
-Trammell
-Raines
-Whitaker
-Murray
-Evans
-Bell
-Winfield

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to opal611

I don’t understand your parentheticals. Both Biggio and Alomar are on the ballot, not off it. And while Alomar could lose his eligibility this round, Biggio’s on the next three ballots no matter what.

opal611

11 years ago

Reply to Dr. Doom

Biggio and Alomar are people I have voted for in past rounds, but they are off MY ballot. (In other words, I’m not voting for them this time, but I’m hoping I can vote for them again in future rounds.)

The other people on my list are the folks that I’m still considering each time (as long as they are still eligible), but I have not yet voted for.

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to opal611

Ah… I see. Okay. That makes WAY more sense. Thanks for clearing up my confusion.

11 years ago

Bert Blyleven, Lou Whitaker, Alan Trammell

Bill Johnson

11 years ago

Trammel

Whitaker

Sandberg

David Horwich

11 years ago

Alomar, Blyleven, Raines

Luis Gomez

11 years ago

Gwynn, Alomar, Whitaker (again).

Darien

11 years ago

Blyleven, Trammell, and Raines

bstar

11 years ago

Bert “I’ll be home” Blyleven, Goss Goosage, Craig Biggio

11 years ago

Blyleven, Gwynn, and Dew-ey Dew-ey Dew-ey

Happily surprised to see Evans with 3 votes already, though he is, at best, a borderline COG, but as good as Winfield IMO

How does Evans have a -4.6 dWAR for his career?

mosc

11 years ago

Reply to PP

because DWAR is stupid? The “answer” is the positional adjustment and his standing as a fairly average fielder (as is typical for good fielders who play into their later years)

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to PP

Hard for a pure right fielder to have a positive dWAR, but remember that dWAR is not added to oWAR to get WAR. Dwight Evans’s role on defense plays a positive effect on his total WAR, because he was an excellent defensive right fielder. But he gets some general deduction for being a right fielder because the offensive replacement value of a right fielder is not the same as the offensive replacement value of a middle infielder, catcher or center fielder. Mosc is correct that Evans also is estimated by WAR to have been a below-average defensive right-fielder in his… Read more »

RonG

11 years ago

Blyleven, Trammell, Biggio

KalineCountry

11 years ago

Trammell, Whitaker, Blyleven.

J.R. Lebert

11 years ago

Gwynn, Raines, Biggio

michael Sullivan

11 years ago

Blyleven, Trammell, Whitaker

The Diamond King

11 years ago

Murray, Gwynn, Sandberg

11 years ago

Whitaker, Trammel, Raines

Nick Pain

11 years ago

Blyleven, Whitaker, Dewey.

Brendan Bingham

11 years ago

Blyleven, Winfield, Murray

Hartvig

11 years ago

Roberto Alomar is presenting me with a real problem. He’s been on the ballot longer than anyone else. He’s received vote totals in the mid-20’s six years apart and totals in the high teens multiple other seasons. He also had one year where he got just one vote. If you use just WAR and WAR-based systems to evaluate him he is right on the bubble along with at least a couple of dozen other players for the last handful of spots or so. You can make a case for his maybe being a tiny bit more worthy than say Willie… Read more »

Mike L

11 years ago

Reply to Hartvig

Hartvig, I have very similar feelings. The Robbie Alomar I remember was good at everything, including the glove. Perhaps people’s memories are colored by the remarkably sharp drop off from the three years with Cleveland 99/01 to the three last years of his career, where he had negative WAR and seemed listless and often uninterested. O voted for him once, and I do think he’s a worthy Hall of Famer. I think that comparison with Randolph is interesting, because I saw Randolph for almost every day, and never thought he was close to Alomar in overall career value.

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Hartvig

At least as big a fielding-related mystery to me in this round is Dave Winfield. He was considered a very strong fielder in his time and won 7 Gold Gloves, but b-ref’s Rfield treats him as a substantially below-average outfielder almost his entire career. If his Rfield metric were zero (a merely average outfielder on defense), his overall WAR would be COG-worthy or close to it, but with his very negative Rfield, he drops below the WAR level that most COG inductees have been meeting.

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

My perception of Winfield from watching old highlights and old games is that his arm was outstanding and that his range was meh. Perhaps when he was there, he made great plays… but he just didn’t “get there” often enough?

Editor

John Autin

11 years ago

Reply to Hartvig

I saw Alomar play a lot with the Mets … guess I have to recuse myself. 🙂

Phil

11 years ago

Reply to Hartvig

I’ve voted for Alomar every round since he came on the ballot. I’m baffled by the general lack of enthusiasm for him–enough to keep him on the ballot, not a whole lot more. I’m in Toronto, so I saw him when he was young and seemed to do everything effortlessly. His time here ended on a sour note–he basically sulked his way out of town–but for three or four years, he was probably my favourite baseball player ever. As far as his fielding goes, I’m reduced to one of those archaic pre-sabermetric guys who say things like “You had to… Read more »

Editor

John Autin

11 years ago

Reply to Hartvig

Hartvig, a more serious reply about Alomar: I don’t have a real sense of his defensive prowess, except that he always looked good to me. But I don’t put much faith in eyewitness observations, even watching a player closely over years. I don’t think that most of us, myself included, are skilled enough to make better judgments that way than are made by statistical analysis. Our brains are wired to notice things that do happen — balls handled cleanly, and highlight plays — but not so much things that don’t happen, like balls not gotten to. There are many players… Read more »

Hartvig

11 years ago

Reply to John Autin

I’m starting to get the feeling that maybe- at least in Alomar’s case- defensive metrics might have gotten it right. I know the spitting incident colored some writers opinions about him but when people who saw him play fairly regularly start mentioning that they saw at least periods where he didn’t seem to give his all then I’m a little more comfortable with the picture that Rtot paints as an inconsistent defender. But now birtelcom has got me wondering about Winfield so maybe I’m just back where I started. Thanks for all the input guys. If anyone from the East… Read more »

Hartvig

11 years ago

Reply to Hartvig

Oh wait, we’ve already done Knoblauch. And there weren’t enough televised games for me to comment on Carew.

Nevermind.

Voomo Zanzibar

11 years ago

Reply to Hartvig

I’ve been wanting to write and make the case again for Alomar, but I, too am not sure what is reality vs my perception. For instance, I have a concept of him being one of those guys who instantly makes teams better when he arrives – Toronto, Baltimore, Cleveland. Is that the case, or is it a matter of being in the right place at the right time. Not sure, and I’m not sure that I’m voting for him again. Winfield, on the other hand – I had a RF Bleacher view of Dave at least 30 times a year… Read more »

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Voomo Zanzibar

b-ref doesn’t have him as a minus defender in 1985-86, and he never played right field for the Yankees after 1988.

koma

11 years ago

Tony Gwynn, John Smoltz, Bert Blyleven

Jeff Harris

11 years ago

Blyleven, Whitaker, Trammell

Hub Kid

11 years ago

Dave Parker, Dwight Evans, Tony Gwynn I can’t see having voted for Jim Rice and then not voting for Dave Parker. The great responses I got to my Jim Rice vote were pretty convincing about the equivalence of their late 70s baseball careers. And now to vote for an actual under-appreciated 1970s Red Sox great. Oh, and Tony Gwynn, too. I have real hopes that the CoG will ‘put right what once went wrong’ with HoF voting… (apologies for a cliche from a certain time travel soap opera) but then again, maybe it is really showing how difficult this kind… Read more »

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Hub Kid

Nice to think that the COG could be a “quantum leap” in this sort of thing.

mosc

11 years ago

DWAR would have me believe a guy with 7 gold gloves was a constant disappointment (-23.7 dwar) in the field, particularly in comparison with his many time over gold-teammate (79,82,83,84,85) Dwight Evans. I watched both play and I did not see anywhere near that big a difference even accumulated over the years. Winfield was noticeably faster than Evans when they were younger, he covered more ground. Right field arms tend to get overrated in my opinion but I suppose Evans had the better arm. I don’t think there’s a close second to Winfield on this ballot. Offensively he was a… Read more »

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to mosc

Using a very basic counting stat, Evans had 2.23 chances (putouts or assists) per nine innings over his career in right field, Winfield had 2.13. So on average Evans was making one extra play every ten games or so. That adds up over a long career. Now of course that doesn’t account for possibly different numbers of opportunities, which WAR and other advanced fielding metrics tries to adjust for. But if you ignore WAR and assume that the opportunities for each guy more or less evened out over their long careers, then based on the crude but inarguable fact of… Read more »

mosc

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

Fenway and Yankee stadium are polar opposites in terms of right field real estate. Winfield played more away from NY than in it but that might speak a great deal to the difference in chances you’re talking about.

Hartvig

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

I’ve been wondering a bit too about the make up and tendencies of the pitching staffs that Winfield played behind, particularly in New York where they tend to keep a lot of lefties around. I don’t know if Total Zone accounts for this in any way and I don’t have time right now to check out the make up of the Yankees staffs (or any other of the teams that Winfield played for) and what positions he was playing in those seasons but I might try to do that sometime in the future unless someone knows that that’s already accounted… Read more »

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Hartvig

Based on what Sean Smith, who developed Total Zone, has written, here is my basic understanding of how Total Zone is calculated for all era when hit location data is not available. If I don’t get it right, blame me, not Sean. Let’s say we are looking at Buddy Bell on defense. We know how many plays he turned into outs, but what we don’t know is how many balls were hit his way that he did not turn into outs. To get a good estimate of that number, TZ looks at every hit that occurred while Buddy was at… Read more »

Hartvig

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

Holy carp does that seem like a lot of work. Really have to respect people who are committed enough to go thru every box score of every game to figure that out. I know that there are still probably some issues with some defensive measurements but that certainly gives me a good reason to have at least a certain amount of confidence in them.

Thanks.

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

birtelcom, that’s basically my understanding of how it works, too, for what that’s worth. It seems a pretty good system for the times we don’t really know what’s happening.

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

Hartvig, I do trust that the work is all by computer, although I’m sure the programming required was complex.

There is some comfort to be taken in the fact that not only does the system seem logical as a way to develop a good (though of course not perfect) estimate of defensive opportunities, it also, as I understand it, correlates pretty well with results obtained using more recent, observational tracking of actually hit locations when the two systems can be compared head-to-head. No fielding metric is perfect, but TZ is pretty well conceived, I think.

Gary Bateman

11 years ago

Gwynn, Alomar, Smoltz

Brent

11 years ago

Once again I get to vote for a dead Royal, this time Al Cowens, he of the crazy big glasses as well as a cannon in RF and an unexplainable sticks-out-like-a-sore-thumb-in-his-stat-line 1977 crazy great season;

I will refrain from double dipping on my Royals and picking Dennis Leonard (or Jim Sundberg for that matter, who ushered a young Bret Saberhagen, Danny Jackson and Mark Gubicza to that WS victory in 1985), and will go conventional with Whitaker, Trammell and Cowens.

Professor Larry

11 years ago

Winfield, Evans, Raines

Lineman

11 years ago

Sandberg, Murray, Alomar

Editor

Bryan O'Connor

11 years ago

Wins Above Average, excluding negative seasons:

Blyleven 56.8
Trammell 44.7
Whitaker 42.7
Smoltz 40.1
Sandberg 38.8
Alomar 36.8
Raines 36.8
Gwynn 36.5
Biggio 36.3
Bell 35.5
Murray 34.9
Evans 34.7
Winfield 31.7
Cedeno 29.9
Gossage 20.6

Lots of underratedness in this class of ’51. The ninth-most-valuable pitcher ever (per Hall Rating) barely makes the Hall, the eighth-most-valuable third baseman can’t get 2% of the vote, and the 14th-most-valuable rightfielder is done after three rounds. Cedeno’s in the Hall of Stats too. Alas, I’m sticking with two holdovers:

Blyleven. Trammell. Smoltz.

11 years ago

Tony Gwynn, Lou Whitaker, Craig Biggio

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

birtelcom,

How do we handle a tie for the “top nine?” Right now (according to the spreadsheet – not sure when you last updated), there are three players tied for 8th. Would all 10 players automatically make it through to the next round (if this tie remained)? Thanks.

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Dr. Doom

The rule has always been that the top nine, including ties, make it through, so yes if three players are tied for 8th at the end, they all survive.

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

Thanks. I thought that was right; I just wanted to make sure.

Mike L

11 years ago

Winfield, Blyleven, and Sandberg. But I find myself moving back and forth between poles. I know this is a misuse of stats, but Winfield has an OPS+ of 130, and Blyleven an ERA+ of 117. But then WAR tells me Winfield was inferior glove and has to be penalized, (although until he got older, bigger, and slower I always thought he was a good outfielder), and WAR tells me Blyleven was great, even though I always thought he was a B+/A- pitcher.

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to Mike L

True, Winfield had a 130 OPS+, and Blyleven a 117 ERA+. If we look at rankings, we see that Winfield is tied for 164th all-time with 8 other guys, making him one of the top 171 ever offensively. We also see that Blyleven is tied for 159th with 20 guys, making him one of the top 178 ever. I’d say that’s basically even. And then we can look at actual run impact. Winfield was 30% better than average for 12358 PAs. Blyleven was 15% better than average (we should really show him with an 85 ERA-, rather than a 117… Read more »

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to Dr. Doom

Whoops. It has Winfield as 50 runs better than Blyleven, not 70. I got the rest of the math right, but the simple subtraction… that’s where they get ya. There is a 70-run swing depending on whether to use Blyleven’s ERA- or FIP-. So at least that “70” was relevant somehow.

bstar

11 years ago

Reply to Dr. Doom

Doom, Bert Blyleven has over 95 WAR, Winfield less than 65. Bert has over 50% more WAR than Winfield. There is over a 300-run gap in value between the two.

I just don’t see how their value can be considered comparable in any way.

Mike L

11 years ago

Reply to bstar

Bstar, don’t blame Doom. I’m the one having difficulty reconciling what I saw, their individual counting stats, their OPS+ and ERA+, and WAR. I just never considered the two of them to have that much of a difference in their overall production and contributions. WAR says different, but a lot of the difference comes from Winfield fielding stats, and many of us who saw him thought he was a pretty fair glove until later in his career. I picked them both on my ballot, but I’m still enough of a luddite to mistrust WAR in connection with these two players.

bstar

11 years ago

Reply to Mike L

I was just bringing up the point about the huge disparity in value between the two, and it seemed Doom’s study was attempting to prove the two were equal in value, or that Winfield was better. I agree with the general assessment here, that Winfield seemed a great right fielder at the time. Of course, my perspective comes from when he was a Padre in the NL, so he still had his speed in those days. Winfield is definitely one of the more imposing guys I’ve ever seen in a batter’s box. In his prime with the Padres, it just… Read more »

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to Mike L

bstar, I think you’re completely and totally mischaracterizing my position and my “study.” My initial attempt was actually made under the assumption that it would show Blyleven to be superior to Winfield. It turned out that something I whipped up really quickly didn’t show that. I even wrote: “I have a lot more confidence in the WAR numbers at B-Ref and Fangraphs than I do in something I just thought of 20 minutes ago.” I voted for Blyleven; I did not vote for Winfield. I will not vote for Winfield. He is not one of the top half-dozen players on… Read more »

bstar

11 years ago

Reply to Mike L

I apologize to you if any offense was taken. That was honestly not my intent in the least, so I’m sorry for that.

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to Mike L

bstar, apology accepted. And I am truly sorry for overreacting. It was unnecessary and childish.

Mike L

11 years ago

Reply to Mike L

I’ve been letting this Bert/Dave thing rattle around in my head, particularly the seeming disparity of the OPS+/ERA+ comparison, and I could use a clarification from bstar, doom, and those smarter than I am. Doom said “if we look at rankings, we see that Winfield is tied for 164th all-time with 8 other guys, making him one of the top 171 ever offensively. We also see that Blyleven is tied for 159th with 20 guys, making him one of the top 178 ever,” I see that, but the comparison between a pitcher’s ranking and a batter’s ranking may be inapt.… Read more »

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to Mike L

Yes, Mike L. Winfield does rank “higher” proportionally speaking, than Blyleven. The question to which that always leads, though, is this: to what extent did the (mostly bad) teams for which Blyleven pitched artificially inflate his ERA, and thus deflate his ERA+? ERA, and thus ERA+, is a team-dependent stat; OPS, and thus OPS+, is dependent only upon the individual. So that’s something you have to figure, as well. Since Blyleven pitched for those awful early-80s Indians, I’ve got to think that he was probably more like 20% better than league average than 15, (and by this I mean a… Read more »

bstar

11 years ago

Reply to Mike L

The only other thing I would say, Mike L, is that both of these guys had really long careers, which tends to force your career rate stats like OPS+ or ERA+ down.

For example, Pedro Martinez has the highest career ERA+ mark for starters at 154, but how much did he pitch from age 35 and beyond? Not even 200 innings, or one full year’s worth of pitching. Blyleven? 1200+ innings. It makes a difference. (not saying Bert and Pedro are comparable, just making a point).

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to Mike L

Mike L., another thing you might want to consider with Winfield’s ranking is that ahead of him are primarily other outfielders and corner infielders. Basically, yes, he ranks in the top 160 of all-time, but he’s REALLY not being compared to, say, Ozzie Smith, because Smith was a below-average hitter… but a GOOD hitter for a shortstop. That adjustment is not present in OPS+. Winfield’s 130, for example, ranks behind Gary Sheffield’s 140 and Albert Belle’s 144. Just something else to consider.

Editor

Bryan O'Connor

11 years ago

Reply to Mike L

bstar asks how much Pedro pitched after age 35. I might answer one game too many, since his last decision was his 100th loss. For those who care about such things, no modern pitcher has won 200 without losing 100.

Of course, he would have needed a win in that game and the next to best Whitey Ford’s career winning percentage of .6901.

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to bstar

One might argue that Blyleven was Gaylord Perry, except with two World Series rings, and a legal curveball instead of a spitball.

Starts: Perry 690, Blyleven 685
ERA+: Perry 117, Blyleven 118
OPS+ Against: Perry 86, Blyleven 86
Pitching WAR: Perry 93.7, Blyleven 96.5
Team’s Record in his Starts: Perry 360-329, Blyleven 364-321

Niekro, Spahn and Glavine probably belong in the same category as these two: very long and prolific careers at a very high level of performance, albeit a big step back from the Clemens/Maddux/Seaver/RJ level.

mosc

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

I’d rather have more Koufax/Smoltz/Gooden type guys than Blyleven/Perry/Niekro/Spahn/Glavine type guys. I know the sustained excellence of the second group gives them a clear career value advantage but I like to see a few seasons of near-best in league performance at minimum.

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

Gooden had one of the greatest seasons by a pitcher in history in 1985. But WAR suggests that Blyleven had eight seasons more valuable than Gooden’s second best season. Blyleven was the best pitcher in his league the same number of times as Gooden — once (1973 for Bert, though the Cy Young voters had no idea — they ranked 6 guys ahead of him, all of whom who had higher W-L percentages).

mosc

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

you’re right. His 1973 year doesn’t have an eye popping ERA but he pitched in a lot of high offense ballparks. Still, I think palmer was the better pitcher in 1973. Point taken though, Blyleven’s peak was pretty high when looked at historically.

He’ll get in without my help.

Dr. Doom

11 years ago

Reply to Dr. Doom

bstar

11 years ago

Vote change, birtelcom. I thought I had decided for myself that as far as relievers go I would vote for Mo (if we get to vote for him), Hoyt Wilhelm, and Gossage, mainly because I think the retelling of baseball history would be incomplete without mention of these three. But now I’m thinking it’s sufficient that Wilhelm and Goose are in the Hall and there’s no need here to suggest either is one of the 112 best players ever. Mo, obviously, is a very different story. I am going to rescind my vote for Gossage. I just can no longer… Read more »

Voomo Zanzibar

11 years ago

BBBBBBBBBB

Buddy Bell
Bert Blyleven
Braig Biggio

Author

birtelcom

11 years ago

Reply to Voomo Zanzibar

“Best Ballot” banner belongs to ‘Bar.

11 years ago

Reply to birtelcom

But birtel bags “Best Blogger”!

Daniel Longmire

11 years ago

Reply to RJ

Birtlecom better be bagging “Best Blogger”. By benevolently brandishing bewitching bulletins, baseball benefits bunches.

Hartvig

11 years ago

After agonizing over this for 2 days- OK, maybe agonizing is a bit strong, let’s say thinking about it a little instead- I’m going with

Trammell, Whitaker, Sandberg

which is exactly how I have voted for the past 4 or 5 rounds, I think