THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

Thursday, December 29, 2011

Most inconsistent HOF ballot this year?

This blogger points out that Barry Bloom manages to include Rafael Palmeiro, Mark McGwire and Fred McGriff on his ballot (all of which are justifiable to some extent), but Bloom is trying to argue that Jeff Bagwell does not belong with those guys, because he compares most favorably to… Steve Garvey?  Well, if you strip out the huge HR and huge walk advantage, then, yeah, sure, maybe.

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I like what Posnanski said the other day about his HOF voting, where one year he will vote for a guy on a ballot, and another year he won’t.  And it’s not because the player did anything new (obviously he didn’t) but because Poz is looking at the evidence in a new way, a way he hadn’t considered.

So, let’s hope that Bloom will take the same approach next year, start Bagwell with a clean slate, and maybe he will come to see Bagwell as one of the greatest hitters of his generation.  Unless of course Bagwell gets his deserved enshrinement this year.

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And don’t get me started on the voter who wouldn’t vote for Raines and his 808 steals because right behind him is Vince Coleman and his 752 steals.  Ok, you got me started.  As I noted a few years back:

The biggest debates for me were Tim Raines, who obviously was overshadowed by Rickey Henderson, but also if you take Vince Coleman’s five top years, I would say he outperformed Raines, too, and I don’t see Coleman as a Hall of Famer.
— Tracy Ringolsby

FACT

Just for fun, I took Coleman’s 5 best years. They were hard to find, but I settled on this: 85, 87, 89, 90, 92. That totaled 2818 PA. (If you prefer different seasons, let me know. ) I looked for Raines worst years (which includes alot of abbreviated seasons) to match that total. I came up with these years: 79, 80, 82, 91, 94, 96, 98, 99, 02. The total of Raines’ worst years was 2820 PA. Ok, so we have two partial careers of exactly the same length (in plate appearances), one for the guy at his best, and the other for the guy at his worst. Coleman outscored Raines, by 25 runs. Raines outRBIed Coleman by 78. Raines also did that while using up 99 less outs.

The batting line:
0.275 0.337 0.355 Coleman
0.266 0.363 0.371 Raines

Raines, at his very worst, is better than Coleman at his very best.

I believe Ringolsby has seen the light, putting Raines on his ballot this year.  So, it is possible to look at the same data in a new way, and be convinced that you were originally wrong.  Congratulations to Ringolsby!  Maybe that other voter who saw Raines and Coleman in the same boat will also see the light.