Torii Hunter, Angels – I should start by saying that I’ve always thought Hunter was an overrated player. For all his skills, I always saw the faults. A great centerfielder, sure, but what about the fifty games he missed in 2005 when he broke his ankle scaling the wall in Fenway? A fast runner, sure, but why is his stolen base percentage a hair under 70%. A power hitter, okay, but would it kill him to walk more than 40 times a season?
When the Angels signed him to a five-year, $90 million dollar contract before 2008 (to replace the albatross contract given to Gary Matthews), I thought it would turn out to be a huge mistake.
It is a mistake: Torii Hunter isn’t worth $18 million dollars. But damned if he isn’t trying. Damned if he isn’t making me a believer.
Last year, at the age of thirty-two, Hunter posted the best on-base average of his career, and the highest walk rate. He was 19-for-24 as a basestealer, a respectable success rate of 79%. He still wasn’t great, but he was making it harder to root against him.
This year, he’s having a great season. If he continues on his current pace, he will blow away his career highs in batting average, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage. He is drawing walks at a good rate, and is 13-for-16 as a basestealer, cracking the 80% barrier.
With Guerrero out and Teixeira in the Bronx, the Angels had a breach in their batting order. They had no power hitter, no one to hit cleanup. Torii Hunter stepped in to fill that breach, and he has done so admirably. Much to my surprise, Hunter is a serious candidate for the American League MVP award.
Brad Hawpe, Rockies – The 2007 Clutch Player of the Year makes his first All-Star game. In 2009 the Hawpster has a 1.106 OPS in two-out, runners-in-scoring-position situations, and a 1.042 OPS in Close/Late situations.
Javier Vasquez, Braves – In 1987, Nolan Ryan led the NL in ERA and strikeouts. In that year of astonishing batting lines, Ryan was the only pitcher in the NL with an ERA under 3.00, and the only pitcher with more than 250 strikeouts. His W-L record was 8-16.
Vasquez is having a similar year in 2009: at this writing he is 8th in ERA, 2nd in strikeouts, 1st in WHIP, and 1st in K/9 IP. His W-L record is 5-7.
Vasquez has had an unusual career. To be frank, his career looks like the career of a knuckleballer: a lot of bouncing around teams, a lot of innings pitched, and a lot of 13-12 or 12-16 records. He’s played in five different teams: most pitchers who strike out hitters like Vasquez does usually don’t get bounced around so much.
He’s been as healthy as a horse, averaging 207 innings for the twelve years he’s been in the majors. His career is reminiscent of Jack Morris: lots of innings, an ERA a few ticks below average, some strikeouts. It is certainly not out of the realm of possibility that Vasquez reaches 3000 career strikeouts and 200 wins.
Albert Pujols, Cardinals – In his 2009 Gold Mine, Bill suggested that someone would come along and win a Triple Crown in the next ten years. Albert Pujols, apparently an avid reader of Bill’s work, has decided to go ahead and fulfill that prediction in 2009. At this writing, Pujols leads the NL in homeruns and RBI’s, and is third in batting average (.337), behind two scrubs named Hanley Ramirez (.345) and David Wright (.340).
Justin Upton, Diamondbacks – Upton is having a terrific season: .315 batting average, 14 homeruns, 10 steals…
Let’s assume he keeps it up. He has an adjusted OPS of 146 right now…let’s assume he finishes the year in that ballpark. He’s twenty-one years old. How rare is it for a twenty-one year old to do that?
Age 21 Season
|
OPS+
|
Joe Jackson
|
193
|
Jimmie Foxx
|
193
|
Eddie Mathews
|
171
|
Rogers Hornsby
|
169
|
Ty Cobb
|
169
|
Sam Crawford
|
167
|
Cesar Cedeno
|
162
|
Ted Williams
|
162
|
Albert Pujols
|
157
|
Ken Griffey, Jr.
|
155
|
Tris Speaker
|
152
|
Stan Musial
|
151
|
Hal Trotsky
|
151
|
Mel Ott
|
150
|
Arky Vaughn
|
146
|
Hank Aaron
|
143
|
Mickey Mantle
|
143
|
Del Ennis
|
143
|
I assume you recognize a few of those names. Fourteen of the eighteen are in the Hall-of-Fame, and of the other four (Jackson, Cedeno, Trotsky, and Ennis), it can reasonably be said that at least three of them had Hall-of-Fame ability, if not Hall-of-Fame careers.
Upton would be near the bottom of the list, with Arky Vaughn and a few ticks ahead of Aaron and Mantle.
But Justin is a centerfielder. How does he compare with his own ilk? What are the best OPS+ by twenty-one year-old centerfielders?
Age 21 Season
|
OPS+
|
Cesar Cedeno
|
162
|
Ken Griffey, Jr.
|
155
|
Tris Speaker
|
152
|
Mickey Mantle
|
143
|
Juan Gonzalez
|
121
|
Rick Monday
|
121
|
Vada Pinson
|
118
|
Whitey Lockman
|
118
|
Andruw Jones
|
116
|
Rick Manning
|
116
|
He’d be right between Speaker and Mantle, which is nice company to keep. When all is said and done, Upton could put together one of the five best Age-21 seasons of any centerfielder.
Tim Wakefield, Red Sox – Joe Maddon picked Wakefield his first ever spot on the All-Star team, a decision that has garnered near-universal approval around baseball. I certainly won’t argue it: Wakefield has been one of my favorite players since his stunning debut with the Bucs in 1992. I just hope he gets the chance to pitch.
Few remember this now, I suppose, but Wakefield’s first season in Boston was terrific; for much of the year his ERA was under 2.00, and in a weak year for pitchers there was talk that he’d win the Cy Young Award. He faded down the stretch, but still posted fine numbers.
He wasn’t an All-Star in 1995, but he probably deserved to be one. It was a short first-half following the strike year, and Wakefield started the year in the minor leagues, trying to get his knuckler straight. Going into the break Wakefield’s numbers compared favorably with the pitchers selected to the game:
Randy Johnson – 9-1, 2.88 ERA
Kevin Appier – 11-5, 3.04 ERA
Chuck Finley – 7-7, 3.56 ERA
Erik Hanson – 7-2, 3.61 ERA
Dennis Martinez – 8-0, 2.37 ERA
David Wells – 8-3, 3.00 ERA
Steve Ontiveros – 8-3, 3.09 ERA
Kenny Rogers – 8-4, 3.05 ERA
Tim Wakefield – 7-1, 1.61 ERA
A few of the pitchers had to be on the team: Steve Ontiveros was the A’s lone representative in 1995, and Appier was the Royals only star. But Chuck Finley? There were three other Angels represented on the team. Dennis Martinez? Cleveland had five other players.
Most galling of all was the selection of Erik Hanson, who was Wakefield’s teammate on the Red Sox. Hanson had one more win than Wakefield…and two more runs on his ERA. Yet Buck Showalter thought Hanson deserved the nod.
Well…it took fourteen years, but someone finally corrected that mistake.
David Wright, Mets – Wright is on a pace to hit about a dozen homeruns this year, which is about twenty off what anyone would have expected on the season. And while it would be easy to chalk it up to park effect, it bears mentioning that Wright has only two homeruns on the road this year.
Question: has there ever been a player who has endured such a steep drop in homeruns at the Age of 26, after establishing a clear level of ability?
Carlos Beltran, Mets – At some point, the Mets of the late Aughts will join the Braves of the late 1950’s, the Cubs of the late 1960’s, the mid-1980 Yankees, and the mid-1990 Mariners as one of the great squanderers of talent ever.
Think about it: the Mets have three truly great players in Beltran, Wright, and Johan Santana. They have surrounded those players, at various times, with talented players like Carlos Delgado, Francisco Rodriguez, Billy Wagner, Jose Reyes, Pedro Martinez, Moises Alou, and Gary Sheffield. Yet for all of the talent the Mets have had over the years, they have just one playoff series victory to show for it: a 3-0 drubbing of the Dodgers in the Wild Card round of 2006.
Jay Bruce, Reds – What kind of player does Jay Bruce become?
His positives are obvious: he can hit baseballs very far. His negatives are also obvious: he doesn’t make great contact or get on base, and he’d be wise to ignore Dusty Baker when the skip tells him to steal second.
There is something deceptive about the power: it sort of blinds us to the liabilities. We look at a hitter like Votto and we think: “If he can get those strikeouts down, learn to lay off the bad pitches, he might turn into something.”
Compare Jay Bruce to Colby Rasmus, the centerfielder for the Cardinals. Both players are twenty-two years old:
|
R
|
H
|
2B
|
HR
|
BB
|
SO
|
BA
|
OBP
|
SLG
|
Rasmus
|
33
|
63
|
17
|
8
|
12
|
44
|
.270
|
.313
|
.455
|
Bruce
|
38
|
58
|
11
|
18
|
30
|
58
|
.212
|
.294
|
.458
|
Rasmus has been the better player than Bruce this year, better in the field and better at the plate. But the Reds wouldn’t think to trade Jay Bruce for Colby Rasmus. Why not? Because Bruce is on a pace to hit 35-40 homeruns this year.
Here’s the thing, though: Colby Rasmus is far more likely to be a good player than Jay Bruce. He has more ways to become a good player.
Michael Young, Rangers – Call me crazy, but I might have taken Alex Rodriguez here. Or Brandon Inge.
Justin Morneau, Twins –Why is it most baseball fans think Justin Morneau is a better player than Joe Mauer?
If you ask a Twins fan to name their team’s best player, they will almost always cite Justin Morneau. Moreover, these people will argue for Morneau with surprising passion and zeal. This is true even among casual fans who don’t root for the Twins. And this is true of most sportswriters, or at least those who get to vote on the MVP ballot: Mauer has never finished ahead of Morneau in an MVP tally.
This should be surprising.
Think about it: in a typical season, Justin Morneau hits .300 with 30 homers and a 120 RBI’s. Those are fine numbers for a first-baseman, sure. But they are hardly rare: there have been sixty-six seasons in baseball history where a first basemen has posted a Triple Crown line of .300/30/120. No one would argue he is the best first baseman in baseball right now, nor is he the best in his league.
Meanwhile, Joe Mauer is putting up numbers that no catcher has ever put up. He is doing things that we’ve never seen before. He has won two batting titles and is making strides towards his third, and is nearly hitting .400 to boot. He is also a terrific, Gold Glove-winning defensive player. He is, by any objective measure, the best catcher in baseball right now, and it isn’t even close.
I’m not trying to pick on Minnesota fans. I just think it’s interesting. Why do most people think Morneau is better than Mauer?
I think the Morneau/Mauer thing demonstrates an interesting truth about how we understand and order our perceptions of the world. Specifically: we tend to favor the familiar, and ignore the unique.
With Morneau, there is a precedent for the things he does, one that is clearly defined and entrenched enough that even casual fans recognize that Morneau is meeting that precedent. He fits the expectation of what a good first baseman does.
Meanwhile Mauer is doing things that have no precedent. We have no memory of a catcher who regularly wins batting titles, a catcher who flirts with a .400 batting average and wins Gold Gloves. It doesn’t fit the realm of our understanding.
Mark Teixeira, Yankees – I was surprised to see this is only Teixeira’s second All-Star game. It’s tough to get in as a first baseman.
Freddy Sanchez, Pirates – On the other hand, it’s pretty easy to make the All-Star team if you’re a middle infielder for the Pirates. This is Freddy’s third All-Star game.
Sanchez’s most similar player, according to baseballreference.com, is Cotton Tierney, who played second and third for the Pirates in the early 1920’s. Which makes Freddy Sanchez something of a throwback player.
Kevin Youkilis, Red Sox – I’m glad Youks is on the All-Star team, but it’s interesting that Joe Maddon took him over Miguel Cabrera.
|
R
|
H
|
2B
|
HR
|
RBI
|
BA
|
OBP
|
SLG
|
Youkilis
|
49
|
72
|
20
|
14
|
47
|
.301
|
.423
|
.569
|
Cabrera
|
48
|
97
|
17
|
16
|
47
|
.323
|
.385
|
.540
|
There are a lot of Red Sox on Joe Maddon’s team. A case of keeping friends close, enemies closer, perhaps?
Ryan Braun, Brewers – Ryan Braun recently complained about the poor pitching that the Brewers starters have been handing in. He also insinuated his belief that the Brewers GM should be making some moves to acquire new pitching.
Is it just me, or are players getting a little freer about expressing their opinions? To my ears, criticizing the pitching staff of your own team isn’t typical behavior, nor is giving advice to the GM.
This is a side-note, but it occurs to me that, in this age where media structures are being altered and reshaped, we’re seeing an emerging freedom of expression. Whereas in the past it was left to the sportswriters to criticize a team, now the players themselves are doing it. Anyway, more on this topic to come.
Josh Hamilton, Rangers – The voting for Hamilton and Manny Ramirez is interesting, isn’t it?
Both players have missed significant time this season: neither Ramirez nor Hamilton are really deserving of All-Star status. Despite their missing seasons, both players garnered a significant number of votes from the fans. And lastly: both players were, at one time, suspended for violating baseball’s drug policy.
There has been a lot written in the mainstream press about how fans shouldn’t be voting for Manny Ramirez, who is, after all, a cheat and a scoundrel. There has been no such response about Josh Hamilton.
We Americans love the repentant sinner, the prodigal son returned from the wilderness. We have less affection for those who refuse to atone. Neither player deserves to make the All-Star team, not on the basis of their play this year. But only Ramirez is being called out for it. Hamilton gets a pass.
I don’t bring this up as a criticism of Josh Hamilton, whom I respect a great deal. I just find it interesting that in the loud din that arose from the press when Manny Ramirez was leading NL outfielders in the fan votes, no one noticed that Hamilton, too, was receiving votes that had little to do with how his season was going.
Dave Fleming is a writer living in Iowa City, IA. He welcomes questions, comments, and suggestions here and at dfleming1986@yahoo.com.