Hey, guys, you want to have a tournament?
I have been asked several questions here about how does Graig Nettles stack up as a Hall of Fame candidate, and where is Chipper Jones on the list of great third basemen, etc., and also I was thinking about what could be called the Brooks Robinson group of third basemen.
I was thinking about the Brooks Robinson group of third basemen, honestly, because the Red Sox have two of them—Mike Lowell and Adrian Beltre. Brooks Robinson has become the archetype of a successful third baseman. A Brooks Robinson-type third baseman has seven characteristics:
1) Right-handed hitter,
2) Medium-range power, 18 to 28 homers in a typical season,
3) Can drive in 100 runs in a season,
4) Quality defense at third base,
5) Slow,
6) Not generally a .300 hitter; more like a .270 hitter,
7) Not a guy with a .380 on base percentage.
It is not particularly unusual that the Red Sox have transitioned from one of these guys to another; actually, there are several organizations that, over the last 30 years, have transitioned from one of these guys to another to another. The Texas Rangers over the last 30 years have had Buddy Bell, Steve Buechele, Toby Harrah, Dean Palmer and others at third base. Only Buddy Bell is EXACTLY a Brooks Robinson-type third baseman. Buechele was a Brooks Robinson-type except he didn’t have the power to drive in 100 runs, and Palmer was not exactly a Brooks Robinson type because he had too much power and was a God-Awful defensive third baseman, and Harrah perhaps was not exactly a Brooks Robinson type because he walked too much and was better defensively at other positions than he was at third base, but. . .they’re all kind of in the mold; if you say generally that they’re right-handed hitters and slow but good defensively and can drive in 100 runs, you’re generally right about all of them. Even the third baseman the Rangers have now, Mike Young, is sort of generally in the mold.
Other organizations like that. . .the Phillies, the Tigers, the Indians. They tend to switch from one player of this type to another. Many or most of the greatest third basemen in baseball history are not Brooks Robinson types in any way, shape or form. Eddie Mathews isn’t, and George Brett isn’t, or Pie Traynor, or Wade Boggs. Mike Schmidt is too good a player to be put into somebody else’s family; he had more power and more walks than the Brooks Robinson types.
A true Brooks Robinson-type third baseman has a higher defensive winning percentage than offensive winning percentage. A-Rod is nowhere near the group, because he hits twice as many homers as these guys do, and his defense at third is not that good.
Anyway, I was thinking about all of the Brooks Robinson-type third basemen, and then I was thinking that I was neglecting the Win Shares and Loss Shares comparisons that I had promised to do more of, so then I thought. . .well, let’s make up a list and sort them out, one through 64.
One through 66, actually; we’re going to have a couple of play-in games. We need the play-in games because, out of curiosity and a lack of discipline, I decided to include three third basemen in the tourney who don’t even come close to meeting the definition: Graig Nettles, Chipper Jones and Howard Johnson. Hojo isn’t anywhere near the Brooks Robinson family; he has too much power, too much speed, nowhere near enough defense, plus he’s a switch hitter—but he’s an interesting player and I decided to throw him into the field and see where he comes out.
We’ll set it up like the NCAA basketball tourney, players seeded one through sixteen. The “seeds” are just based on career plate appearances. The players who had long careers will get the highest seeds; those who had shorter careers will get the low seeds. These are the matchups:
Baltimore Regional
Brooks Robinson (#1) vs. Steve Buechele (#16)
Jimmy Dykes (#2) vs. Tony Batista (#15)
Toby Harrah (#3) vs. Ray Knight (#14)
Matt Williams (#4) vs. Melvin Mora (#13)
  Jimmy Collins (#5) vs. Charlie Hayes (#12)
  Harlond Clift (#6) vs. Doug Rader (#11)
  Billy Nash (#7) vs. Joe Randa (#10)
  Doug DeCinces (#8) vs. Jeff Cirillo (#9)
This will be more fun if you fill out your brackets, or at least try to pick the upsets. I’d run the brackets here, but. . .our site is badly engineered, and we have limited ability to display graphics. We’re working on fixing that. Anyway, figure out who you think should win which matchup, and post your thoughts; we’ll see how well we do.
Cleveland Regional
Graig Nettles (#1) vs. Phil Nevin (#16)
; Ron Santo (#2) vs. Jim Davenport (#15)
  Sal Bando (#3) vs. Brook Jacoby (#14)
  Bob Elliott (#4) vs. Dean Palmer (#13)
  Larry Parrish (#5) vs. Heinie Zimmerman (#12)
; Travis Fryman (#6) vs. Frank Malzone (#11)
  Willie Jones (#7) vs. Bill Bradley (#10)
  Clete Boyer (#8) vs. Ken Keltner (#9)
The #1 seeds are Brooks Robinson, Graig Nettles, Buddy Bell and Gary Gaetti, but, of course, there is no guarantee that a #1 seed will win the tourney, nor is it likely that the Final Four will be the four #1 seeds. Pick your Final Four:
St. Louis Regional
Play-In Game: Bill Melton Vs. Luis Salazar
  Gary Gaetti (#1) vs. Melton or Salazar (#16)
Chipper Jones (#2) vs. Don Hoak (#15)
Todd Zeile (#3) vs. Ken Reitz (#14)
Ken Boyer (#4) vs. David Bell (#13)
Scott Rolen (#5) vs. Howard Johnson (#12)
Don Money (#6) vs. Aramis Ramirez (#11)
Harry Steinfeldt (#7) vs. Freddy Lindstrom (#10)
Pinky Whitney (#8) vs. Edgardo Alfonzo (#9)
Don’t hesitate to protest if I eliminate a player you have going to Final Four. The recommended way to protest is to burn a copy of the Baseball Handbook.
Los Angeles Regional
Play-In Game: Ed Sprague vs. Tom Brookens
Buddy Bell (#1) vs. Sprague or Brookens (#16)
  Tim Wallach (#2) vs. Bob Aspromonte (#15)
  Ron Cey (#3) vs. Jerry Denny (#14)
  Carney Lansford (#4) vs. Ray Boone (#13)
Vinny Castilla (#5) vs. Ken McMullen (#12)
  Willie Kamm (#6) vs. Troy Glaus (#11)
  Adrian Beltre (#7) vs. Kevin Seitzer (#10)
; Hubie Brooks (#8) vs. Mike Lowell (#9)
What we’re essentially asking, in each matchup, is “who was really a better player?” Who was a better player: Carney Lansford or Ray Boone? The controlling metric, in 90% of these matchups and more, will be the player’s Win Shares and Loss Shares. I am trying to figure out who is really the better player; I think Win Shares and Loss Shares get us closer to that goal than any of my other methods, but if the Win Shares method says that Pinky Whitney was a better player than Edgardo Alfonzo, we don’t want to just salute at that time and say, “Yes, Sir”, because when we do that, then our analysis is dead. At that point we’re no longer learning anything from the study, no longer trying to figure out what we’re missing that could have been included. We’re no longer working.
We’ll post the results of the play-in games tomorrow—Bill Melton against Luis Salazar, and Ed Sprague against Tom Brookens. On Wednesday we’ll have four first-round games: #1 seed Brooks Robinson against 16 seed Steve Buechele, #2 seed Ron Santo against fifteenth-seeded Jim Davenport, #3 seed Todd Zeile against fourteenth-seeded Ken Reitz in the St. Louis Regional, and fourth-seeded Carney Lansford against thirteen seed Ray Boone in LA. I’ll explain more about the process as we go along.