Updated Position Player Rankings

In Eric’s last post, he shared his updated rankings for position players since we folded in our (his) segregation adjustment. In short, we adjust the statistics of all players before Jackie Robinson (and a bit after until MLB was fully integrated), basically. And we do that because neither MLB nor the Negro Leagues were as competitive as they should have been because of MLB’s racist practices. Fortunately for us, Eric’s outstanding MLEs for Negro Leaguers allow us to apply the same adjustment to all players, Black and White, before Robinson, making an incredibly complex job just a bit less so.

Since Eric shared slots 18-28 on his lists, I’m going to do the same. Perhaps you’ll see some surprises, perhaps not. But it’s good that he began presenting in this manner to help you brace yourselves. See, our lists are going to look quite different than they once did. Lou Gehrig and Albert Pujols didn’t play against the same level of competition. Neither did Arky Vaughan and Barry Larkin, nor Paul Waner and Larry Walker. Even if 18-28 might not look too strange in isolation, there’s going to be some getting used to toward the top of our lists.

It’s not easy to wrap your mind around the idea that the players you’ve always known as the greatest, or close to it, might not actually rank there. But what makes us think that we’re right, you might ask. Well, we know that we’re not right. What we are is as right as we know how to be. Eric’s work on this segregation adjustment has been painstaking, and it all makes sense to me. So we rolled with it.

One caveat before we move on. Even though the in/out line is around #23 on each list, the intention remains to elect a similar number of players across the generations. What this means is that some of the pre-Jackie players below the line might make it while some of the post-Jackie players above it might not.

Catcher

As I’ve explained a bunch of times, because of framing, my numbers skew toward more recent players. I’m most pleased that Roy Campanella, who a number of years ago we had to resurrect to put into the HoME version 1.0, ranks 8th now. It feels a whole lot more accurate than seeing him as a borderliner. Things aren’t looking wonderful for HoMEr, Bill Freehan, but we kinda thought he might have been a mistake the first time through.

Rank  Name             MAPES+
18    Thurman Munson   110.7
19    Gabby Hartnett   109.7
20    Ted Simmons      108.1
21    Brian McCann     101.8
22    Tony Pena        101.4
23    Jim Sundberg     100.9
24    Gene Tenace       99.1
25    Bill Freehan      97.2
26    Biz Mackey        96.2
27    Javy Lopez        95.5
28    Quincy Trouppe    95.5

First Base

Lots of strange stuff around here. Happily, the segregation adjustment drops racist Cap Anson behind Albert Pujols. But it also drops Lou Gehrig behind him. Hmm. I don’t love seeing Josh Gibson here, not that I have a problem with him at first base. Eric is quite confident Gibson wouldn’t have caught in MLB, at least not for long. What I don’t like is that he’s 18th. Then again, 18th might be a bit better than it seems for a couple of reasons. First, he’s only 0.35 MAPES+ points from 16th. And second, I include Rod Carew, Pete Rose, Ernie Banks, and Dick Allen at 1B, any of whom might be placed elsewhere. Hank Greenberg isn’t looking good at all. However, it’s not like we’re going to overfill from the integration era, so there remains hope.

Rank  Name              MAPES+
18    Josh Gibson       108.0
19    Miguel Cabrera    107.8
20    Rafael Palmeiro   106.5
21    Willie McCovey    106.2
22    Eddie Murray      102.5
23    Johnny Mize       101.1
24    Mark McGwire       99.0
25    Buck Leonard       98.7
26    Will Clark         97.3
27    John Olerud        97.0
28    Hank Greenberg     94.4

Second Base

Ian Kinsler, a guy I pegged as a hidden Hall of Famer about the time he became a Tiger in 2014, looks pretty good to make it in 2.0. And it’s nice to see the trio of Childs, Dunlap, and Richardson fall some. They previously felt a little high, particularly Richardson.

Rank  Name              MAPES+
18    Tony Phillips     115.5
19    Joe Gordon        111.1
20    Ian Kinsler       110.3
21    Cupid Childs      109.7
22    Fred Dunlap       105.9
23    Ben Zobrist       100.6
24    Hardy Richardson   99.4
25    Bid McPhee         98.9
26    George Scales      98.4
27    Billy Herman       95.6
28    Dustin Pedroia     94.1

Third Base

Man, this is a tough position. I love seeing Josh Donaldson move into an area where we might elect him one day. However, already in the HoME 2.0 are Deacon White and Jimmy Collins. I think they’re both still guys we’d elect, but if we had the segregation adjustment done before we began elections this time around, it’s certain that neither one would be in yet.

Rank  Name              MAPES+
18    David Wright      106.2
19    Sal Bando         105.5
20    Ron Cey           102.5
21    Evan Longoria     101.6
22    Ned Williamson    101.5
23    Deacon White      100.3
24    Jimmy Collins      99.7
25    Toby Harrah        96.1
26    Matt Williams      93.5
27    John McGraw        93.0
28    Josh Donaldson     92.7

Shortstop

That’s right, David Wright is 18th at his position, and Derek Jeter is 19th. Take that! I’m quite surprised that Pee Wee Reese has fallen like he has. Let’s make clear though, the fall is a function of the outstanding representation from Negro Leagues shortstops, with five Negro Leaguers in front of him. I think we may go a bit deeper at shortstop than some other positions. One player not falling with the inclusion of additional players is the #4 man on the list, Barry freakin’ Larkin. That seems strange, but so many of those perceived as the very best ever played in leagues without Black players. So maybe? I have HoMEr Grant Johnson all the way down at #29 based on an updated MLE, so either we’ll need to talk more about him, or he’s just a mistake that’ll need correcting.

Rank  Name              MAPES+
18    Dobie Moore       110.4
19    Derek Jeter       108.7
20    Lou Boudreau      108.2
21    Art Fletcher      105.0
22    Miguel Tejada     100.4
23    Dick Lundy        100.3
24    Bert Camapneris    99.7
25    Pee Wee Reese      99.7
26    Hughie Jennings    99.4
27    Jim Fregosi        98.4
28    Joe Tinker         94.4

Left Field

I like Ryan Braun even less than I like Derek Jeter, so I hate seeing him here. Willie Stargell, on the other hand, makes me quite happy. Same with Charlie Keller. If our final left field spot comes down to Keller and, say, Luis Gonzalez, I’m going to have a hard time rejecting King Kong.

Rank  Name              MAPES+
18    Ryan Braun        107.4
19    Bobby Veach       106.4
20    Willie Stargell   105.3
21    Luis Gonzalez     104.6
22    Monte Irvin       103.4
23    Sherry Magee      100.2
24    Matt Holliday      99.8
25    Jimmy Sheckard     98.5
26    Charlie Keller     98.0
27    Joe Kelley         97.1
28    Ralph Kiner        96.6

Center Field

A number of years ago I got to talk to Willie Wilson in Spring Training. We talked about his Hall of Fame chance, and he sort of chuckled. Well, I don’t think Wilson is going to make it into the HoME 2.0, but he’s not a laughable choice. I’m happy that Willie Mays now tops my list rather than Ty Cobb. And in this iteration, Mike Trout is up to 5th for me. Also, HoMEr Alejandro Oms falls all the way to #37 with Eric’s latest MLEs. Oops!

Rank  Name             MAPES+
18    Jim Wynn         107.6
19    Paul Hines       105.7
20    Duke Snider      103.2
21    Willie Davis     102.5
22    Pete Hill        101.8
23    Cesar Cedeno     101.5
24    Willie Wilson     98.5
25    Bernie Williams   98.1
26    Chet Lemon        98.0
27    Brett Butler      96.9
28    George Gore       96.0

Right Field

Hey, hey Mookie! I’m happy that it’ll be a little easier to elect Vladimir Guerrero. And I’m pretty surprised that we’re going to have to talk about Brian Giles as much as we will. He looks better here than he would if he played. Eric had been talking about reconsidering Joe Jackson because of the whole Black Sox deal. I’m not on the same page right now, but falling all the way to #20 means his exclusion from just a playing standpoint might not be ridiculous. Sam Crawford down at #30 means that the Tiger may not stay in. That feels super odd.

Rank  Name               MAPES+
18    Ichiro Suzuki      107.0
19    Vladimir Guerrero  106.7
20    Joe Jackson        105.8
21    Reggie Smith       104.8
22    Bobby Abreu        104.2
23    Brian Giles        100.6
24    Harry Heilmann      99.4
25    King Kelly          99.4
26    Elmer Flick         99.2
27    Hurley McNair       99.0
28    Mookie Betts        98.8

Some Sad News

For about four years I think, I’ve been working to get my pitchers right. Folks, I just can’t do it. Unlike our position player rankings, which must be imperfect because we are, my pitcher rankings are just wrong. They’re certainly close enough that I could sell them as “right” even though they’re not, but I don’t want to keep doing that. My pitcher spreadsheet is held together with old chewing gum and scratch and sniff stickers, and I haven’t been able to improve on it in the last four years. Either time or my attempted application of the segregation adjustment just broke me. I hate quitting things, but my soul just can’t go on failing as I have been for this long.

Basically, what Eric called “creative differences” in response to a comment on his position player post is his kind way of saying that his partner can’t keep up.

So this is going to be my last post for a while. I don’t know if I’ll ever have the disposition to give pitchers another try, and even if I do, I suspect I won’t get them to a point where I know they’re not wrong. As for Eric, he’s on hiatus right now while figuring out his next move. And he has next moves. Don’t believe me? The guy’s made it. If you haven’t before, check out the “thank you” at the bottom of this BBREF announcement. In a quiet moment, I think Eric might have acknowledged at the start of this project that he hoped it would lead to other writing gigs in the field, or at least being in that orbit. If he does want it, I think that’s going to happen. I hope you’ll see him someplace really soon. As for me, well, the thing I stated that I wanted at the start of this project was for Eric to achieve enough here that he would become known and respected in the field. And that’s happened. So I’m a success!!!

Seriously though, this has been a wonderful ride. It’s really cool to have gotten to talk to Ryan Thibodaux of the Hall Tracker. And I feel kinda special that Adam Darowski of the Hall of Stats knows who I am. More than that, I’m so happy to have met the wonderful people who have shared their thoughts and some private emails over the years. I’m touched that anyone at all would enjoy my work. The fact that so many of you with impressive baseball minds have done so lets me know that all of the work that’s gone into this project has been worth it. Thanks everyone, and don’t be strangers.

Miller