Originally Posted by the 'stache (Post 1528244)

Wait, what?

One outstanding year? Carl Yastrzemski's 1967 was not just one great year. It was an historic year. Full statistics only go back to 1901 on Baseball Reference, and his 12.4 WAR in '67 is the third highest since 1901. Only Babe Ruth's 14.1 in 1923, and his 12.9 in 1921, are higher.

Look at the statistics: .326 AVG, 44 home runs, and 121 RBI. 112 runs scored, 189 hits, a .418 OBP, .622 SLG, 1.040 OPS, 193 OPS + 360 total bases. He won the Triple Crown, and every single stat I listed led the American League.

Look at the Triple Crown line again. .326 AVG, 44 home runs, 121 RBI. A really good season, to be sure, but historic? This is where context is so vitally important in statistical analysis, and why the Jeff Kent vs Jackie Robinson sub-debate looks so silly. You can't simply extrapolate these stats, and compare them to hitters from today, or say, the early to mid 2000s.

"Yastrzemski only hit 44 home runs. Barry Bonds hit 73 home runs. Mark McGwire hit 70. Sammy Sosa hit 60 + multiple times. Those guys were much better power hitters than Yaz."

The game back in the late 60s was completely different than it is now. Yastrzemski was the hitter in 1967. His oWAR of 9.9 is off the charts. Since 1950, only Mickey Mantle, Barry Bonds (three times each) and Mike Trout (in 2013) have had higher. Robin Yount's 9.8 in 1982 is right behind him.

But that was hardly the only great season Yaz had. Two above average seasons? He had two other tremendous seasons.

In 1968, he had a 10.5 WAR. An 8 + WAR is considered MVP level. Yaz far exceeded that. The second best player in the American League, Frank Robinson, had an 8.4 WAR. In simplest terms, Carl Yastrzemski, by WAR, was 25% better than any other player in the American League that year. That's a dominant performance. If you only casually look at Yastrzemski's numbers in 1968, using the eyes of a baseball fan in 2016, you won't be impressed by what you see. .301 AVG, 23 HR, 74 RBI. His slash line was .426 OBP/.495 SLG/.922 OPS. He had a 171 OPS +.

But again, context. Yaz led in batting, walks (119), on base, OPS and OPS +. Carl Yastrzemski was the only player in the entire American League to hit over .300 in 1968. Oakland's Danny Carter was second in the A.L. with a .290 AVG. Tony Oliva hit .289, Willie Horton .285, and Ted Uhalender .283. Nobody else in the A.L. even hit .280! That's how absolutely dominant the pitching was in 1968. '68 is the year Denny McClain won 31 games. Luis Tiant had a league-best 1.60 ERA, and four other pitchers (Sam McDowell, Dave McNally, McClain and Tommy John) had ERAs below 2.00. Another six starters had an ERA of 2.50 or better. Twenty-two starters with at least 20 starts and 154 IP had an ERA below 3.00. Yaz was by far the best hitter in the American League in 1968. So, no, that was not an "above average" season if you know how to accurately gauge statistics. His 9th place MVP vote was more a product of Boston's finishing 4th in the American League East than anything.

What about 1970? Again, Yastrzemski had the best WAR (9.5) in the American League. He was the best player in the A.L. that year, too. His 8.9 oWAR is the 34th best by any hitter in the American League since 1901. The second-best WAR in the American League that year was a 7.9 by pitcher Sam McDowell. By WAR, Carl Yastrzemski was 20% better than the next-best player in the American League that year. Yet he was only 4th in the MVP. His stat line clearly shows that he didn't have a merely above average season: 40 home runs, 102 RBI, .329 AVG. His slash line .452 OBP/.592 SLG/1.044 OPS was best in the AL. He led in all three metrics. He also led in runs scored (125), total bases (335) and OPS + 177. In fact, 1970 represented the fourth time in a six year span that Yaz led the A.L. in OPS + (in addition to 1967, 1968 and 1970, he also led with a 156 OPS + in 1965).

That's three seasons, 1967, 1968 and 1970, where Carl Yastrzemski was clearly the best player in the league, and by a wide margin.

In 1963, he had a 6.6 WAR, leading the A.L. in batting (.321), hits (183), doubles (40), walks (95), and on base (.418).

In 1965, he led the A.L. in doubles (45), on base (.395), slugging (.536), OPS (.932), and, again, OPS + (156).

Now, after hitting age 30, he was clearly not the same player. You could make an argument against some of his 11 All Star selections post 1970. But he still had some very good seasons. In 1974, he led the A.L. with 93 runs scored. 93 runs scored. That should tell you how difficult it was to score runs in that era, again, reinforcing how dominant pitching was. Only Yaz, Bobby Grich and Reggie Jackson even scored 90 runs that year. Compare that to 2015, when 13 players in the American League, alone, scored over 100 runs, and 28 players scored 90 or more.

Context.

Carl Yastrzemski had nine seasons, in total, with a WAR exceeding 5.0 or better. 5.0 WAR is an All Star level. And, he was one of the elite players in the American League for the decade of the 1960s. Only Frank Robinson's 53.8 WAR bested Yastrzemski's 53.2. But Yaz wasn't even a rookie until 1961. Had he played at all in 1960, he'd have been worth more wins than any player in the American League. Take away his -0.3 1961 rookie season, and his monster 1967 and 1968 seasons, and he still has a 30.6 WAR for the other six seasons, a 5.1 WAR average.

Yaz was a great player. He's one of only nine players in the history of baseball with over 3,000 hits, 400 home runs and 500 doubles. He was a great hitter, and a great fielder (good with the glove, great arm = 7 Gold Gloves). He's a deserving Hall of Famer.





No, he's not. What an absurd statement.

Clemente had 3,000 hits and a career .317 AVG. He won four batting titles, and finished in the top five six other times, including a pair of seconf place finishes. He was a twelve-time All Star, and won twelve consecutive Gold Gloves to close out his career. And, unlike most players, who see their productivity drop off at the end of their careers, Clemente was getting better. Had he not died in that plane crash, there's no telling how much longer he could have played. Clemente was in fantastic shape, and at the plate, he was lethal. Look at his last four seasons, 1969 to 1972. Between the ages of 34 and 37, Clemente batted a combined .339. He hit .345 in 1969, .352 in 1970, .341 in 1970, and .312 in 1971. He had a 153 OPS + for those four years. If he could have overcome a series of nagging injuries, he could have kept playing for another four years. He was still an elite hitter and fielder.

Please, educate yourself, because your statement is laughably bad.

Originally Posted by Marckus99 (Post 1528273)

We know what this is about, let's not be so naive.

- Mark

Originally Posted by Marckus99 (Post 1528273)

Of course Jackie belongs in the HOF....and so does his wife too, right?
Hell #42 has been retired, how about #1947 as well.

Actually we should make 4/15 a national holiday as well.
Let's start a religion as well, I mean he did suffer as much as Jesus.
Correct?

Because no one else in the history of baseball suffered as much as poor Jackie.
None of the Latin ball players from the 1910s or 1920s or 1930s suffered at all.....right?

We know what this is about, let's not be so naive.

- Mark

Originally Posted by Marckus99 (Post 1528273)

Of course Jackie belongs in the HOF....and so does his wife too, right?
Hell #42 has been retired, how about #1947 as well.

Actually we should make 4/15 a national holiday as well.
Let's start a religion as well, I mean he did suffer as much as Jesus.
Correct?

Because no one else in the history of baseball suffered as much as poor Jackie.
None of the Latin ball players from the 1910s or 1920s or 1930s suffered at all.....right?

We know what this is about, let's not be so naive.

- Mark

Originally Posted by Marckus99 (Post 1527297)

No contest - Cobb all the way.

10 million 54T cards made...
BTW, Hank Aaron, very overrated player.

Originally Posted by bdk1976 (Post 1528290)

This thread is obviously a trolling attempt (that's working).

1) Jackie Robinson is a HOF-caliber player
2) There are plenty of players who don't belong in the HOF - Jackie is not one of them
3) I think the color-barrier issue should (and does) cement his legitimacy in the HOF if he was borderline (he isn't - I can put together a lot of names in the HOF that are 'borderline' - or lower - and he wouldn't be on it)
4) I do think it's important to remember history and his contributions to baseball and our country.
5) I also think some of the Jackie-worship these days is becoming borderline over the top
6) On a somewhat related note, I think #3 should be retired by the MLB and Marvin Miller should be in the HOF.

Originally Posted by Marckus99 (Post 1528273)

Of course Jackie belongs in the HOF....and so does his wife too, right?
Hell #42 has been retired, how about #1947 as well.

Actually we should make 4/15 a national holiday as well.
Let's start a religion as well, I mean he did suffer as much as Jesus.
Correct?

Because no one else in the history of baseball suffered as much as poor Jackie.
None of the Latin ball players from the 1910s or 1920s or 1930s suffered at all.....right?

We know what this is about, let's not be so naive.

- Mark

Originally Posted by Dewey (Post 1528008)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Joshchisox08 View Post
This is bound to catch a lot of flack. And for the life of me I can't imagine why, though we live in PC America these days.
Translation: I'm going to stir the pot on the day of Jackie Robinson's commemoration and only the PC mental midgets would disagree with me. None of the disagreement to follow, therefore, will be my fault or legit and I will purposefully avoid responding intelligently to forthcoming evidence. My narrative about Jackie's induction is the right one, even though I will say I want open disagreement and argument. In fact I'll only respond with snide, not substantive, remarks.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Joshchisox08 View Post
WHY is Jackie Robinson in the HOF? I may be mistaken but isn't an induction for a player based almost entirely on statistics?
Translation: I won't take into consideration the actually criteria for induction. My magic numbers are the criteria. I have an agenda here, afterall. Don't get in my way.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Joshchisox08 View Post
Yes he endured a lot while playing. But that doesn't mean that he should be in the HOF over many other players with much better statistics.
Translation: Setting players in their historical and game era context is for suckers. Let's take out all those dead ball era bums! Actually they were white, so they must be okay. Let's just take out Jackie. I'm not PC like the rest of 'Merica. Understanding history is for PC wimps.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Joshchisox08 View Post
His induction seems more like a charity induction to me. Just my opinion and wondering if there's anyone else that has at least questioned any of this.
Translation: Jackie's hall induction is affirmative action charity and I HATE THAT. Don't you hate what I hate? As I've already assumed, I'm right, so don't tell me I'm not.

RESPONSE: Bro, you could have just asked:
Why is Jackie in the hall? His numbers don't seem measure up to my HOF expectations?

That would be a good question and conversation starter. In fact, I had that conversation with a friend and historian two weeks ago. Yet, you injected all this other nonsense followed by more snide nonsense.

Originally Posted by Marckus99 (Post 1528273)

Let's start a religion as well, I mean he did suffer as much as Jesus.
Correct?

Originally Posted by pclpads (Post 1528363)

It's unfair to compare Jesus to Jackie. First, they existed in different eras. And Jesus never had to deal with bean balls and being called a "N" by Ben Chapman. Just wondering, but could Jesus hit a 98 mph fastball? :rolleyes:

Originally Posted by drcy (Post 1528349)

He's in the Hall of Fame, and should be in the Hall of Fame, because he broke the color barrier. Stat arguments are beside the point.

If honoring the allowing of blacks to play in Major League Baseball is considered "PC," then I'll take being PC as a good thing.

For the record, I take no issue with someone questioning his statistical worthiness visa vie getting into the Hall of Fame. It's a legitimate question and topic. That I take a different route to my conclusion doesn't mean I find fault with someone bringing up the topic. Hall of Fame merits and stat debates for players is a regular topic on this and other boards.

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290 (Post 1528175)

This might be the dumbest post I have ever read. Clemente? Really??

Originally Posted by howard38 (Post 1528383)

The post was a little vague so it depends on what he meant. Clemente certainly got into the hall of fame at least five years early for reasons unrelated to stats and Robinson likely got in earlier than he otherwise would have based on his stats alone. Also, more than any other players, questioning their place among the all-time greats really seems to piss a lot of people off. They both definitely belong in the HOF though.

Originally Posted by Cmount76 (Post 1528381)

I think the overwhelming (and obvious) consensus is that Jackie is without question a HoFer.

So now what!?!?!

Show what ya got!!

Originally Posted by pclpads (Post 1528363)

It's unfair to compare Jesus to Jackie. First, they existed in different eras. And Jesus never had to deal with bean balls and being called a "N" by Ben Chapman. Just wondering, but could Jesus hit a 98 mph fastball? :rolleyes:

Originally Posted by darwinbulldog (Post 1527872)

You actually have to beat out more people today to make a roster, just not as high a proportion of the white American male demographic.

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528272)

I'm not sure Anthony was suggesting there was any argument Clemente should not be in the HOF based on his playing field accomplishments. Perhaps what he meant was that, like Jackie our perception of his greatness is further enhanced by externalities, in Clemente's case being the first great Hispanic major leaguer, and/or his premature death. For example, most people I think would immediately agree that Clemente was in the top 20 or 25 all time greats, but Bill James based purely on stats has him in the 70s.

Then again maybe Anthony has no clue. :D

Originally Posted by steve B (Post 1528450)

Nope.

We had an oldtimer speak at the club, one who was in baseball in the prewar era and was still involved.

One question he asked us was about exactly this. How many players were in organized ball in say 1940 and how many are there now. The comparison was US and maybe Canada only, so can be adjusted a little for the international players.

The answer?
At the time, roughly 17,500 in organized pro ball.
in the late 30's - closer to 175,000 not counting semi pro and industrial leagues, some of which had a higher level of competition than some minor leagues.

His point was that unless you were Ted Williams or Joe D. you had to hit, field, and be a fairly agreeable sort of guy because someone mediocre and caustic could be replaced very easily.

Todays teams worry about replacing the number 5 long relief guy.


Steve B

Originally Posted by Enfuego (Post 1528497)

You basically nailed it. Whoever this MIZE Character is, needs to read between the lines before opening his oxygen sucker. A lot of players today get into the HOF solely because of stats, accomplishments and records. Jackie and Roberto were acknowledged for their careers AND their contributions off the field.

Originally Posted by Enfuego (Post 1528497)

You basically nailed it. Whoever this MIZE Character is, needs to read between the lines before opening his oxygen sucker. A lot of players today get into the HOF solely because of stats, accomplishments and records. Jackie and Roberto were acknowledged for their careers AND their contributions off the field.

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290 (Post 1528388)

Possibly his post was. But how in the World can anyone question Clemente as a HOFer? He had 3,000 hits, and the best arm in baseball that I've ever seen....As a young kid in Atlanta, I saw him throw out Ralph Garr of the Braves who was arguably the fastest man in the game. The ball was hit to the warning track and Clemente caught the ball and threw a bullet that did not even bounce! The catcher caught the ball standing on the plate and tagged Garr out...Everybody in the stadium buzzed about that play for 30 minutes...Milo Hamilton said it was the best throw he had ever seen or ever will see....Oh, and by the way, his rookie card just keeps going thru the roof (if it's in a PSA holder)!

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290 (Post 1528515)

I would love to chat with Bill James about Clemente being only in the top 70's, that's just idiotic....This guy won 4 batting crowns in 6 years, and had the best arm in the game...

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290 (Post 1528530)

OK, lets try this with the board. Pertaining Outfielder's, other than Ruth, Aaron, Mays, T. Williams, and Mantle, maybe a drug free Bonds, who would you rate higher than Clemente? Also, of these five who would you put Clemente over?

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528529)

Bill Madlock won 4 batting titles. :D

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528535)

This site ranks him 61. http://www.stevetheump.com/top_players.htm


I would probably rate Cobb higher.:D Maybe Ott and Henderson. Frank Robinson. Speaker. Griffey.

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290 (Post 1528536)

Agree Peter, but could he even compare to Clemente? Not even close....

Originally Posted by Joshchisox08 (Post 1527741)

The magical 3,000 hits --------- him 1,518
The magical 500 HRs ----------- him 137
The magical 1,500 RBIs -------- him 734

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290 (Post 1528538)

OMG, lights out on this thread....Ott, Henderson, Speaker over Clemente?? I know when I'm whipped...Good night

Originally Posted by Leon (Post 1528305)

To me trolls aren't known, he is known and you aren't (publicly). If you want to make that comment your name needs to be by your post. That goes for everyone in this thread and on the board. I see a few comments in this thread that need their name by them. Either the member can edit out their comment, put their full name next to it, or I will help.

This is at the top of each page for a reason and folks can take it to include snarky comments too.

If you give an opinion of a person or company your full name needs to be in your post.

Make comments all you want to, but put your name next to your post. And don't follow members around the board making snarky comments. If you do it too often you will no longer be here.

I am with Brendan (post #47) with my thoughts on the question. I think it is a good question and a good debate in an open forum. Why not talk about it?

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290 (Post 1528543)

I'm sorry, my feelings are getting the best of me and I was hoping that some other members would come to my rescue. I think Clemente is one of the best players of all time (top 10). When you factor in his defense (12 straight gold gloves), best arm in the game, along with his bat, I think it's hard to argue. He seems to get too much praise for great deeds he did off the field, and that maybe hurts him in the stats world. Great topic, let's move on....

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290 (Post 1528543)

I'm sorry, my feelings are getting the best of me and I was hoping that some other members would come to my rescue. I think Clemente is one of the best players of all time (top 10). When you factor in his defense (12 straight gold gloves), best arm in the game, along with his bat, I think it's hard to argue. He seems to get too much praise for great deeds he did off the field, and that maybe hurts him in the stats world. Great topic, let's move on....

Originally Posted by Vintageclout (Post 1528599)

Kevin,

Clemente is truly one of baseball's premier outfielders/players, and you need no support to justify this. However, I do feel from the late 50's thru the mid 60's he was the FIFTH best outfielder in baseball, falling somewhat short of Mays, Mantle, Aaron and Frank Robinson. His defensive excellence unfortunately gets trumped by those player's far superior power, and keep in mind they were all formidable defensive outfielders. Great story for you. When Tom Seaver was called upon for the save in the 1967 All-Star game during his rookie season, he stated one of his greatest bseeball moments ever was even before he through his first pitch. After his warmups, he stepped behind the mound to rub up the ball and looked at an outfield of Clemente in right, Mays in center and Aaron in left! How about that supporting cast for a rookie pitcher!

JoeT.

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290 (Post 1528543)

I'm sorry, my feelings are getting the best of me and I was hoping that some other members would come to my rescue. I think Clemente is one of the best players of all time (top 10). When you factor in his defense (12 straight gold gloves), best arm in the game, along with his bat, I think it's hard to argue. He seems to get too much praise for great deeds he did off the field, and that maybe hurts him in the stats world. Great topic, let's move on....

Originally Posted by the 'stache (Post 1528608)

Frank Robinson was not a formidable defensive player. Not by any stretch of the imagination. He had one season with a positive dWAR, a 1.1 in 1957. His next best season, defensively, he had a dWAR of 0.0 in 1961, meaning he was at the level of a replacement level outfielder. Every other season, he had a negative dWAR. And for his career, his dWAR is -15.0

Clemente, on the other hand, has a 12.1 dWAR for his career, and I think that metric is on the conservative side.

And, while Robinson had the power advantage, if you compare their career WAR head to head, Clemente is actually the better player. Much of that has to do with how they ended their careers. While Robinson was God awful his last four season (4.3 WAR combined), Clemente was sensational (25.0 WAR).

Robinson's career WAR is 107.2. He played 2,808 games. He represents one win per 26.19 games played over his career.
Clemente's career WAR is 94.5. He played in 2,433 games. He represents one win per 25.74 games played over his career.

It's close, but Clemente's versatility edges Robinson's power.

Originally Posted by the 'stache (Post 1528608)

Frank Robinson was not a formidable defensive player. Not by any stretch of the imagination. He had one season with a positive dWAR, a 1.1 in 1957. His next best season, defensively, he had a dWAR of 0.0 in 1961, meaning he was at the level of a replacement level outfielder. Every other season, he had a negative dWAR. And for his career, his dWAR is -15.0

Clemente, on the other hand, has a 12.1 dWAR for his career, and I think that metric is on the conservative side.

And, while Robinson had the power advantage, if you compare their career WAR head to head, Clemente is actually the better player. Much of that has to do with how they ended their careers. While Robinson was God awful his last four season (4.3 WAR combined), Clemente was sensational (25.0 WAR).

Robinson's career WAR is 107.2. He played 2,808 games. He represents one win per 26.19 games played over his career.
Clemente's career WAR is 94.5. He played in 2,433 games. He represents one win per 25.74 games played over his career.

It's close, but Clemente's versatility edges Robinson's power.

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528630)

Can't find Bill James online but this is similar.

Taking on an icon is always dangerous, and I apologize up front for any feelings I offend. Also, let me acknowledge the obvious--i.e., that Roberto Clemente was a tremendous humanitarian who died by far the most heroic death of anyone in the MLB Hall of Fame, and probably of anyone in the history of baseball.

But is he an "overrated PLAYER"? Absolutely. In fact, I think that by current standards, he's the most overrated player of all time. And I am more than ready to make my case.

As Bill James says in his recent magnum opus--which rates the Top 100 of all time at each position, and the Top 100 of all time total, including Negro Leaugers (see Oscar Charleston)--Clemente never hit 30 HR's in a season, made a ton of throwing errors and had horrible strikeout-to-walk ratios. Yes, his batting average was often very high, but he would not take a walk, so his lifetime on-base-percentage was a mediocre .359.

Do you have any idea how many players, including nobodies like Gene Tenace and Mickey Tettleton, had better lifetime on-base percentages than .359? If you made a list of everyone, it would be enormous... probably over 500. And since Clemente averaged fewer than 14 HR's per season in his 18-year career--he played over 100 games in every season, too--he didn't make up for his mediocre on-base percentage with great power stats. Indeed, although he had the second-highest career triples total since WWII (behind Musial), his career slugging percentage was .475, miles behind Mays, Mantle and Aaron, which makes those oft-heard comparisons frankly a little difficult to swallow for those of us who saw and remember Mays, Mantle and Aaron.

And it doesn't end there.

Most experts consider either runs scored and RBI's, or slugging percentage and on-base percentage, the two most important stats in baseball. If you add up the number of times Clemente led the National League in any of those four stats, do you know what number you get? Try zero. That's right: Clemente never led the NL in ANY of those categories. Not once.

Now, for those of you not old enough to remember Forbes Field, let me acknowledge it gave Clemente a lot of his triples and cost him a lot of HR's. It was second only to Griffith Stadium (Washington's home park) as a bad park for hitters. But if you compensate for that, Clemente gets what, maybe 60-80 more HR's, for a career total of 300-320, and loses a bunch of those triples. It will not significantly alter his career numbers, except to perhaps give him a slugging title--whereas it would have hugely altered the numbers of the more powerful Willie Stargell, probably giving him 600 HR's.

So I think I've pretty well established that "Clemente the fearsome slugger" is hugely overrated, as are his batting titles. Don't you agree, in light of everything I've shown? I mean, assume that all the facts I've set forth above are accurate--which they are--and how do you deny that Clemente was not that great offensively?

As for baserunning, yeah, Clemente got his 166 triples, but he got only 440 doubles, and his career ratio of stolen bases to caught stealings was 83-46, which is less than 2-1 and not worth the effort--a fact not understood then, but well understood now.

That leaves Clemente the right fielder. First off, NO right fielder can be worth as much to a team as people make Clemente out to have been. Bill James and others have conclusively shown that hitting is more important than fielding, even for middle infielders. Read them. I didn't believe it at first, either, but it's inarguably true. Second, at left field, right field or first base, it isn't even close. Take the hitter over the fielder every time.

And Clemente wasn't as phenomenal and flawless a fielder as people make him out to have been. In fact, he may only have been the third best defensive right fielder born in the year 1934. His career fielding percentage, .973, was 12.5% WORSE than the league average. Hank Aaron's was 16.7% higher than the same league's average. Al Kaline's was 30% higher than the AL's average.

Now, I was around and a rabid fan back then, and I can assure you that yes, a lot of people really did stop at second or stop at third because of Clemente's arm. It was well worth the extra 12.5% of errors he made, and then some. There is a good case to be made--and James accepts the case--that Clemente was a better fielder than Kaline or Aaron. But certainly not by much. And James himself explains, at length, how limited the value of a right fielder's arm is, in the context of runs prevented per year. Take that number, subtract the number of runs allowed by the excess throwing errors, and we're not talking about that big a deal.

Meanwhile, in the case of Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, Frank Robinson and Mel Ott, we're talking about guys who created 5 to 10 times the number of extra runs on offense that Clemente saved in the field. It is my opinion that Tony Gwynn, Pete Rose (who played more games in RF than anywhere else), Reggie Jackson and Paul Waner were also clearly superior to Clemente as players, and that Dave Winfield and a couple of others probably were as well.

I will grant that Jackson, Waner and Winfield are matters about which reasonable baseball fans could disagree. I don't think Gwynn and Rose are, and I'm certain the first four aren't, and that's just in right field. In center field, not even counting some extremely talented current players, you have guys like Cobb, Speaker, Dimaggio, Mays and Mantle (chronologically arranged), none of whom Clemente was within 10 miles of as a player.

I hope someday I am as great a human being as Clemente was. I'm sure most people who read these things feel the same way about themselves. But the idea Clemente was one of the 10, 20 or 30 greatest players of all time is just silly, and a review of all relevant stats leaves no room for rational debate on the subject.

Was he a very good player? Yes. Does he belong in the Hall of Fame? Yes, but he's probably a below-average Hall of Famer, albeit nowhere NEAR as bad as Frankie Frisch's many pals, Lloyd Waner, Phil Rizzuto, etc., etc.

MLB has it right. They give an annual Roberto Clemente Humanitarian Award. That is as it should be. But if they are going to give awards for great right fielders, they must start with Ruth, Aaron, the greatly underrated Frank Robinson, Ott, at least a few others, and only then get to Clemente.

Sorry, but it's an inescapable fact.

Baseball History Nut

Originally Posted by Neal (Post 1528639)

Not the MLB HOF, but the National Baseball HOF.

Jackie, and other Negro League players who played there entire career in those leagues, are well deserving.

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528630)

-Clemente never hit 30 HR's in a season

Now, for those of you not old enough to remember Forbes Field, let me acknowledge it gave Clemente a lot of his triples and cost him a lot of HR's. It was second only to Griffith Stadium (Washington's home park) as a bad park for hitters. But if you compensate for that, Clemente gets what, maybe 60-80 more HR's, for a career total of 300-320, and loses a bunch of those triples. It will not significantly alter his career numbers, except to perhaps give him a slugging title--whereas it would have hugely altered the numbers of the more powerful Willie Stargell, probably giving him 600 HR's.

Originally Posted by rats60 (Post 1528650)

Willie Stargell hit 30 HRs once in Forbes Field, 33 in 1966. That season Clemente hit 29. That was the season that Harry Walker asked Clemente to try to hit home runs. Willie Stargell in his first full season in 3 Rivers Stadium hit 48 HRs and went on to hit more HRs than any other player in the 70s. The Pirates moved out of Forbes Field in the middle of 1970.

I agree that Stargell would have hit 600+ HRs if he had played in an average stadium his whole career. I think your estimate is very low for Clemente, I believe he could have hit 500. It has already been posted how far he could hit the ball. The HR of Sandy Koufax was the hardest hit ball and longest hit ball off Koufax, that is from Sandy himself. Clemente hit the only HR that really mattered, in game 7 of the 1971 World Series that led to a world championship. He could hit HRs when he wanted to.

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528653)

I forget if Bill James addressed the Forbes Field factor. The notion that he could hit HRs when he wanted to, though, strikes me as absurd. Who would NOT want to, ever?

Originally Posted by Rookiemonster (Post 1527924)

I was referring to his sprinting time .
Bolt would have beaten American Thomas Burke, the first gold medalist ever, by more nearly 20 meters, or over 60 feet. Jesse Owens? About 21 feet behind.a in 1913 and died in Arizona in 1980 was the most impressive athlete in the 1936 Berlin Olympics. He won 4 gold medals (100m, 200m, 4x100m and Long jump) and crushed the myth of Aryan supremacy in front of Hitler and the entire Nazi regime. One year before, at the 1935 Big Ten track, he managed to set three world records and tie another one in less than an hour.
Carl Lewis, also born in Alabama in 1961 was the first athlete to equal Owens record in a single Olympics: in 1984 he won 4 gold medals (100m, 200m, 4x100m and Long Jump). He was able to win gold medals in 4 different Olympics, for a total of 9 golds in his carreer. During his career he set world records in 100m, 4x100m and 4x200m and he is still holding the world record for indoor long jump (established in 1984).
Usain Bolt, born in Sherwood Content (Jamaica) in 1986 is the first athlete ever to hold both 100m and 200m world records since fully automatic time measurement became mandatory in 1977. He is currently holding 3 world records (100m, 200m and 4x100m). He is the first athlete to win 6 golds medal in sprint (Carl Lewis won 5 in sprint and 4 in Long jump). Not only did he break records, but he did it by large margins. For example, in 2009 he broke his own world record of 100m (from 9.69 to 9.58, the highest margin since the start of fully automatic time measurements).

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528670)

And Babe Ruth could have hit .750 if he weren't swinging for the fences. It's a meaningless argument. If Clemente intentionally sacrificed home runs for his batting average he was a very selfish player, and I don't believe that.

Originally Posted by Exhibitman (Post 1528797)

That argument is a fallacious one. Human beings do not evolve over a few decades; the tools they have to work with did. You cannot take athletes out of historical context and compare them across eras because training, medicine and nutrition have evolved so dramatically over the decades. In 1924 it was frowned upon to allow professional coaches to train Olympic athletes and the athletes were not full time athletes. Medical techniques were primitive and nutritional concepts were laughably wrong. Today, elite athletes do nothing but train and have access to a coterie of professional trainers, consultants and coaches. Strip Bolt of all of the advances of the last 70-80 years and see where he is; he might very well be the fastest man alive but I do not think that he would have blown by Jessie Owens Secretariat style.

Originally Posted by rats60 (Post 1528821)

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2015/12/...erto-clemente/

On more than one occasion, Clemente told sportswriters about the absurdity of trying to hit home runs in Forbes Field. In 1964, for example, Clemente told a sportswriter that “As long as I’m in Forbes Field I can’t go for home runs; line drives, yes.”

Walker was the manager of the Pirates in 1966. Before the season started, he went to Clemente and told him (according to the Wagenheim bio) “Roberto, I wish this year you would go for power, hit 25 homers and get 115 runs batted in. We will need it for the pennant.”

This all started a few years ago when Hall of Famer Duke Snider was on a New York radio station talking about, among others, the great Clemente. Clemente has always been considered an all-time great player, EXCEPT for that one fact — he didn’t have power. When the interviewer said what everybody has repeated through the years – that Clemente didn’t have power, that he only hit 240 home runs – Snider interrupted and said, with surprise in his voice, “Clemente had power. HE PLAYED IN AN AIRPORT.”

Kiner played one year, his first, at Forbes Field when it was an airport (the year before Hank Greenberg came to Pittsburgh). In that first year (old dimensions), Kiner hit 23 home runs. Then, with the advent of Greenberg Gardens, Kiner hit 51, 40, 54, 47, 42 and 37 in his next six seasons.

Kiner, according to The Baseball Biography Project, only hit eight home runs (of his 23) at Forbes Field in 1946.

Let that last one sink in. Ralph Kiner who led the NL in Home Runs for 7 straight years could only hit 8 HRs playing in Forbes Field with the dimensions Clemente faced, but you think he should have tried to hit more home runs. Sorry, but I have to agree with Roberto Clemente.

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528836)

He played half his games on the road. What happens if you double his road home runs?

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528630)

Most experts consider either runs scored and RBI's, or slugging percentage and on-base percentage, the two most important stats in baseball. If you add up the number of times Clemente led the National League in any of those four stats, do you know what number you get? Try zero. That's right: Clemente never led the NL in ANY of those categories. Not once.

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528653)

I forget if Bill James addressed the Forbes Field factor. The notion that he could hit HRs when he wanted to, though, strikes me as absurd. Who would NOT want to, ever?

Originally Posted by trdcrdkid (Post 1528842)

Clemente hit 138 of his 240 home runs on the road, so if you double that, you get 276.

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290 (Post 1528909)

Regardless of these posts (some of which make no sense), Clemente in my mind ranks as one of the top 10 players of all time overall that ever played....thanks

Originally Posted by ullmandds (Post 1528910)

makes sense to me!

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528670)

And Babe Ruth could have hit .750 if he weren't swinging for the fences. It's a meaningless argument. If Clemente intentionally sacrificed home runs for his batting average he was a very selfish player, and I don't believe that.

Originally Posted by rats60 (Post 1527746)

. I'll take a player who is great for 10 years over a Craig Biggio who is good but not great for long enough to get 3000 hits.

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1528630)

And Clemente wasn't as phenomenal and flawless a fielder as people make him out to have been. In fact, he may only have been the third best defensive right fielder born in the year 1934. His career fielding percentage, .973, was 12.5% WORSE than the league average. Hank Aaron's was 16.7% higher than the same league's average. Al Kaline's was 30% higher than the AL's average.

Originally Posted by BBB (Post 1528961)

And of course I agree that Jackies brief MLB stats combined with his negro league career make him a no brainier for the hall. Larry doby would be easier to pick on for statistical credentials.

Originally Posted by Tabe (Post 1528965)

You might want to double-check your math. If Clemente's .973 is 12.5% below average that would mean the average was 1.112 - not exactly possible.

Originally Posted by the 'stache (Post 1527826)

Sometimes, baseball players transcend simple statistical analysis. And Jackie Robinson is clearly one of those few men who do.

You don't seem to appreciate just how much pressure he was under. Death threats. Opposing players going out of their way to injure him during games. Fans, opposing players, coaches and managers calling him every vile name in the book. Of course, other team owners didn't want him to play, either. It was their "gentleman's agreement" that kept African Americans out of Major League Baseball. If the Jackie Robinson "experiment" didn't succeed, we might have never seen Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Roberto Clemente and a slew of other black or dark skinned Latin players in the Majors. They would have become other footnotes in history, joining the likes of Cool Papa Bell, Josh Gibson, Buck Leonard, and Satchel Paige (he only made it to the Majors at the very end of his career; we never saw how truly great he was in his prime). Robinson was not just playing for himself, his team, and the people of Brooklyn. He was playing for a people. Most people would wilt under that pressure. Jackie Robinson thrived, and he did it while being forced to turn the other cheek for the first two years of his career.

And to go back to the statistics, not every player needs to achieve some benchmark statistic to get into the Hall of Fame. And not every player who gets close to a benchmark deserves to get in, either. There are a good number of players who came close to 3,000 hits, or 500 home runs, that won't ever make Cooperstown. Robinson, of course, never approached those career benchmarks. But he is quite clearly one of the best, most exciting players the game has ever seen. He was incredibly disruptive as a base stealing threat. He was a phenomenal hitter (one who didn't strike out), had good power, and was sensational defensively.

To simplify it, look at WAR. A single season WAR of 8.0 or higher is considered an MVP caliber season. Of the ten seasons he played, three were clearly at an MVP level, and a fourth was very close to it. He was the Rookie of the Year in 1947 (the first to ever win the award). He had only a 3.3 WAR that season, however. The next five seasons, 1948 to 1952, he put up a combined 40.6 WAR. That's an average of 8.1 WAR per season. He averaged an MVP season for five years.

Compare his play to other second basemen of the live ball era (starting in 1920). Robinson played six of his ten seasons primarily at second base. In the 96 years of the Live Ball Era, Major League second baseman have reached a 7.0 WAR or higher a total of 66 times. Robinson has four of them. And his best two seasons? He had a 9.7 WAR in 1951 (and was 6th in the MVP vote!). Among all Major League baseball players of the last century, only Rogers Hornsby (six times) and Joe Morgan (once) have had a better season. And in 1949, he had a 9.6 WAR, winning the MVP. Joe Morgan's 9.6 is the only other season to get into the same elite level.

One last thing to consider. Of all Major League second basemen in the Live Ball Era who played at least 700 games at the keystone corner, Rogers Hornsby is the only one with a higher OPS + than Robinson. Hornsby had a 182 OPS +. Robinson and Joe Morgan each have career 132 OPS + marks. But in the seasons where Robinson was a second basemen, excluding his later seasons, he had a 137 OPS +. Higher than Rod Carew. Higher than Ryne Sandberg, Joe Morgan, Eddie Collins, Tony Lazzeri, Dustin Pedroia, Robinson Cano and Jeff Kent.

Robinson was awesome on the field, and his courage changed the game for the better.

Originally Posted by JTysver (Post 1529705)

That is inaccurate. Many games have no recorded box scores. This is a function not only of there not being box scores but also some of the newspapers which kept the box scores simply were not archived in the same way other newspapers were.

Originally Posted by Rookiemonster (Post 1527850)

What nobody is saying is this . Is Jackie Robinson was white would he be in the hall of fame ?

I do belive he is a hall of famer but not just because he was a good baseball player and great man .That being said how many great men are not in any type of hall of fame .