HOF Numbers Game: The Accumulators
 

Not flashy, they just keep going. Players who had long, productive careers. Where do they stack up against each other?

In my opinion, the 'most accomplished' accumulators are:

1. Eddie Murray
2. Adrian Beltre
3. Tony Perez
4. Harold Baines

The cynic's question: If you were well paid to do so, would you stick around and reap whatever glory comes just from black and white statistics?

Heck Yeah!

Comments?


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While a lot of people sort of dismiss the accumulators, I think it's much harder for a player to pull off than we think.

Basically, a player has to want to keep playing, be good enough AND affordable enough that he doesn't get replaced. And also has to be liked enough that he doesn't get replaced.


As things move more towards complex modern stats, I believe that gets much tougher. A player in his last few years is usually pretty much average. So teams will be more likely to replace them with someone at least equally average but at a price that's a few million a year less.

It's also less likely that a player who's already made maybe 100 million will want to stick around putting in the effort it takes to stay at the big league level. Especially if they end up with one of those nagging injuries.


Not that there won't be players like that, or ones that stick around for as many extra years they can get because they love playing, just that they will become less common.

Other accumulators: Molitor maybe? Yaz, to some extent. Vizquel for sure. Colon. Moyer. Kaat.

Biggio


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I understand your point, but I would never consider Yaz an accumulator...just because of that 1967 Season! Wow! Was that something special?


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Ray yeah but if you look beyond the mystique, Yaz had an awful lot of decent but not outstanding seasons that eventually added up.

Yount comes to mind

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If the 'Stache sees this all hell will break loose.:D

Don’t forget Gorman Thomas and Cecil Cooper.:D

And the innocent Ryan Braun.

Hank Aaron is the all time king of accumulators. Led the league in home runs only 4 years out of 23. RBI's: 4 times. Hits: twice. Doubles: 4 times

Not saying he wasn't awesome though - because he accumulated all star level stats for at least 20 of his 23 years. But never hit 50 home runs. Never won the triple crown.

In Hank's defense, you could take chop off several seasons off his career and IMO he'd still be a First Ballot Hall-of-Famer. That cannot be said of the others I have designated 'accumulators'.


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If Aaron is an accumulator, which player is not an accumulator?

I'm not going to knock a player because they didn't hit 50 homers or win a triple crown.

" He's ( Aaron ) the King of accumulators, but not saying he wasn't awesome though ". Your words. This is either a backhanded compliment or conflicting statements.

If you want to play the stats game, Aaron hit 40 or more homers in 8 seasons, had 100 or more rbi's in 11 seasons with 5 additional seasons of 90 or more rbi's, led the league in hits twice and 2 batting crowns.

Mantle, btw, only had 4 seasons of 100 rbi's and led the league 1 time in the category over an 18 year career. 4 years of 40 or more homers, never led the league in hits and 1 batting crown.

I refer to Mantle in comparison because of his status.

Both Aaron and Mantle are all-time greats and I wouldn't label either as an accumulator. However, to each their own......

Winfield sort of fits the accumulator category.

To me, an accumulater is someone who would not be a HOFer except that they hit a magical stat (3000 hits, 300 wins, etc. The 2 players that come to my mind are Craig Biggio and Don Sutton.

When he hit .301?

Was surprised it took this long for Sutton's name to come up. Won 300+ games, but career ERA+ of 108.

I guess what Sutton has going for him is that there are others in the Hall who were not as good and didn't accumulate as much. (Hard to understand how Morris, Marquard, Catfish Hunter and a few others made it)

Lineup card from Sutton's final MLB win

Aww Peter.... Busting on Mr. May? …. :D

I think a lot of whether a player who might be borderline gets in or not comes down to exactly when they retire, and who retires during the next 5 years or the couple years before they did.

Dwight Evans would be borderline, and I was really hoping he'd get in. He fell just short of 400 HR, which at the time was almost automatic. But after a couple years on the ballot there was a year with something like 3 first ballot guys and a couple maybe first/second, which took away enough votes that he was dropped.

Guess we can talk about Harold Baines here now.

Kind of fitting he gets in along with Lee Smith since January will likely bring two other players prominently known for being a designated hitter and reliever.

Wow! Uh, No!

He won the Triple Crown and led the Red Sox to their first pennant in 21 years.

Led the league in the following categories:

R-112; H-189; HR-44(tied); RBI- 121; BA- .326; OBP- .418; SLG- .622; OPS- 1.040; OPS+- 193; TB- 360; WAR- 12.5

His Sept/Oct slash was .417/.504/.760

Boston lost WS in 7, but Yaz's line was 24AB-10H-3HR-5RIBI .400/.500/.840

Definitely Not an Accumulator's type year.



He hit .301 the following year leading the league and also leading with 119 walks.


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When he was playing, I would say Brett Favre was the best quarterback active. It could be reasonably argued there were better on the field players, but Favre played every game and even an average quarterback in the game is worth more than Johnny Unitas or Dan Marino on the sideline. Plus, he was a great quarterback anyway.

So longevity and games played is itself a desirable quality to the team. Though that's not to be confused with me saying that longevity and "accumulation" make a player a HOFer. I certainly don't think Harold Baines is a HOFer, no matter how many years and games he played.

Not fair to Biggio to call him an accumulator or compare him to DH Baines without a positional adjustment.

Not much below the average 2b peak or career in the HOF:
65.5 career WAR / 41.8 7yr-peak WAR / 53.7 JAWS
Average HOF 2B (out of 20):
69.5 career WAR / 44.5 7yr-peak WAR / 57.0 JAWS

IMO, Comparing longevity in Football and Baseball is like...well...

Comparing Apples and Zagnut Bars. :rolleyes:

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Baines OPS + 121 Biggio OPS + 112. If Baines is an accumulator, as most would agree, then so are those who were worse hitters. Using Baines hit total as the floor, you get

Baines 121
Pete Rose 118
Beltre 116
Jeter 115
Yount 115
Biggio 112
Sam Rice 112
Ripken 112
Frisch 110
Brock 109
Ichiro 107
Vizquel 82

Molitor was one of the most exciting guys to play the game. And, had he not been injured so often early in his career, he'd have challenged Cobb's all-time hits record.

If Molitor is a compiler, so was Pete Rose.

Yaz? I can see it, but for a time, he was probably the best player in the game. The problem is that the second half of his career wasn't exceptional. But if we're talking a combination of both offense and defense, in his prime, he was fantastic.

Yount's inarguably one of the top five shortstops to ever play the game. And before he hurt his shoulder, he was one of the top two or three players in baseball. Shortstops just didn't hit for that kind of power, and play incredible defense, at the same time. You had guys like Ernie Banks who could crush the ball, and was pretty good with the glove, but he couldn't do all the things Yount could. Wagner is the Gold standard. But after that, Yount's not far behind anyone else who's ever played the position.

There's NO comparison between Baines and Yount. None. Baines, in 22 seasons (20 full ones) finished 9th and 10th in the MVP. Yount was an MVP at short and center field, two of the three toughest defensive positions in baseball. Baines by no stretch of the imagination should be a Hall of Famer, and that he is in now further waters down what has become a joke.

And nowhere have I ever said that Ryan Braun was innocent. He screwed up, broke the rules, and deserved to be suspended. The narrative I've always pushed was that he didn't need PEDs to be a great player, and that he didn't take a PED. He took a banned substance to heal an injury. Dumb, and illegal, per baseball's rules, but not the same thing as a performance enhancer. Before he had the nerve damage in his hand, he was one of the very best hitters in baseball. After his positive test, and with baseball testing him/watching him under a microscope, he put up a season nearly as good as his 2011 MVP one. Led the league NL in home runs, and with a .987 OPS, only 7 points lower than the prior season.

In defense of Yount, his first 700 games, he had an 89 OPS. He was a full-time player at age 18, long before medicine and training had guys hitting the ground running at such a young age. He didn't know if he wanted to be a baseball player, or a golfer. Once he decided, and started adding weight training to his exercise regiment, he took off. From age 24 to 34, he was a .305 hitter, and OPS +'d 135. For those ten seasons, his 162 game averages: 108 runs scored, 194 hits, 38 doubles, 10 triples, 20 home runs, 92 RBI, 17 stolen bases, .365/.485/.850. Considering, especially, that this is between 1980 and 1989, those numbers for a shortstop/center fielder are pretty exceptional.

Yaz had two great years, 67 and 70. Other than those years and a pretty good year in 69 though his BA went way down, the first half of his career wasn't so spectacular either.

His first 6 years and last 4 years he was an average hitter. That is half his career. The middle 10 years he had an OPS+ of 135 3 seasons. No doubt a Hofer, but Arky Vaughan had a career OPS+ of 136 and he played 85% of his games at shortstop.

The problem with ALL PED guys is that you never know exactly when they STARTED - and once he was caught, he lied like a rug.

A BUM!

I question ALL of his stats!


I agree with you on Yount and Molitor - GREAT, EXCITING HOF players!

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