Quote:
Originally Posted by jsfriedm
What's the evidence for Cobb having been a terrific outfielder? I don't necessarily love WAR's defensive metrics, especially going that far back, but Baseball Reference has Cobb as being worth negative defensive WAR almost every year of his career, and -10.8 total.
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I believe in Charles Leerhsen's thorough research on Cobb, whom he credits as being an excellent fielder. He details Cobb as having had a tremendous arm, a good glove, and of course outstanding speed in tracking a baseball. Those WAR numbers don't always tell the correct story. Oddball rules and misinterpretations of errors could have accounted for those.