Which Player Do You Want?

[AndrewJerome]

More info:

Player A. B.
SLG. .579 .557
OPS .977 .977
OPS+ 155 172

Wild that they have same exact OPS. Peak will favor B, but that is a different exercise.

[Rad_Hazard]

I know who they are and this is a very fun exercise!

The answer is player A and I would not have expected that, but I also don't know as much about that era as I do the 19th century.

[Fred]

How can anybody make a decision on this if the WAR rating is not provided?


Player A = 74.5
Player B = 110.2

I like A, but B was pretty darned good.

[cgjackson222]

Originally Posted by Fred

How can anybody make a decision on this if the WAR rating is not provided?


Player A = 74.5
Player B = 110.2

I like A, but B was pretty darned good.

Interesting that they have the same career bWAR per 162 games of 7.4

B had a slightly higher Offensive bWAR, and a slightly lower defensive bWAR

If you use FanGraphs WAR, player A is 7.96 WAR per 162 games, and player B is 7.58 WAR per 162 games.

[robertsmithnocure]

Originally Posted by AndrewJerome

More info:

Player A. B.
SLG. .579 .557
OPS .977 .977
OPS+ 155 172

Wild that they have same exact OPS. Peak will favor B, but that is a different exercise.

I would take B with the higher OPS+.

[butchie_t]

Neither one, I cannot afford their salaries. ;-)

[rats60]

Originally Posted by AndrewJerome

More info:

Player A. B.
SLG. .579 .557
OPS .977 .977
OPS+ 155 172

Wild that they have same exact OPS. Peak will favor B, but that is a different exercise.

I would take DiMaggio's bat over Mantle's. That is without DiMaggio being a much better defensive fielder. He is everything you want in a middle of the lineup hitter, a guy who hits for a high average, .325, with power, a top 10 slugging percentage. This playing in Yankee Stadium which hurt righties power numbers. You also can add only 34 strikeouts to Mantle's 115.

This is the perfect example that exposes the flaws of OPS+ and WAR. These are only one person's opinion, they are not real stats, which I often disagree with.

[cgjackson222]

I think it's hard to make the case that DiMaggio was a better hitter than Mantle. Mantle was just much more dominant.
His black ink score is 62 to DiMaggio's 34.

Mantle led the League in Runs 5x, HRs 4x, OBP 3x, Slugging 4x, OPS 6x.
DiMaggio led the AL in Runs 1x, HRs 2x, OBP 0x, Slugging 1x, OPS 0x.

Mantle won the triple crown.

DiMaggio had 30 Stolen Bases in his career. Mantle had 23 in one season and 5x as many in his career.

Pretty much the only things DiMaggio had on Mantle was Batting Average (led the League 2x vs. Mantle's 1x), he never struck out, and he stayed healthier.

The exercise of comparing their career stats per 162 games is misleading because Mantle's body broke down and his career stats were watered down by his final years. It is almost as misleading as comparing their counting stats, which Mantle dominates.

Now if DiMaggio played at Fenway or some other place that was friendlier to Right Handers, maybe things would be different. Or if DiMaggio didn't serve in the military. But those are IFs.

[oldjudge]

Originally Posted by cgjackson222

I think it's hard to make the case that DiMaggio was a better hitter than Mantle. Mantle was just much more dominant.
His black ink score is 62 to DiMaggio's 34.

Mantle led the League in Runs 5x, HRs 4x, OBP 3x, Slugging 4x, OPS 6x.
DiMaggio led the AL in Runs 1x, HRs 2x, OBP 0x, Slugging 1x, OPS 0x.

Mantle won the triple crown.

DiMaggio had 30 Stolen Bases in his career. Mantle had 23 in one season and 5x as many in his career.

Pretty much the only things DiMaggio had on Mantle was Batting Average (led the League 2x vs. Mantle's 1x), he never struck out, and he stayed healthier.

The exercise of comparing their career stats per 162 games is misleading because Mantle's body broke down and his career stats were watered down by his final years. It is almost as misleading as comparing their counting stats, which Mantle dominates.

Now if DiMaggio played at Fenway or some other place that was friendlier to Right Handers, maybe things would be different. Or if DiMaggio didn't serve in the military. But those are IFs.

It's more than batting average, DiMaggio also dominated in RBI's and runs scored, two pretty important categories. DiMaggio lost three years in his prime because of the war and was not the same player when he returned that he was when he left. Although it is a moot point since they are close on HRs, I think HRs is a very overrated stat. A batters job is to create runs either by driving them in or scoring them. How he accomplishes this is secondary to how well he does this. DiMaggio was superior in both RBIs and runs scored.
As for their off field personalities after they retired neither was close to being a model citizen.

[cgjackson222]

Originally Posted by oldjudge

It's more than batting average, DiMaggio also dominated in RBI's and runs scored, two pretty important categories. DiMaggio lost three years in his prime because of the war and was not the same player when he returned that he was when he left. Although it is a moot point since they are close on HRs, I think HRs is a very overrated stat. A batters job is to create runs either by driving them in or scoring them. How he accomplishes this is secondary to how well he does this. DiMaggio was superior in both RBIs and runs scored.
As for their off field personalities after they retired neither was close to being a model citizen.

I listed Runs. DiMaggio led the League in Runs all of one time. Mantle led the League in Runs 5x. Why did this happen? One main reason is that Mantle led the League in OBP 5x and DiMaggio never did. Mantle also stole bases (7 top 10 finishes), and stole them at a high percentage (top 3 in the Leage in stolen base percentage each year from 1957 thru 1960).

Are you seriously saying that Home Runs are overrated but RBI's are not?

[Gorditadogg]

Originally Posted by oldjudge

It's more than batting average, DiMaggio also dominated in RBI's and runs scored, two pretty important categories. DiMaggio lost three years in his prime because of the war and was not the same player when he returned that he was when he left. Although it is a moot point since they are close on HRs, I think HRs is a very overrated stat. A batters job is to create runs either by driving them in or scoring them. How he accomplishes this is secondary to how well he does this. DiMaggio was superior in both RBIs and runs scored.

As for their off field personalities after they retired neither was close to being a model citizen.

Do you think Joe D was better at scoring and driving in runs, or do you think he just had more opportunities?

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[Gorditadogg]

Originally Posted by rats60

I would take DiMaggio's bat over Mantle's. That is without DiMaggio being a much better defensive fielder. He is everything you want in a middle of the lineup hitter, a guy who hits for a high average, .325, with power, a top 10 slugging percentage. This playing in Yankee Stadium which hurt righties power numbers. You also can add only 34 strikeouts to Mantle's 115.



This is the perfect example that exposes the flaws of OPS+ and WAR. These are only one person's opinion, they are not real stats, which I often disagree with.

Some might say the opposite, that WAR and OPS+ expose the flaws in people's subjective opinions.

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[Misunderestimated]

To the extent that I really understand its components I have one issue with WAR as the Uber Stat.... It only gives credit what a player does that a exceeds replacement value and actually subtracts what a player's performance does that does not meet this level.... Thus a players performance -- wha he actually achieved can be disregarded and sometimes used to negate his career achievements. In other words I don't accept the premise that value about replacement is the best indicator of career value.
It's just not the right way to assess achievement.....A bad season (or seasons) at the end of a career can actually detract from a players value. I think that what a player actually accomplishes should always have some positive value.
The end of Albert Pujols's career illustrates my point. During his last six years Pujols essentially flirted with a career WAR score of 100 -- a truly awesome achievement.*
Excepting his final miraculous season (2022) these last years (2017-21) were not good. Baseball reference gives him a Negative War score of 1.8.... But during these five seasons Pujols did actually hit over 85 HRs and score nearly 200 Runs (and he wasn't just a DH).. To me that "ain't nothing" -- it has to have some affirmative value in measuring Pujols's career. That's my quibble with WAR.

-------
At his retirement Pujols was just over 100 WAR (101.7)-- making him the 21st position player to reach 100 WAR ... The last guy to get there was AROD and the next will be Trout if he can keep up his performance for a few more years. If you remove the PED guys the last offensive player to make it to 100 WAR was Rickey Henderson.

[obcbobd]

Originally Posted by Misunderestimated

Excepting his final miraculous season (2022) these last years (2017-21) were not good. Baseball reference gives him a Negative War score of 1.8.... But during these five seasons Pujols did actually hit over 85 HRs and score nearly 200 Runs (and he wasn't just a DH).. To me that "ain't nothing" -- it has to have some affirmative value in measuring Pujols's career. That's my quibble with WAR.

Isn't WAR telling you that in those last years a replacement value player would have been better than Pujols? Therefore Pujol's playing, instead of a replacement player, hurt the team. Makes sense that he loses WAR points for that. Assuming the numbers are correct of course

[JollyElm]

Let me try to lower the temperature a little bit by posting a pic from our visit to The Yankee Clipper's birthplace site out here...

dimaggiobirthplace.jpg