Surprisingly low WAR

[Aquarian Sports Cards]

Originally Posted by Tabe

In a roundabout way, you're agreeing with me. His season adds up to being really impressive because his contemporaries sucked. If you moved him 70 feet to the right defensively, it would be just another in a long list of MVP-caliber seasons. Again, *50* extra base hits. That's just not impressive number. It was a borderline all-time great season - for a 2B. It's not even remotely in the conversation for greatest overall. Better than EVERY season from Ted Williams? Hard disagree.

That's because you're still hung up over only the traditional numbers. Morgan hit into a total of (without double checking) 5 double plays in those 2 seasons. He stole about 130 bases at an 85% clip and I imagine he stretched a lot of extra bases as a runner, tagging up going to third on a single etc.

Combine that with gold glove caliber defense (In 1975) at a premium position with excellent range vs Ted whose range was what was hit right at him and what Dom could get to in left field and I imagine that Joe was worth more wins to his team in 1975 than Ted in his best season.

Look at it this way. Ted's OWAR was often higher than his WAR. Joe's only was in the second half of his career (amazingly beginning in 1976 which would explain the drop in his total WAR for what appears to be an offensively superior season)

Morgan's best OWAR seasons, while impressive, don't compare with Ted's best. It's just that there's more than offense to the game.

If you want to discuss the best OFFENSIVE players of all-time might I point you in this direction:

https://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=350700