So who was better ( Kaline or Clemente) ?

[profholt82]

These guys are so close, both the cornerstone of their teams for many years. Both at 3000 hits(well, 1307 to 1300, but come on). Clemente with the higher career BA (.297 to .317), but Kaline with a lot more HR and RBI (399/1583 to 240/1305). So I think batting is about a wash. Both were excellent fielders with double digit Golden Glove seasons.

Kaline
18 All Star
10 Golden Gloves
1 Batting Championship
0 MVP, although it's easy to argue he had a better 1955 campaign than winner Yogi Berra when you https://www.baseball-reference.com/a..._AL_MVP_voting. Pound sign Yankees bias. Ha!

Clemente
15 All Star
12 Golden Gloves
4 Batting Championships
1 MVP


Let's get into the weeds a bit...

Kaline
1277 Bases on Balls
137 Stolen Bases
65 Caught Stealing

Clemente
623 Bases on Balls
83 Stolen Bases
46 Caught Stealing

Deep Dive statistical comparison:
https://stathead.com/baseball/player...um=0&request=1


In their careers, Kaline played for 22 seasons, 2834 games. Clemente played 18 seasons, 2433 games. And it's worth noting that Kaline's final two seasons fell off dramatically, batting .255 and .262 those years with no Golden Gloves. Meanwhile, Clemente batted .341 and .312 his final two years with Golden Gloves in both. With his tragic demise at 37, we can only guess at what it would have been had he played for 3 or 4 more years. It is worth pointing out that in Kaline's 3rd to last season, he was 37 and batted .313.


So what does all of this information tell me? That it's impossible to say which one is better. They were both excellent, among the greatest players of all time. Both in the hitting and fielding conversations. Even looking purely at statistics, it's practically impossible to choose, they're so close.