Why is Jackie Robinson in the HOF?

[CMIZ5290]

Originally Posted by Enfuego

Roberto Clemente is in the same boat regarding this topic.


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What???? There are some dumb people on this board....

[CMIZ5290]

Originally Posted by Enfuego

Roberto Clemente is in the same boat regarding this topic.


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This might be the dumbest post I have ever read. Clemente? Really??

[CMIZ5290]

Addie Joss quick stats... 160-95 W-L record, 45 shutouts, career ERA 1.89....Yeah, he's overrated

[Thromdog]

I didn't read through this thread so I'll just say Ozzie Smith and Bill Mazeroski.

Intangibles and great gloves, stats be damned.

JR had good stats, but doing what he did and the inspiration he has been makes him HOF material in my mind.

Well deserved and beyond worthy.

[howard38]

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290

This might be the dumbest post I have ever read. Clemente? Really??

The post was a little vague so it depends on what he meant. Clemente certainly got into the hall of fame at least five years early for reasons unrelated to stats and Robinson likely got in earlier than he otherwise would have based on his stats alone. Also, more than any other players, questioning their place among the all-time greats really seems to piss a lot of people off. They both definitely belong in the HOF though.

[CMIZ5290]

Originally Posted by howard38

The post was a little vague so it depends on what he meant. Clemente certainly got into the hall of fame at least five years early for reasons unrelated to stats and Robinson likely got in earlier than he otherwise would have based on his stats alone. Also, more than any other players, questioning their place among the all-time greats really seems to piss a lot of people off. They both definitely belong in the HOF though.

Possibly his post was. But how in the World can anyone question Clemente as a HOFer? He had 3,000 hits, and the best arm in baseball that I've ever seen....As a young kid in Atlanta, I saw him throw out Ralph Garr of the Braves who was arguably the fastest man in the game. The ball was hit to the warning track and Clemente caught the ball and threw a bullet that did not even bounce! The catcher caught the ball standing on the plate and tagged Garr out...Everybody in the stadium buzzed about that play for 30 minutes...Milo Hamilton said it was the best throw he had ever seen or ever will see....Oh, and by the way, his rookie card just keeps going thru the roof!

[frankbmd]

Originally Posted by CMIZ5290

Possibly his post was. But how in the World can anyone question Clemente as a HOFer? He had 3,000 hits, and the best arm in baseball that I've ever seen....As a young kid in Atlanta, I saw him throw out Ralph Garr of the Braves who was arguably the fastest man in the game. The ball was hit to the warning track and Clemente caught the ball and threw a bullet that did not even bounce! The catcher caught the ball standing on the plate and tagged Garr out...Everybody in the stadium buzzed about that play for 30 minutes...Milo Hamilton said it was the best throw he had ever seen or ever will see....Oh, and by the way, his rookie card just keeps going thru the roof (if it's in a PSA holder)!

[Terrier8HOF]

it is not purely based on stats. if it were, Pete Rose would be in, and so would McGwire, Clemens, Bonds and several others from "the steroid era".

[steve B]

Originally Posted by Joshchisox08

The magical 3,000 hits --------- him 1,518
The magical 500 HRs ----------- him 137
The magical 1,500 RBIs -------- him 734

Ok, looking at just those numbers.

3000 hits.

Rafael Palmeiro is the only player over 3000 that I think is unlikely to make the hall. Still a chance with the veterans committee, or whatever they'll have in a few years, but he's dropped off the ballot. He's also over the other two numbers with 569 HR and 1835 RBI.
The others over 3000 but not in are Rose, Jeter, and Arod. I figure Jeter and Arod will get in, Jeter quickly, Arod maybe eventually. Rose......Lets not go there and make this even more confusing. Should be based on stats, isn't but maybe someday.

500 HR.

There's a few guys over 500 who aren't in. PEDs are the stumbling block for most of them. Others are either still active or aren't eligible yet. I think a few of them will eventually get in.
That number used to be 400.
And that makes it more interesting. It was only fairly recently that there were players with more than 400 HR who didn't make the hall.
Darrell Evans 414
Juan Gonzalez 434
Dave Kingman 442
Jeff Bagwell 449
Jose Canseco 462
Fred McGriff 493

Plus a bunch of guys who aren't eligible yet or are still on the ballot.
McGriff not being in sort of surprises me, but maybe the steroids era really made 500 the special number.
Bagwell may still be on the ballot? I thought there was a limit to how many years someone could be on, and he's been on 6 years.

The other guys all had other things keeping them out. Canseco was a truly bad fielder, and had PED issues, although I think some of the knock against him is that he's been open about that which makes some people uncomfortable. Most of the others simply were too one dimensional, not having much besides HR power. Especially Kingman who I liked as a player. He did almost become the first player to hit 40HR while batting under .200 but had a late season streak of normal hitting and "ruined" it ending up at 37/.204 I always wanted the RedSox to sign him. If they had we'd all be wondering if even steroids could beat the single season record of 90 - Short left field at Fenway, and the wall being no obstruction to a guy who hit a load of 360 ft popups.

1500 Rbi

Mostly the same guys above, plus
Harold Baines 1628

Again leaving out guys who could still get in.

Baines is an odd one, I'd think he should be in, but probably isn't because he wasn't really amazing, just a player who was average or above for 20 years with a few better seasons


I don't think most of those guys would be remotely close to Jackie Robinson, I haven't looked at comparing all the 162 game averages, but I'd bet there are very few that would even get close. Maybe Bagwell?174 hits /34/115/.297 Robinson 178 hits/16/86/.311 Ok, so he's close, more power, less average but pretty close. And I think Bagwell will eventually be in.


Steve B

[jason.1969]

I think the OP asks a very fair question and only differ with the PC angle he brings in. When Jackie was inducted, we were a long way from PC. And baseball wasn't exactly an island of PC within a broader racist ocean. Reading the book, "After Jackie," you can see just how hard baseball was for guys like Dick Allen and Curt Flood who came up more even with Jackie's election.

But if we limit ourselves only to to MLB stats (which also would exclude nearly all Negro League inductees), Robinson is certainly no Ruth.

I would guess that had a white ballplayer posted identical stats to Jackie Robinson in that same era, played similar positions, and enjoyed similar team success, he would have indeed made the HOF eventually but not as soon.

So yes, I believe that Jackie Robinson's being black impacted his HOF standing. However, I don't think voters were giving charity here; I think they recognized his being black carried legitimate X Factors that supported his case as a HOFer.

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[Peter_Spaeth]

Can't find Bill James online but this is similar.

Taking on an icon is always dangerous, and I apologize up front for any feelings I offend. Also, let me acknowledge the obvious--i.e., that Roberto Clemente was a tremendous humanitarian who died by far the most heroic death of anyone in the MLB Hall of Fame, and probably of anyone in the history of baseball.

But is he an "overrated PLAYER"? Absolutely. In fact, I think that by current standards, he's the most overrated player of all time. And I am more than ready to make my case.

As Bill James says in his recent magnum opus--which rates the Top 100 of all time at each position, and the Top 100 of all time total, including Negro Leaugers (see Oscar Charleston)--Clemente never hit 30 HR's in a season, made a ton of throwing errors and had horrible strikeout-to-walk ratios. Yes, his batting average was often very high, but he would not take a walk, so his lifetime on-base-percentage was a mediocre .359.

Do you have any idea how many players, including nobodies like Gene Tenace and Mickey Tettleton, had better lifetime on-base percentages than .359? If you made a list of everyone, it would be enormous... probably over 500. And since Clemente averaged fewer than 14 HR's per season in his 18-year career--he played over 100 games in every season, too--he didn't make up for his mediocre on-base percentage with great power stats. Indeed, although he had the second-highest career triples total since WWII (behind Musial), his career slugging percentage was .475, miles behind Mays, Mantle and Aaron, which makes those oft-heard comparisons frankly a little difficult to swallow for those of us who saw and remember Mays, Mantle and Aaron.

And it doesn't end there.

Most experts consider either runs scored and RBI's, or slugging percentage and on-base percentage, the two most important stats in baseball. If you add up the number of times Clemente led the National League in any of those four stats, do you know what number you get? Try zero. That's right: Clemente never led the NL in ANY of those categories. Not once.

Now, for those of you not old enough to remember Forbes Field, let me acknowledge it gave Clemente a lot of his triples and cost him a lot of HR's. It was second only to Griffith Stadium (Washington's home park) as a bad park for hitters. But if you compensate for that, Clemente gets what, maybe 60-80 more HR's, for a career total of 300-320, and loses a bunch of those triples. It will not significantly alter his career numbers, except to perhaps give him a slugging title--whereas it would have hugely altered the numbers of the more powerful Willie Stargell, probably giving him 600 HR's.

So I think I've pretty well established that "Clemente the fearsome slugger" is hugely overrated, as are his batting titles. Don't you agree, in light of everything I've shown? I mean, assume that all the facts I've set forth above are accurate--which they are--and how do you deny that Clemente was not that great offensively?

As for baserunning, yeah, Clemente got his 166 triples, but he got only 440 doubles, and his career ratio of stolen bases to caught stealings was 83-46, which is less than 2-1 and not worth the effort--a fact not understood then, but well understood now.

That leaves Clemente the right fielder. First off, NO right fielder can be worth as much to a team as people make Clemente out to have been. Bill James and others have conclusively shown that hitting is more important than fielding, even for middle infielders. Read them. I didn't believe it at first, either, but it's inarguably true. Second, at left field, right field or first base, it isn't even close. Take the hitter over the fielder every time.

And Clemente wasn't as phenomenal and flawless a fielder as people make him out to have been. In fact, he may only have been the third best defensive right fielder born in the year 1934. His career fielding percentage, .973, was 12.5% WORSE than the league average. Hank Aaron's was 16.7% higher than the same league's average. Al Kaline's was 30% higher than the AL's average.

Now, I was around and a rabid fan back then, and I can assure you that yes, a lot of people really did stop at second or stop at third because of Clemente's arm. It was well worth the extra 12.5% of errors he made, and then some. There is a good case to be made--and James accepts the case--that Clemente was a better fielder than Kaline or Aaron. But certainly not by much. And James himself explains, at length, how limited the value of a right fielder's arm is, in the context of runs prevented per year. Take that number, subtract the number of runs allowed by the excess throwing errors, and we're not talking about that big a deal.

Meanwhile, in the case of Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, Frank Robinson and Mel Ott, we're talking about guys who created 5 to 10 times the number of extra runs on offense that Clemente saved in the field. It is my opinion that Tony Gwynn, Pete Rose (who played more games in RF than anywhere else), Reggie Jackson and Paul Waner were also clearly superior to Clemente as players, and that Dave Winfield and a couple of others probably were as well.

I will grant that Jackson, Waner and Winfield are matters about which reasonable baseball fans could disagree. I don't think Gwynn and Rose are, and I'm certain the first four aren't, and that's just in right field. In center field, not even counting some extremely talented current players, you have guys like Cobb, Speaker, Dimaggio, Mays and Mantle (chronologically arranged), none of whom Clemente was within 10 miles of as a player.

I hope someday I am as great a human being as Clemente was. I'm sure most people who read these things feel the same way about themselves. But the idea Clemente was one of the 10, 20 or 30 greatest players of all time is just silly, and a review of all relevant stats leaves no room for rational debate on the subject.

Was he a very good player? Yes. Does he belong in the Hall of Fame? Yes, but he's probably a below-average Hall of Famer, albeit nowhere NEAR as bad as Frankie Frisch's many pals, Lloyd Waner, Phil Rizzuto, etc., etc.

MLB has it right. They give an annual Roberto Clemente Humanitarian Award. That is as it should be. But if they are going to give awards for great right fielders, they must start with Ruth, Aaron, the greatly underrated Frank Robinson, Ott, at least a few others, and only then get to Clemente.

Sorry, but it's an inescapable fact.

Baseball History Nut

[Vintageclout]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Can't find Bill James online but this is similar.

Taking on an icon is always dangerous, and I apologize up front for any feelings I offend. Also, let me acknowledge the obvious--i.e., that Roberto Clemente was a tremendous humanitarian who died by far the most heroic death of anyone in the MLB Hall of Fame, and probably of anyone in the history of baseball.

But is he an "overrated PLAYER"? Absolutely. In fact, I think that by current standards, he's the most overrated player of all time. And I am more than ready to make my case.

As Bill James says in his recent magnum opus--which rates the Top 100 of all time at each position, and the Top 100 of all time total, including Negro Leaugers (see Oscar Charleston)--Clemente never hit 30 HR's in a season, made a ton of throwing errors and had horrible strikeout-to-walk ratios. Yes, his batting average was often very high, but he would not take a walk, so his lifetime on-base-percentage was a mediocre .359.

Do you have any idea how many players, including nobodies like Gene Tenace and Mickey Tettleton, had better lifetime on-base percentages than .359? If you made a list of everyone, it would be enormous... probably over 500. And since Clemente averaged fewer than 14 HR's per season in his 18-year career--he played over 100 games in every season, too--he didn't make up for his mediocre on-base percentage with great power stats. Indeed, although he had the second-highest career triples total since WWII (behind Musial), his career slugging percentage was .475, miles behind Mays, Mantle and Aaron, which makes those oft-heard comparisons frankly a little difficult to swallow for those of us who saw and remember Mays, Mantle and Aaron.

And it doesn't end there.

Most experts consider either runs scored and RBI's, or slugging percentage and on-base percentage, the two most important stats in baseball. If you add up the number of times Clemente led the National League in any of those four stats, do you know what number you get? Try zero. That's right: Clemente never led the NL in ANY of those categories. Not once.

Now, for those of you not old enough to remember Forbes Field, let me acknowledge it gave Clemente a lot of his triples and cost him a lot of HR's. It was second only to Griffith Stadium (Washington's home park) as a bad park for hitters. But if you compensate for that, Clemente gets what, maybe 60-80 more HR's, for a career total of 300-320, and loses a bunch of those triples. It will not significantly alter his career numbers, except to perhaps give him a slugging title--whereas it would have hugely altered the numbers of the more powerful Willie Stargell, probably giving him 600 HR's.

So I think I've pretty well established that "Clemente the fearsome slugger" is hugely overrated, as are his batting titles. Don't you agree, in light of everything I've shown? I mean, assume that all the facts I've set forth above are accurate--which they are--and how do you deny that Clemente was not that great offensively?

As for baserunning, yeah, Clemente got his 166 triples, but he got only 440 doubles, and his career ratio of stolen bases to caught stealings was 83-46, which is less than 2-1 and not worth the effort--a fact not understood then, but well understood now.

That leaves Clemente the right fielder. First off, NO right fielder can be worth as much to a team as people make Clemente out to have been. Bill James and others have conclusively shown that hitting is more important than fielding, even for middle infielders. Read them. I didn't believe it at first, either, but it's inarguably true. Second, at left field, right field or first base, it isn't even close. Take the hitter over the fielder every time.

And Clemente wasn't as phenomenal and flawless a fielder as people make him out to have been. In fact, he may only have been the third best defensive right fielder born in the year 1934. His career fielding percentage, .973, was 12.5% WORSE than the league average. Hank Aaron's was 16.7% higher than the same league's average. Al Kaline's was 30% higher than the AL's average.

Now, I was around and a rabid fan back then, and I can assure you that yes, a lot of people really did stop at second or stop at third because of Clemente's arm. It was well worth the extra 12.5% of errors he made, and then some. There is a good case to be made--and James accepts the case--that Clemente was a better fielder than Kaline or Aaron. But certainly not by much. And James himself explains, at length, how limited the value of a right fielder's arm is, in the context of runs prevented per year. Take that number, subtract the number of runs allowed by the excess throwing errors, and we're not talking about that big a deal.

Meanwhile, in the case of Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, Frank Robinson and Mel Ott, we're talking about guys who created 5 to 10 times the number of extra runs on offense that Clemente saved in the field. It is my opinion that Tony Gwynn, Pete Rose (who played more games in RF than anywhere else), Reggie Jackson and Paul Waner were also clearly superior to Clemente as players, and that Dave Winfield and a couple of others probably were as well.

I will grant that Jackson, Waner and Winfield are matters about which reasonable baseball fans could disagree. I don't think Gwynn and Rose are, and I'm certain the first four aren't, and that's just in right field. In center field, not even counting some extremely talented current players, you have guys like Cobb, Speaker, Dimaggio, Mays and Mantle (chronologically arranged), none of whom Clemente was within 10 miles of as a player.

I hope someday I am as great a human being as Clemente was. I'm sure most people who read these things feel the same way about themselves. But the idea Clemente was one of the 10, 20 or 30 greatest players of all time is just silly, and a review of all relevant stats leaves no room for rational debate on the subject.

Was he a very good player? Yes. Does he belong in the Hall of Fame? Yes, but he's probably a below-average Hall of Famer, albeit nowhere NEAR as bad as Frankie Frisch's many pals, Lloyd Waner, Phil Rizzuto, etc., etc.

MLB has it right. They give an annual Roberto Clemente Humanitarian Award. That is as it should be. But if they are going to give awards for great right fielders, they must start with Ruth, Aaron, the greatly underrated Frank Robinson, Ott, at least a few others, and only then get to Clemente.

Sorry, but it's an inescapable fact.

Baseball History Nut

Hi Peter it's JoeT and one of your points struck home with me regarding the significance of offense vs. Defense. I have been coaching for nearly 30 years and have coached many professional ballplayers. During that tenure I have had the distinct honor of meeting and building relationships with a myriad of pro scouts and the consensus is ALWAYS THE SAME: "Show me a player who can crush the baseball and we will FIND a position for him"! There is no substitute for a world class slugger who can hit for average and power.

[rats60]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

-Clemente never hit 30 HR's in a season

Now, for those of you not old enough to remember Forbes Field, let me acknowledge it gave Clemente a lot of his triples and cost him a lot of HR's. It was second only to Griffith Stadium (Washington's home park) as a bad park for hitters. But if you compensate for that, Clemente gets what, maybe 60-80 more HR's, for a career total of 300-320, and loses a bunch of those triples. It will not significantly alter his career numbers, except to perhaps give him a slugging title--whereas it would have hugely altered the numbers of the more powerful Willie Stargell, probably giving him 600 HR's.

Willie Stargell hit 30 HRs once in Forbes Field, 33 in 1966. That season Clemente hit 29. That was the season that Harry Walker asked Clemente to try to hit home runs. Willie Stargell in his first full season in 3 Rivers Stadium hit 48 HRs and went on to hit more HRs than any other player in the 70s. The Pirates moved out of Forbes Field in the middle of 1970.

I agree that Stargell would have hit 600+ HRs if he had played in an average stadium his whole career. I think your estimate is very low for Clemente, I believe he could have hit 500. It has already been posted how far he could hit the ball. The HR of Sandy Koufax was the hardest hit ball and longest hit ball off Koufax, that is from Sandy himself. Clemente hit the only HR that really mattered, in game 7 of the 1971 World Series that led to a world championship. He could hit HRs when he wanted to.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by rats60

Willie Stargell hit 30 HRs once in Forbes Field, 33 in 1966. That season Clemente hit 29. That was the season that Harry Walker asked Clemente to try to hit home runs. Willie Stargell in his first full season in 3 Rivers Stadium hit 48 HRs and went on to hit more HRs than any other player in the 70s. The Pirates moved out of Forbes Field in the middle of 1970.

I agree that Stargell would have hit 600+ HRs if he had played in an average stadium his whole career. I think your estimate is very low for Clemente, I believe he could have hit 500. It has already been posted how far he could hit the ball. The HR of Sandy Koufax was the hardest hit ball and longest hit ball off Koufax, that is from Sandy himself. Clemente hit the only HR that really mattered, in game 7 of the 1971 World Series that led to a world championship. He could hit HRs when he wanted to.

I forget if Bill James addressed the Forbes Field factor. The notion that he could hit HRs when he wanted to, though, strikes me as absurd. Who would NOT want to, ever?

[Peter_Spaeth]

Clemente hit 240 by the way. Changing parks does not get him to 500. No way.

[rats60]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

I forget if Bill James addressed the Forbes Field factor. The notion that he could hit HRs when he wanted to, though, strikes me as absurd. Who would NOT want to, ever?

Why did Harry Walker have to ask Clemente to try to hit HRs? Clemente valued hitting for a high average over trying to hit HRs. Just because you think every player should try to hit HRs doesn't mean every player does. Clemente was quoted as saying he didn't want to hit HRs because it would hurt his average because of Forbes Field.

What I find absurd is saying that one player could hit 600 HRs and another only 300 when head to head it was 33 to 29. If Clemente could hit 29 HRs when he tried to in the most difficult park in the NL, why couldn't average that in an average park if he wanted to?

Also in regards to Clemente's fielding percentage, that same argument has been made against Ozzie Smith. Clemente made 23 more outfield errors than Hank Aaron. He also produced almost 300 more put outs and 65 more assists. When you are making that many more plays than other players, those plays are going to be difficult, those are balls Aaron couldn't even get to, and that is not counting hits Clemente fielded that Aaron didn't. That is tremendous value.

[steve B]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

I forget if Bill James addressed the Forbes Field factor. The notion that he could hit HRs when he wanted to, though, strikes me as absurd. Who would NOT want to, ever?

For what it's worth, there's a few sources that would make me believe it's was and is common to not try to hit home runs. Either by the players choice, or because of the attitude of the manager or the organization.

The biography I read of Hank Aaron (admittedly a 70's paperback so it may be a bit inaccurate) Said that one manager he had early on believed home runs were fortunate accidents and wanted the players to focus on line drives.

And more recently one of the bios of David Ortiz mentions that when he came to the Sox he was trying to hit opposite field line drives until Francona asked him why. The answer was that that's what the Twins wanted so he figured that's what every team wanted.

Steve B

[steve B]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Most experts consider either runs scored and RBI's, or slugging percentage and on-base percentage, the two most important stats in baseball. If you add up the number of times Clemente led the National League in any of those four stats, do you know what number you get? Try zero. That's right: Clemente never led the NL in ANY of those categories. Not once.

That whoever wrote that gives any play to runs scored and RBI as the most important stats really stretches my ability to give him much credibility. Both stats are very dependent on other players and to some extent a players place in the lineup. As I've learned more about some of the more complex stats I've come to regard RBIs and Runs Scored as almost irrelevant stats.

I could buy slugging percentage and on base percentage as important.

Steve B

[xplainer]

I promised myself, I would not post on this thread. But, I just couldn't take anymore. Without, at least, saying my two cents.

Roberto is a HOFer with out discussion. I was 10 win he was killed in the plane crash. I remember it said on the evening news (there was local news, then national news at 7pm). I knew his was a great player who had died. Later, as I grew older, I learned how and why it happened.

The same argument can be made about Mickey Mantle (though I don't support it). Hit didn't hit 300 for his average, and when he retired, held the record for most strike-outs.

I understand the OP. JR should be in the HOF. But MLB reached too far in retiring his number from all teams. That is ridiculous. Then, having a JR day were everyone wears 42. Just my opinion, that like your, means nothing.

[Tabe]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

And Clemente wasn't as phenomenal and flawless a fielder as people make him out to have been. In fact, he may only have been the third best defensive right fielder born in the year 1934. His career fielding percentage, .973, was 12.5% WORSE than the league average. Hank Aaron's was 16.7% higher than the same league's average. Al Kaline's was 30% higher than the AL's average.

You might want to double-check your math. If Clemente's .973 is 12.5% below average that would mean the average was 1.112 - not exactly possible.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by Tabe

You might want to double-check your math. If Clemente's .973 is 12.5% below average that would mean the average was 1.112 - not exactly possible.

Men were men in those days. Not my stat anyhow as was clear I cut and paste that opinion of Clemente.

[jason.1969]

Isn't there also a story about Cobb in his latter years wanting to show the world he could hit HRs if he wanted to...and then he hit 2 or 3 that very game?

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