This is a bait and switch. I’ll say less than 10% of voters had a different opinion at the time of the vote, but that does not mean that same <10% is today stamping their feet and insisting that, despite the opinion of their colleagues, Ozzie Smith doesn’t belong in the HoF. A few perhaps, but that’s why unanimous voting is never required. So if it’s simply a matter of opinion, why not take the opinon of 90+% of voters more seriously?
I might understand your argument better if you could provide the names of players eligible for induction who have not been enshrined because of prevailing attitudes toward the evaluation of candidates. To put it glibly, does the “wrong” criteria (e.g. over-emphasis on defense) that worked in favor of Ozzie Smith’s candidacy work against player X’s candidacy?
To be blunt, my suspicion is you won’t be able to come up with one; in general you simply feel that the line for “the best” is too low, and that the number of writer-voted-in candidates (averages about three every two years) is just too high for your taste. I’m not sure why that would be–the figures work out to about 30 clear HoF’ers playing over a 20 year period. That’s one for every team in the league, and I think if you look at any MLB team over the past two decades you’ll find at least one legitimate HoF candidate.
Wow. What makes an offensive run more valuable? I’m dying to see the logic here. They count the same on the scorecard.
Individual runs? Maybe. But there are some pretty great tools out there that can measure this over the course of seasons and careers.
Are you sure? What if they’re only saving 30? Or 25? And are below average (for a SS) hitter? Doesn’t this open up enough of a gap for Ozzie?
Just how many shortstops belong in the Hall? Fewer than other positions since shortstops as a whole are weaker hitters? Which shortstops do you think are more worthy than Smith?
(No one actually did claim that Ozzie saves 40. That was a hypothetical)
Will you quit giving defensive opinion on Ozzie. He played great defense. Hit like a girl.
Above addition
Shoeless Joe out
should not be in
Bowie Kuhn
Morgan Bulkeley
The last sentence is ridiculous and has been debunked repeatedly in this thread. You don’t care about discussion or conversation, and you have no interest in evidence. The man was provably a better hitter than 10 of the other 11 shortstops in the National League during the year I detailed earlier in this thread, and arguably a better all around offensive player than the eleventh. “Hit like a girl” is just an absurd characterization, and it shows how blinded to actual fact you are.
It has been debunked according to you. It has been upheld repeatedly according to me. Sounds like opinion doesn’t it?
28 life time homers. I bet they were pitching around him a lot.
I just wasted time looking a t a site that gives the top 120 batter every year. Many times the great wizard of Oz was not even in it, Yount and Trammel were ahead of him endlessly and so were many others. He was a crappy hitter.
What’s the site? What’s the metric they use? I’m not looking to bash on it, but if it’s helpful, it’s good to learn. I’m not afraid of revising opinion in the face of improved information.
Have you ever read the Baseball Prospectus book “Baseball Between the Numbers”?
The metric was simple. It listed batters in order of average and showed rbis and hrs. It did not find a "metric’ to make a position. It did not twist the numbers .it listed them.
I have been a fan of Bill James since abstract. I do reserve the right to disagree with him. I read the hardball times on line everyday .They really get into numbers. I do not always agree with them either. Not baseball by the numbers.
James thinks bunting a man to second is a statistically positive play. I do not agree. In the day when games were lower scoring ,playing for a run was more significant than it is now. That however is distorted by the Tigers who have been so bad at it the last few years.
Well, I’m going to list all the shortstops by the numbers of runs they saved.
Hey look! Ozzie’s first.
Now Im going to list ALL players in my lifetime by runs saved as fielders. Oh look. Ozzie’s first again. How about that.
You still haven’t explained why a run scored is more valuable than a run saved. Until you do, your argument, such as it is - it pretty much amounts to just “I don’t think he’s a Hall of Famer,” which isn’t really a convincing argument, and “He hit like a girl,” which is false.
You have not realized a bad hitter does not belong in the hall. When I went through the list year after year a bunch of SS appeared way ahead of him in hitting ave and rbis. He was a poor hitter. Way down on the list. THAT DQS HIM FOR THE HALL.
You say he saved a ton of runs with his incredible fielding. I say he lost games with his shitty hitting and inability to drive in runs. If you want to say its a wash ,he becomes a middle of the road hall applicant.
…and… scene. If you are going to continue to argue that Ozzie Smith was a poor hitter, and base your opinion on the two worst statistics available for judging hitting - batting average and RBIs - then talking baseball with you is officially and utterly pointless, because you don’t understand the game and don’t want to.
And now for something completely different, for anyone still watching this train wreck at this point. Here are Ozzie Smith’s top 5 single-season fielding runs above average (RAA) scores for his career: 29, 27, 25, 24, 21.
Now here are the top 10 single-season FRAA for another player: 27, 24, 22, 16, 16. Not quite equal to Ozzie’s, of course, but still pretty impressive. But for his career, this second player had an OBP of .384, a career batting average near .300, and a career OPS+ of 128 including seven seasons above 140. Player two falls short of Ozzie’s defensive utter defensive dominance, but not by much; the statistics indicate that he was saving very nearly as many runs as Ozzie when compared to an average defensive player at his position. And he was obviously an exponentially better offensive player.
Player Two is not in the Hall of Fame, nor has he ever received more than token consideration. How does this fit in with the discussion so far?
We put bad hitters in the Hall all the time. Far worse than Ozzie. Lefty Grove had an OPS of 416 and he’s one of the greatest players in the Hall.
I know…he was a pitcher! But we use different offensive standards because pitchers make up for it with their defense (and by defense I mean preventing runs from scoring). Why shouldn’t field players get the same consideration? If a shortstop prevents enough runs from scoring to make up for his offense, why shouldn’t he be considered?
:rolleyes:
Again, why is an offensive run created more valuable than a defensive run saved?
By the numbers offered to me above, Ozzie saved a little bit more runs than the second and 3rd SS. But he was a much worse hitter. I looked through the batting averages year after year and he was behind other short stops by a wide margin. If I found him competitive or at least a reasonable hitter I might have acquiesced. However he did not even make the list most years and was way down as a rule. Other shortstops were way ahead of him. I am more convinced than ever you guys have bought a myth perpetrated by TV,
No. But hypothetically, the fact that shortstop is a more “valuable” position than the position played by Player Two isn’t relevant, in light of the fact that the runs above average figure is so close - the defense of these two players theoretically had approximately the same impact on the final score of the games in which they played.
Batting average is a terrible measure of a player’s overall ability as an offensive player. Yet you persist in using it as if it is the only available measure. Also, you just ignored my post in this thread, where I showed that in 1985 Smith had the second-best batting average among shortstops in the entire NL, and a much better OBP than any. Are you choosing to ignore these facts?
Batting average,homeruns and rbis are the measures I judge hitting by. If they are close I go to OBP and others . He was so weak in the first THREE that there is no need to go farther.
Its good that so many people buy the hype of major league baseball. a dead spot like Ozzie is actually two dead spots. They will not give the hitter ahead of him anything to hit because they know the ever fabulous defensive SS will not drive in runs. His girlie girl hitting hurt the team.
OK. Terrible stats to judge by, and they lead you to terrible and factually incorrect conclusions, but if you’re happy watching baseball from this standpoint than who I am to ruin it for you? Have fun. Meaning absolutely no offense, I personally am not going to continue this conversation with you. If you consider batting average a useful measure of hitting ability, than you and I have no common ground whatsoever.