One severe deficiency in my love of baseball is a thorough knowledge of its past players. I try to keep an eye on baseball-reference.com’s daily blog, which likes to pull up random and weird facts that tend to shed light on the more unknown stars of the game. This thread isn’t for weird, out-of-context stats - just a backwards look at someone you think may be missed in typical discussions of great players (“great” being an extremely subjective term). Feel free to cherry pick whatever stats you like. So, without further ado:
This catcher posted these lifetime numbers over a 21 year career:
Yup. Ted Simmons. I grew up an AL fan, so he’s never touched my radar. I know I’m completely giving myself up as an ignorant baseball fan, but there it is. Those numbers are really good - was it the lack of big media markets that did him in?
The whole “small market” thing gets too much play. The idea that playing in New York or LA automatically brings one acclaim is a reidiculous exaggeration, at best.
The reason Ted Simmons got so little attention is that he played catcher at the same time as a legend (a legend who ALSO played in a small market). No matter how good a catcher was, he wasn’t going to get much attention so long as Johnny Bench was around. Bench is the reason Simmons was always a benchwarmer in the All-Star Game.