Ozzie got to the Hall because of his glove, not bat.
Fielding Percentage:/ Games
Dahlen .926/ 2139
Trammell .977/2132
Smith .978/ 2511
While Ozzie didn’t have a significantly numbers he did it in 379 more games. Also the Total Fielding Runs Above Average* (sorry for getting all saber) of Ozzie over Trammell is frankly ridiculous .
Total Fielding Runs Above Average
Smith-- 238.7
Trammell-- 81.1
Total Fielding Runs Above Average is the “Number of runs above or below average that the player was worth based on the number of plays made”-- Baseball Reference
There were a number of threads but I never fionished the project. Anyway, the SDMB chose the following shortstops for the SDMB Hall of Fame:
Honus Wagner
Cal Ripken Jr.
Robin Yount
Arky Vaughan
Alex Rodriguez
Luke Appling
Ozzie Smith
Joe Cronin
Ernie Banks
Lou Boudreau
Derek Jeter
Just missed: Barry Larkin
That is ordered by vote total. Wagner was unanimous, IIRC. So at the time the consensus was that Ripken was #2. Note that this was held halfway through the 2008 season, so Jeter has added to his credentials since.
You can feel (and I mean that word literally) however you like about Derek Jeter, but you appear to be unaware of how pedestrian his production has been in the context of the all-time greatest. Alex Rodriguez is going to retire as like the fourth or fifth best player in the history of the game. How far down does Jeter have to be on the list for you to have to acknowledge that nobody’s treating him like anything at all other than exactly what he is? He’s a great singles and doubles guy who gets on base enough and slugs .450, and is a career liability with his glove at an essential defensive position. He’s led the league in hits once, runs once, and plate appearances a couple of times, and nothing else.
He’s hit 20 homers three times. When A-Rod hit 30 last year, it was only the third time in 10 seasons that he didn’t hit 40.
Jeter’s average is only 10 points higher, and A-Rod still has a higher on-base. There is literally nothing that Jeter can do that Rodriguez doesn’t do better, except hit singles, and even in that he can only barely claim the edge.
Rodriguez’ career WAR is over 99. Jeter’s is under 69; right behind Luke Appling and Barry Larkin. Far inferior, oh hell yes he is, and so is everybody else who isn’t the Flying Dutchman.
Yeah, I didn’t say anything differently. But putting aside the question of whether someone deserves the HoF based almost solely on fielding prowess, my point is that a shortstop’s contribution to his team is hitting + fielding. If you hit well enough that you negate the runs you give up in the field, defense doesn’t matter so much. Adam Everett is one of the most marvelous fielding shortstops I’ve seen in the league, but don’t tell me that he contributes more to his team than Hanley Ramirez. And definitely don’t tell me he deserves to go into the Hall.
So what you leave out is that when you account for the bat, Ozzie Smith compiled a career 64.7 WAR (Wins Above Replacement), Trammell 66.8 (in fewer games, I might add), and Dahlen 75.9 (also in fewer games).
Well…what are you saying again? That Adam Everett contributes more than HanRam and deserves the HoF? In 200 fewer games Ramirez has posted a WAR of 25.5, versus 9.0 for Everett. For his entire CAREER.
Yes, that Adam Everett deserves the Hall of Fame and is better than Hanley Ramirez.
No, you brought up Adam Everett; the discussion was about Ozzie Smith. My point was that you’re saying “don’t even tell me X is more valuable than Y,” and I’m saying that sometimes an Ozzie Smith is more valuable than a whoever-else, and I don’t see why it should matter that the reason is defense, not hitting. The fact that your example was one that nobody anywhere would ever use makes your point a little hard to isolate.
Sure, Ozzie Smith’s composite is better than a lot of guys. If I implied otherwise, I apologize. What I was trying to say is that even when you take defense into account, his bat negated some of the runs he saved. Or specifically, negated so many that Dahlen or Trammell become fairly comparable when you also take batting into account. At any rate, I am perplexed at how people thought Smith was so much better that he got in on the first ballot and neither of the other two ever had a chance.
While I believe that Trammell (I’m leaving Dehlen out of this because other then looking up his stats I know next to nothing about him.) is a better offensive player. His offensive stats aren’t superior enough to Smith’s to overcome the relative defensive inferiority.
You know what comes to mind when I think of Derek Jeter?
All those times he went sailing across the infield chasing balls in the playoffs (into the stands, the flip to Posada from the first-base line), and then all those times a ground ball not hit immediately at him skipped harmlessly through the infield for a base hit.
As much as it pains me to say it, Ozzie’s bat probably disqualifies him from this discussion even in spite of his defense.
It’s got to be Ripken. Without Cal playing short, guys like A-Rod, Jeter, Garciaparra and even Tejada don’t get a shot to play shortstop, because Cal changed the idea of what a shortstop is supposed to be by having a good bat, solid defense and not being, well, short. Without Ripken, we’d have 30 David Ecksteins playing shortstop (OK, 29 David Ecksteins and Omar Vizquel.)
I certainly don’t disagree with your rankings, I merely get hypersensitive about the disdain that Jeter causes among the sabermetric crowd. It’s as if his teams manage to win despite him, and that attitude rankles this Yankee fan.
