Here’s a topic with a little meat: What players do you most want on your team, or least want on the other team, when there’s an opportunity to break a game open? Who can carry a whole team by himself? This informal survey of MLB insiders came up with the top 10. Surely there will be some disagreement from those Dopers who watch the game, but let’s start it off, shall we?
Albert Pujols - a near consensus choice. No argument here.
Manny Ramirez - “when he wants to be”. True, but the qualifier is very necessary.
Johan Santana - seems ranked a bit high to me; hasn’t done it in October
Grady Sizemore - !!! Fine player, sure, but does the Tribe climb on his back? Not that I’ve seen.
David Wright - Now waitadangminute - are these guys giving credit for all-around talent, ability to rise to the occasion notwithstanding? Tell me more about him and Santana in October.
Roy Halladay - Regular season: Yep, the Jays are scary every 5th day. But we may never know what he can do in the postseason, when the question is really answered.
Dustin Pedroia - I’m biased, sure, but the word “scrappy” traditionally used for short infielders is just inadequate. He simply doesn’t feel pressure.
Jose Reyes - Okay, that’s 3 Mets. If any of them could carry a team, the team would be carried, knowhamean? Very good player, sure, but c’mon.
Alex Rodriguez - This poll sucks. The Mariners got better when he left, so did the Rangers, and the Yankees have not ended their season with a celebration since he got there either. Great talent, but not the new Mr. October by any means.
CC Sabathia - another regular-season wonder. If he can carry a team, he hasn’t shown it in October either. Must be a lot of New York people in this poll, huh?
Kevin Youkilis belongs there. So do a few Phillies (hard to tell if their rings were won by Hamels, Rollins, Howard, Utley, or all of them). Ichiro changes games all by himself, too. And it might well be that the game-changing players on the top teams don’t stand out as much because there are several of them on the roster.
There are plenty of players who can put good numbers together, or play very well on teams that are out of contention. This poll is about the *intangibles *that produce tangible results. Some guys break under pressure, some rise to it - who are they?
I’ll agree about Hanley, because he’s been an outstanding performer on a bad team, when it’s hardest to do. I’d love to see what he can do on a team good enough for him to win with.
Ortiz used to be on that list, sure. Now he’s a question mark, partly from injury and partly from facing that silly shift from every team now, not just the Rays. Youk came through when it mattered last year, and the MVP voters saw it too. Jimmy, wtf?
Well, the idea is that there’s no definition, but it
And I really don’t know how to make that assessment without coming to the conclusion that somebody like A-Rod – or roughly all the players who have the best tangible qualities - is exactly the answer to that question. But I know that’s not really a very exciting approach to take. I think that carrying a team on your shoulders is a very ex-post-facto attribute, is all.
Well, the biggest problem with that list is that it isn’t a list of 10 pitchers. If you’re going to define this list as finding the players with “the ability to change the complexion of a game, to win a game singlehandedly, or to carry a team on your shoulders”, then that should simply be a list of pitchers, no?
You’ve never seen a hitter affect the opposing team so much that they change their pitch choices several places ahead in the lineup? That they try to make sure they can walk or pitch around him with minimal damage? That the opposing manager never feels the need to say “We’re not going to let Albert Pujols beat us”? You’ve never seen a player affect his own teammates’ approaches to their at-bats so the game-breaker on a hot streak can come up in an optimal situation? Really? That’s remarkable.
If I had the choice to manage one game between Team Albert and Team Johan, where each are manned by a bunch of average players except for either Pujols or Johan Santana, I’m picking Team Johan every time.
Okay, on reread, I think I see where some confusion might be. I’m not saying that every single pitcher out there is having a larger per-game impact greater than Pujols would - I’m saying that Pujols doesn’t make the Top 10.
You have Ichiro on the bubble, but he should definitely be on the list. Not only is he just a hit-producing / SB machine, he comes equipped with a 92 MPH fastball. Not that the Mariners would ever let him pitch, but he’s the game’s best all-around athlete.
Cannon arm, excellent plate vision, speed on the base paths, durability (he’s missed 16 games in 8 seasons), and class.
J Roll carried the team in 2007, Howard has had horribly slow starts the last couple years but ended the regular seasons on fire (to the point where last year he was a serious candidate for MVP, in spite of hitting around .200 for most of the year), and Hamels carried last year’s team in the post-season. I don’t know which of those players (you could even throw Utley into the mix, really) belong in the top 10, but I know at least one does.
I have a really tough time putting Ichiro on the list, too. The man is a singles hitter. That’s about it. Also, if he’s so capable of carrying the team single-handedly, how come they lost 100 games last year?
Well, Ichiro has never been known – in Major League Baseball at least – as a power hitter. Rather, he is the finest example in the game today of what is known as a “pure” hitter, one who goes up and tries to put the ball in play, aiming to maximize his value by getting as many base hits as possible. For his part, Ichiro is one of the best pure hitters in recent memory.
But apparently, this doesn’t have to be the case. In Japan, albeit with its lesser competition and its compact car stadiums, Ichiro was a 3-4-5er, and hit between 12 and 25 homeruns in each of his full seasons. And after winning the All-Star game MVP, he came right out and indicated that this is the case. Speaking to a reporter through his interpreter, Ichiro was asked the following question (thanks to Scout.com for the transcript):
“If you concentrated on hitting for power, how many home runs do you think you could hit?"
His answer was borderline controversial:
"Tough question. If I’m allowed to bat .220, I could probably hit 40. But nobody wants that.”
Maybe I am alone on this, but I have always assumed that Ichiro did not hit homeruns because he could not hit homeruns. But even as I say those words to myself, I realize how foolish a notion that is. As the baseball world has become obsessed with the performance enhancer controversy, we as fans and commentators have begun to give tacit approval to a notion which has never been true - hitting homeruns is all about strength.
ETA: To address the Mariners losing 100 games, even with Ichiro - the notion that one player can single-handedly carry a baseball team is absurd to begin with. To further solidify this, the OP lists three Mets players in his top 10. Three players “who can carry a whole team by themselves,” who are on the same team? Uhhhh
Because each team has 25 players, at least 9 in use at any time. Ichiro was a great outfielder, albeit it a step below where he was in 2007, but he couldn’t also DH, play short, or pitch. Substitute Ichiro for Babe Ruth, and that still was a terrible team.
In other sports you can have game changers, but I don’t really think a baseball player can be. Maybe a pitcher, but certainly not a hitter. You can keep going to Kobe in the clutch or throwing to Boldin, but you can’t just keep going to David Wright. He only gets to bat once every nine times, and field the ball when it is hit at him. Wright was incredible in Sept of 2007, but that didn’t stop the team from collapsing around. Santana was unhittable down the stretch in 2008, but he didn’t get to pitch everyday.
I’d hardly qualify a player who has just one season with more walks than strikeouts as a “pure hitter”. Ted Williams is the very definition of “pure hitter”, and Ichiro doesn’t hold a candle to him. Getting infield singles doesn’t rank much higher than a walk when you’re talking about putting the ball in play.
Meh. You have to separate the “can carry” in the text with the “has carried” you’re implying into the statement.
Aw, Ortiz had a frustrating yeat last year, sure. He had wrist surgery, missed about a third of the season, but still did hit 23 home runs and 11 shy of 100 rbi. He should get the benefit of the doubt for this season seeing it wasn’t a pain issue wih the wrist, just an annoyance that he had to get used to. And we started seeing teams really go crazy with that shift in 2007- resulting in probably his most productive season ever- .330+, 52 doubles, 35 HR and 1.066 OPS, his highest ever. (Plus, nobody in my memory has as many game ending hits as Ortiz, which is literally the definition of game breaking)
It does when the guy is leading off third just a few pitches later. Ichiro is pretty much the modern Rickey Henderson in terms of his effect on the game. Maybe his teammates have gotten used to waiting for the hero to perform the heroics?
It could be argued, I suppose, that the true gamebreakers make their teammates better too, partly from the way they play and partly by inspiration. If that’s a criterion, then Ichiro might not qualify. Bootis, Papi was doing fine before his injury, and was mortal afterward. He may be fine now, but it does seem that guys who get significant hand or wrist injuries don’t get comfortable with the bat again for up to a year later.
