1990 Best of Baseball Election thread

[Captain Cold Nose]

1. Rod Carew
2. Jim Palmer
3. Burleigh Grimes
4. Edd Roush
5. Bob Lemon
6. Addie Joss
7. Hilton Smith
8. Luis Aparicio
9. Don Sutton
10. Lefty Gomez
11. Alejandro Oms
12. Jose Mendez

Contributors

1. Billy Evans
2. Ford Frick
3. Gus Greenlee
4. Happy Chandler
5. Kazuto Tsuruoka

[Chadwick]

Players
1. Rod Carew
2. Jim Palmer
3. Alejandro Oms
4. Bob Lemon
5. Luis Tiant
6. Jose Mendez
7. Joe Torre
8. Jimmy Wynn
9. Burleigh Grimes
10. Hilton Smith
11. Edd Roush
12. Roger Bresnahan


Contributors
1. Kazuto Tsuruoka
2. Gus Greenlee
3. O.P. Caylor
4. Tim Murnane
5. Vic Harris

[J W]

Players

1. Rod Carew
2. Jim Palmer
3. Willard Brown
4. Joe Torre
5. Addie Joss
6. Roger Bresnahan
7. Don Sutton
8. Bob Lemon
9. Eppa Rixey
10. Alejandro Oms
11. Jose Mendez
12. Edd Roush

Sewell drops off again. Reggie Smith squeezes into 7th in the players' queue and is likely to rise soon alongside Joe Kelley. Tommy John settles into 4th in the pitchers' queue directly in front of Jim Kaat.

Contributors

1. Paul Krichell
2. Hughie Jennings
3. Danny Murtaugh
4. Kazuto Tsuruoka
5. Al Munro (& Walter) Elias

I figure it's time to enter the name that I believe is most responsible for us the stat-heads existing as we do today... the founder(s) of the Elias Sports Bureau. Bob Howsam and Sy Berger are next, as well as Ford Frick if he needs a lil' push.

[Jar of Flies]

Brad Harris from post 17:

5. Luis Tiant
9. Burleigh Grimes
10. Hilton Smith

Hey Brad...good to see you here and at the Hall of Merit ballots. In the 2011 Hall of Merit election, you ranked the following 1990 Best of Baseball eligibles as follows:
(6) Luis Tiant, (9) Bob Johnson, (10) Don Newcombe, (12) Tommy Bridges, (13) Gavvy Cravath, (15) Eddie Cicotte.

This made me curious...have you become better friends with Burleigh Grimes and Hilton Smith since your vote at the HOM in December.
As a Hilton Smith HOM voter, I understand and condone your vote/rise in ranking.
With regard to Grimes, I haven't been able to come around. When viewing Clay Davenports DERA (Defensive Independent Earned Run Average - found at baseballprospectus), or Sean Smith's WAR (found at baseball-reference.com), Grimes falls well short of many eligibles. Grimes looks much better through a raw win shares view, but studies have shown that the replacement levels have been set much too low to find raw win shares as reliable.

For the Grimes voters, can you float me a reasonable argument for your support. Maybe I am just missing the boat on this one?

Currently I see the following hurlers more worthy who remain unelected:
Jim Palmer, Masaaki Koyama (I can understand those who have passed - numbers are challenging to interpret - however, the evidence that jalbright has shows Koyama as overwhelmingly deserving), Don Sutton, Urban Shocker, Hilton Smith, Don Newcombe, Jose Mendez, Jim McCormick, Vic Willis, Luis Tiant, Tommy Bridges, Billy Pierce, and Dick "Cannonball" Redding. For Sean Smith WAR fans, I would recommend looking at Tommy Bond, Tony Mullane, and Bob Lemon. For those who might like Baseball Prospectus WARP, I recommend Cincinnati Reds hurlers Eppa Rixey and Bucky Walters.

[J W]

Well JoF, the list you have sums up the vast majority of pitchers left in my queue (and several that I'm voting for now). I, too, see no point in Grimes, but then I'm voting for Addie Joss so that tells you I'm not basing my opinion solely on DERA, WAR, WARP, or anything that may factor in defensive metrics.

I took a look ahead and see that in many of the years coming up in the early/mid 90s, we'll either have three strong newcomers, or none at all. We could have maybe a dozen holdovers elected by 2000 and that will clear the board of a lot of these pitchers.

[J W]

In regards to Sutton, he's made my ballot first try and it'll be hard to shake him off. I know he pitched in Dodger Stadium but he got going in the 1970s, after the mound was lowered. I'm particularly impressed by his career WHIP... and he was a dang horse out there. I think he's in good company with the other pitchers at the top of the charts. I mean we're talkin' Jose Mendez and Bob Lemon here, not Smokey Joe Williams and Christy Mathewson.

[Paul Wendt]

...
How does Alejandro Oms compare to Reggie Smith, Jimmy Wynn, Edd Roush and Jimmy Scheckard? He just entered my queue, but I always thought of him as a borderline HOFer and I see he is very close to election.

For me the centerfielders (all but Sheckard) are not yet among the best available backlog candidates.

...
The Hall of Merit voters also ranked players by position -
Oms finished 20th, 1 spot below Earl Averill, 1 ahead of Cool Papa Bell, 2 spots below Jimmy Wynn, 2 spots ahead of Edd Roush. Sheckard is considered a left fielder, with Reggie Smith was elected to the Hall of Merit after Alejandro Oms - both were eligible for many "years" together.

Before ranking all of its members within fielding position (2008/2009) the Hall of Merit also ranked its members who were not in the Hall of Fame, 57 as of 2008, within four groups by Cooperstown jurisdiction.

Alejandro Oms is last among twelve who were ineligible for election by any of the Cooperstown panels because they played primarily before or beside the major leagues, around 1870 or in the Negro Leagues (Group 4). At #12 he trails Lip Pike and Dick Lundy.

Jimmy Wynn is #10 among twelve who were in the jurisdiction of the Hall of Fame members because they played entirely 1943 to 1987 (Group 2). There he is just ahead of Graig Nettles and Ken Boyer, the last-ranking of about 20 thirdbasemen. He trails Billy Pierce, the last-ranking of about 20 pitchers who played primarily 1924-58.
: HOM election results, ranking "Group 2"


The HOM classifies 27 of its members as centerfielders. In my opinion it's a top heavy and bottom heavy group. The HOM rankings show some agreement by the strong showings of Wynn and Oms among CFs combined with their poor showings in jurisdictions 2 and 4. (There is also a contradiction between Oms #20 ranking ahead of Lip Pike #23 among CFs, yet Pike ahead of Oms at the bottom of Group 4, also casts doubt on the meaning of that CF #20.)

See the Hall of Merit archives for the both sets of ranking elections. They constitute most of the threads from October 2009 back to January 2008 and all except Jan 2008 now show up on the first page of the archives directory.
: HOM Archives

[J W]

So in that project, he trails Lip Pike, but in the Centerfield rankings Oms finishes 20th and ahead of Lip Pike... as well as Cool Papa Bell, Edd Roush, Willard Brown, Pete Browning, and Andre Dawson. The only CFer ranked higher than him who has yet to be elected in our project is Jim Wynn (18th).

Hall of Merit rankings, CF 2008

[joggerdru]

1 Rod Carew
2 Jim Palmer
3 Burliegh Grimes
4 Eppa Rixey
5 Bob Lemon
6 Addie Joss
7 Luis Tiant
8 Don Sutton
9 Ed Roush
10 Lou Brock
11 Roger Bresnahan
12 Hugh Jennings

[jalbright]

We now have a quorum on the player side, and are two away from that status on the contributor side.

[TheMendozaLine]

Players:

1. Rod Carew
2. Jim Palmer
3. Addie Joss
4. Lou Brock
5. Hilton Smith
6. Jake Beckley
7. Jose Mendez
8. Edd Roush
9. Roger Bresnahan
10. Don Sutton
11. Sam Rice
12. Bob Lemon


Contributors:

1. Happy Chandler
2. Harry Caray
3. Ford Frick
4. Phil Rizzuto
5. Warren Giles

[Tiboreau]

1. Rod Carew
2. Hughie Jennings
3. Charlie Keller
4. Alejandro Oms
5. Jim Palmer
6. Cal McVey
7. Jose Mendez
8. Joe Kelley
9. Willard Brown
10. Jimmy Wynn
11. Leroy Matlock
12. Lip Pike

I've dropped Mendez a little bit after comparing him to Palmer. Palmer's a player who is overrated by some, IMO, while others tend to underrate him, a conflict that's caused by attempting to better understand the impact of a talented defense, such as the Baltimore Orioles squad of the '70s.

[Tiboreau]

(There is also a contradiction between Oms #20 ranking ahead of Lip Pike #23 among CFs, yet Pike ahead of Oms at the bottom of Group 4, also casts doubt on the meaning of that CF #20.)

Yeah, like the rest of the 2nd tier Negro League HoMers (and 2nd tier 19th century stars) there's wide consensus on Oms' value (and Pike's). Depending on which 25-50 voters were participating, there are a variety of places both Oms & Pike could've landed on that CF ballot.

[Paul Wendt]

So in that project, he trails Lip Pike, but in the Centerfield rankings Oms finishes 20th and ahead of Lip Pike... as well as Cool Papa Bell, Edd Roush, Willard Brown, Pete Browning, and Andre Dawson. The only CFer ranked higher than him who has yet to be elected in our project is Jim Wynn (18th).

Hall of Merit rankings, CF 2008

It isn't a distinct project but a distinct ranking. A great majority of the voters coincide, as in distinct cycles within one baseball-fever hof forum project. Even if the voters coincide precisely, and every one votes consistently, under scoring by the sum of rank orders, the differences between candidate pools will generate some reversals.

In the HOM centerfield scores there are big gaps between 12/13 and between 17/18. Those are reliable reports of collective opinion, robust to moderate differences in the pools of voters and candidates. Thus I think it's fair to say that the Hall of Merit group, which contains the voters in any particular HOM election, judges those five in ranks 13 to 17 to be "below" the first twelve and "above" the last ten --including Reggie Smith who has been elected since the ranking. On the other hand it's a stretch to make much of the rankings within those last ten. These judgments aren't based only on scores in the one CF ranking election but on all of the ranking elections. Above I noted some supporting evidence in the rankings of "Cooperstown ineligible" and "1943-1987" players.
(Here we have elected the top twelve, the middle five, and two of the last ten, Earl Averill and Cool Papa Bell. This

[J W]

Actually, you could divide the rankings even further. All but two voters ranked Joe DiMaggio 6th all-time. So you've got the top five (Cobb, Mays, Speaker, Mantle, Charleston), then DiMaggio, then 7-12 (Stearnes, Hamilton, Torriente, O' Rourke, Snider, Hines), then 13-17 (Doby, Gore, Hill, Ashburn, Carey), then the rest (Wynn, Averill, Oms, Bell, Roush, Pike, Brown, Browning, Dawson, Smith). Through all this I suppose the point is, we're beginning to elect "the rest" and I support that. I don't mind if CF has the largest number of electees, so long as numbers are relatively even across the board. CF is a demanding position.

Off topic: in your opinion, which group would Griffey fit in among HoM voters? And how close are Kirby Puckett/Jim Edmonds to the last group?