Let's look at what my 1999 Cuban Official Guide says about cubano100%'s top four third basemen of the 1990's (I'd need Morales' first name in Spanish to try and add him--this book doesn't give "Andy") It's only a career line in each case, but here goes:
Linares 17 years, .369 average, .471 OBP, .655 slugging, 3.62 successful plays made per 9 defensive innings. Until he went to Japan a few years ago, everything I'd read about him was positive. I'm sure he's not this good, but he could still go down a fair ways and be a heck of a player. Can't say much about that defensive number for a third baseman, but I thought I'd include it since someone probably can.
Pierre 14 years, .298 average, .384 OBP, .535 slugging, 3.67 successful plays per 9 defensive innings. These are good numbers, but if Cuban ball is even a little lower than major league quality, he'd go to just another third baseman fairly quickly. If the Cuban ball is below AAA, his career numbers aren't imposing, though I don't know at what age he started, and how he performed over that career. Also, I don't know how many years he had left at the point the book came out.
Vargas 19 years, .321 average, .394 OBP, .433 slugging, 3.64 successful plays per 9 defensive innings. At these numbers, a nice player, though not a lot of power. The key for him is how his OBP would hold up at a major league level. A 40 point drop would make him good, but not much more, a sixty point drop would likely make him very ordinary, and much more than that, he'd ride the pine or play in the minors. Again, these are career numbers only, so perhaps he'd have played 14-15 years but been as good as these numbers in that time (the difference in quality of play cancelled out by losing some struggling early years).
Caldes 12 years, .289 average, .347 OBP, .476 slugging, 3.75 successful plays per 9 defensive innings. If he met these numbers, he'd be fine--but any drop off would start to hurt him fairly quickly.
The only clear conclusion I can reach is that except for Linares, the difference between Cuban ball and the majors would make a huge difference in what we could expect these guys to produce. Linares likely would have been a star unless the difference between the two is huge. This is a classic example of why we want solid evidence on exactly how good Cuban ball under Castro really has been in order to fairly appraise these guys. Even what I've posted is terribly incomplete--a single career line without even knowing their dates of birth. For all I know, Caldes could have been in his prime in 1999 after entering the game as a 16 year old.
Maybe someone can do something with the international competition, especially if we had season by season data in Cuba, plus accurate dates of birth. Some day, that will be available, but as far as I know today, it isn't in the States. That's a shame.
Jim Albright
Linares 17 years, .369 average, .471 OBP, .655 slugging, 3.62 successful plays made per 9 defensive innings. Until he went to Japan a few years ago, everything I'd read about him was positive. I'm sure he's not this good, but he could still go down a fair ways and be a heck of a player. Can't say much about that defensive number for a third baseman, but I thought I'd include it since someone probably can.
Pierre 14 years, .298 average, .384 OBP, .535 slugging, 3.67 successful plays per 9 defensive innings. These are good numbers, but if Cuban ball is even a little lower than major league quality, he'd go to just another third baseman fairly quickly. If the Cuban ball is below AAA, his career numbers aren't imposing, though I don't know at what age he started, and how he performed over that career. Also, I don't know how many years he had left at the point the book came out.
Vargas 19 years, .321 average, .394 OBP, .433 slugging, 3.64 successful plays per 9 defensive innings. At these numbers, a nice player, though not a lot of power. The key for him is how his OBP would hold up at a major league level. A 40 point drop would make him good, but not much more, a sixty point drop would likely make him very ordinary, and much more than that, he'd ride the pine or play in the minors. Again, these are career numbers only, so perhaps he'd have played 14-15 years but been as good as these numbers in that time (the difference in quality of play cancelled out by losing some struggling early years).
Caldes 12 years, .289 average, .347 OBP, .476 slugging, 3.75 successful plays per 9 defensive innings. If he met these numbers, he'd be fine--but any drop off would start to hurt him fairly quickly.
The only clear conclusion I can reach is that except for Linares, the difference between Cuban ball and the majors would make a huge difference in what we could expect these guys to produce. Linares likely would have been a star unless the difference between the two is huge. This is a classic example of why we want solid evidence on exactly how good Cuban ball under Castro really has been in order to fairly appraise these guys. Even what I've posted is terribly incomplete--a single career line without even knowing their dates of birth. For all I know, Caldes could have been in his prime in 1999 after entering the game as a 16 year old.
Maybe someone can do something with the international competition, especially if we had season by season data in Cuba, plus accurate dates of birth. Some day, that will be available, but as far as I know today, it isn't in the States. That's a shame.
Jim Albright
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