if Earle Combs is a HOFer, why can't Bernie be one?

[Blackout]

just a thought.

126 OPS+ for Combs, 125 for Bernie. But Bernie was more important to his dynasty by far IMO.

[leecemark]

--Williams would be a better choice than Combs. The problem is that so would alot of people. Combs has no business in the Hall.

[yanks0714]

just a thought.

126 OPS+ for Combs, 125 for Bernie. But Bernie was more important to his dynasty by far IMO.

Because that argument doesn't work. Combs shouldn't be in the Hall. Why elect Bernie (my favorite latter day Yankee) and make it two mistakes. Two wrongs don't make a right.

[Paul Wendt]

Because that argument doesn't work. Combs shouldn't be in the Hall. Why elect Bernie (my favorite latter day Yankee) and make it two mistakes. Two wrongs don't make a right.

Williams was better than Combs and he played longer. Especially if you are a supporter of Williams, it is a mistake to look at any career rate measure, both because he put up the long or medium long career that many HOF members lack, and because he declined a lot before retiring --as usual but not universal and some of those short or medium-long career HOFers did not decline much.

Bernie Williams was a great player for at least a short while, maybe a long while. By my interpretation of Clay Davenport's ratings (DT cards at baseball prospectus), he was building a good HOF resume 1992-2002, eleven years with 1992 only a half-season. He was a super fielder in the beginning, enough to carry 1992-93 onto that HOF resume. He was a woefully weak CF after 2001 but carried for one more season by his great batting. If you chop off 2003-2006 you'll find a CF with moderately short career like Combs but much superior. On the same interpretation of Davenport's ratings, Combs was building a good HOF resume only 1927-1928.

Williams should probably be compared directly with HOF members like Hugh Duffy, Earl Averill, and Kirby Puckett; outsiders like Mike Griffin, Cy Seymour, Wally Berger, and Dale Murphy. Not only the three HOF members because they may not be the best of these eight players.

[stejay]

I agree, Bernie should be in the hall for sure.

[Fuzzy Bear]

Combs and Williams are about equal. If you look at Combs' eight best years, they are about at the level of Williams' in terms of OWP.

Combs was a late arrival to the majors. He was a college man (Eastern KY University) at a time when MLB teams shyed away from college players; he was probably ready for the majors a year or two before he arrived with the Yankees.

Combs' career was shortened on the front end and back end by injury as well. He broke his ankle in his rookie season (1924) which put him out for most of the year. He came back nicely from this, and did not have a major injury until 1934, when he fractured his skull crashing into the fence in St. Louis. He came back from this the next year (1935) as a player-coach, but he broke his collarbone and played only 89 games that year. He retired and became a full-time coach the next year. Seems the Yankees had this kid from San Francisco that they thought was a hot prospect, and they wanted the Kentucky Colonel to work with him full-time as a coach. (Gee, I wish I remember that kid from San Francisco's name. :bowdown

Combs' obituary indicates that he was a first class defensive center fielder. Combs had an average arm, but extraordinary range, and this was a widely held perception supported by Combs' range factors. He was a career CF, playing 1,161 out of 1,387 games in the field in center.

The 1927 Yankees are something of an overrated great team. This is, in part, because of Ruth's 60 HR season, but also because of the large number of HOFers (6) on the roster. Gehrig and Ruth are, of course, no-brainers, but the other four are marginal picks (Pennock, Hoyt, Lazzeri, and Combs). So is Combs a HOF mistake?

Bill James thought so in his 1984 Historical Baseball Abstract, comparing Combs to Mickey Rivers. James seemed to back away from his earlier harsh assessment in his 2000 Historical Baseball Abstract, although he did not explicitly say so.

Combs was a Frankie Frisch VC pick, but he was not selected out of Frisch's desire to pack the HOF with his teammates on the Giants and Cardinals. He was selected because of his .325 BA, and because he was the center fielder on a great team. Combs is one of the MOST defensible Frisch picks; he's heads and tails ahead of Chick Hafey, George Kelly, Pop Haines, Rube Marquard, Dave Bancroft, and Freddie Lindstrom. He's arguably on a par with Jim Bottomley, Ross Youngs, and (maybe) Bill Terry. I haven't really looked at Combs on the Keltner List, but I suspect he would not turn out all that badly.

I won't endorse the argument of "If Combs, then Williams." But Combs isn't a guy whose plaque I'd want to rip out of the wall. He's at the top of the barrel of the Frisch VC picks, and his selection was NOT a case of cronyism.

[leecemark]

--Combs didn't have an average arm. He had a notoriously weak one..

[Paul Wendt]

Combs was a Frankie Frisch VC pick, but he was not selected out of Frisch's desire to pack the HOF with his teammates on the Giants and Cardinals. He was selected because of his .325 BA, and because he was the center fielder on a great team. Combs is one of the MOST defensible Frisch picks; he's heads and tails ahead of Chick Hafey, George Kelly, Pop Haines, Rube Marquard, Dave Bancroft, and Freddie Lindstrom. He's arguably on a par with Jim Bottomley, Ross Youngs, and (maybe) Bill Terry.

Note that Terry was not elected by Frisch or by cronyism as this paragraph suggests. He was a member of the Veterans Committee beginning 1971, sitting with Frisch for two or three years. According to the Deane/James list he retired after 1976, the cycle when they elected his longtime 3Bman Freddie Lindstrom.

I haven't really looked at Combs on the Keltner List, but I suspect he would not turn out all that badly.

But Combs isn't a guy whose plaque I'd want to rip out of the wall. He's at the top of the barrel of the Frisch VC picks, and his selection was NOT a case of cronyism.

(By the way I agree about the wall and the diagnosis of .325 and CF for champions. But I rank Bancroft higher and count only five clear "mistakes" there, in the wall sense. The number of clear cronies is also less than implied, for a few were elected later.)

[Fuzzy Bear]

Note that Terry was not elected by Frisch or by cronyism as this paragraph suggests. He was a member of the Veterans Committee beginning 1971, sitting with Frisch for two or three years. According to the Deane/James list he retired after 1976, the cycle when they elected his longtime 3Bman Freddie Lindstrom.

That's true. I used Terry's example not because he was one of the horrible Frisch picks, but because he was a short career guy with a gaudy BA.

Terry's a valid HOFer, but he's somewhat overrated. Terry would not be as well remembered as he is if he hadn't hit .401 in 1930. He's not as far ahead of Combs as some may think.

[Captain Cold Nose]

One's HOF argument should never be reduced to a single stat.

Being better than a mistake does not make one a HOF'er.

[jjpm74]

(By the way I agree about the wall and the diagnosis of .325 and CF for champions. But I rank Bancroft higher and count only five clear "mistakes" there, in the wall sense. The number of clear cronies is also less than implied, for a few were elected later.)

Who are your five, Paul?

[Paul Wendt]

Who are your five, Paul?

I simply meant the other five where FB listed six.

Combs is one of the MOST defensible Frisch picks; he's heads and tails ahead of Chick Hafey, George Kelly, Pop Haines, Rube Marquard, Dave Bancroft, and Freddie Lindstrom. He's arguably on a par with Jim Bottomley, Ross Youngs, and (maybe) Bill Terry.

But I would include Travis Jackson, elected after Frisch's and Terry's time (see table below).

By the way, Bill James in his discussion of eight crony selections (Giants and Cardinals from Frisch-Terry time, elected for one kind of wrong reason) distinguishes Bancroft and Bottomley as "marginal Hall of Famers", covers Hafey, Kelly, Haines, Lindstrom, and Youngs as "absolutely beyond any kind of logical defense", and leaves Travis Jackson in limbo. Jackson was elected after Terry left. by a cmte "criticized for not putting shortstops in the HOF" says James.
Source: Whatever Happened, p162-168

Here is my current reconstruction in chron order (F=Frisch, T=Terry)
F T
x o Haines (1970)
x x Bancroft
x x Hafey
x x Youngs
x x Kelly
o x Bottomley
o x Lindstrom
o o Jackson (1982)

--add: In 1978 the board appointed six new members, which increased the size of the VC from 12 to 18. That may be a crucial part of the story, meaning new blood, a larger group, and a number indivisible by four. The Negro Leagues Cmte retired at the same time so there may have been something else going on, open discussion and criticism of the pace of inductions.--

Rube Marquard played for the Giants a decade before Frisch and Bill James covers him among "the Glory of Their Times selections", supposedly stimulated by Larry Ritter's classic book, mainly in the words of the 1900s-1910s players whom he interviewed.

[KCGHOST]

Williams wouldn't be the worst selection to the HoF, but the only modern guys he is clearly better than are Combs, Hack Wilson, Earl Averill and Kirby Puckett. Puckett got a kind of medical exemption election and Wilson was (for some reason) rewarded for one monster season. And Combs and Averill are high BA, short career, 1920's-1930's guys that the VC loved.

But neither is he demonstrably worse than Edd Roush, Richie Ashburn, and Max Carey. Some would say he is better than them.