HOF debate: Vladimir Guerrero

[matfanofold]

Let me clarify I'm pro Clark , but not Pro Clark HOF. Wish he could redo 6 years at full health, oh well

Ryan

I agree, both Clark & Mattingly were cornerstones of the sport and hobby in the late 80's and early 90's. Both had careers shortened by hampering issues like injuries and one can only wonder just how the chips may have fallen if both were afforded 18-20 years of quality, healthy, baseball. I also believe neither are HOF worthy. But I will always remember Mattingly for the animal he was at the plate and Clark for the sweetest swing since the splendid splinter. Both made it in to my 'Hall of Great Memories"...

 

[elmalo]

I would take Mattingly in his prime over Clark in his prime. MAttingly was never the same after that back injury in 87.

 

[Scartchy18]

Vlad Guererro is 100% certain HoF in year one or two, but biases may keep him out for another year or two. People do get biased at voting time. He was a top ten offensive player for 15 years, a solid defender (great range, fantastic arm, and decent glove), so those of you who think his D wasn't good never watched him. All-time hits leader from the DR, Expo leader in so many career and single season stats, lead an OK Angels team to 5 Division titles in six years, then the Rangers to the first WS ever. And a great teammate, a great player to watch, a fan favorite still. His D stats are fine but statisticians screw things up, bias and all. Saw a game in Atlanta years ago; Sammy Sosa got a grounder off the right-center wall, bobbled it, runner stayed on 2nd, error anyway on a clean double. Two innings later popup to center, easy play, Andruw Jones dropped it, runner went to second not just 1st on his drop (couldn't blame the Sun, or a shout beside him, he just dropped it). No error. Bias.

A guy about 2 years ago created a spreadsheet of great players by year; he took certain HoF standards and looked at who had the most great years. He'd look at BA, RBI's, runs, SLG, OBP, OPS+, mixing and matching different stats to get different results (like making a table of guys who reached HoF standards in BA, OBP, RBI's, and OPS+, and seeing who had the most great years, then doing it again looking at OBP, runs, OPS+, then again with BA, SLG, HR, hits....).

His purpose was to show that being mediocre for 20 years didn't make you worthy of the HoF, and that a lot of guys with great career totals only had 3-4 great years and were worse than advertised for the other 12. He also took issue with some players being called great before they'd really done it all (Pujols, Hamilton were two he went on about). His main point was that some guys get overlooked, and some overvalued, simply because of bias. So he created 25 tables and found out who had the most great years in each table, who made the top ten; Gehrig, Ruth, Aaron, Cobb, Mays, Mantle, Ted Williams, everyone who could be anyone.

What's interesting is that only two players appeared on every single list, only two guys made the top ten no matter how he juggled the categories to make his lists: Lou Gehrig and Vladimir Guerrero. Pujols, as a comparison, made under 10 lists. Ruth made 17. Only two guys. I wish I had saved the page because he never archives his blogs!

Vlad a HoF, most certainly. Look at what he did, how he played. Awesome player. Some people who didn't watch him for years think his D wasn't that good. Others who never saw him play use some bastardized sabermetrics to make him look very good but not great. You can twist and add up numbers in that way to make anyone look good, or bad. But that guy, his HoF blog post. that wasn't fiddled with or stretched to favour one way or another. Don't like RBI's, he dropped it. Love OPS, he used it. Prefer OBP, OPS+ only, he did that. Again, he looked at who made HoF standards and how many years they did it, then listed the top 10 every time, the greatest of the greats in terms of having great years. Gehrig and Guerrero. Not Mattingly, Will Clark, Dale Murphy, Larry Walker, Todd Helton, Albert Pujols, Andruw Jones.... Nope, but the guy who swung and and drove everything hard, high ROE, gave 100% all the time, power and average, great arm, great range, played hurt, played sick, and played great.

 

[Mighty Bombjack]

+1 and welcome to the boards