All-Time All-Mariner Roster: First Base
Derek:
Ah, John Olerud. I find his 2002 season to be the finest by a first baseman in all Mariner-dom.
Frist, the stats — playing in Safeco, he hit .300/.400/.490 that year (fun side fact: that’s worth about 23 runs more than Raul Ibanez at first in KC and 12 runs more than Richie Sexson in Milwaukee). That’s not all that impressive for a first baseman, but among Mariner first baseman it’s really between him and Alvin Davis.
Davis’ best offensive season might match or even get a little ahead of Olerud’s, but he was never the defender that Olerud was. Davis was average or below average, and Olerud was good. That broke the tie for me, much in the same way it pushed Wilson ahead of Johjima.
My problem here is making a convincing argument about this. Olerud’s fielding percentages were better than league average, and range factor isn’t good enough for me to do much with it. But where we can apply rough defensive metrics across years — and I know you’re going to blanch at this — by using something like Davenport’s fielding runs, there’s a huge gap, on the order of ten runs a year between the two.
I think this is going to be a problem we encounter frequently, that comparing defense way back is tough. But what evidence I can find suggests that Olerud was the better defender by a significant margin in 2002, and that’s enough for me to put that season above the best of Alvin Davis’ years.
It’s a little sad that the best all-time all-Mariner season wasn’t near Olerud’s best season, or in that year nearly the best season by a first-baseman. Yet there it is.
Dave:
Time has a nasty habit of making people forget the degree of things that occurred but weren’t monumental. Alvin Davis was never the best player in baseball, and he played on some truly horrible Mariners teams in the 1980s, but we can’t let time deceive us into not realizing just how good he was in 1989. It was a remarkable season – the best the organization has ever gotten from a first baseman.
Davis hit .305/.424/.496 with 21 home runs and 101 walks against just 49 strikeouts, and his raw numbers are actually very similar to John Olerud’s in 2002 that you’ve noted above. On a per at-bat basis, they were practically the same hitter – good average, great plate discipline, gap power and the occasional long ball. So what was different? The run scoring environment of the day, and through that, the relative value of that same performance.
In 2002, the league average OPS for a player who spent half his time in Safeco Field was .747. In 1989, the league average OPS for a player who spent half his time in the Kingdome was .718. AD’s .920 OPS was good for second best in the American League that year, .004 points behind Fred McGriff. They were the only two guys in the AL to post an OPS over .900. In 2002, Jim Thome led the AL with a 1.122 OPS, there were three other players over 1.000, and six more with an OPS between .900 and .999. Olerud’s .893 OPS ranked 11th in the AL that year, and more importantly, it ranked behind Jim Thome, Jason Giambi, Mike Sweeney, Rafael Palmeiro, and Carlos Delgado.
Offensively, the 2002 John Olerud was the 7th best hitting first baseman in the league that year. His defense moves him past Palmeiro, Delgado, and Sweeney, but even with that adjustment, he’s still not among the three best at his own position that year.
Alvin Davis, however, was as good as any other hitter in the league in 1989. If he was on a better team, he’d have finished in the top 7 in MVP voting. It’s hard to make a case that Olerud even belonged in the top 20 in 2002.
Yes, John Olerud was a good defender and an underrated player during his time in Seattle, but Alvin Davis was as good as anyone else who stepped to the plate in 1989. In an era where teams weren’t scoring more than 4.00 runs per game with regularity, Davis’ offensive contributions were simply more valuable than a comparable performance from Olerud in ‘02, and we simply don’t have enough evidence that Olerud’s defensive value made up for that difference at the plate. And no, Davenport Fielding Runs don’t count as evidence – they’re beyond useless.
AD didn’t earn the Mr. Mariner nickname out of pity or a lack of anyone else to carry the franchise. He earned it by being a premier, front line talent who put up some monstrous seasons in which there wasn’t much else to get excited about. There’s a reason I’m sad every time I hear someone else announced as #21 over the Safeco P.A. as time and a lack of diligence by the M’s has eroded the memory of just how tremendous Alvin Davis really was. Let’s not make that same mistake.
Derek:
All fair points, but I’m still in the Olerud 2002 camp.
First, to the best-at-their-position or best-in-league-argument: I didn’t consider this as a criteria. There are too many external factors at work here. Not to skip ahead too far, but we might never be able to select some positions if that’s a serious consideration. If the M’s tended to have good but not great 1b, and one year the league had a bumper crop of great ones, I don’t see that we can’t say the M’s offering that year wasn’t the best.
I want to return to the defensive argument. Let’s toss Davenport’s Fielding Runs out the door for a second. My larger point there is that it’s really hard to compare fielding across time spans like that, because the tools that can do it – like Clay’s Fielding Runs – necessarily operate at such a high level and with such macro statistics that when they try and work out who was good and bad, they break down.
So let me offer another way to look at this: Olerud played 152 games at first in 2002. Lou only started other players there twelve games all season, and despite Olerud’s station-to-station baserunning which you’d think would get him pinch-runners, other players only appeared at first another 16 times. Olerud played 1,317 innings at first that year, tied with Bret Boone and only one inning behind Mike Cameron. Piniella kept his glove guys in when he could, and for Olerud to get the same respect afforded the 2002 Boone and Cameron, well, that’s something.
The 1989 Alvin Davis didn’t play first base as much. I can’t argue that the best Mariner first-base season came from someone who only played 125 games there in a year without a labor interruption. Lefebvre started Jim Presley 18 times, a 37-year old Darnell Coles 11 times, and Dave Cochrane (!) 6 times. Alvin Davis played 1,077 innings at first — that’s way less than Olerud did.
Davis was the team’s DH 14 times, and didn’t play at all in another 13 games. The M’s brought in defensive subs another 22 times (though unlike in Olerud’s case, we might not be able to presume they all subbed in for AD). We have to admit that Olerud played first base a lot more than AD did, and so we have to concede that even if they were exactly the same defensively, Olerud helped his team more by playing more.
Beyond that, unless there’s an injury-related reason that I’m not remembering as I write this, the judgment of the men who made out their lineup cards should be taken as some evidence of their relative merit with the glove: Lou really had to have an overwhelming reason to not start Olerud or to pull him from a game, where AD was a lot more likely to start at DH, not start, and get subbed for when he did start. That’s a big difference in how their managers viewed their defensive contributions.
Olerud also won a Gold Glove that year, and Davis never did.
Now, how much weight you want to assign to that is up to you, but I’m entirely comfortable putting it at ten runs, which is about what an average 1b to good 1b gets you, defensively.
Is that enough to put him over AD? For that, we have to go back to the offensive arguments. Now, the case for 89 Davis at 1B is pretty compelling, I totally admit: 2nd in the AL in on-base percentage, 5th in slugging percentage… but Olerud in 2002 was 7th in the AL in OBP, and… okay, his slugging wasn’t in the top ten.
And your points about the different contexts and so far are all fine. But when I’m lazy and look them up with a stat that corrects for league and offensive positions and all of that, the difference is not that large at all. In terms of VORP, for instance, Alvin Davis’s 1989 was worth 52 runs, while Olerud’s 2002 is worth 48 (#1, AD 1989, #2, AD 1984, #3, Olerud 2002, $4 Bruce Bochte 2005).
I thought having read your argument that it would be a lot larger, but it’s not. It’s only four runs, and Olerud’s increased playing time at first and his quality defense while out there makes up for that difference and then some.
I have to stick with Olerud. If we were arguing who the best first baseman in M’s history was, I would answer “Alvin Davis” without hesitation. But in the terms we’re discussing, which is who put up the best one-season performance at that position, I’m convinced that Olerud’s 152 games in 2002 were a better year as a first baseman than Davis’s 125 games.
Dave:
I’m not saying that best-in-the-league has to be the ultimate deciding factor, but it needs to be in the conversation. Even if the offensive difference due to run environments is only half a dozen runs, there’s added value in having the best or second best hitter in the league on the roster. As we’ve talked about in roster construction posts, it’s much easier to make marginal upgrades than it is to go from good to great, and relative to the years they played, John Olerud was a good hitter while Alvin Davis was a great hitter.
Defensively, certainly, Olerud has Davis beat, but I’m not comfortable using managerial decisions to attempt to quantify the difference. If we did that, we’d have to conclude that Raul Ibanez is a superior defender since he plays everyday and John McLaren never takes him out for defensive purposes. Olerud was better with the glove? Was it enough to cancel out the fact that Alvin Davis was the second best hitter in the league that year, while Olerud wasn’t even able to crack the top ten? I don’t think so.
Derek:
I’m unswayed. I don’t think there’s so much added value in being the #1 or #2 bat that it outweighs the difference in overall contribution here. It’s like — if you can have a prime Carlos Beltran season, you get a top-tier bat and a good defender. His overall contribution might be the best in the league while his offense isn’t the #1, and his defense might not even be #1.
Olerud played a whole season at first, hit really well, and played good defense. Davis played 75% of a season at first, hit better, and played significantly worse defense. In terms of total value, I have to hand it to Olerud.
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Great Job guys, curious to whom you’d have as honorable mention- 1995 Martinez, 1996 Sorrento, or 05 Sexson?
I’d put Tino’s 1995 as the best season. His .OPS was identical to AD’s 89 campaing, but I would argue that Tino’s .OPS was more meaningful, as it was 30 points higher of slugging. Tino’s 31 HR’s was quite good coupled with his line of .293/.369/.551. For comparison, AD and JO hit 21 and 22 HR’s, respectively. An increase of nearly 1/3rd is significant.
Nice back and forth. You both have valid points, and I’d say it is a very close call. Davis had a really solid offensive year. What I would like to know, how big is the difference in their defensive abilities? Are we talking Ibanez vs Matt Holliday, or Ibanez vs Manny? I’m still not great at knowing which defensive statistics are the most valuable.
Without knowing, I’d have to give a slight edge to Olerud. But, most of that could be credited to, what Dave said, memory. I just don’t have as clear of memories of Davis as I do with Olerud.
(That Ibanez vs Manny thing was a bad choice, as neither were that bad. I meant to show two guys who are around the same skill level)
1995 Tino doesn’t even belong in the discussion. His offensive output was worth about 27 runs above an average hitter. 1989 Alvin Davis was worth about 44 runs above an average hitter.
The home run difference doesn’t matter – Tino doesn’t even have a prayer in this conversation.
“His offensive output was worth about 27 runs above an average hitter.”
- Is average hitter based off 1995 stats?
And how do you come up with runs over average?
Those are park adjusted, era adjusted, linear weights values. They’re called BtRuns on baseball-reference, and were invented by Pete Palmer. But pretty much any linear weights metric you use will get you close to the same point.
Bruce Bochte 2005? Trying to check this, I find Bochte 1979 at 45.9 VORP, and Sexson 2005 at 45.8 VORP, so I guess it’s splitting the difference or something.
Bochte – 29 runs above average in 79. Like Tino, no chance. Sexson was worth 37 runs above an average hitter in 2005, but that’s still half a dozen behind AD. Big enough gap that he doesn’t get considered.
It really is Davis vs Olerud. Everyone else falls short.
I’ve always felt that Olerud’s value as a player had always been far underappreciated. This article has always stuck in my head due to the obvious names you would expect to see in the top 20, and then the one that many might be stunned by. Not me.
[mod note - somehow your whole post turned into a link and I couldn't decipher it enough to fix it. please repost the link if you feel it's relevant. Thanks!]
How much does team record factor in?
1989: 73-89
2002: 93-69
1989 Mariners were cruising into a 6th place finish. No pressure of a pennant race.
2002 Mariners finished 3rd but were in it fighting with Oakland AND Anaheim right to the end.
I would say an Olerud on a contending team is more valuable than a David on a losing team.
I hate that line of thinking. A player doesn’t become more or less valuable because his teammates change.
Sorry…Davis
I wasn’t trying to suggest Bochte, I was trying to sort out the reference to Bochte that gives the wrong year.
How much does team record factor in?
Not at all. This will come up again later, but I don’t think it’s important to either Dave or me.
Yeah, there’s a typo there in my “Bochte 2005″ — I’ll have to fix that later.
On a purely subjective note, I have to say I loved watching Olerud at the plate, both his serenity and his swing.
I’m not really olod enough to remember Alvin Davis, but I do remember that Olerud had a couple great seasons with the M’s before his perfromance took a cliffdive in ‘04
Interesting…I won’t take up your time arguing Team Record and value of a player but in my mind, a players react differently when there is more on the line or more meaning to a game (example A: Alex Rodriguez). Someone who can put up their best numbers during a pennant run to me means more than someone playing out the string.
Dude!
Pete O’Brien!!!! Not even a sniff?
Unfortunately, Spanky, there’s no evidence to support your line of thinking, and it’s been studied in so much depth that it’s ridiculous. It’s basically a myth.
[insufficiently glow-y light rejected by firmament]
Don’t get me wrong…I’m not talking about being “Clutch” if that’s the studies you’re talking about. It has more to do with Mr. Davis not having an easier go of it because the team sucked. Other teams not having to pitch him carefully because no one was on base and the team was up 4 runs so go ahead and let him swing away.
Please stop, you’re making my argument for Olerud look bad.
S/B “…Mr. Davis having an easier go of it…”
It’s Monday morning!
Not being a mariner fan long enough to personally recall the AD seasons (I was 13 and living in Utah in 1988), I can’t really contribute much of substance, other than to say it really seems to boil down to a) the extent to which Olerud was better defensively and b) the extent to which the better defender playing more games at first prevented runs. Offensively, it seems clear that AD had an advantage, and the difference can be quantified. As the arguments above imply, I’m not sure that the difference in contributions due to defense can be quantified at this point.
If it was easier for Davis because on a losing team, you can get away with pitching to him, it was also harder for him because on a losing team, he doesn’t have as good protection and you can get away with not pitching to him. Seriously, this is why trying to add teammate “context” to individual performance never gets anywhere.
I forgot to add–great post! Very interesting.
I’m not saying he had / didn’t have protection. I’m saying, the pitcher falls behind 3-1 and doesn’t want to start a rally with a walk so he just puts a fast ball over the plate. Nothing to do with who’s ahead or who’s behind him.
This is a nice point, but I’m not convinced to say that it “wins” the discussion for Davis; more that it leaves things in question to a degree that we can’t get past based on current metrics.
Personally, my gut feeling (also not having been around for Davis’s season in question, or any of them) is that Olerud’s defense was enough to make up the offensive gap; he’s one of the few guys I’ve watched play defense at first base who seemed to have an actual positive impact, as opposed to most first basemen who either don’t seem to matter much or are actively detrimental.
But that’s a gut feeling, not supported with actual analysis, and I’m prepared to say it’s an open question until we can measure defense more effectively.
Do you honestly think this happened enough over the course of a season to have a measurable effect?
Great post guys.
AD gets the check mark for platoon splits.
AD ‘89 vs RHP as LH .910 OPS
AD ‘89 vs LHP as LH .942 OPS !
JO ‘02 vs RHP as LH .931 OPS
JO ‘02 vs LHP as LH .802 OPS
Lower platoon split gets a check mark? Um… why?
I didn’t mean to imply it “wins” the discussion, although I can see why it was read that way. Rather I meant to suggest that the uncertainty will not allow us to unambiguously identify a “winner” until we can get a better handle on the defense.
DMZ, I can see the point that RaoulDuke is making in 32. If you’ve got a guy with no platoon split, it makes the “situational pitching” thing a bit more difficult on an opposing manager. Sure, go ahead and send your LOOGY out there. My guy will blister the ball anyway.
That said, surfing through AD’s platoon splits makes me think this wasn’t a persistent skill. He just had a good year against LHP.
Okay, but I don’t see how that’s significant.
32- 75% of MLB pitchers are right handed
If you’re trying to construct a roster in order to play seasons in some imaginary future, the platoon splits might be important. But if the only question is which single-season performance was the best, as I understand this exercise, it matters less how that performance was reached.
The platoon split does raise an interesting question: Should it matter in this sort of discussion?
If I interpret the topic of “best season” to be “which of these players would I most like to have on my team for a season”, then the platoon issue might be of some import. Namely, if one of the players had a very large platoon differential (and admittedly over a single season, some of that is small sample size)I might be less likely to choose that player, since, if the difference was large enough, I might need to look for another hitter who could take some of those at bats.
However, at this level, where we are considering players who were the best, it’s unlikely that a platoon split would be large enough to matter in this way. An .802 OPS, for example, is good enough for a first baseman.
I think you and I are saying the same thing, just in two different ways.
It doesn’t make it any less of an interesting question, and again my gut feeling lies with Olerud, but I suspect there’ll be a couple more of these that are tough questions when you try to figure out how much of a difference defense made (the defense question came into play with Wilson vs. Johjima also), and the answer in my mind is definitely not to discount defense just because we don’t have a reliable metric for it.
Here’s how I approached the question: it’s about picking the player-season who contributed the most at that position. It’s not necc. about skill sets or anything.
So like the platoon thing: I’m just looking at what they did. I figure if something like that was important or significant, it’s part of the record.
Like Olerud may have faced more lefty relievers, and it may have dragged his numbers down a little. But in that case, in comparing their total contributions, you incorporate that.
Yeah, looking at historical seasons, platoon splits are 100% irrelevant. If an otherwise all-star caliber player were mincemeat against lefty pitching (for example), then he’d either: a) not play much against lefties, which would hurt his counting stats (runs created, etc.) or b) suck against lefties, thereby degrading both counting stats and rate stats, which shows up in the end-of-season numbers.
Great topic!
I was someone who suffered through may seasons listening to virtually every game on the radio growing up (many which sadly resemble THIS abortion of a year) in the early ’80s. Man, AD really stood out when we had very, VERY little. So for old school M’s fans its hard not to choose AD in a close comparison due to that bias.
What’s indisputable is both did a lot of things well and were both such reliable, consistent hitters who knew how to work the count and get their share of X-base hits.
So the only fair thing would be to decide it by going back in time and when they’re both 30 have them run the 100 yd dash and let that decide who should get the nod w/ each’s blazing speed.
I came out of the post more convinced by Derek’s argument – if the hitting is close, then Olerud’s games played and defense are more than enough to make up the difference.
But after taking a look at baseball-reference, I’m coming over to Dave’s side. What he says about league context is right on – OPS+ is adjusted for the context of the league, I believe, and that reflects a pretty substantial advantage for Davis – 156 OPS+ vs. 140. That’s a big difference.
I’m not sure what the ground rules of this conversation are, but if the goal of the all-time All-Mariner roster is to build the best roster to play games, as opposed to honor the best seasons at each position, I’d think you’d take Davis. He contributes more in each at-bat, and when he’s out you will likely have an excellent bench player in the at-bats he doesn’t take (assuming you’re going to continue this through the bench positions). In the absence of definitive data on how many runs Davis would cost you defensively, I think you’d have to go with the higher offensive ceiling.
For example, I’d take 125 games of Alvin Davis and 37 games of John Olerud as backup before I’d take 152 games of John Olerud and 9 games of Alvin Davis as backup.
Perhaps that’s not how you’re doing this, though. At the very least, this is a pretty fascinating question. Well-debated, gentlemen.
I agree. Defense cannot be discounted just because we aren’t good at counting it. I think we need better ways of analyzing defensive contributions. In present times, we have things like fan scouting reports, but unless we can get a few thousand people to watch a bunch of old tapes of games, we’ll never have that for former players. (I’m not volunteering.)
Great debate. Certainly Ole caught a break defensively compared to AD because he didn’t have to field on the carpet.
It’s interesting to observe that 1st base is a position that, before last year, traditionally provided a lot of offense for the team. Other good years that haven’t been mentioned above are David Segui’s 1998 (.305/.359/.487) (and he could field), and Paul Sorrento’s powerful 1996 (.289/.370/.507).
It’s also interesting how similar Olerud’s 2001 and 2002 seasons; his BA, OBP, and OPS were all very close – 136 OPS+ vs 140 OPS+, and 270 and 271 total bases.
I wouldn’t think that strange if those two seasons weren’t also head and shoulders above all of his other seasons as a Mariner.
What I get from the discussion is that we have two performances that are at about the same level. Olerud played more often, and contributed more on defense. AD, relative to the season, was better offensively.
I think that if you want to come to an agreement on the better season, then you have to start looking at the small differences.
The platoon splits looks like an area where AD may come out ahead.
sOPS+ (vs RHP) – AD in ‘89 – 156
sOPS+ (vs LHP) – AD in ‘89 – 191
sOPS+ (vs RHP) – JO in ‘02 – 137
sOPS+ (vs LHP) – JO in ‘02 – 126
I’m not using those stats to say Alvin Davis is the overall winner. Just to say that not only did AD hit well against Righties, but that he CRUSHED lefties. And in a discussion about the BEST single season, I don’t think it matters what AD did historically against lefties.
I apologize for my stupid Edgar comment earlier. But I think that 89 Alvin Davis was better than 02 Olerud. His OPS+ is higher(140 vs 156) and he walked more than twice as many times as he struck out. I do realize that Olerud’s defense was better, but I think that the feilding ability of your first baseman is not all that important. Your basic job is too catch the ball, and if you can do that and not make a huge amount of errors, you’re fine. (Davis made 10 errors, btw)
I’m sorry, but if a good defender at first can save their team ten runs, that’s just as valuable as saving ten runs at any other position. Defense matters at every position but DH.
Dave said: 1995 Tino doesn’t even belong in the discussion. His offensive output was worth about 27 runs above an average hitter. 1989 Alvin Davis was worth about 44 runs above an average hitter. The home run difference doesn’t matter – Tino doesn’t even have a prayer in this conversation.
So Tino gets no credit for the importance of his 1995 performance to the team and the franchise overall? If you take out some of what he did and the M’s lose even one less game that year they don’t make the playoffs, they don’t beat the Yankees, there’s no Safeco Field, the team moves to some other city, we never become familiar with the name Howard Lincoln, the team never wins 116 games and, most importantly of all, the USS Mariner site never comes to be…
I think most significant season is probably a fundamentally different discussion, jwgrandsalami.
52 –
Agreed. Tino hit .293/.369/.551 with 31 HRs, 111 RBIs, and 35 2Bs. How is that not mentioned?
DMZ- Yes, saving ten runs fielding is saving ten runs fielding no matter how you look at it, but not as many balls get hit to the first baseman as they do to the shortstop or third baseman, so having a good defender there isn’t as important.
Also, Pete O’Brien!!! WTH?
Come on, massive oversight. LOL
I’d almost consider a ten-run-saving defender at first to be MORE valuable than at other positions, since it’s generally such a crappy defensive position.
But yeah, there’s definitely no reason to value defensive run prevention LESS at 1B.
While I know that the sepia-toned affection for the ‘95 season continues to this day, it shouldn’t figure into discussions like this; this is about evaluating the performances on the field, not off-field circumstances that made them seem more significant.
It’s like the argument about if a player’s numbers on a last place team makes him a candidate for the league MVP…best season and most significant season are two different topics…
Since nobody addressed this argument back there….
You’re argument is in fact the opposite of the truth. If we are only considering OBP and SLG, OBP is more valuable — it correlates more closely to wins and runs scored than SLG does — so if two players have the same OPS, the one with higher SLG is probably less valuable, not more.
I don’t disagree. But Davis was practically the embodiment of self-possession and serenity at the plate. I remember Bill James writing about Davis’s strike zone judgment, noting that when Davis took a pitch, he rarely even twitched. His whole attitude on borderline pitches said “Yep, that’s a ball.”
Ten runs saved is ten runs saved, regardless of position.
If anything, your argument about scarcity of run prevention chances makes a ten run saving defender at first base MORE significant, not less, since he did more with the opportunities that he did have than a ten run saving defender at short.
Pete said:
That was a 135 OPS+ season, which in context was less valuable than Olerud’s 140 OPS+ (or Richie Sexson’s 144 OPS+ in 2005). And that’s just taking hitting into account, not defense or innings played.
Also, Spanky, even if what you’re talking about has any reality, Alex Rodriguez isn’t example #1, or any example at all; he hits the crap out of the ball no matter how good or bad his team is, whether they are in the race or not. This is a particularly bad two-year stretch to be giving him that label, when he’s basically been the difference between the Yankees being contenders or not.
link
I’ve always felt that Olerud’s value as a player had always been far underappreciated. This article has always stuck in my head due to the obvious names you would expect to see in the top 20, and then the one that many might be stunned by. Not me. He was not only the best to play the position for the Mariners, he was one of the best players in the league in the 1972-2002 era.
I’d take Pat Putnam and Paul Sorrento over Pete O’Brien. O’Brien was well into his decline when he came to Seattle (don’t even talk to me about RBI totals), and was offensively replacement-level for his position in his best Mariners years. If he’d had some of his prime Texas seasons in Seattle, however, we’d be having a whole different conversation.
Though you’d be hard-pressed to find even one example that held up to non-anecdotal scrutiny.
This is much more interesting than Three Guys Who Agree On Everything.
1995 was a crazy good year for AL hitters, his numbers aren’t that amazing when compared with Davis, Olerud, or even Sexson.
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Alvin Davis 1989 also had a stint on the 15-day disabled list, which hurts his counting stats like VORP and considerations like the number of games played at first.
The era adjustment argument persuades me to remain in the Davis camp. The defense makes it very close, but without data from 1989, I am not sure we can fairly say that Davis was X runs below Olerud with the glove. Bad defenders have good years too, which for Davis might have been 1989. But I would not argue with adding an asterisk noting Olerud’s defensive contribution (and the lack of data for Davis).
Correct me if I’m wrong, but you’re saying this as though we should compensate for the missed games (and the reduced counting stats) in our comparision. Which is true if you’re talking about who’s the best hitter per at bat, but not if you’re talking about who had the best season. The missed time works against Davis in this argument. Every day he missed was damaging to the team. It’s not his fault, but it matters.
Jeff Nye- I still don’t agree with either you or DMZ, so I’m going to offer one more thing about defense and first base before I shut up- The reason there are so many crappy defenders at first base is that they are put there so that their defense only hurts the team minimally. Guys that hit a ton but can’t field are put at first to hide their shortcomings with the glove.
I think the argument there though is not that the 10 runs don’t count because he’s a first baseman, but that 10 runs seems rather high. A first baseman has two main ways of preventing runs – stopping more balls hit at him and making better plays on throws. A quick Google check shows that about 72% of all runners are stranded.
Admittedly, this is back of the envelope calculations here, but to get 10 runs over 162 games with a normal strand rate, Olerud would have had to prevent over a hit a week more than Davis. That does seem high.
That’s not one more thing, it’s the same thing.
You can play good defense at first, or left. That they’re not premium defensive positions doesn’t lessen the contributions that can be made there.
See: Randy Winn, Mariner left fielder.
I’d take Pat Putnam and Paul Sorrento over Pete O’Brien
Oh, man, Pat Putnam. During the 1984 season, MLB did an in-season, elimination-style home run derby among each team’s home run leader from the previous season. The players would face off against each other just prior to the game. I went to the game early that season when Baltimore’s future Hall of Famer Eddie Murray was paired against a very embarrassed Pat Putnam, who at that point was homerless and hitting .200, had lost his job to Alvin Davis, and was basically just waiting for a trade or his release. While Murray put on a show, Putnam could not take his cuts and sit down fast enough.
Gee, aren’t we glad we’ve only been around just over 30 years. Imagine doing this for a team like the Yankees, Braves, Red Sox, White Sox, Cubs, etc., that has been around since forever…
Of course, the Yankees would be easy. Just pick pretty much 1927 from any of the positions. Especially Gehrig’s at first…
Not as many balls get hit to first base a the other positions.
Therefore, the amount of times a good defender can help his team by turning a sure hit into an out or the amount of times a bad defender can hurt his team by making a sure out a hit is lessened.
If you look at spray charts for batters, you will see more balls getting hit to the left and up the middle than you will see hit to the right, which is where the 1st baseman is.
Positive, the baseball simulation game APBA did that a few decades ago. They released a series called “Original Franchise All Stars” that took the 25 best seasons from each of the 16 teams’ history. They obviously cheated and made it biased in favor of players you’d know, but the Phillies had some from the 1890’s. Billy Hamilton was an amazing lead off hitter. A Hamilton/Sam Thompson/Mike Schmidt top of the lineup scored a LOT of runs.
Cody, the evidence is against you. Read this, for instance – the 2008 UZR best and worst at each position. Lots of first baseman are playing really good defense and having it be significant.
Is shortstop more significant? Of course. Does that make first base insignificant? No.
This isn’t even really an opinion argument. There’s evidence and factual basis for Derek’s claims. He’s right.
I agree with the Olerud argument. The season’s should be judged on how the player played, not how other players around him did. Then there’s the Safco thing. Plus, dude wore a batting helmet in the field. Nuff said.
Surviving an anuerysm will make you a bit reluctant to risk a blow to the head.
The missed time works against Davis in this argument. Every day he missed was damaging to the team. It’s not his fault, but it matters.
This is a redux of the Chase Utley v. Jimmy Rollins debate from last year. The injury to Davis should not be held against him as it was not his fault. Even with the missed time, Davis still outperformed Olerud at the plate. The mere happenstance of the injury makes them appear closer than the actual level at which they hit that year.
I see how it is.
The more at bats you have, the harder it is to maintain a good stat line.
Dave- Thanks for the link. I found it intersting that a lot of our guys were in the “worst” catagory. I also found it odd that A-Rod was listed as the #3 third baseman. You think that the guys on ESPN would catch onto this.
I now agree with DMZ- for the most part. I still think that you can hide a crappy glove at first, but I now know that it hurts your team more than people would think.
77 – I trust that the people who did the work know what they’re doing but that definitely goes against my intuition so I’m more reluctant to accept it. Still though, when my argument is, “It doesn’t feel right,” I can only go so far with it.
The more at bats you have, the harder it is to maintain a good stat line.
But even if you regressed the 50 AB or so that Davis missed to, say, his 3-year weighted average, Davis still increases his value over Olerud with the bat.
Why not just give Olerud another 15 home runs then, and +5 runs saved defensively.
I have a slightly different reaction to this: I think it’s basically a toss-up, and the stats are not accurate enough to make a firm choice. You’re both right.
Actually, my real reaction is a little tear that just slipped out of my eye for Alvin Davis and John Olerud and even Tino (whom I never liked or thought was all that good) and just the very idea that a Mariner first baseman could stimulate some emotion besides anger, frustration, and loss.
Look at it this way: Which depresses you more, the descent from Olerud to Cairo, or Davis to Cairo? Devolution in action.
While he may have outperformed him in rate statistics, counting stats do matter. Player A with an .900 ops that plays 162 games is more valuable then Player B with a .920 ops that only plays 135. Those extra 28 games go to a reserve who is probably much worse than the starter. So while Player B’s rate stats may be more valuable than Players A’s, Player A provided more value to the team because he prevented a backup from playing more. Counting stats do matter.
Grizz, where do you draw the line? How about a guy who played 120 games at a higher level? How about 100?
The missed games matter. We’re not talking about who was the best hitter; we’re talking about who had the best season.
I’ll admit to being a little biased towards Olerud, too; I wasn’t around for Alvin Davis, and Olerud was really the only first baseman I’ve watched on a consistent basis that actually made me think on a pretty routine basis “wow, that was a nice play”.
Firstbasemen fielding (specifically, ONLY on catching/scooping throws) was discussed on my blog. See relevant links at post #2. According to that research, while Olerud is who we expect, Alvin Davis’ numbers hold up pretty well. How well you trust the system is based on how well the other players line up to your expectations. Richie Sexson also looks good. (Height seems to help).
Honestly, the real answer – which could probably be ascertained by reading the post and seeing that Derek and I didn’t really disagree all that much – is that picking one or the other is splitting hairs. They were both awesome, probably close to equally so, and the difference one way or another is going to be a run here or there.
You can’t go wrong with either Davis or Olerud. You can go wrong with anyone else, though. Those two really are the only two options.
It’s too bad that Davis fell off the table so young. His short career has hurt his reputation, even in Seattle.
Back to the thing about the value of defense at first base- If you take the averages of the + or- contibutions from the link that dave gave us and average them out and rank them from greatest to least, this is what you get-
RF
CF
SS
LF
3B
1B
2B
Not having seen any of the future posts in this series, my suspicion is that there’ll be a lot of this.
Two guys that you can make a really good argument for, and then the rest of the pack significantly behind them.
And I wouldn’t be surprised if defensive valuation ends up being the primary point of contention in a lot of those cases.
I saw both Davis and Olerud. I’ve been around awhile, huh?
I do have fond memories of watching Alvin hit.
In the field, though, my eyeball impression of him was one of a lack of range. Alvin did not appear to go to his right very well, and Harold Reynolds did not appear to go to his left, and a lot of balls seemed to go between them, more than should have. I also recall Reynolds playing closer to first than other secondbasemen did.
Take that for what it is worth, it doesn’t add anything to the fielding measures out there.
Now now, let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
Richie Sexson also looks good. (Height seems to help)
So Sexson is about +4 runs on throws, but -15 runs on the rest of his fielding (averaging his 2007 and 2008 UZR)? Or does UZR also account for his ability to pick errant throws?
In other words, it looks like people arguing that Sexson’s height has this benefit are right, but he’s still a bad defensive first baseman.
The generally accepted defensive spectrum looks like this:
C-SS-CF-2B-3B-RF-LF-1B
Catchers are pretty much a group unto themselves, and then you can pair off most of the rest of the positions, so a more realistic player pool approach would give you this:
C, SS/CF, 2B/3B, RF/LF, 1B/DH
The best defensive players are going to be on the left side of the spectrum, with the worse defenders on the right side. That does not mean, however, that you can’t have a positive impact on the right side – Casey Kotchman’s a pretty fantastic defensive first baseman, for instance, and helps the Angels a lot with his glove.
I’m afraid I might be too big a fan of Olerud to be fair.
Even though AD is the only player I remember from my childhood, getting my picture taken with him after driving hours to see the game (Only possible because they had a program that gave poor kids with good grades free tickets. Or maybe any kids, I dunno. Rich kids probably got free tickets for every day the nanny didn’t do their homework. I digress.)… and I like my picture of me and a beaming Alvin Davis.
But Olerud… Olerud was a joy to watch play defense at first. And maybe the best example for me of why defense is undervalued almost everywhere… even where it matters less, it still matters a lot.
I’m inclined to believe that it matters enough to offset AD’s other advantages. But again… I might not be impartial.
While he may have outperformed him in rate statistics, counting stats do matter.
No one said that counting stats do not matter. This what is called a strawman.
Your hypothetical is also irrelevant because we have actual park and era-adjusted data for both and the actual difference in playing time was 12 games, not 28. Despite playing less, counting stats like VORP and BtRuns still put Davis ahead.
Grizz, where do you draw the line? How about a guy who played 120 games at a higher level? How about 100?
Again, here the difference is 12 games (154 to 142). Davis still finishes ahead of Olerud, which makes Davis’ performance more impressive. Wherever the line is, Davis is above it.
I remember reading an ESPN article a while back (while he was still playing, of course) that noted how the number of errors by the infields that Olerud played with was significantly lower while he was there, and went back up after he left (specifically citing the Met’s and the M’s, I think). There’s one measure that’s not captured by any other fielding metric, as far as I’m aware.
His range fielding balls hit to him may not have been eye popping, but he saved his teams runs by being one of the best at fielding errant throws by other infielders.
I still think you are missing the point. The fact of the matter is that those other at-bats go to much worse players. So there is value in a good player simply playing. The team was hurt by AD’s absence. Same with Olerud’s however his didn’t last as long. So who added more value to the team? Olerud.
You said “The injury to Davis should not be held against him as it was not his fault.” You can’t really blame someone for coming to the conclusion that you’re saying the missed time (and the counting stats lost with it) don’t matter.
Again, you’re counting games he played at DH. He played 125 games at first base. Not playing the field makes a difference in his contribution, too.
No one is saying, as you seem to think, that the difference in games played makes the difference. As you say, if Davis’s total value is still higher, then he was the best. All we’re saying is that the rate contribution isn’t the point, the total contribution is, and Davis doesn’t get a break for missing games.
The best part about both of those guys?
Ask Olerud who was better…he’ll say AD
Ask AD who was better…he’ll say Olerud.
Olerud had the prettier swing, Davis was a much more iconic player on a team that needed it. AD…in a statistical wash (which this just may be.)…was the only true offensive guy on that team…he didn’t have a Buhner/Boone/Martinez triumvirate to make sure he got fastballs in fastball counts.
Both, though, deserve to be remembered.
This segment is a lot of fun. Really good debate between these two guys.
I think I might have to go with Olerud though.
I still think you are missing the point. The fact of the matter is that those other at-bats go to much worse players. . . . So who added more value to the team? Olerud.
If only there was a metric that measured a player’s value over a replacement player. You could call it VORP for short.
I feared Alvin Davis when he came to play in Oakland. He was a real difference maker as a hitter. As much as I admired John Olerud in his time here, I never saw him in the same light. Earlier in his career, yes.
But when it came to defense, Olerud was the master and I can easily believe that his defense was worth more than 10 runs per season. As far as I’m aware defensive metrics for first baseman do not measure errors saved on throws from other infielders. Olerud was the best I’ve seen at scooping throws from the dirt. He made it look so effortless that it was easy to overlook how difficult some of the plays were. I believe that Olerud was a large reason that the Mariners defenses of 2000-2003 were so highly regarded. And was it the 2002 team that set the record for fewest errors in a season? How much of that was Olerud responsible for? He was also an outstanding thrower for 1B. I don’t think that he scored so well on range and that is probably the reason that he doesn’t come out better overall in fielding metrics.
Safe to say, I would be quite happy with either Davis ‘89 or Olerud ‘02 playing 1B for the Mariners ‘08!
Who was the all-time most booed Mariner first baseman?
-Pete O’brien 1990 : The only million dollar Mariner.
-Richie Sexson 2008 : The worst Mariner of all time, adjusted for contract.
Who was the all-time Brett Boone all frosted tips team first baseman?
-David Segui 1998
-Richie Sexson 2006ish
Re: 19 – Spanky, I guess there’s been back and forth already on this, but I wanted to add that my instinct is to think something nearly opposite to you – that it’s harder to have the mental toughness to excel on a lously team, putting up an excellent season performance in the misery of a losing clubhouse with lousy teammates in front of mostly empty bleachers. Both your instinct, and mine, are unsupported by data.
The AD memory this all jogs is not of AD himself, but rather J Michael Kenyon on his sports talk show of the time, advocating that since neither playing in Seattle nor being a Mariner was going to engender any great respect, the team should be renamed the New York Alvins.
Correction to my comment in 108.
It was actually the 2003 season when the Mariners set was is still the record for fewest team errors in a season, 65. Olerud manning 1B in either case.
Interesting post, as always.
It strikes me that the team of greatest Mariner seasons would be required to have an Edgar Martinez at DH, and so the games that you would be getting out of ‘89 Davis would be pretty exclusively at 1B. Does the discussion of 1B defense factor this in, or is the idea of a team not really considered in that way?
moocow – I recall talk like that and looked it up on Baseball-Reference this morning. The 1999 Mets had 60 fewer infield errors (not counting the catcher) than the 2000 Mets, which seems significant. However the 2000 Ms only had 20 fewer infield errors than the 1999 Ms. So I assumed the difference is too variable by player and luck to be of real significance.
VORP takes into account the amount of runs created above what a replacement-level player would given the same number of plate appearances. I could be mistaken but it still takes into account games played. So those extra games that AD didn’t play that Olerud did does come into play.
Re: Era adjustments….
In 2002, Olerud had a 403/490 line for a 140 OPS+. In 1989, Davis had a 424/496 line for a 152 OPS+. I looked for some comparables in both years….
In 2002, Magglio Ordonez had a 153 OPS+ from a line of 381/597.
In 1989, Julio Franco had a 137 OPS+ from a line of 386/462.
In either comparison, I’m pretty sure I like Davis enough to overcome the defensive inferiority.
As much as I’m in the Olerud camp on this particular discussion, I think this particular factor gets overstated a lot since we can’t really effectively measure it.
Olerud made a lot of nice plays going to his right, though.
I hope this isn’t too off-topic, but I’m interested to know the answer and am too young to have followed his career: What happened to Alvin Davis? Why did he hit a wall at 30 and have to retire?
Except that Chone Smith and Mitchel Lichtman have effectively measured it, it would seem, from tangotiger’s comment earlier in the thread. I grant that a lot of people have overstated its importance, though.
I would have to vote for Alvin Davis in 89′ because of how he ranked against the rest of the league that year. Not to take anything away from John Olerud, but Davis was the team that year. He did what he did surrounded by mediocrity, while JO had a pretty good team around him. As good as JO was, he never stood out as “the star” of that team. Alvin Davis was “the star” of the team, no question about it.
Tino’s 95 should have been further discused though. He was pretty darn good too.
All we’re saying is that the rate contribution isn’t the point, the total contribution is, and Davis doesn’t get a break for missing games.
Again, this is a counterargument to an argument that I did not make. Here is what I said:
In other words, Davis outperformed Olerud in the counting stats (or to use your term, “total contribution”), but what made Davis’ season more impressive is the higher rate at which he produced (which the injury – something over which Davis had no control – obscures). In determining “greatest season,” the rate of contribution should be a factor. No one said it should be the determinative factor.
Mea culpa! I meant to follow the link and got sidetracked.
Still, though, the range from best to worst is about 12 net errors (if I’m reading the data right), so that seems to jive with my idea of the overall effect being pretty small.
A player having to be “the star” of a particular team is a horrible criteria that potentially would keep us from nominating anyone from teams that had outstanding contributions from more than one player… like 1995, when you want Tino.
Why should we have discussed Tino’s 1995? The two seasons we talked about are the contenders.
Plus, we’ll talk about what we want to talk about.
AS YOU WILL SOON DISCOVER MU WA HA HA HA HA
Uhoh.
I’m intrigued by this comment from Dave.
I’m not saying that best-in-the-league has to be the ultimate deciding factor, but it needs to be in the conversation.
Why would that be in the discussion, if OPS+ is a metric that is supposed to be balanced. If a player has an OPS+ of 175 but it is eighth best in the league one season, that is still better than an OPS+ of 140 that leads the league in another. You wouldn’t give the 140 guy extra credit, would you?
(Note – these numbers may or may not make sense, but work for the point I’m trying to make. Obviously a differential this extreme would be dealt with appropriately. It just seems odd to use other team’s players to evaluate the greatest seasons in MARINER history to me.)
And the thing is, OPS understates AD’s contribution, because he, like Olerud, was heavy on the OBP side.
To be honest, they are fairly close- close enough that there really isn’t a clear answer, because we can’t do a rigorous examination of AD’s defense in 1989. They are also fairly similar players- slow LHB 1B with good batting eyes and line-drive power, with AD having more power and walks, Olerud having more betting average and a better reputation for glovework.
I only heard Al Davis play, radio was my only option for the games back then aside from a rare trip to the park. It’s hard to imagine a prettier back handed pick of a short hop than Olerud had, it was nearly a signature move. And he had such a command of the strike zone, I miss that cool look he’d give an ump when he disagreed with a call, didn’t he get tossed once for looking hard at an ump? Hate to break down such a great numbers discussion with the anecdotal stuff, but I get all misty eyed sometimes for guys like Olerud when I have to watch our current team scuffle.
If we look at their whole careers, though, there are a couple of serious differences: Davis was a model of consistency, while Olerud interspersed great seasons — 1998 and especially 1993, which are peaks well above Davis’s best (but not in Seattle) — with merely good ones; and Olerud made it to 36 as a full-time player, while Davis’s last full-time season was at age 30 (and it was a very bad season).
Again, if you loved Olerud’s command of the strike zone, you would have loved Davis’s just as much.
I didn’t mean any offense by the comment, I just think that a .293/.369/.551 season is pretty solid.
And my “star” comment about Mr. Mariner was only to point out that Olerud was just another guy in a group of guys that where having great success that year. Alvin Davis was about the only guy in 1989 that was putting up good numbers. I just remeber watching games back then and he was really pitched around. Other than Justin Leonard, there was a bunch of easy outs in that lineup.
If he was pitched around, that should be reflected in his OBP, so it’s already accounted for as part of the discussion.
i think you mean Jeffrey Leonard, who had an OPS+ of 100 that year.
M’s with an OPS+ over 100 that year, other than AD:
Reynolds 104
Briley 116 (!)
Griffey 108
Buhner 129 (only 58 games)
Great post, guys. Didn’t think I could be talked out of ‘02 Olerud, but Dave makes a really compelling case for Alvin.
Excellent Post men! I can’t for the riveting DH discussion with Edgar “the original Turbo” Martinez vs Jose “Turbo II” Vidro.
Okay, the big question is by just missing making it as your starting first baseman, is…whichever one of them didn’t make it, now elligible to be a bench player on the 25 man roster you’re putting together or will you be using actual bench players for that?
So, next up 01 Boone and 00 A Rod vs 96 A Rod?