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Originally Posted by Aquarian Sports Cards
He played like he was in the dead ball era. He had some amazing abilities, but the way he used them weren't necessarily the best for winning baseball. He was literally dropping balls in front of outfielders almost every time he made contact. It led to tons of hits and very few extra bases, advanced runners or RBI's.
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OK so we can add "didn't get many extra base hits or RBI" to the list of his drawbacks. That still doesn't get us anywhere near to outweighing the positives on his resume though. He was a leadoff guy, he stole more than 500 bases and scored more than 100 runs for eight seasons in a row, so obviously he was contributing something of exceptional value even if it didn't translate into a bunch of RBI
Quote:
Originally Posted by Aquarian Sports Cards
Any time there was a man on base he hurt his team. Balls dropping in front of outfielders mean a guy on first usually only gets to second and a guy on second can't score. Not all singles are created equal, outfielders were almost always coming in on his hits setting them up to throw.
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Just to be clear: getting a bloop single with a runner on base doesn't hurt your team. Its not as good as getting a double obviously, but is preferable to recording an out. A guy getting a bloop single 1/3 of the time in that situation is arguably preferable to a guy hitting a line drive to right 1/4 of the time.
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Originally Posted by Aquarian Sports Cards
People compare him to Boggs and Gwynn which is crazy. They both had a TON more extra base hits than Ichiro and neither of them will ever be mistaken for a power hitter. Plus I hate when a guy hangs on at the end of his career for milestone numbers. Ichiro has been pretty useless since 2010 if I recall correctly.
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Agree about the Boggs and Gwynn comparison being inaccurate.
I'm neutral about the hanging on at the end of the career for milestones since a ton of HOFers have done that. Its basically irrelevant to HOF consideration IMHO - even Ruth hung on longer than he should have.
Also, Ichiro's last years weren't entirely unproductive:
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features...-old-and-good/
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Originally Posted by Aquarian Sports Cards
If you like WAR he had 2 superstar seasons and 5 additional all-star seasons (again trusting memory here) that pales in comparison to Boggs or Gwynn.
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His career WAR isn't spectacular by HOF standards, nor is it an outlier though as there are a lot of guys with much lower WAR already in, including some big names. His WAR just makes him an average HOFer but I don't think you can use it effectively to put him in the Hall of Very Good, given all the other stuff he has going for him. The numerous records, including important ones, the trailblazer role that he played as the first Japanese position player, and all the other stuff that is too well known to be worth repeating here.
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Originally Posted by Aquarian Sports Cards
He is, to me, Hall of Very Good. Maybe if he hadn't lost 3 or 4 years of his prime to Japan the case would be different, especially if they were superstar caliber seasons like his best two.
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I think the fact that he played his prime years in Japan just adds to his resume (or at the very least it does not detract from it), he actually played 7 seasons in Japan and won the batting title in each of them. I know they don't give much weight to NPB stats in making HOF decisions, but its an extremely impressive footnote to his career - he managed to squeeze periods of brilliant dominance into not just one but two major leagues.