Who is the greatest right handed hitter of all time?

rats60 · #1 02-24-2023, 11:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gorditadogg

I think OPS+ does a pretty good job of measuring relative performance, at least over the last 100 years. The top right handers in the modern era, by OPS+, are:

1.Trout
2.Hornsby
3.Suttles
T4.Foxx
T4.Judge

The next five, ignoring juicers, are:

6.Greenberg
T7.Allen
T7.Thomas
T9.Aaron
T9.Dimaggio
T9.Mays

Trout and Judge will probably drop some as they get towards the end of their careers, but still they are in select company surrounding Hornsby and Foxx. Dick Allen had an amazing career in the era of cavernous parks and high mounds. Frank Thomas's achievements get overlooked because he played in the Selig/Reinsdorf PED-approved years.

OPS+ does a poor job of adjusting for home parks. Yankee Stadium was a completely different park for righties and lefties. Left handed hitters could hit cheap HRs into the short porch in right while who knows how many HRs DiMaggio lost hitting into the cavernous left center field of Yankee Stadium. Joe only hit 148 HRs at home vs 213 on the road.

Compare that to Jimmie Foxx, playing in hitters parks, who hit 299 at home and 235 on the road. On the road, DiMaggio hit a HR one in every 16.25 AB, Foxx one in every 18.08. They both hit .325, but Foxx's 30 point advantage in SLG is more than offset by their difference home parks. Joe was the better power hitter, even missing 3 prime years serving in WWII. I have DiMaggio as a slightly better hitter overall than Foxx.

molenick · #2 02-24-2023, 11:40 AM

I don't know if it does a good job or a poor job...but supposedly OPS+ does adjust for ballparks.

packs · #3 02-24-2023, 11:41 AM

Joe also won three MVP awards. His second MVP two seasons before he left and his third MVP two seasons after he came back. You can't assume an MVP award, but if he had played those three extra seasons and won another, he'd be the only player other than Bonds with 4 or more MVPs.

Gorditadogg · #4 02-25-2023, 04:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rats60

OPS+ does a poor job of adjusting for home parks. Yankee Stadium was a completely different park for righties and lefties. Left handed hitters could hit cheap HRs into the short porch in right while who knows how many HRs DiMaggio lost hitting into the cavernous left center field of Yankee Stadium. Joe only hit 148 HRs at home vs 213 on the road.

Compare that to Jimmie Foxx, playing in hitters parks, who hit 299 at home and 235 on the road. On the road, DiMaggio hit a HR one in every 16.25 AB, Foxx one in every 18.08. They both hit .325, but Foxx's 30 point advantage in SLG is more than offset by their difference home parks. Joe was the better power hitter, even missing 3 prime years serving in WWII. I have DiMaggio as a slightly better hitter overall than Foxx.

OPS+ does fine adjusting for parks. It just has a problem adjusting for right-hand hitters in Yankee Stadium. Your points there are valid.

Still, Dick Allen had it worse. He played his home games at Connie Mack, Comiskey, Veterans, Chavez Ravine, and Busch Memorial. All big parks, most with high walls and lots of room in foul territory.

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rats60 · #5 02-26-2023, 06:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gorditadogg

OPS+ does fine adjusting for parks. It just has a problem adjusting for right-hand hitters in Yankee Stadium. Your points there are valid.

Still, Dick Allen had it worse. He played his home games at Connie Mack, Comiskey, Veterans, Chavez Ravine, and Busch Memorial. All big parks, most with high walls and lots of room in foul territory.

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It does a good job if you are willing to accept a 10+% error rate and that two players within 20-25 points may be equal hitters.

HistoricNewspapers · #6 02-26-2023, 07:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rats60

It does a good job if you are willing to accept a 10+% error rate and that two players within 20-25 points may be equal hitters.

There is some truth to that statement. 20-25 may be a tad high though.

Dick Allen was brought up above and how he played in pitchers parks.

Here is the dilemma. Was Allen really hurt by his parks?

Allen's lifetime Home OPS was .932
Allen's lifetime road OPS was .892

Players generally have a littler better hitting in their home park(independent of park factors), but here Allen has more than a little better hitting at home.

So the question is, was Allen really hurt by his home parks being that he did much better at home, or were his home parks suppressing that .932 and it really would have been .950 if his parks weren't so tough....but if it were to be .950 in a neutral park, then why was it only .892 when he did hit in all the rest of the parks? A dilemma.

Park factors do exist. Nailing them down to 100% accuracy is impossible. They are certainly pieces to the puzzle though.

On the flip side, Larry Walker hit at home waaaay better than what the park adjustments show. He may have been helped MORE than the park factors are already 'deducting' when they take Coors into account.

Same with Wade Boggs at Fenway. He was a completely different hitter outside of Fenway. Fenway factor deducts this a little, but it is possible it should deduct it even more for Boggs.

cgjackson222 · #7 02-26-2023, 08:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HistoricNewspapers

There is some truth to that statement. 20-25 may be a tad high though.

Dick Allen was brought up above and how he played in pitchers parks.

Here is the dilemma. Was Allen really hurt by his parks?

Allen's lifetime Home OPS was .932
Allen's lifetime road OPS was .892

Players generally have a littler better hitting in their home park(independent of park factors), but here Allen has more than a little better hitting at home.

So the question is, was Allen really hurt by his home parks being that he did much better at home, or were his home parks suppressing that .932 and it really would have been .950 if his parks weren't so tough....but if it were to be .950 in a neutral park, then why was it only .892 when he did hit in all the rest of the parks? A dilemma.

Park factors do exist. Nailing them down to 100% accuracy is impossible. They are certainly pieces to the puzzle though.

On the flip side, Larry Walker hit at home waaaay better than what the park adjustments show. He may have been helped MORE than the park factors are already 'deducting' when they take Coors into account.

Same with Wade Boggs at Fenway. He was a completely different hitter outside of Fenway. Fenway factor deducts this a little, but it is possible it should deduct it even more for Boggs.

Really talented hitters are able to take advantage of their surroundings more effectively than others. Players like Boggs, Walker, Mel Ott were better at taking advantage of their home parks than other players on their team. Ultimately, OPS+ needs to adjust a player's home field advantage evenly across players.

Not sure if anyone on this board knows the inner workings of OPS+, but I'd be interested to know how OPS+ accounts for batting right handed at Fenway vs. being a left-handed hitter. Either way, should Boggs be penalized because he was better at hitting doubles off of the Green Monster than his right handed contemporaries?

peterb69 · #8 02-26-2023, 09:53 AM

I agree that Hornsby, Gibson, Aaron, and Mays are top. But I think more deserving than Pujols is a name I think nobody mentioned yet, Manny Ramirez.
He was a very good right handed batter.

Tabe · #9 02-26-2023, 05:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HistoricNewspapers

There is some truth to that statement. 20-25 may be a tad high though.

Dick Allen was brought up above and how he played in pitchers parks.

Here is the dilemma. Was Allen really hurt by his parks?

Allen's lifetime Home OPS was .932
Allen's lifetime road OPS was .892

It's a little misleading to just go with home/road splits for Allen since he played for 5 teams during his career. Instead, let's go with his "home parks" and his "road parks" - that is, the 5 parks he called home at any time and then the rest of the parks he played in.

Doing it this way, his "home parks" result in an OPS of .934 and his "road parks" result in an OPS of .887. Actually, not all that far off your numbers now that I look at it

His numbers are significantly boosted by his Chicago numbers where Allen put up a 1.026 OPS during his career.

So, was Allen hurt by playing in pitchers' parks? No.

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