eras committee candidates baseball HOF

rats60 · #1 11-19-2024, 09:58 AM

When I see pitcher A has an ERA+ of 169 and a WHIP of .914 and pitcher B has an ERA+ of 123 and a WHIP of 1.278, I don't need WAR to tell me pitcher A was better than pitcher B. When WAR tells me different, then I just ignore it.

If there are large discrepancies in one season, then the sum of discrepancies for a career becomes even larger. When someone tries to argue Bobby Grich was better than other players because he has more WAR or Rich Reuschel was better than pitchers with less WAR, I am not going to believe it.

cgjackson222 · #2 11-19-2024, 10:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rats60

When I see pitcher A has an ERA+ of 169 and a WHIP of .914 and pitcher B has an ERA+ of 123 and a WHIP of 1.278, I don't need WAR to tell me pitcher A was better than pitcher B. When WAR tells me different, then I just ignore it.

If there are large discrepancies in one season, then the sum of discrepancies for a career becomes even larger. When someone tries to argue Bobby Grich was better than other players because he has more WAR or Rich Reuschel was better than pitchers with less WAR, I am not going to believe it.

The discrepancy you have cited is for a pitcher. I think the ways that Fan Graphs (fWAR) and Baseball Reference (bWAR) calculate pitching value are quite different. But can the same be said for hitting and fielding?

For instance, Bobby Grich has a career bWAR of 71.1 and a career fWAR of 69.1

Not terribly far off.

I'm sure you can find examples where there is a larger difference, but I am not sure that is the norm for hitting/fielding.

Peter_Spaeth · #3 11-19-2024, 10:41 AM

In medicine, numerous widely accepted tests yield both type 1 and type 2 errors, because they are not completely perfect. But we don't discard them just because one can find outlier cases where they didn't do such a great job. So too here. This is not, IMO, an invalidating example. False standard of it's invalid if it isn't perfect.

rats60 · #4 11-19-2024, 11:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cgjackson222

The discrepancy you have cited is for a pitcher. I think the ways that Fan Graphs (fWAR) and Baseball Reference (bWAR) calculate pitching value are quite different. But can the same be said for hitting and fielding?

For instance, Bobby Grich has a career bWAR of 71.1 and a career fWAR of 69.1

Not terribly far off.

I'm sure you can find examples where there is a larger difference, but I am not sure that is the norm for hitting/fielding.

There is a pretty big discrepency for Jackson Merrill this year. 5.3 for fangraphs and 4.4 for baseball reference. Paul Skenes goes the other way. 5.9 for baseball reference and 4.3 for fangraphs. When you have those type of discrepencies, you can't use WAR to compare players.

You can say Grich is a HOFer, but if your only argument is WAR, then you are going to get a lot of people disagreeing with you. In the end, it is only opinions. The only opinions that matter said 11 yes and 419 no the one year he was on the HOF ballot. Interestingly enough, Bill Mazeroski received 182 votes on the same ballot. So at least 171 HOF voters thought Mazeroski was a Hall of Famer and Grich was not.

Peter_Spaeth · #5 11-19-2024, 11:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rats60

There is a pretty big discrepency for Jackson Merrill this year. 5.3 for fangraphs and 4.4 for baseball reference. Paul Skenes goes the other way. 5.9 for baseball reference and 4.3 for fangraphs. When you have those type of discrepencies, you can't use WAR to compare players.

You can say Grich is a HOFer, but if your only argument is WAR, then you are going to get a lot of people disagreeing with you. In the end, it is only opinions. The only opinions that matter said 11 yes and 419 no the one year he was on the HOF ballot. Interestingly enough, Bill Mazeroski received 182 votes on the same ballot. So at least 171 HOF voters thought Mazeroski was a Hall of Famer and Grich was not.

Sure, and there are many guys who eventually got in who were denied 10 or 15 times by the voters. Assessments can and do change. That said, I doubt he will get in unless he has a political ally on some future committee, and it's no crime to leave him out. But I don't think, as some do apparently, that he invalidates WAR.

cgjackson222 · #6 11-19-2024, 12:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rats60

There is a pretty big discrepency for Jackson Merrill this year. 5.3 for fangraphs and 4.4 for baseball reference. Paul Skenes goes the other way. 5.9 for baseball reference and 4.3 for fangraphs. When you have those type of discrepencies, you can't use WAR to compare players.

You can say Grich is a HOFer, but if your only argument is WAR, then you are going to get a lot of people disagreeing with you. In the end, it is only opinions. The only opinions that matter said 11 yes and 419 no the one year he was on the HOF ballot. Interestingly enough, Bill Mazeroski received 182 votes on the same ballot. So at least 171 HOF voters thought Mazeroski was a Hall of Famer and Grich was not.

Again, I think discrepancies for pitchers are common when comparing fWAR and bWAR. But a difference between 5.3 and 4.4 for Jackson Merrill doesn't seem that big to me.

Kutcher55 · #7 11-19-2024, 04:00 PM

I like WAR because it is one single number that makes it easy on the surface to compare one player to another across different eras, but man is it heavily flawed for all the reasons outlined in this conversation. It rewards compilers/longevity to a fault, and penalizes certain positions such as catcher, because it's impossible for a catcher's knees to hold up for 3000 games even after they switch positions mid career.

Also, it's awesome when rats60 chimes in. Dude is pure hickory even if I don't always agree with him. I wouldn't totally throw WAR out with the bathwater, but it is not the end all be all.

Peter_Spaeth · #8 11-19-2024, 04:04 PM

How does it reward compilers? If people at the end of their careers have lousy years, they don't accumulate much if any WAR for those seasons, look at Pujols? From 2016 on he essentially added no WAR despite adding to the counting stats totals. I believe same is true of Cabrera.

Kutcher55 · #9 11-19-2024, 06:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

How does it reward compilers? If people at the end of their careers have lousy years, they don't accumulate much if any WAR for those seasons, look at Pujols? From 2016 on he essentially added no WAR despite adding to the counting stats totals. I believe same is true of Cabrera.

Was checking and yeah you�re right Peter it doesn�t always reward compilers. A guy like Don Sutton was able to eke his way into the HOF with some modestly effective +WAR years late in his career but then again Jim Kaat, another classic compiler, had negative WAR late in his career, and probably shouldn�t be in the HOF anyway but that�s a separate argument.

WAR does a credible job identifying the true greats of the game who were good for a long time (ie, nobody with a 100+ WAR played for less than 15 years). For borderline HOFers it should be one of many considerations and it clearly has been just that. The Jeter/Grich argument being the ultimate example, as I don�t think too many people would say DJ doesn�t belong in the HOF whereas Grich wasn�t even close and will likely never make it despite being a terrific player (I wouldn�t vote for him either).

JollyElm · #10 11-19-2024, 04:31 PM

tidalwavewargraphic.jpg

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