Third Base ATG
Posted: November 9th, 2007 | Filed under: Baseball | 18 Comments »
Gold Glove (NL): David Wright
Gold Glove (AL): Adrian Beltre
Fielding Bible: Pedro Feliz
People are in love, I think, with the idea of the all-round player (and by the way, is it “all-round†or “all-around?†I always assumed it was “all-around player†— that makes more sense to me — but the editors at the newspaper, who know a heck of a lot more about this stuff than I do, keep changing it to “all-round playerâ€).
Think about how many times over the years as a sports fan have you heard a manager or coach say something like this: “Joe Bob Bobby is a great player. But he’s an even better person.â€
Well, you know what? I’m calling total BS on that whole “better person†thing. If Joe Bob Bobby is, say, an all-star Major Leaguer, that would mean he’s one of the, oh, 50 or 60 best baseball players in America. That would place him in the top .0000002 percent of all players in this country.
There is NO way that Joe Bob Bobby is one of the top .0000002 percent of people in this great land of ours. I mean NO chance. We’ve got veterans who have fought for this country, fire fighters and police officers and numerous others who risk their lives, volunteers who work in soup kitchens 60 hours a week, researchers who work day and night to cure dreaded diseases, teachers who give entirely of themselves (I see these people in the movies all the time), citizens who dedicate their lives to expose wrongs and make this world a better place, the guy who fixed my Mac when it broke and so on. I realize I’m taking the quote a few steps too far but I can’t help it — I’m so sick of hearing that. He’s not a better person than he is a player. He’s just not. He may be a perfectly fine person. She may be better than an average person. He or she may be the kind of person you would want your child to marry.
But stop with the “better person than player†quote. Just stop. STOP. Arthur Ashe may have been a better person than athlete. Maybe. Roberto Clemente might be in the conversation. Maybe. That’s where it ends.
Sorry. I had no idea how strongly I felt about that until I started writing.
Anyway, we’re in love with that concept of the all-round player, the all-round great person, and I think that’s why David Wright won the Gold Glove this year. This is not to say Wright is a bad choice — no, he’s a fine fielder. The Fielding Bible folks ranked him seventh in baseball, which is quite good.
But is he really better than Pedro Feliz defensively? I don’t think so.
Feliz scored a +27 on the Dewan Scale, best among third basemen.
Wright scored a +13, which ranked him sixth.
Feliz had a 2.91 fielding range, fifth in baseball.
Wright had a 2.73 fielding range, 11th in baseball.
Feliz had a .852 zone rating, best in baseball.
Wright had a .771 zone rating, 11th in baseball.
Feliz made 46 good fielding plays according to Dewan (second behind Ryan Zimmerman)
Wright made 44 good field plays (fourth behind Zim, Feliz and Alex Gordon).
Feliz had only 11 defensive misplays (sort of the opposite of he good fielding plays) which was the best among every day third basemen.
Wright made 20 defensive misplays, middle of the pack.
And so on. Plus Feliz is such a liability as a hitter — I mean a .290 on-base percentage, that flat kills you — that you KNOW he has to be great defensively. Otherwise he would be on the bench.
We trust offensive statistics enough to know, without a doubt, that David Wright (.325/.416/.546, 30 homers, 117 RBIs) was a better hitter than Pedro Feliz (.253/.290/.418, 20 homers, 72 RBIs). We don’t yet trust defensive stats to that degree — and maybe that’s because defensive stats are not nearly as complete or as comprehensive. Still, I think the stats clearly point to Feliz being quit a bit better than David Wright in the field.
Again, I think it goes back to our love of the all-round — managers and fans WANT David Wright to be the best defensive third baseman in the NL. It fits the super hero role — he hits, he hits with power, he steals bases, and what do you know? He’s also the best defensive third baseman! Really! This also might help explain why Jeter won Gold Gloves and Dave Winfield and other big stars.
Let’s face it. It’s a lot more fun to vote for David Wright than to vote for Pedro Feliz.
Adrian Beltre, in my opinion, won the Gold Glove one year too late. He was terrific in 2006 — best in the game. He was merely good in 2007. Brandon Inge (+20) in my opinion was significantly better than Beltre (+5) this year.
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“Arthur Ashe may have been a better person than athlete. Maybe. Roberto Clemente might be in the conversation. Maybe. That’s where it ends.”
I know this can go on forever, but I’d add Jackie Robinson and Lou Gehrig to the list. How about Pat Tillman?
Zimmerman was robbed!
Watch this play
or this one, robbing the gold glove winner. — that one LITERALLY took a run off the board; no other 3B in the league even tries for the DP there.
Thanks for getting back so quickly on the Tony Pena, Jr. question. I’m also TPJ fan, though I admit a big part of that HAS to come out of putting up with Berroa.
One more rookie for ya, if you got the time…how about Alex Gordon? He definitely improved as the season progressed, either from getting comfortable, learning more about the position, or just sharpening his instincts. How’d his first season in the bigs rank? (I’m assuming he doesn’t get docked points for trying to field a grounder with his nose in the last game.)
You’ve reminded me of the time when Bill Walton said, “John Stockton is one of the true marvels, not just of basketball, or in America, but in the history of Western Civilization!”
Joe,
I think when someone says of a athletes: “He’s a great player, but he’s an even better person.” it should be read as
He’s a great player [compared to the other players in this league], but he’s an even better person [than the other players in this league].
It is a rather trite compliment that announcer’s throw around, often to players that they a) don’t know well enough to make that statement about and b) are not really doing anything that someone on your block isn’t already doing.
Thanks to Chris for those links to a couple of great defensive plays.
Kirby Puckett was the best all-round player I have ever seen. Was he the best all-around player? I don’t know.
@SBG: What about David Wells? He’s got to be in the conversation of best all-round player. Also Babe Ruth and Fernando Valenzuela, no?
@Butch: I know someone who went to high school with Pat Tillman and said he was an asshole jock, so who knows on that score? (Granted, that was high school, and one person’s opinion.) I think he was a person with a highly developed sense of patriotism, to whom the safety of his country mattered more than his paycheck. Admirable, but does that put him in Clemente’s league?
I’d like to add Archibald “Moonlight” Graham to the “better person” list of names.
Bill Bradley maybe?
I think the problem is more on the other end of the equation, as we don’t really think about how good you have to be in order to make it as a major league player.
It should be “all-around” should’t it? “All-round” would mean he’s shaped like a basketball.
There is a version of events in Afghanistan that might suggest that Pat Tillman was, indeed, an “asshole jock,” even after he went to war. I dunno. His death was a tragedy, regardless.
Jackie Robinson most likely *was* a better person than he was a ballplayer. As Buck O’Neil noted… and Buck never denigrated Jackie’s abilities… there were better ballplayers in the Negro Leagues than Robinson. But Jackie was *the* man for *the* job at hand.
Another player who was probably a better man than player might be PeeWee Reese, because he embraced Robinson as a teammate, despite Reese’s southern roots.
Lou Gehrig is an inspirational story. He dealt with life gracefully and was one helluva player. But the challenged he faced at the end of his life and career were met with the cold hard facts of inevitablity.
Roberto Clemente is probably the only guy on the list who proved to be a better person first, then an elegant ballplayer because of it. The prejudice against Hispanic players as he was playing was as real (though not as evident) as the bias against African-American players in the pre-Robinson big leagues. Roberto simply did what he did the best he could, on the field and off.
I don’t know enough about Bill Russell, but I suspect he is a very good man who just happened to be a very good basketball player.
Ron is correct, and you ought to go to the mat with your idiot editors that “all-round player” makes no sense and force them to allow you to write “all-around player”.
As an English major and sometime editor, I gotta jump in on your side of this debate, Joe. “All-around” is correct, and if someone had written “all-round” in something I was editing, I would change it. It sounds British to me, actually. Do your editors change “color” to “colour”?
And as we’re all big on empirical evidence here, Mirriam-Webster gives this definition for all-around: “considered in or encompassing all aspects, comprehensive (the best all-around performance so far).” It calls “all-round” a variant of “all-around,” but doesn’t give it its own definition.
http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/all-around
http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/all-round
I know, I’m a nerd.
I don’t mind the “better person” trope. Gammons uses this all the time (actually, he usually says someone is a “tremendous” person, so maybe that is better).
Incidentally, I wonder where Lowell fell in the Fielding Bible voting?
Back to 3B, Zimmerman’s defense is adequate but not in the class of Fleas the last three years. As a Giants fan you simply hate him, since he’s such a sinkhole at the plate, but he has simply *picked it* with the glove. He’s been as beautiful with the leather as he is awful with the bat, and that is saying a lot.
But yeah, you want to vote for Wright or Rolen, guys who can actually hit. A vote for Fleas is hard. The last three years, though, he’s been the best.
As a lifelong Tiger fan, I can say without a shadow of a doubt that Brandon Inge plays the best everyday third base of any Tiger I’ve ever seen. I’m glad you’ve provided me with some empirical back-up when I get into my next argument with my friend who says Inge’s Ks are killing this team. Defensively, I don’t think they can afford to replace him. All you can do is stick him 8th or 9th in the order and hope he hits like 2006 again.
First, I absolutely can’t support “all-round” it is ridiculous. I say, take it up with the editors.
Second, has anyone used the metric “good ballplayer, better person” on an especially awful ballplayer? As you say, we’re talking about the top .0000002% of players in their sport, on the planet, right? But what about your out-and-out bombs? The guys signed, paid for, and bumped up to the big league club with absolutely zero skill? “He’s a better person than he is a ballplayer” doesn’t mean much if he stinks as a ballplayer, right?
Any nominees?