I’ve previously established that Lou Whitaker is no Joe Morgan (who in turn is no Willie Mays). But how does Sweet Lou stack up against the rest of the best second basemen of the past fifty years? I ran the numbers on eight other players who are either already in the Hall of Fame, rate highly in career OPS+, or rate highly in career fielding runs. Those players are Rod Carew, Bill Mazeroski, Willie Randolph, Roberto Alomar, Ryne Sandberg, Jeff Kent, Bobby Grich, and Craig Biggio. (I’m shocked at how few modern second basemen are in the Hall.)
I may be blowing the surprise, but here’s the graph of all ten players’ careers, each with their seasonal wins above replacement sorted from best to worst. (Here’s a full screen version.)
The first thing I noticed is that Bill Mazeroski does not belong in the Hall of Fame based on career value, and it’s not even close. Sure, his fielding is reputed to be among the best ever, but his bat was so bad that he only had one season where he contributed significantly more than an average player. Yes, fielding is underrated, but it’s difficult to make a case for enshrinement with a career .299 OBP and .367 SLG. Maz deserves his own display for his Game 7 walk-off homerun in the 1960 World Series. But a plaque? No way.
Maz PAs Bat Field Pos WAR 1956 277 -1.2 0.0 0.0 -0.3 1957 568 -0.4 0.3 0.0 1.7 1958 607 -0.4 2.1 0.0 3.6 1959 537 -2.5 -0.6 0.0 -1.4 1960 591 -0.5 -0.1 0.0 1.2 1961 595 -1.8 0.0 0.0 0.0 1962 617 -0.6 0.0 0.0 1.3 1963 576 -1.6 1.9 0.0 2.1 1964 644 -0.9 1.2 0.0 2.3 1965 527 -1.4 1.6 0.0 1.9 1966 660 -0.9 0.1 0.0 1.3 1967 679 -1.6 0.7 0.0 1.2 1968 556 -0.8 1.3 0.0 2.2 1969 256 -0.8 -0.6 0.0 -0.6 1970 404 -1.8 0.9 0.0 0.4 1971 213 -0.8 0.1 0.0 0.0 1972 72 -0.6 -0.5 0.0 -0.9
Rod Carew and Ryne Sandberg posted the two best seasons behind Joe Morgan’s 9+ win year. For Carew it was 1977, when he put up a .388/.449/.570 line thanks to 38 doubles, 16 triples, 14 homeruns, 239 total hits and 69 walks. For Sandberg, it was 1992, thanks to a typical .304/.371/.510 line and a career-best 21 runs above average in the field.
Looking at the rest of their careers, Carew was much more consistent and held on much longer after his peak. His career .393 OBP in .327 OBP leagues is amazing and provided most of his offensive value given that he hit only 92 career homeruns. Carew put up 67 career wins above replacement and had eight All-Star caliber years. On the other hand, Sandberg had only six seasons where he was even above average, totaling 52 career wins above replacement. By his seventh-best season, he no longer can be compared even to Willie Randolph.
Carew PAs Bat Field Pos WAR 1967 561 0.9 0.0 0.0 2.6 1968 492 -0.4 -0.3 0.0 0.8 1969 504 2.2 0.6 0.0 4.4 1970 204 1.3 0.0 0.0 1.9 1971 632 0.4 -1.4 0.0 0.9 1972 591 1.4 0.5 0.0 3.8 1973 657 3.6 0.0 0.0 5.6 1974 690 4.4 -1.2 0.0 5.3 1975 617 4.4 0.5 -0.1 6.7 1976 687 4.0 1.3 -1.1 6.3 1977 694 6.6 0.4 -1.1 8.1 1978 651 3.3 -0.1 -1.0 4.2 1979 493 1.8 -0.3 -0.8 2.2 1980 612 2.6 -0.1 -0.9 3.4 1981 421 1.1 1.0 -0.6 2.7 1982 612 1.8 2.2 -0.9 5.0 1983 536 2.1 -0.7 -0.8 2.2 1984 378 0.2 0.1 -0.6 0.9 1985 518 0.2 -0.9 -0.8 0.1
RyneS PAs Bat Field Pos WAR 1981 6 -0.1 0.0 0.0 -0.1 1982 687 -1.0 0.6 0.0 1.7 1983 699 -1.7 1.3 0.0 1.7 1984 700 3.2 1.8 0.0 7.1 1985 673 2.6 -0.2 0.0 4.4 1986 682 -0.3 0.2 0.0 2.0 1987 587 0.9 -1.3 0.0 1.4 1988 679 0.4 -0.5 0.0 2.0 1989 672 2.7 -0.8 0.0 3.9 1990 675 3.2 0.4 0.0 5.6 1991 684 3.4 1.5 0.0 7.0 1992 687 3.8 2.6 0.0 8.5 1993 503 0.6 0.1 0.0 2.3 1994 247 -0.6 0.7 0.0 0.9 1996 621 -0.5 0.6 0.0 2.0 1997 480 -1.2 1.0 0.0 1.3
Speaking of Willie Randolph, he’s probably the second-worst player to make the graph, but considering his name never pops up in Hall of Fame discussions, I might have to consider him underrated. Willie was basically a league-average hitter, with one very good season in 1980 with 119 walks and a .294/.427/.407 line. His strength was in the field where he tallied 52 career runs saved, including a season at +19 and two at +11. He’s probably not Hall of Fame material, but are there any second basemen better than him over the past fifty years other than the eight on the graph? That’s worth celebrating.
Willie PAs Bat Field Pos WAR 1975 70 -0.7 0.1 0.0 -0.4 1976 500 0.4 2.4 0.0 4.3 1977 624 0.3 1.0 0.0 3.2 1978 596 1.3 1.3 0.0 4.5 1979 682 0.6 1.2 0.0 3.9 1980 642 3.1 0.0 0.0 5.1 1981 422 -0.3 0.0 0.0 1.0 1982 643 0.4 -1.5 0.0 0.9 1983 477 0.3 0.5 0.0 2.2 1984 664 1.0 -0.6 0.0 2.5 1985 597 0.9 0.7 0.0 3.4 1986 601 0.9 -0.3 0.0 2.4 1987 543 1.8 0.5 0.0 4.0 1988 474 -1.0 0.7 0.0 1.2 1989 633 0.4 -0.5 0.0 1.9 1990 446 -0.5 0.6 0.0 1.5 1991 512 2.0 0.1 0.0 3.7 1992 336 -0.1 -0.2 0.0 0.7
The best player left to talk about is Bobby Grich, who, to be honest, I hadn’t heard of until three weeks ago. Grich played for the Orioles and Angels, and made up for his mediocre career batting average (.266) with some power (591 XBHs in only 6890 career at-bats) and a lot of walks (1087). His career 125 OPS+ ranks eighth all time for second basemen with at least 3000 career plate appearances, ahead of everyone on this list except Joe Morgan. He could play defense, too, with 79 career runs prevented. While Grich didn’t have the longest career and missed parts of many seasons, he was an excellent player when in the lineup.
Grich PAs Bat Field Pos WAR 1970 104 -0.7 0.5 0.0 0.1 1971 35 0.1 0.4 0.0 0.6 1972 528 1.9 1.2 0.2 5.0 1973 700 1.7 3.0 0.0 6.8 1974 707 3.3 0.6 0.0 6.1 1975 655 2.8 1.9 0.0 6.7 1976 615 3.0 0.0 0.0 4.9 1977 225 0.5 0.2 0.2 1.6 1978 591 0.3 1.0 0.0 3.1 1979 609 3.1 0.0 0.0 5.0 1980 596 1.7 0.7 0.0 4.2 1981 404 2.9 0.6 0.0 4.8 1982 605 2.0 0.0 0.0 3.9 1983 477 2.7 -0.5 0.0 3.7 1984 432 1.3 -1.2 -0.2 1.3 1985 571 0.2 0.8 -0.2 2.6 1986 366 0.5 0.3 -0.1 1.9
We’re now down to Roberto Alomar, Craig Biggio, and Jeff Kent, three players with extremely similar careers. Biggio’s turquoise line lies mostly above the other two, although he has more below-average seasons. As a player we’ve all watched, there’s not much I can add, other than emphasize that his bat made up for a pretty poor glove (-53 career runs after moving out from behind the plate.) Bill James once called Biggio the best player of the 1990s and those ten years definitely were his peak, averaging 4.7 wins above replacement.
Biggio PAs Bat Field Pos WAR 1988 131 -0.5 0.2 0.1 1989 509 0.9 0.9 3.4 1990 621 -0.4 1.0 2.5 1991 609 1.1 -0.2 1.4 4.1 1992 721 2.1 -1.3 0.0 3.0 1993 706 2.7 1.0 0.0 5.9 1994 511 2.7 -0.6 0.0 3.7 1995 673 3.7 -0.7 0.0 5.0 1996 723 2.2 -0.7 0.0 3.7 1997 744 4.3 0.9 0.0 7.5 1998 738 3.8 0.6 0.0 6.7 1999 749 1.6 0.7 0.0 4.6 2000 466 -0.2 -0.2 0.0 1.0 2001 717 1.1 -2.2 0.0 1.1 2002 655 -1.1 -0.3 0.0 0.6 2003 717 -0.2 -0.7 0.6 1.8 2004 700 0.3 -0.8 -0.1 1.5 2005 651 0.2 -0.6 0.0 1.6 2006 607 -1.3 0.5 0.0 1.1 2007 555 -2.2 -0.9 0.0 -1.4
Alomar’s best season trumps Kent’s, but Kent has the advantage from years three to five. Past that, there’s no difference. They were equally talented offensively, with Kent’s strength coming from his power and Alomar making up that gap with a small on-base advantage and the ability to steal bases at a high rate. They were also equally poor in the field.
Alomar PAs Bat Field Pos WAR 1988 611 0.3 0.4 0.0 2.5 1989 702 0.7 -0.5 0.0 2.4 1990 646 -0.2 1.3 0.0 3.1 1991 719 1.2 0.6 0.0 4.0 1992 671 2.6 -0.2 0.0 4.4 1993 683 3.5 -1.6 0.0 4.0 1994 455 1.0 -1.4 0.0 1.0 1995 577 0.6 -0.5 0.0 1.9 1996 699 3.3 0.4 0.0 5.8 1997 469 2.0 -0.4 0.0 3.0 1998 657 0.1 0.9 0.0 3.1 1999 694 3.5 1.3 0.0 7.0 2000 697 1.3 0.1 0.0 3.5 2001 677 4.2 -1.1 0.0 5.1 2002 655 -1.0 -0.5 0.0 0.5 2003 598 -1.3 -2.1 0.0 -1.6 2004 190 -0.5 -1.2 -0.1 -1.2
Kent PAs Bat Field Pos WAR 1992 343 0.2 -0.6 0.0 0.6 1993 544 0.1 -1.5 0.0 0.3 1994 452 0.6 0.9 0.0 2.9 1995 514 0.5 0.5 0.0 2.6 1996 477 0.1 -0.6 -0.1 0.8 1997 651 0.4 0.4 0.0 2.8 1998 594 3.1 0.3 0.0 5.2 1999 585 1.9 0.0 0.0 3.7 2000 695 5.4 -1.8 -0.1 5.7 2001 696 2.9 0.7 -0.2 5.6 2002 682 3.9 -0.4 0.0 5.6 2003 552 1.3 -0.7 0.0 2.3 2004 606 1.6 0.2 0.0 3.7 2005 637 2.7 0.2 0.0 4.9 2006 473 1.3 -0.9 0.0 1.8 2007 562 1.6 -0.3 0.0 3.0
How about one more table, comparing the number of seasons each second basemen produced above certain thresholds: 8 wins (serious MVP candidate), 6 wins (superstar), 4 wins (all-star), and 2 wins (league average). The list is sorted by career wins above replacement.
Player WAR 8+ 6+ 4+ 2+ <2 Morgan 84.0 3 2 5 7 5 Carew 67.2 1 2 5 6 5 Whitaker 66.0 0 2 4 10 3 Grich 62.2 0 3 6 3 5 Biggio 57.7 0 3 3 5 9 Sandberg 51.9 1 2 3 4 6 Kent 51.5 0 0 5 7 4 Alomar 48.5 0 1 5 7 5 Randolph 46.0 0 0 5 7 6 Mazeroski 15.7 0 0 0 5 12
Here’s how I would rank all ten players. I don’t think players should be voted into the Hall of Fame judged solely against their positional peers, but Cooperstown does seem large enough to include 6-8 second basemen from the past 50 years. That would make fans of everyone above Willie Randolph extremely happy. What do you think? Did I forget to include anyone important?
Morgan
Carew/Grich
Biggio/Whitaker/Sandberg
Alomar/Kent
Randolph
Mazeroski
Popularity: 7% [?]
Share This
Sky is a baseball fan and racket sport afficianado living in upstate NY. His favorite color is orange and is just about ready to give up on his life-long dream to become the next Magnus ver Magnuson (World's Strongest Man). His favorite baseball teams are the Yankees and Red Sox, proving that there's hope in the Middle East. 
February 17th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
Throw an early look at Chase Utley in there.
You’ve re-set my thinking on Kent, Carew and Grich the most. Kent won’t belong, as I thought he might, and the other two do, which I had doubted. We’ll see if Kent has some more good years left in him.
Sandberg is more over-rated than I thought (blasphemy). Luckily, I’ve always considered Biggio and Whitaker hall-caliber, so I haven’t created any serious internal conflict.
I think if you put the rest of the top 6 in the hall, you’d have the elite modern second basemen covered.
And shame on you for not knowing who Bobby Grich is ;-)
February 17th, 2008 at 2:33 pm
Harry, Utley’s played only three full seasons, and posted WAR’s of 6.8, 4.9, and 7.7 — those years aren’t much different offensively, it’s just that two of them were +21 runs on defense and one was only +4. The thing working against Utley is that 2008 will be his age 29 season. He’ll need to keep up his current pace to make the Hall. But his offense/defense combo is right there with Grich.
(By the way, after peaking at some shortstop numbers, we may have all underrated Cal Ripken Jr.)
February 17th, 2008 at 4:59 pm
But he’s tracking Alomar so far. Not a fair comparison obviously, but we’ll see where he goes.
Looking forward to those shortstop numbers.
February 17th, 2008 at 10:55 pm
Bobby Grich is in the Darrell Evans “most underrated players ever Hall of Fame” right between Arky Vaughan and Dewey Evans. A sabermetric hero ;)
Biggio and Alomar have very good defensive reps. I’m surprised to see that they rate below average for their careers.
Ripken is an interesting case. A few great seasons, about 15 above average ones, and some hang around seasons when everyone was paying attention to him. Also, his two best seasons were about a decade apart.
February 18th, 2008 at 2:36 am
Alomar has the same defensively value as Kent? I remember watching him in late 90s-00s, and he never seemed that bad. I;ve always thought he was above average. I’d like to know what other fielding metrics say on this. Obviously GG’s don’t mean “the best” And sometimes they make big mistakes, Jeter, but they will correct themselves (such as him not winning last year). But Alomar had 10GG. That has to mean something, right? He was talked about as a great defensive 2B, the best DP combo with Visquel. I really don’t get how he could be negative value all those years
February 18th, 2008 at 10:12 am
Josh — I look forward to attacking the Darrell Evans graph. I’ve done Jim Rice and he’s basically Alan Trammel. I’m guessing that’s less impressive compared to other left fielders than compared to other shortstops.
MLBFan — I was somewhat surprised by Alomar’s low fielding totals, too, although I’ve heard rumblings that he was always overrated. If he was especially smooth turning the double-play, that’s not something reflected in the range stats.
February 18th, 2008 at 1:12 pm
I like to think I am sabermetrically inclined, but, tha said, I don’t give a damn what the metrics say about Alomar’s fielding. I watched him (on TV) in hundreds of games when he was with the Jays, and to this day I’ve never seen a better fielding 2B. His range stood out then far more than his DP ability.
February 18th, 2008 at 1:15 pm
BTW, a quick look at Jackie Robinson suggests he may have been a 8 WAR player at his peak (49-52). Over those four years, I have him averaging 4.2 Batting Wins; he averaged 649 PA, so he gets +2 WAR there. His fielding is unknown, but he was a great athlete, and both Win Shares and BP’s system like him. Let’s call him + 0.7 Wins in the field. He was at 2B all 4 years, so no positional adjustment (probably). He was a great baserunner by all accounts, so maybe give him + 0.4 Wins there per season. That puts him at an average of 7.3 WAR over a four year period with what I think are reasonable assumptions. Then consider the fact that he didn’t break into MLB until he was 28 because of circumstances beyond his control, and I think he’s much closer to Morgan than any of the other second basemen listed here.