ALL-TIME TOP 100: Catchers

[jcbarr]

In relation to Hundley, he is probably ranked correctly. I'm starting to think that possibly the points adjustment for date of birth is off slightly. Seems like guys like Hundley are getting a little too much credit for their offense in those years. Looking at his '96 season, there were a ton of guys that hit 40 that year, so it really wasn't all that impressive given the time in which he did it. I mean Brady Anderson hit 50 that year.

[jcbarr]

So in essence we have ranked the top 100 offensive catchers really. When you put it that way and you look at I-Rod, he did have a stretch where he was one of the best offensive catchers in the game. He has come back down in recent years, but for a while he was quite the hitter.

[Swampdog]

All in all, the list isnt all that bad. Its similar, for the most part, to others "greatest" lists. I disagree with this statement, though....

"He said, and I completely agree, that hitting is much tougher now than it was at any prior time in history." If hitting was so much tougher now, we would not have experienced the offensive explosion of the past 15 years. The mid-60's, when they changed the strike zone (and subsequently pitchers dominated the game), rendered hitting much more difficult than it is now.

Its also not surprising that Piazza is listed #1, if you believe that A) Hitting is so much tougher now, and B) defense doesnt matter much for a catcher, especially throwing.

Piazza's gaudy offensive numbers did come in an era when everyone was hitting...a lot. His horrible throwing came during the same period, when there was little emphasis on the running game. The difference between Bench, Berra and others vs Piazza is that they could have played in any era, as catchers. piazza would have been a first baseman or left fielder at virtually any other time in history....maybe except the 50's, when no one stole bases either.

[metsguy234]

Wass, whatever else is said, I award you and Justin an "A" for effort...I for one, have c&p'd your list for future reference...as for the chorus of criticism, well, no good deed goes unpunished...

But he didn't make that list. He c&p'd it from a different site and posted the link at the bottom.


P.S.

Look at the date this was posted on the site wass linked to:

Friday, November 5, 2004

[HoustonGM]

A report like this probably is not fair to the catcher position, and yet, the players still deserve mention. It will be more interesting to see how the rankings go at other positions, which we will start next week.

Correction: which have already happened.

This is an article from over 3 years ago.

[ohms_law]

Actually, YH wasn't saying that. He copy and pasted it from the website. I added some quote tags to his post to clarify that.

[HoustonGM]

Got it.

[grasshopper]

Yogi Berra = 1.

Piazza like 5 or 6. Part of being a catcher is being able to throw out baserunners and play defense. Piazza could do neither. He was a converted 1Bman.

[jcbarr]

This argument could go on and on forever for the simple fact that no one is going to be righ there. You can compare offensive stats of two players in the same era against each other, you can even compare errors and runners thrown out. The problem is that you can't compare players from different eras accurately, at least enough for my taste, and you will never be able to come to a consensus on how much offense and defense offset each other.

[Rongar]

But he didn't make that list. He c&p'd it from a different site and posted the link at the bottom.


P.S.

Look at the date this was posted on the site wass linked to:

Friday, November 5, 2004

But, at least, Wass made the effort of c&p-ing the extract, which is more than you or I did

[Reade]

But, at least, Wass made the effort of c&p-ing the extract,

And thank you for doing so, not all of us have all day to play around on the net.

[jcbarr]

But to what extent is the question that I am referring to. We all know that defense at the position of catcher is important, but at what point does the offense overcome the defense. For example, Piazza. At what point would his offense no longer have been good enough to cancel out his poor defense? If he hits only 25 homers is that not good enough, if he hits .290 instead of .300 is he now not good enough to overcome his lackluster defense?

I don't think that you will ever be able to come to a consensus on that. There is a lot to defense, and we don't really have the stats that will allow you to really judge the defense of two players against one another. I mean just think about how many guys never ran against Pudge based on his reputation and how many more ran on Piazza for that very same fact.

[jcbarr]

Yep, pretty much what I have been saying above. The problem lies with the "guess" part of things. It is for that reason that I stated the argument could go on and on forever. When making an accurate guess there are always going to be differing opinions.

The list isn't that bad. Some of them are in the wrong spots on the list, but I have no problems with most of them being at least included in the top 100.

[Swampdog]

Bill James did not leave defense out of his Win Shares. These are not his WS stats either....this is based on his stats, and then adjusted by the guy that made his own list.

[jcbarr]

Every statistical total rating goes off of a guess. You can't get around it. The guess is based of averages.

You dont guess how many home runs a guy hit, you don't guess how many people a pitcher struck out. When comparing offense to offense it is very easy, more often then not there isn't much of a "guess" going on there. When you try to factor in defense and offense together is when, at least to me, the problem pops up.