If you’ve read Bill James’ massive book The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract, which came out in 2001, then you might recall he took a great deal of time explaining why Willie Davis was a far better baseball player than his actual statistics implied. You can thank your lucky stars that I will not repeat that exercise here, because it involved lots of math, literal formulae and calculations, and, well, those aren’t terribly fun to read.
What an eye opener regarding Davis' similar numbers in comparison to Brock's. Of course, Brock's SB number stands out, but I'll take slug% and OPS+ over SB every time! Also, Ed Kranepool?! HOF consideration?? Really??!! Thank you Paul
Watching Willie play in the 60’s he was certainly an exciting player to watch, he had some power and lots of speed. He might not have been a hall of famer but he has a case, maybe he’ll end up being more famous as “the best player that never made it on the ballot”. Were there any other cases of very good players that never got their chance, excluding Pete Rose for obvious reasons?
No one quite as good as Davis, but there have been quite a few really good players that deserved to at least be on the ballot and were somehow skipped anyway. Larry Jackson won 194 games and was never put on the ballot. Jesse Barfield won 2 Gold Gloves and hit 241 homers and never made the ballot. Junior GIlliam was Rookie of the Year and had nearly 1,900 hits but didn't make the ballot. It's all sort of inexplicable.
What an eye opener regarding Davis' similar numbers in comparison to Brock's. Of course, Brock's SB number stands out, but I'll take slug% and OPS+ over SB every time! Also, Ed Kranepool?! HOF consideration?? Really??!! Thank you Paul
Watching Willie play in the 60’s he was certainly an exciting player to watch, he had some power and lots of speed. He might not have been a hall of famer but he has a case, maybe he’ll end up being more famous as “the best player that never made it on the ballot”. Were there any other cases of very good players that never got their chance, excluding Pete Rose for obvious reasons?
No one quite as good as Davis, but there have been quite a few really good players that deserved to at least be on the ballot and were somehow skipped anyway. Larry Jackson won 194 games and was never put on the ballot. Jesse Barfield won 2 Gold Gloves and hit 241 homers and never made the ballot. Junior GIlliam was Rookie of the Year and had nearly 1,900 hits but didn't make the ballot. It's all sort of inexplicable.