Underrated / Overrated: Baseball and Other Stuff – Part 2
I began my first “Underrated / Overrated” blog-post with the sentence, “There is more to life than baseball.”
Apparently, some people took offense to this heretical statement.
Nevertheless, let’s face it. Other people, things and events have had at least a modicum of importance even though they have had almost nothing at all to do with baseball.
Things like the Hindenburg Disaster, for example, which took place not all that far from the Elysian Fields of New Jersey, where some of the very first baseball games were ever played.
Some of these people, events and things have been historically overrated, just as certain baseball players have long been overrated.
And, of course, the opposite is true as well, as I will argue throughout this blog-post.
For those of you who read the first edition of Overrated / Underrated, the format hasn’t changed.
I alternate a contemporary baseball-related Overrated / Underrated, comparing either teams or players, with another Overrated / Underrated that might be a pair of movies, authors, foods, historical people or events, or just about anything else that I find momentarily amusing or interesting.
For those of you who are either new to this blog, or who may have missed the first installment, don’t worry, you’ll catch on rather quickly.
Keeping in mind that this author’s opinions are highly biased, and not to be taken entirely seriously.
So, let’s begin.
Overrated: Mariners Outfielder Ichiro Suzuki – 200 hits per year, every year, is a pretty cool, and not insignificant accomplishment. Ichiro is also an excellent defensive outfielder (nine gold gloves.)
He has stolen 344 bases in his career, for an 80% success rate.
Ichiro also reliably scores over 100 runs per season, and he has only grounded into 43 double-plays in his entire career.
Six times, he has led the A.L. in hits, and he holds the single-season record for hits with 262 in 2004.
He has a .333 career batting average (good for 29th all-time) and he has won two batting titles.
Finally, he has played in nine All-Star games in nine years, while winning three Silver Slugger awards.
So why overrated?
Despite all the hits, Ichiro has topped a .400 on-base percentage in only one season. His career on-base percentage of .378 is good, but not great. He comes in at 188th all-time, sandwiched between Taffy Wright and Merv Rettunmund.
Moreover, Ichiro’s career OPS of .811 is not at all impressive. It ranks a pedestrian 331st all-time, right up there with Phil Nevin and Andre Thornton.
Also, despite Ichiro’s obvious speed and his ability to generate hits, he has hit an astonishingly low number of doubles and triples, not to mention home runs. Fine, homers aren’t a part of his game. But doubles?
Only twice has Ichiro topped 30 doubles in a season, never coming anywhere close to forty. And only once has he hit more than nine triples.
Getting to first base is nice, as any teen-age boy can tell you.
But a great hitter is someone who normally accumulates a large number of total bases, and whose presence in the lineup leads to much more significant run production than Ichiro’s has in his nine years in Seattle.
Underrated: Indians Outfielder Shin-Soo Choo – Choo was a 20-20 man last season in his first full year, and he hit .300 with a nearly .400 on-base percentage. He was caught stealing just twice in 23 attempts.
Through 40 at bats this season, Choo is hitting .350 with four homers (including a Grand Slam), and he has drawn 11 walks to 10 strikeouts. He has also driven in 12 runs, and he has scored ten.
Choo, who turns 28 years old in July, has a legitimate shot at a 30-30 season, with 100 runs scored and batted in, plus a .300 average.
As I stated in my last blog-post, Grady Sizemore gets all the hype in Cleveland, but Choo is the real deal.
Overrated: “Silence of the Lambs” – Quick question. Who is, as far as the plot is concerned, the primary antagonist in this film?
Wrong. It is not Anthony Hopkins’ character, Dr. Hannibal Lecter. It is, in fact, an ill-defined serial killer who goes by the moniker “Buffalo Bill” whom F.B.I. agent Clarice Starling (Jody Foster) is pursuing.
But because a big box-office film needs to put its stars front-and-center, Hopkins character receives far more show-time than his character warrants.
Now let me ask you something else. In this movie, Foster’s character has recently graduated from the F.B.I. Academy. So, do you really believe that this freshly minted graduate, who apparently has zero experience dealing with serial killers, would be placed on such an enormously important case as virtually the lead investigator?
But Hopkins hammed it up so effectively, he won the 1991 Best Actor Award for his performance. And “Silence of the Lambs,” a nominal horror movie, won the Best Film award. Too bad that much of its dialogue was lifted verbatim from an earlier film called…
Underrated: “Manhunter” – The original Dr. Hannibal Lecter character was played, not by Hopkins, but by Brian Cox in this Michael Mann film. Watch Cox’s spell-binding portrayal of Lecter in this film, and you will have to admit that Cox’s Dr. Lecter would eat Hopkin’s Dr. Lecter for lunch, perhaps with a nice Chianti.
Moreover, the lead investigator, Will Graham (played by William Peterson of C.S.I. fame) is far more credible as a foil for both Lecter and the “Tooth Fairy” serial killer (whose character is given far more depth than Silence of the Lamb’s “Buffalo Bill”) because it is established early on in Manhunter that he and Lecter have a history which almost resulted in Graham’s death.
And again, much of the dialogue in the first part of “Silence” is exactly the same as in “Manhunter.”
Shouldn’t an Academy Award winning film be at least somewhat original?
Overrated: Cubs Pitcher Carlos Zambrano – Being paid like an ace, despite the fact that he hasn’t truly pitched like an ace in about three or four years. Still only 29 years old, he has avoided the quick Mark Prior burnout in favor of a longer-slower approach. Perhaps he can thank manager Lou Piniella simply for not being Dusty Baker. Nevertheless, Zambrano’s decline is evident, although not apparent, to many fans and “analysts” who still refer to him as an “ace.”
(Note: Just before I published this blog-post, it was reported that Zambrano had been banished to the Cubs bull-pen.)
Underrated: Red Sox Pitcher Josh Beckett – Although there are some people out there who believe that Beckett is actually overrated (Boston sports-writer Dan Shaughnessy for one), the fact is that Beckett is one of the most unappreciated aces in the Majors.
He has posted WHIP’s below 1.20 in each of the past three seasons while pitching most of his games in the toughest division on the planet, and half his games in a great hitter’s park. He keeps his walks reasonably low, and he strikes out nearly a batter an inning.
So what’s not to like?
Overrated: Horror Writer Stephen King – Full disclosure here. I own 16 of his books, and I used to be a big fan of his. I also lived in Maine for over twenty winters.
But the truth is, King’s books haven’t been truly creepy, let alone scary, since “Gerald’s Game,” published way back in 1992. Since then, the scariest thing about King’s books have been their massive heft, and the dismaying frequency with which he produces them.
Underrated: Horror Writer Franz Kafka – This man was so far ahead of his time, we’re still trying to catch up to him. “The Trial” and “The Castle,” as well as his other works, propose primary characters so de-humanized by the modern world that they barely have names. The normal narrative of a life characterized by triumph and tragedy is replaced by one of a constant state of anxiety, confusion, and paranoia from which there is no escape.
And the real horror here is that it’s not even clear that the primary characters in his stories ever truly even want to escape, so accustomed to the moral chaos they have become.
Sound familiar?
Overrated: Yankees First Baseman Don Mattingly – “Donnie Baseball” had three truly great seasons, and several good ones. In the Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract (a great book, overall), James has only this to say about Mattingly: “100% ballplayer, 0% bullshit.”
Fine, but according to Baseball-Reference.com, Mattingly’s career most closely resembles those of Cecil Cooper, Wally Joyner, Hal McRae and Will Clark.
Mattingly was a good fielder, winning nine Gold Gloves, but the last couple were won primarily on reputation, and, anyway, defensively he was not the game-changer that cross-town rival Keith Hernandez was.
Do I wish Mattingly had a long and highly successful career? Of course I do. But the fact of the matter is that once his back problems sapped his power by the time he was 28-years old, he was basically not much better than your average first baseman.
Underrated: Mets First Baseman Keith Hernandez – During the decade of the 1980’s Major League Baseball kept an official statistic called Game Winning RBI’s. I’m not sure why they discontinued that stat, but guess which player produced the most GWRBI’s in that decade? Yup, Keith Hernandez.
Like Mattingly, Keith Hernandez won one MVP Award (co-winner with Willie Stargell in 1979.) Unlike Mattingly, however, Hernandez’s presence led to his New York team winning a World Series title in 1986.
Keith Hernandez was an excellent line-drive hitter, a superior on-field leader, a clutch performer, and easily one of the top five defensive first basemen of all-time. Keith played first base with the quickness, agility and brashness that usually characterizes the very best middle infielders.
Keith Hernandez: 100% ballplayer, 0% bullshit.
Overrated: Las Vegas Elvis – Virtually everyone under the age of 45 has only the bloated, self-parodying Vegas Elvis as their reference point here. The favored Elvis of the vast majority of Elvis impersonators, one has to wonder if even Elvis himself grew tired of playing this version of himself.
Underrated: Memphis Elvis – This talented young crooner sang country, gospel, and rockabilly long before he was exploited for his sexy good looks and distinctive voice by the quickly emerging Rock n’ Roll establishment, not to mention Hollywood.
Overrated: Mets Outfielder Jason Bay – He’s being paid like a Super-Star, but he is best suited as a complementary piece in a deep line-up, which the Mets clearly do not have. Thus, he will feel the New York pressure in the not-too-distant future. Athletically, his body-type and skill set are reminiscent of Tim Salmon, Kevin McReynolds, Ryan Klesko, and an over-the-hill George Foster. Fenway Park inflated his numbers; Citi Field will expose them. Sorry Mets fans. Poor signing.
Underrated: Mariners Outfielder Franklin Gutierrez – Hands down, the best defensive outfielder playing today. According to Baseball Prospectus, Gutierrez’s defensive prowess saved between 25-30 runs last season, an estimated value of about three wins for his team. Offensively, he has the power and speed to go 20-20 on you, and last season, his first full year in the Majors, he scored 85 runs, just three fewer than Ichiro. Now entering his age 27 season, he could enjoy a very nice, All-Star caliber year in Seattle.
In fact, as I write this, Gutierrez, through 57 at bats, is hitting .421 with a .460 on-base percentage. Not too bad.
Overrated: The Winchester Rifle – These beautiful, classic weapons are now collectors items worth thousands of dollars. They sound cool when they shoot, and on T.V. many years ago, the Winchester Rifle was the preferred weapon of Chuck Connors’ “The Rifleman.”
Yet the Winchester did not significantly alter the balance of power between cowboys and Indians in the old west, or even the balance of power between cowboys and other cowboys. Smith and Wesson, and Colt, with their handy revolvers, were arguably more important to the culture and history of the American West.
Still, no question about it, Winchesters are pretty cool.
Underrated: The Martini-Henry Rifle – This breech-loaded, single-shot rifle, in the hands of disciplined, well-trained British soldiers, was an extremely deadly weapon. Firing in ranks, and independently, barely 100 British soldiers held off approximately 4,000 determined Zulu warriors at Rorke’s Drift in 1879. This rifle, with a fixed bayonet, made all the difference.
Check out the final attack of the Zulus in the 1964 film, “Zulu.”
It is only five minutes long, and there are a couple of decent shots of the Brits using this weapon in battle.
Overrated: Inter-League Play – Mets and Yankees fans need several fixes of this match-up per year to satisfy their unquenchable desire to turn baseball into an all-New York event. Meanwhile, a few other rivalries, Cubs-White Sox, Angels-Dodgers, are kind of cool I guess. But there are far too many pointless match-ups (Tigers-Reds, anyone?), to justify so many games per year of this stunt, especially when teams in different divisions, but in the same league, barely ever get to play one another.
Moreover, how fair is it that some teams always draw the toughest teams the other league has to offer, while other teams usually end up playing the rival league’s patsies?
Underrated: Pre-game Warm-ups and Batting Practice – Yes, some teams actually still do these things. It’s a great time to enjoy the quiet that has been bled out of baseball. Sit back, watch the players toss the ball around, put your feet up, and have a beer. If you have a child in tow, bring them down to the seats closest to the field, and try for an autograph or two. And you still have an entire game to look forward to. What could be better than that?
Overrated: Pittsburgh Steelers Defense – They sacked their opponents quarterbacks 47 times last year. Nice total, but nothing special. Their opponents sacked Steelers quarterbacks 50 times.
Underrated: F.D.N.Y. (Fire Department of New York City) –
Saved thousands of lives on 9/11 at the cost of 343 of their own. One Firehouse, Engine 40 / Ladder 35, sent 13 men to the World Trade Center that day. Only one returned alive. ‘Nuff said.
So ends another installment of Underrated / Overrated. Hope you enjoyed it. Whether you agree or disagree with my opinions expressed here in this blog-post, I’d love to hear from you.
And, as always, thanks for reading.
The On Deck Circle 
Baseball Predictions, 2010: A Look Back
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Having been foolish enough to have committed my player and team predictions for the recently departed (regular) baseball season to a couple of blog-posts several months ago, I find I have little choice but to go back and analyze my, uhm, analysis.
Let’s start with my team predictions.
As a Mets fan, I was not optimistic going into this season. I wrote an entire blog-post about why I thought Jason Bay was a bad signing. Turns out I was wrong about Bay. He wasn’t just bad. He was horrible.
Meanwhile, I predicted the Mets would win somewhere between 78-84 games, probably coming in right around .500. Allowing Oliver Perez to pitch the Mets to disaster on the last day of the Mets season, the Mets lost to Washington 2-1, thereby securing a 79-win campaign.
Oddly, I had predicted the Mets to finish in a third-place tie with the Marlins. The Marlins actually won just one more game than the Mets, so I feel vindicated.
Staying in the N.L. East, I picked the Phils to win and the Braves to earn the Wild Card. Good for me! The Nats, of course, were predicted to come in last.
In the N.L. Central, like virtually everyone else, I thought the Cardinals would win without a serious fight. I stated that, “The Reds are an enigma.” I still think they are an enigma. But here’s what I had to say about Joey Votto:
Joey Votto – Don’t bother reminding me about his anxiety problems. This year, the only people who will experience anxiety problems will be the pitchers who have to face him. 26-year old pure hitter in a nice hitter’s park.
For some reason, I picked the Brewers to finish in second place. They actually finished third. But that’s not saying much in this sorry division.
I had the Cubs, Houston and the Pirates finishing in 4th, 5th and 6th. The Astros actually finished just a game ahead of the Cubs, so…not bad.
In the N.L. West, my picks were terrible. I predicted the Padres would finish in last place, the Giants in fourth place, and Arizona in third place. And I thought the Dodgers would finish second to the Rockies.
Here’s what I said about the Rockies:
I really like the Rockies. Their pitching staff might be the most underrated in baseball, and in Tulowitzki and Carlos Gonzalez, they have two of the most exciting young players in the league. Plus their terrific second-half last year should carry over into this season.
Well, I stand by my characterization of Tulo and Gonzalez being two of the most exciting players in the league. If Tulowitzki didn’t miss a significant part of the season due to injury, I still think this was the team to beat.
But I have no excuse for the rest of my picks in that strange division.
Over in the American League, my player evaluations were better than my team evaluations (with a couple of notable exceptions.)
Let’s take the players first.
From the A.L. East (which I predicted Boston to win), I said this about second baseman Dustin Pedroia: This 26-year old has already won an MVP award, and offers a nice power / speed combination. Scores bushels of runs, and plays in a great hitter’s park. What’s not to like? There is no downside here.
I also predicted that Boston’s first baseman Kevin Youkilis and outfielder Jacoby Ellsbury would have nice seasons, and that Mike Cameron would prove to be a valuable pickup.
Those four key players combined to miss an astounding total of 405 games. Yes, the Yankees had their share of injuries. But no team in baseball saw so much potential run production vanish so quickly and for so long.
Considering that the Red Sox still managed to win 89 games and finish just six games behind the second place Yankees, I still think the Bo-Sox could have, at the very least, won the Wild Card if their injury caseload had been more manageable.
I picked the Yanks to finish in second place, and I declared them to be a rapidly aging team. I may have been a year premature. But age has certainly taken its toll on both Jeter and Posada. Jeter had one of his worst seasons ever, and 38-year old Posada managed just 383 at bats. Here’s what I predicted for Jeter:
First ballot Hall of Famer will see at least a 20% decline in his overall offensive output from last season, but still has enough to offer at age 35. Will be drafted too early in most leagues due to rep and weak position.
As for Tampa Bay, I thought they would finish a strong third place. I generally liked Carl Crawford, but I really didn’t like first baseman Carlos Pena. Here’s what I said about Pena:
[He is] The 31-year old Latin Dave Kingman. Steer clear.
Pena’s final line: 28-84-.196 Very Kingmanesque.
Pointlessly, I picked Baltimore to finish ahead of Toronto. Baltimore ended up being even worse than I imagined. I thought losing Roy Halladay would signal the death-knell to this Toronto team, but they overcame his loss pretty well, finishing with an impressive record of 85-77.
In the Central Division, I didn’t think the Twins could win with just two excellent players: Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau. Here’s what I said about the Twins back in March:
I keep reading about the Twins killer offense, but Cuddyer and Kubel should, in fact, be a platoon tandem, since one primarily kills lefties and the other can’t hit them at all. Morneau either gets injured, or slumps badly in the second half. It becomes the Joe Mauer show, but one man can’t do it all. And Joe Nathan being done for the year won’t help.
Nowhere did I see DH Jim Thome rescuing the team about mid-season, when, as I predicted, Justin Morneau got injured. And the acquisition of Matt Capps to close games was also an unforseeable stroke of genius.
I predicted the White Sox would win this division. They fell short by six wins. The Tigers, a team that I considered a dark-horse, were one of only two teams in the Majors to finish with a perfect .500 record, 81-81 (the other was Oakland.)
Picking the Royals and Indians to finish at the bottom was, of course, a no-brainer.
Over in the A.L. West, I bought into the hype that is (or was) the Seattle media machine. In retrospect, although I predicted the Angels were ready for a fall, and that the A’s would be an also-ran, I definitely underestimated the Rangers. Thus, I predicted a team that would finish with one of the worst records in baseball (Seattle: 61-101) would have a nice season due to the off-season acquisitions of Cliff Lee and Chone Figgins (remember Chone Figgins?)
My preseason thoughts on the A.L. West:
Many people still pick Angels to win West. This is a lazy pick. These are not the Angels of the past few seasons. Ervin Santana is your ace? He may win a dozen games. Too many defections to recover from. Texas’ pitching will also regress some from last year, and they’ll have their usual assortment of injuries. Heck, Ian Kinsler is already hurt again.
It was Texas’ pitching that I was most wrong about, although interestingly, their “ace” of 2009, Scott Feldman, did have a poor season in ’10. He finished with a record of 7-11 with a 5.48 ERA a year after winning 17 games and posting an ERA south of 4.00.
In my Pre-Season Pitching Preview, here’s what I said about Scott Feldman:
Although he is only 27-years old, he has already had his career season. His 17 wins last year, despite just 113 K’s in 190 innings, were a fluke. Yes, he did have a nice WHIP, but look for that .250 batting average against to go up around 20-30 percentage points this year. And, as we all know, wins are primarily a reflection of the quality of the team for whom you pitch.
But I did not foresee C.J. Wilson, Tommy Hunter and Colby Lewis finishing with a combined record of 40-25, and all three with ERA’s below 4.00.
As for other players that I liked going into 2010, I was optimistic about Twins starter Francisco Liriano, Padres starter Matt Latos, Brave second baseman Martin Prado, and outfielders Andrew McCutchen (Pirates) and outfielder Justin Upton (Arizona.) Four of the five had very nice seasons. Upton was disappointing, but still managed 17 homers and 18 steals in his age-23 season.
Here was my take on Liriano:
Last years numbers, 5-13 with a 5.80 ERA and a WHIP of 1.55 will scare away most fantasy managers. But there are four reasons for optimism going into this season: 1. He is still just 26-years old, and will be another year removed from his elbow operation. 2. His strikeout rate last year remained pretty high despite his problems 3. The new ballpark in Minnesota should play to his strengths 4. He dominated in the Winter League. Could pay big dividends this season.
In fact, Liriano improved to a solid 14-10 with a 3.62 ERA in 192 innings, striking out 201 batters.
Latos also finished with a 14-10 record for the punchless Padres with an excellent ERA of 2.92 in 185 innings, striking out 189 batters.
And on an awful Pirates team (57-105), McCutchen scored 94 runs, stole 33 bases, hit .284, slugged 16 home runs and 35 doubles, and drew 70 walks.
Finally, here is what I said about Tiger’s first baseman and potential A.L. MVP Miguel Cabrera:
According to Baseball-Reference.com, the two players whose career profiles Cabrera’s is most similar to are Ken Griffey, Jr. and Hank Aaron. Has a .925 career OPS in six full seasons. Turns 27 in April. The A.L. player most likely to win a Triple Crown.
Cabrera had a fantastic season: 38 homers, 128 RBI, 111 runs scored, a 1.042 OPS, and a .328 batting average. As for the Triple Crown categories, he led the A.L. in RBI, finished second in batting average, and Blue Jays outfielder Jose Bautista’s It-Came-Out-Of-The-Sky home run total of 54 pushed Cabrera’s home run total down to third place, just one behind runner-up Paul Konerko.
In other words, if you remove Bautista’s outlier season from the mix, Cabrera comes damn close to winning the A.L. Triple Crown.
Finally, here were my picks for the major awards:
A.L. Cy Young: Felix Hernandez
N.L. Cy Young: Roy Halladay
N.L. MVP: Troy Tulowitzki
A.L. MVP: Joe Mauer
N.L. Rookie of the Year: Jason Heyward
A.L. Rookie of the Year: Brian Matusz
I think I got the pitching right.
Tulo got hurt, but had a huge September, at one point hitting 14 home runs in 15 games. Mauer’s power disappeared, but he still hit .327 on a first-place Twins team. Heyward might win the ROY award, though personally I’d give it to Buster Posey of the Giants. Matusz was simply a case of expecting too much too soon from a pitcher who still displayed promise on a very bad Orioles team.
BTW, I predicted that the Phillies would lose to Boston in the World Series. I still think the Phils will go to the W.S., but now I think they will beat whomever they face. Halladay, Hamels, and Oswalt is just too deep a rotation to have to face.
So there, I’ve done it again. Now I have yet another inadvisable prediction to explain away in about a month. So be it.
Later this week, I will resume my series, “Best Forgotten Baseball Seasons” with a look at the Chicago White Sox.
On a final note, an essay of mine, “Opening Day 1977: A Swan Song for the Mets,” has just been published in a collection of stories called “Tales From Opening Day,” published online at Baseballisms.com. Check it out. It’s free!
Damn, that was a long post. Until next time,
Bill
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