Rankings of Baseball's All-Time Greatest Non-Pitchers

[3and2Fastball]

Just wanted to add that after going through the numbers again, I realize that Alfonso Soriano does compare favorably to George Brett but not Joe Morgan...

[The stache]

Rickey Henderson ahead of Roberto Clemente, George Brett, Albert Pujols, Al Kaline and Wade Boggs?

 

Rickey was one of the most exciting players to ever step on the field. But as a pure hitter? The players I mentioned dust him. Henderson doesn't even belong in the same breath as Clemente as far as hitting goes.

 

 

I don't agree with this at all.

 

Clemente had a career line of .317/.359 /.475 with an OPS of .834

Henderson had a career line of .279/.404/.419 for an OPS of .820

 

I think Henderson had a much greater impact on the game, and his overall numbers took a big hit because he wanted to play so long. But the guy scored more runs, stole more bases than anyone and was the greatest leadoff hitter of all time.

 

6 times in the top 10 in MVP voting, 3 times in the top 3 including 1 MVP.

 

 

Now take this into consideration.

 

Clemente tragically died when he was 37 years old and started playing when he was 20 years old.

 

Henderson started playing when he was 20 years old. If you just take Henderson's career through age 20, it looks like this'

.287/.406/.435 OPS of .842 with 244 HR's and 1186 SB's.

 

So the exact same OPS, a couple more HR's, about 1140 more SB's(which I realize doesn't fall under the best "hitter," of all time, but I think it needs to be taken into consideration how often a walk was a double to Henderson).

 

Given the choice to play for my team for their entire career, I'd take Henderson. Clemente wasn't really a power hitter and he was a #3 hitter while Henderson was a leadoff hitter who hit about 60 more HR's and from ages 20-37 were nearly identical players.

 

You can disagree, but if the discussion is about hitting and hitting alone, no, Henderson doesn't belong in the same discussion with Clemente. When Henderson got on base, he was incredible. But stealing bases to get into scoring position has absolutely nothing at all to do with hitting ability. Henderson was a good hitter, and had a spectacular impact on the game when he did get on. Clemente was an incredible hitter.

 

And if we're going to look beyond hitting, I'll still take Clemente, the best defensive right fielder to ever play the game. Henderson created a lot of runs with his legs. How many runs did Clemente save the Pirates with his range, and his arm?

[Ennder]

Henderson was a good hitter, and had a spectacular impact on the game when he did get on. Clemente was an incredible hitter.

 

I think you just greatly undervalue the BB. If you take out Clemente's early career where he was pretty mediocre and just look at his prime he had an OPS+ of 146 with a line of .331/.377/.507/.884. Truth is the guy just didn't walk very much.

 

If you take out Henderson's late career and concentrate on his prime he had an OPS+ of 142 with a line of .291/.409/.449/.858. Their peaks were pretty close to the same with Henderon's maybe being a little more valuable since it is OBP heavy. Henderson's rate states take a small hit given the overall career but they get a big boost from longevity if you do that. I can't see how anyone can reasonably make a comment that they don't belong in the same discussion.

[Baldkin]

Just wanted to add that after going through the numbers again, I realize that Alfonso Soriano does compare favorably to George Brett but not Joe Morgan...

 

Soriano has a 112 career OPS, both Morgan and Brett are over 130. Maybe their career numbers sort of compare to one another, but taken in context they really aren't in the same stratosphere.

[3and2Fastball]

Just wanted to add that after going through the numbers again, I realize that Alfonso Soriano does compare favorably to George Brett but not Joe Morgan...

 

Soriano has a 112 career OPS, both Morgan and Brett are over 130. Maybe their career numbers sort of compare to one another, but taken in context they really aren't in the same stratosphere.

 

Yes that is true, however OPS+ is somewhat of a strange stat. It is challenging to put up a huge OPS+ if you play in Wrigley or play for the Rangers. The one year Soriano played for Washington he had a 135 OPS+ ...

 

I tend to look more at Total Bases as opposed to OPS or OPS+. George Brett averaged 302 Total Bases per 162 games in his career. Soriano has averaged 324 total bases per 162 games in his career. If you look at Total Bases + Walks + Stolen Bases, then Soriano is even further ahead.

[Baldkin]

Yes that is true, however OPS+ is somewhat of a strange stat. It is challenging to put up a huge OPS+ if you play in Wrigley or play for the Rangers. The one year Soriano played for Washington he had a 135 OPS+ ...

 

I tend to look more at Total Bases as opposed to OPS or OPS+. George Brett averaged 302 Total Bases per 162 games in his career. Soriano has averaged 324 total bases per 162 games in his career. If you look at Total Bases + Walks + Stolen Bases, then Soriano is even further ahead.

 

But context matters.

I averaged 743 bases per 162 games. That was in slow pitch softball. Context matters.

Playing with a juiced ball in tiny ball parks during the biggest offensive era in history doesn't make it a strange stat.

 

His single best season was barely as good as Brett's career average.

 

Brett's Career wOBA: .374, Soriano's: .353; average is .340.

 

Brett from '79 to '90: .314/.390/.525/.915, 150 OPS+

Soriano's single best year: 135 OPS+

[3and2Fastball]

Very good point about context. I argue context quite a bit in favor of players from an integrated league vs players from MLB prior to 1947 (or the Negro Leagues) so it wouldn't be fair to turn around and try to ignore context just to support my own point of view in this case.

 

I'll crunch some more numbers on Soriano and look at his career more closely.

[RockCoCougars]

You can't compare Brett with Soriano. Brett was one of the best hitters ever who had his prime in an era where offense was mostly down. Soriano had some big seasons when balls were flying out of the park and has been ordinary since he got the big money. Don't get me wrong, Soriano has been a good player, but definitely not HOF caliber like Brett.

 

Normally I don't have any problem coming up with a comparison for someone, but Soriano is a tough one... a rich man's Ron Gant is the best that I can do right now.

[topper09er]

Hi Briggs. The title of the thread is not misleading, I named both the thread, and the page where you're reading the rankings, that's on my website.

 

Baseball-reference.com, which is conducting the voting, has called the non-pitchers list, "batters", so I did too in this thread. I'm going to add the pitchers list to my site as well, when I do, I'll change that page to "All-Time Hitters."

 

 

The thread title is very misleading. The list ranks the best non-pitchers or position players using everything, not just hitting. Baseball-reference just calls non-pitchers "batters" but the list is about all around value. Clemente is the best defensive RF of all-time and that helps him compared to Rickey who was just average in LF.

 

An interesting note on this list is that Ryan Braun was around the 220 I think last season, but now he dropped all the way to around 400 due to people just discrediting his entire career because ESPN told them to.

[3and2Fastball]

I wonder where Josh Gibson should rank in this list? It is pretty reasonable to say that best players from the Negro Leagues were just as great as the best players from MLB, and Gibson averaged about 50 HR's per 154 games and had a career batting average of .362 ... considering the power plus average numbers while playing the premium position of catcher I'd put him in the Top 5 All-Time

[splitterpfj]

Love it or hate it, I'm just calling the list what the guys at baseball-reference call it. No one is told to base their votes on anything...home runs, steals, hair color, none of it....a bunch of stats are given for each player, a lot of which are 100% offense...classic counting stats, etc.

 

WAR is there too, which takes into account more than just hitting stats, but it's one of many things that are provided, and again, no one is instructed to vote based on any particular thing.

 

Whatever you think of the list title, and however your personally choose to rank one guy over another, the point is...to vote.

 

I can't imagine anyone thinking Alfonso Soriano is anywhere near the class of George Brett, and I can't see why the player who scored the most runs in MLB history would seem out of place at #20 on a list like this...but this thread shows the debate that always exists when comparisons begin...which is awesome...

 

Vote on home runs, vote on WAR, vote on whatever you believe in, the more educated fans who participate, the better the list becomes.

[Funketown]

I wonder where Josh Gibson should rank in this list? It is pretty reasonable to say that best players from the Negro Leagues were just as great as the best players from MLB, and Gibson averaged about 50 HR's per 154 games and had a career batting average of .362 ... considering the power plus average numbers while playing the premium position of catcher I'd put him in the Top 5 All-Time

 

From Wiki, Gibson's career avg/slg is .359/.648. With 255 walks and 1855 AB's, his OBP may have been in the .430-.440 range, so we're talking a NNL OPS approaching 1.100 (very similar to Ruth's career line, hence his nickname). Per wiki, he went 21/56 (.375) with 2 HR's against MLB pitchers in his career.

[topper09er]

Love it or hate it, I'm just calling the list what the guys at baseball-reference call it.

 

No you're not, you are calling it "hitters" which in my opinion implies something different from "batters", which is what bb-ref calls it.

[splitterpfj]

Wow, really?

 

I guess I see no difference between the two terms, but ok.

 

I'm not selling a list title on this one, I'm sharing the exercise and inviting people to participate in the process.

[3and2Fastball]

I thought more about "context" and not just as it applies to Alfonso Soriano (!)

 

If we are prepared to discount Soriano and players like, for instance, Carlos Delgado because of the times they played in, then are we prepared to say that Randy Johnson is probably the greatest pitcher of all-time?

 

If we look at how dominant Randy Johnson was, in the steroid era, pitching to juiced up players, to me that is way more impressive than Walter Johnson & Cy Young playing in segregated leagues with a higher mound and much bigger strike-zone

[splitterpfj]

Speaker momentarily takes #10 back from Mantle...whoa folks, we've got a real barnburner today...

[RockCoCougars]

I thought more about "context" and not just as it applies to Alfonso Soriano (!)

 

If we are prepared to discount Soriano and players like, for instance, Carlos Delgado because of the times they played in, then are we prepared to say that Randy Johnson is probably the greatest pitcher of all-time?

 

If we look at how dominant Randy Johnson was, in the steroid era, pitching to juiced up players, to me that is way more impressive than Walter Johnson & Cy Young playing in segregated leagues with a higher mound and much bigger strike-zone

 

I think that Johnson, Maddux and Pedro do score some bonus points based on that. I wouldn't put Johnson quite as high as Walter Johnson or Cy Young though, because he didn't really find himself until he was over 30. Johnson probably right on the edge of my Top 10 all time, and in my view, the best 2nd pitcher who debuted in the past 40 years or so behind Maddux. You have a great point with the segregation issue, but in the end, the best that you can do is to compare guys with their contemporaries. All eras had their benefits and their drawbacks for success.

[Funketown]

Speaker momentarily takes #10 back from Mantle...whoa folks, we've got a real barnburner today...

 

 

Your thread title remains misleading. Did Babe Ruth not pitch ~1,200 innings?

[splitterpfj]

Wow, rough crowd...

[Ennder]

I thought more about "context" and not just as it applies to Alfonso Soriano (!)

 

If we are prepared to discount Soriano and players like, for instance, Carlos Delgado because of the times they played in, then are we prepared to say that Randy Johnson is probably the greatest pitcher of all-time?

 

If we look at how dominant Randy Johnson was, in the steroid era, pitching to juiced up players, to me that is way more impressive than Walter Johnson & Cy Young playing in segregated leagues with a higher mound and much bigger strike-zone

 

Pitchers were just as juiced as the hitters.

[Nottso]

 

Pitchers were just as juiced as the hitters.

 

No doubt. I wonder if the juice had a lesser, equal, or greater effect on pitching performance as it had on batting performance. Anybody ever seen anything on that or have any ideas? I guess I'd have to say lesser just because of the offensive explosion of the times.

[3and2Fastball]

So, are you suggesting that Randy Johnson was on steroids? I'm prepared to accept that some eras were easier to hit in than others, and that there are adjustments that need to be made when comparing players from different decades.

 

That is why players like Richie Allen (Dick Allen) deserve higher rankings for the numbers he put up in the late 60's/early 70's. But if we are severely discounting players like Alfonso Soriano and Carlos Delgado and Jeff Bagwell for the remarkable numbers they put up in the Steroid era, then we need to be prepared to call Randy Johnson & Pedro Martinez Top 5 pitchers of all-time.

 

Can't have it both ways. (And I do think of the Big Unit & Pedro as Top 5 pitchers by the way)

[Nottso]

So, are you suggesting that Randy Johnson was on steroids?

 

I'm suggesting that steroid use was as rampant with pitchers as it was with non pitchers. I'm not prepared to say that any particular individual was using unless I were to see strong evidence that he was.

[Ennder]

Yeah there were plenty of pitchers on steroids and there is no good way to know how much it helped one vs the other. It is a big unknown quantity for all of the players. There were still pitchers that thrived in the era and I think since it followed an expansion and there has been ample evidence that the balls were different that there is more to this offensive spike than just steroids.

[TooLiveBrew]

It's really strange to me that, in general, the prevailing fan opinion is that hitters were the only ones who abused PEDs. It's not just about HRs.