most underrated players

also pondering a guy like Paul Konerko

Me too. He's pulling a Fred McGriff in reverse. For the first few years of his career, McGriff's 35 homers a year were meaningful enough that he was considered one of the very best hitters in baseball; after he moved over to the NL, his power dipped a bit, everyone else surged past him, and he fell off the radar. Konerko averaged about 30 homers a year for his first decade with the White Sox, and while he did get some MVP votes for three of those years, I don't think he got a whole lot of attention at a time when there were a number of people hitting many more home runs. (I know I didn't take him very seriously myself.) Now he's having his best all-around year ever, the league has pulled back in his direction, and he's sitting on 350 home runs at age 34. It's a longshot, but I don't think you can rule him out for the HOF if he stays healthy for another five or six years and continues to play well.

Konerko's having his best season at age-34, and unless he has another four or five career years from ages 35-39, he's not getting anywhere near the HOF. McGriff was a legit offensive force during his career (he had a great OPS+ nearly every year) and was considered just a step below elite status by the writers (he was never the best player in his league, rarely was even in the top five, but had six top-ten MVP finishes, even if he never finished higher than sixth. That's a borderline HOFer. He's basically a poor man's Jim Thome, and even JIM THOM isn't considered a lock for the HOF (although he should be).

Konerko is nowhere near those numbers -- 16 points below McGriff in OPS+, and just one top ten MVP finish (6th, in 2005).

Just to clarify: if Thome had retired at the end of last year, then he'd be in danger of falling off the radar for the HOF ... he'd probably get in eventually, but not on the first ballot. His era is stacked with guys with similar numbers, especially first basemen, and like McGriff, he was never considered to be one of the league's very best hitters (even though he was, and had more great seasons than just about any of his contemporaries, e.g. McGwire, Raffy, Giambi, Delgado (not saying that all these guys are HOFers, just that they usually got more attention and respect than Thome did).

Actually, Thome was prob underrated and deserves a mention on this thread. But of course if he keeps hitting for a couple more years and cracks 600 homers then it could be a different story.

Like I say, a longshot. I'd put Konerko at about 5% right now. But if he continues on as he is this year for another five years--highly unlikely--I still think he'd have about an even chance at the HOF. Not first ballot by any means, but somewhere down the road. Thome is definitely underrated with regards to his contemporaries. If, that is, he's clean.

you know what i always love is how columns discussing certain candidates' lack of HOF qualifications tend to invariably mention a low number of all-star game appearances and low placements on MVP/cy young ballots, which is always funny to me considering how fundamentally stupid the voters are. like thome's lack of top 5 mvp placements (save one season), missing in '97 because voters decided that randy myers was a worthy MVP candidate (#4 to thome's #6), seeing his own teammate juan gonzalez place a couple spots ahead of him in '01 despite thome's insane season, and in his truly all-time great season of '02 placing behind not only behind tejada, a-rod, and giambi, but also soriano, garret anderson, and torii hunter.

the AS game argument is funny too. it's not like a higher number of AS games helps other guys that much. i feel like dave stieb and steve rogers were starting pitchers in the game facing off against each other like 32 times.

One possible difference in how we view this: I'm not ready to write off 500 HR as a benchmark. For most of the players associated with PEDs, yeah, the 500 HR doesn't seem to mean much when they come up for HOF voting--not yet, anyway. But if you eliminate all of them, there aren't as many players crossing the line as everyone seems to think. Bagwell and McGriff fell short, Chipper's not looking good, and Delgado's still very iffy. PED players who've made it: Bonds, Sosa, A-Rod, McGwire, Palmeiro, Ramirez, and Sheffield. If you put them aside for a second, the only players who've exceeded 500 HRs since Eddie Murray did it are Thomas, Thome, and Griffey, and, other than Pujols, I don't see any other sure things on the horizon. So if Konerko were to exceed 500 HRs, I still think that counts for a lot. There's a growing perception out there that 500 HR has lost its exclusivity. To me, it depends on whether or not you count the PED guys.

I really like Bill James' Keltner Test for the HOF, so ASG and MVP voting do help in singling out the guys who were considered the best players of their day. And besides freakish years like 2002 and 1999 (which I won't try to defend), in most years you can't reasonably argue that Thome was one of the top five players in the league. In 2001, for instance, you had Giambi putting up superior numbers in every category (while playing the same position), two insane seasons by second basemen (Alomar and Boone), a shortstop hitting 52 HR (A-Rod) -- all four of those guys were clearly better than Thome that year. In 1997 he finished sixth (yeah, behind Randy Myers, which was a joke), but he also finished ahead of Nomar, Edgar, Clemens, and Johnson, who all had better years, and he deservedly finished behind Griffey and Thomas. So maybe he was the seventh best player in the AL that year. And so on.

Konerko doesn't even seem in the HOF discussion. more like the Hall of the Very Good, like Rusty Staub or Al Oliver (if PK lasts that long).

Then again Staub and Oliver were both better than Jim fuckin' Rice.

For what it's worth, neither Wagner nor Konerko was even on my own HOF radar a week ago; it's only their getting mentioned on this thread, and then taking a closer look at their career boxes, that made me realize how quietly they've been piling up some numbers, and that the HOF wasn't completely out of the question one day. That's all--Konerko, especially, would still have to do a lot in the next five years. But if there's a point where you can say of a player that it's 100% sure he's not going into the HOF, I don't think either one of them has yet reached that point.

The Hall of the Very Surly: Steve Carlton, Dave Kingman, Albert Belle.
The Hall of the Very Profane: Hal McCrae.
The Hall of the Very Unkempt: John Kruk.

thome is pretty much the kind of dude who clearly deserves to get into the HOF, which is basically what i'm saying. he's not pujols or bonds, but he's had exactly one season that's been anything less than really good, and that was due to an injury. i think he gets undervalued b/c of the batting average and the Ks and probably for defense (i think his rep on that was poor? i don't remember...) but w/r/t the sabermetric stats he's had a pretty insane career. not like some konerko level of piling up solid numbers, but in and out season after season being one of the top hitters in the game (if never actually *the* top.)

adam dunn's probably gonna reach 500 HR unless he falls of a cliff. he'd be the most interesting test case for that benchmark because he's not a PED case but has never been considered a great player by media

dunn with 347 currently and is only 30 years old this season, for reference

Dunn is totally Dave Kingman: The Next Generation. I remember rooting hard for Kingman to get to 500, just before he was colluded out of the game--I really wanted to see how baseball would handle him come HOF time. I don't think he ever would have got in. Similarly, for Dunn, I think the bar starts at 600 HR for him to even have a chance. Massive amounts of strikeouts (not a factor for Mickey Mantle or Reggie; for him, I think it would be), low RBI totals, .251 career average, almost zero MVP support.

All this HOF talk has inspired me to do an update on my page of some projections I made a few years ago.

Guys like Konerko and Johnny Damon aren't really on the HOF radar but by the time they retire they'll have piled up the kind of career stats that will convince some people that they were great players, when in fact they were just really good for a long time. Like Morbs said, those kinds of players don't deserve to be HOF's (although they probably tend to be underrated).

there's a pretty huge difference between kingman and dunn though:

kingman: career .302 OBP
dunn: career .381 OBP

dunn is far, far more valuable, especially now that they've gotten him out of the outfield where he was giving back a lot of his value with shitty defense

He has his hilarious moments at 1B too, but fewer of them I guess. Loved his throw into left field the other day trying to start a double play.

They're pretty comparable in terms of home-run rate, batting average (guessing that Dunn's .251 will move in the direction of Kingman's .236 as time goes on), and strikeouts, but you're right, Dunn's walk advantage is huge.

Here's a far-fetched conspiracy theory I've carried around for years: that not only was Kingman colluded out of the game (even at 38, I have to believe there was somebody who could have used a DH coming off three consecutive 30 HR seasons), but that the desire not to have to deal with the possibility of him reaching 500 HR was part of it. In 1987, that number was still sacrosanct; I recall that there was a feeling at the time among some writers that even Reggie had diminished the number's aura. Kingman was 58 HR and two full seasons away. I realize that it's Dave Kingman we're talking about here, but I've always had this feeling that him reaching 500 HR was just too weird to contemplate, and that that was part of his odd exit.

i've never heard anything about Kingman's exit. why would all the owners get together and decide he's not going to make to to 500 hrs?

As I say, far-fetched. But as I tried to explain above, I don't think the baseball establishment (whatever that means) was looking forward to the prospect of Dave Kingman hitting 500 home runs--not in 1987, when there were probably half as many player with 500 than there will be 5 or 10 years from now. It would have been something of an HOF dilemma at the time; it wouldn't be today. By "odd exit," look at what Kingman had done in his last three years--I can't think of anyone offhand who ever left the game coming off three consecutive 30-HR years. Having said all that, the counter-arguments are obvious: 1) Kingman's contribution to a team beyond the home runs was zilch; 2) he was widely considered to be a jerk; 3) he was 38 years old; 4) the owners were colluding against everybody at the time.

I'm currently in negotiations with Oliver Stone to make a movie about all this (Oliver Stone's Kong), so I'll have more to say at some later date.

lol.

the owners were colluding against everybody at the time

would like to hear more about this.

The owners got dinged for about 100 million towards the end of the '80s:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baseball_collusion

I don't remember all the specifics, but I think their treatment of Raines was exhibit A at the time.

things they could have colluded on:

• Kingman
• Twins winning the world series lolwtf
• construction of the baseball-playing-android known as BA-8000-T (later renamed Darryl Strawberry)
• assassination attempt of Ronald Regan
• making Pete Rose the fall guy for Bowie Kuhn's gambling ring
• Jeff Reardon's beard
• Bart Giamatti's "heart attack"

xpost - oh!!!

Kingman was such an abominable outfielder

http://www.checkoutmycards.com/CardImages/Cards/015/184/01F.jpg
http://waxturds.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/zardoz.jpg

For sure. At that point he was an American Leaguer and full-time DH, though.

I don't mean to go on about Dave Kingman, who has nothing to do with this thread. Last thing: I googled "Kingman + collusion" and found this page, where a bunch of people debate "What exactly was 'wrong' with Dave Kingman?" Quite a bit, apparently...

http://www.baseball-fever.com/showthread.php?94792-What-exactly-was-quot-wrong-quot-with-Dave-Kingman-anyway&daysprune=365

Also: read that Wikipedia account of collusion, and it was 300 million the owners had to pay out, not 100 million.

Here's something a little more on-topic, a question posted on Bill James's site today:

Bill, in your book "Whatever Happened To The Hall of Fame?" you discuss how you felt Dwight Evans was one of the most underrated players in baseball history. Do you currently still feel this way and what do you feel his chances are of EVER being voted in through the Veterans Committee in which he becomes eligible in 2012?
Asked by: Patrick Languzzi
Answered: August 22, 2010

I still think that Dewey was one of the most underrated players of all time. I would predict that, over time, more evidence will emerge to demonstrate his value, and that there will be wider understanding of this. Whether that will be enough to carry him into Cooperstown...who knows. What is he, now...58? 58 and in great shape; he's got 30 years to work on it, anyway.

It was lost in the shuffle of Fisk's home run, but he made probably the greatest catch I've ever seen in Game 6 of the '75 Series.

yeah people like to point out that if you take defense and OBP into account properly, Jim Rice was only the 3rd best outfielder on the 70s sox after Dewey and Lynn

rice's obp was slightly better than evans' during the 70s, it was the second half of his career when dewey put up better numbers while rice was on the decline

Kingman hit .210/.255/.431 at age 37 in his last season (as a DH). you don't need sabermetrics to conclude that's not a guy you want to sign for the next year.

yeah rice had a huge peak but dewey and lynn had more career value, is the point. baseball writers obviously tend to value guys who had a few mvp-level years and lots of mediocre ones over guys who were good to great every year but never had the monster season.

guys who were good to great every year but never had the monster season

I don't think that describes Lynn--wasn't he the exact opposite? He was brilliant in '75 and '79, otherwise he was either injured or, through most of the '80s, just treading water. I guess you could make a case that his career stats are the equal of Rice's (.298/.352/.502 for Rice, .280/.360/.484 for Lynn, with Lynn playing most of his career somewhere other than Fenway), but Rice intuitively feels much more like a Hall of Famer to me. I know that's not very scientific. I think Evans (.272/.370/.470, plus eight Gold Gloves) was, on balance, a better player than both of them.

yeah i agree w/ all that

It's a bit of a stretch to put Adam Dunn down at Dave Kingman's level. Dunn's not great, but as a hitter his career OPS is closer to Jim Thome than Kong (.904 Dunn, .961 Thome, .780 Kingman). Dunn hasn't played on any good teams which probably underrates him a bit and the guy is so big (6-7 probably close to 300 pounds) he looks really odd and very ungraceful on the field. I think Dunn would be a good fit for an AL club and it never really made sense why the Angels never looked him up, considering they needed power. I'd think the White Sox or the Rangers might be where he ends up if he leaves the Nationals. The old owner of the Rangers tried to trade for him a couple of times when Dunn was in Cincy. I think a question on Dunn is whether he will hit the wall like Richie Sexton did, who is probably one player that is somewhat similar to Dunn (although he didn't draw as many walks). Sexton was pretty consistently decent, losing only one season to injury and he hit age 32 and he was finished. Don't know if this will be the fate of the Big Donkey or not, but it could be.

I will always be a fan of Dunn & JD Drew, if only because they're hated by the right people.

Also, Adam Dunn doesn't like baseball.

And he clogs the bases!

(His career R/162 is six higher than that of Juan Pierre, but don't tell anyone.)

I will always be a fan of Dunn & JD Drew, if only because they're hated by the right people.

Totally agree with this.

Speaking of underrated -- and I know I'm a total Braves homer, but still -- Tim Hudson is kind of amazing to watch this year, for folks who have Extra Innings or the internet or whatnot.

He's pitching tonight for what it's worth. I'm sure I just jinxed him.

it never really made sense why the Angels never looked him up, considering they needed power.

i thought this was because dunn made it clear he had no interest in being a dh

William, you did jinx him :( (I mean :) obviously but that seems cruel)

I was regretting that post as soon as I made it! Still the larger point of Hudson-is-great-this-year stands. Also, he's grown a full beard and he and Tommy Hanson look like they could be twins. For some reason that is very o_O to me.

I try to catch at least an inning whenever Hudson pitches. Ditto Jurrjens and Hanson.

Maybe Hudson is under the radar this year - but he was certainly a name when he was part of the that great starting 3-some in Oakland.

Is it fair to say Michael Young's underrated?

It depends how you're rating him. Are you rating him as a $16mil/year player, which is what he makes this year and the next two years? Then he's overrated.

He has been consistently good for his entire career. He's never had an OPS over .900, but he's always in the .750-.900 range. He's played reasonably well at every infield position. Not rangey, but a good catch and throw guy.

I wasn't thinking about salary (something I'm generally oblivious to--had no idea he made that much); more that he seems underpublicized for a guy as consistent as he's been since 2003. Baseball Reference even has him over 100 points on their (James's) HOF Monitor, putting him into the "likely" category. That's way too charitable, but he may be in the midst of his best season yet, and another five or six solid years, who knows.