Requiescat In Pace, Frank Howard

 

Frank Howard passed away today at the age of 87. 

https://thecooperstownadvocate.blogspot.com/2020/08/why-i-think-frank-howard-should-be-in.html 

A New Wing To The Hall Of Fame

How many of you have heard of Jigger Statz? Anyone? How about Paul Strand? Buzz Arlett? Come on people, how do you not know who Buzz Arlett is? 

    The National Baseball Hall of Fame is supposed to recognize the best baseball players who have ever taken the field. The common baseball fan may think they've done a reasonably good job (except for Tommy McCarthy), but in reality they've overlooked a great many players who didn't have long MLB careers. Back in the day, there were leagues almost as good as the Majors, such as the Pacific Coast League, that often rivaled MLB for the best players. The PCL routinely attracted MLB stars with higher paychecks and a mild climate. The best players from the PCL ought to be remembered and honored as the greats they were, and adding a new wing to the Hall of Fame would be a great way to honor them. 

   I've published a couple articles on this blog about minor league greats, such as Johnny Bassler and Big Boy Kraft. I'll likely publish many more in the future, and may consider including them in my book. 

Lucky Hall Of Famer Number 47 - Ross Youngs

Ross Youngs is a really tricky Hall of Fame candidate. Since I recently did a post on Addie Joss, I guess now is as good a time as any to talk about Youngs. He played parts of ten seasons in the Big Leagues (1917-1926), batting .322 for his career with a 130 OPS+.  Youngs was diagnosed with Bright's disease in early 1926 but played through the illness, batting .306 in 95 games. He was bedridden by the next year, and died on October 22, 1927 at age 30. 

    What do you think? By inducting him into the Hall of Fame in 1972, did the Veteran's Committee make the right decision? Unlike Joss, Youngs fit official Hall of Fame voting criteria by playing in ten different seasons (although he only played seven games in 1917), and was playing at a very high level when illness struck him down. He had good rate stats, but played only 1,211 games in his career, leaving him well short of typical Hall of Fame counting statistics. Had he survived, he may or may not have finished out what would have been a Hall-worthy career. 

My opinion: Undecided 

Ordinarily, a player with counting statistics like Youngs would never make the Hall of Fame. However, I am sympathetic toward players who died in the middle of their careers, and Youngs was still hitting over .300 when he had to stop playing. I can only wonder if his counting stats would have come around if he'd survived. 

Fred Merkle

    Whenever anyone hears the name Fred Merkle, one thing immediately comes to mind - Merkle's Boner. Merkle's Boner was a baserunning mistake that he made in September 1908 that affected the pennant race between the New York Giants and the Chicago Cubs, a race that the Cubs ultimately won. Although it's unfair to define any player's career by one solitary rookie mistake, Merkle had a reputation as a bonehead for the rest of his career (and his life). That's quite the shame, especially considering how good a player he really was. 

    Fred Merkle made his Major League debut on September 21, 1907 at the age of 18, driving in a run against the Reds. He played 15 games that season and 38 in 1908, and did pretty well. However, the teenager made the one mistake in 1908 that tarnished his entire career. Who knows how good Merkle could have been if he had popular support? He soon became one of the best first basemen in the league, gaining a reputation as a strong hitter, an excellent baserunner, and a decent fielder, and even received MVP votes in 1911 and 1912, but the press still referred to him as Bonehead. What an insult to one of the headiest players in the game, the only player who manager John McGraw would consult for strategy. 

    In April 1917, Merkle's contract was purchased, of all teams, by the Cubs. He gave them four solid seasons before his release in 1921. He then played five seasons for Rochester in the International League, batting a combined .343 in 699 games. The Yankees purchased his contract in midseason 1925 and he played in seven games for the Bronx Bombers, going 5-for-13. He played one game for the Yanks in 1926 before returning to the International League in 1927, batting .307 in 38 games as a player-manager for the Reading Keystones. One day, a player referred to him as a bonehead, and he simply walked off the diamond, never to return. All told, he had more than 2,700 hits in his pro career. 

    Growing up a Giants fan, Fred Merkle is a name that I've been familiar with since a very young age. I never thought it was fair to remember him as a bonehead, considering his long and successful career. Let us instead remember Fred Merkle as a star first baseman throughout the 1910's and 1920's, one of the truly underappreciated players of all time. 

Rick Ferrell Batting Stats vs. Wes Ferrell

48 PA, 42 AB, 12 H, 2 2B, 1 3B, 1 HR, 5 RBI, 5 BB, 0 K, 1 SH, .286 / .362 / .452 

I guess Wes told him some of his secrets in the backyard as a child or as his batterymate from 1933 through 1938. 

Lucky Hall Of Famer Number 46 - Jimmy Collins

    Jimmy Collins was a Major League third baseman from 1895 through 1908. He was a solid player throughout his career, but was only a big star for a few seasons. He was inducted in 1945 by the Old Timers Committee. 

    Collins made his debut in 1895, hitting .273 for two teams. In 1897, he had his first big season, batting .346 with 132 RBI's for Boston. The next season, Collins hit .328 and led the Majors with 15 home runs. It looked like a promising start to a long, successful career for the third baseman, but it never really panned out. His only other big year was 1901, when he batted .332 with 94 RBI's. He finished his career with a .294 / .343 / .409 slash line, which was good for a 113 OPS+, definitely a respectable figure, but not one that screams "HALL OF FAME!" throughout your eardrums. He wasn't typically a league leader in batting statistics, and his counting stats are nothing to fall in love with (1,999 hits, 983 RBI's). 

    Perhaps Collin's biggest claim to fame is his glove. He was a very good third baseman, fielding .929 (league average .907) with a 3.68 range factor / nine innings (league average 3.48). Sure he was terrible at every other position, but what was there to gain by taking him out of his happy place? However, I still don't think that his defense outweighs his lack of hitting; sure he was really good, but he wasn't Brooks Robinson; he probably wasn't even the best of his generation. And he wasn't bad with the bat - he just didn't make a serious Hall of Fame case with it. 

My opinion: Jimmy Collins is not a Hall of Famer. 

Lucky Hall Of Famer Number 45 - Addie Joss

    In the Lucky Hall of Famers section, I tend to emphasize the luck that certain players must have had in order to be inducted to the Hall of Fame with less than stellar records. On the other hand, Addie Joss was one of the unluckiest guys I have ever written about, dying of tuberculous meningitis two days after his 31st birthday. He was one of the best pitchers of his generation, pitching to a 1.89 ERA and 0.968 WHIP in nine Big League seasons, and was still an excellent pitcher when he fell ill. His "luck" lies in the fact that the Hall's own official criteria states that a player needs at least ten seasons under his belt in order to be considered for induction, a mark that Joss fell short of. In 1978, the Veteran's Committee finally made an exception to the rule and recognized Joss, and he is no less a Hall of Famer than anyone else. 

    What do you think? Should the Veteran's Committee have stretched itself to induct Joss? They had to massage the rules in order to do so, but the man died two days into what would have been his tenth Big League season. 

    I personally do not mind Joss's selection to the Hall. The Veteran's Committee in the 1970's certainly went overboard at times, but I think that Joss deserved his plaque. There is no doubt that he had the talent to finish up what would have been a Cooperstown-worthy career. 

Requiescat In Pace, Tim Wakefield

Tim Wakefield, the famed knuckleballer, passed away today at the age of 57.