One thing I like to look at with possible HOF candidates is to see how their numbers stack up against others in their neighborhood. Let's consider Joe Carter as an RBI man, and see how he stacks up.
Carter is 48th all time with 1445 RBI. There are 4 active players in front of him, and another 5 not too far behind. Gallarraga is 33 back, the others will easily overtake Carter. So Carter will not be in the top 50 next year, for those who like cutoffs at round numbers.
OK, so first lets compare Carter to the inactive, non-HOFers. I'm going to look at runs, primarily because I think of Carter as a RBI vulture.
Rank Name RBI Runs 41 Parker 1493 1272 43 Staub 1466 1189 46 Rice 1451 1249 48 CARTER 1445 1170 56 McGwire 1414 1167 57 Canseco 1407 1186 60 Simmons 1389 1074
McGwire's a lock, the best of the others are borderline. Parker and Rice are as far ahead of Carter as Carter is of Simmons, who had no legs left at all that I can tell (a 38% stolen base percentage?).
Rank Name RBI Runs 42 Williams 1475 1410 44 Delahanty 1464 1599 45 Matthews 1453 1509 49 Davis 1437 1539 50 Berra 1430 1175 51 Gehringer 1427 1774 52 Cronin 1424 1233 54 Bottomley 1422 1177 58 Yount 1406 1632
Berra has the excuse of being a catcher and Bottomley the excuse of having played with Frankie Frisch. So you have Cronin (a shortstop in a hitter friendly environment) in the Parker/Rice neighborhood, and then a bunch of guys playing a different game.
I'm forced to conclude that Carter is trapped behind Rice and Parker. He has an edge hitting in the post season (his 236/273/347 ALCS numbers drag down his post season numbers, but he's still on top). His stolen bases help. But I don't think it catches him up to the other two - as we haven't considered their offsetting strengths.
December 26, 2003 12:57 PM
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