Ken Davidoff's baseball insider

Please vote no on Curt Schilling as HOF, and not just because his speech would take hours.

Curt was 52-52 until he was 30 years old in 1996. His statistics picked up markedly after that, the beginning of the steroid era. He had a career strikeout high of 186 in 1993. In 1997 he K'd 319, a jump that makes Bonds' HR increase look pedestrian!

He played with the Phillies, long known as a haven for pharmacology. His mentor and person who motivated him was Roger Clemens. (he claims a new workout regimen and altered mechanics caused the improvement)

I am not accusing him of using illicit PED's, but let's apply the same sniff test to pitchers and batters in the 90's.

Schilling also made comments about steriods in SI in 2001 and when he was question about it in 2005 to congress, he backtrack what he said and lost all creditable IMHO.

Phillies....

http://www.firejoemorgan.com/2005/07/john-kruk-will-not-stand-for-this.html

http://philadelphia.about.com/b/2007/12/13/six-former-philadelphia-phillies-named-in-baseball-steroid-report.htm

In the unlikely-to-be-made biographical film about Ryan Howard, Howard will be portrayed by actor Derek Luke ("Friday Night Lights", "Glory Road", "Antwone Fisher")

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1035682/

Ken, you are getting pretty soft in your advancing age. You actually linked to a Murray Chass column. I didn’t think any of us would live long enough to see that happen. Haha.

I understand your many points on the Chass/MVP “debate” but I see some truth on both sides of it. Some of it may very well be semantics. While I have a clear distinction between a Most Valuable Player Award and a Player of the Year Award, many people don’t. They view the MVP as being the best player. No amount of clarification/illumination is possible with these individuals. They see a player’s stats and even if his team was 52-110 they would think he should be the MVP.

In the age of three divisions, most teams remain in the “pennant” race for almost the entire season. Thus, we are always assured of hearing the argument that a player “kept his team in the race.” We are living in an age when virtually every player will be eligible for the MVP. It isn’t the award of my youth.

JE, I read the story at the link you earlier provided. My thoughts are similar. I understand why Pujols won the award, but he really isn’t the MVP in the historic definition of the word.

James K - and Michael Clark Duncan from "The Green Mile" can play Barry Bonds in his bio.

Ken - it's not even worth discussing anymore with the naysayers. Pujols was a superior player (all 5 skills) and lugged his team on his back from day one until mid-September when the Cards went 2-7 on a road trip and fell from wild card contention.

Albert was simply a better player by all measures and was forced to do the most for his team to keep it in contention - a team without starting pitching or a steady bullpen that the Phils possessed.

Bob, so you think Murray is out to lunch? That's interesting.

The Cards finished in 4th place, 12 wins ahead of the 5th place team. Was Pujols worth 12 wins? OK. So they would have finished 5th without him?

I haven't lost any sleep over Pujols winning, but I do think the award should be renamed Player of the Year, because that's what it really is.

Ken, I wouldn't waste your time arguing about any of this any longer. People that disagree with you are simply incompetent and should be ignored.

I think I wrote this in response to someone's similar comment yesterday, but enough with this "the Cardinals finished in 4th place". They had the 6th best record in the NL, 1/2 game back of the 5th best team, and 4 games out of the Wild Card.

Saying they finished 4th does not tell us how their W-L record stacks up in their league, which is the true way of determining which teams were best.

I do agree the award should just be named "Player of the Year." These "what does valuable mean?" debates are really not very interesting, imo. People pick who they want to win, then shape their argument to conform to the pick.

John McCain came in second place in the presidential election. I think there were something like 12 candidates (or more) counting the third parties.

A team plays in a division. Thus, the fact a team came in fourth place, counts. If it didn't, why should all four teams from the same division be allowed in the playoffs if they have the best four records?

Pujols is a very good player. Maybe a great player. Maybe he was responsible for helping his team finish fourth instead of fifth or sixth. But, they didn't make the post-season and finished 11.5 out of first.

I guess it is 100-2 (Murray and me) that question this. I am not willing to go as far out on the limb as Chass has, but I do wonder about it.

I don't like going with the flow just for the sake of it. Change the name of the award to put it more in line with how voters and the public view it. We don't have Most Valuable Pitcher. The CYA is essentially a POTY Award.

Jack - I don't think Chass is "out to lunch". I just believe he's wrong - as was Phil Sheridan (who was truly out to lunch, tea, dinner and midnight snacks).

http://www.philly.com/philly/sports/phillies/20081118_Phil_Sheridan__MVP_voting_is_out_of_whack.html

I repeat - I didn't hear a word out of Philly when Howard won the MVP on a tean that finished second by 12 games to the Mets!

Howard winning then was wrong, too, if it's an MVP Award and not a POTY Award. But, that argument is the equivalent of saying that because Bill Mazeroski got into the HOF we should allow other .260 hitters.

Jonah Keri may have put it best when discussing Boswell, although it is also applicable to Chass:

"In discussing this further with my buddy Mark, I realize I wasn’t being entirely clear in my wish for Mr. Boswell, and sportswriters in general. I’m not advocating 1,000 new Bill James clones. I do expect people to take the time to learn what the new metrics mean and not blindly mock them (or any arguments, statistical or not) when they contradict their own inflexible point of view. Again, I refer to Joe Posnanski. He writes like a champ, he’s not a stathead by any stretch, but he’s aware of the research out there, wields it effectively when necessary, but does so with a light touch that makes it seamless. Very much enjoy reading his work.

"I’ll take this a step further. If Tom Boswell gave up analysis altogether and just focused on Roger Angell-style writing for the rest of his life, that would also be great. I love sportswriting that’s devoid of numbers, when done right, too. More than I like sportswriting WITH numbers, actually. Roger Kahn, Roger Angell, Ring Lardner, W.P. Kinsella, Allan Barra, David Halberstam–these are some of my favorite writers of all-time, baseball or otherwise.

"If you’re a storyteller in your writing, be the best storyteller you can be. If you’re an analyst in your writing, be the best analyst you can be. If you’re a hybrid of both, be the best hyrbid you can be. Effort and thought. That’s what I ask."

By the way, does anyone know if/when Amy Ryan is returning to The Office? I miss Holly already!

Maybe Murray should stick to storytelling and the baseball-labor issues that he became so well versed in and leave MVP debates to others? Maybe.

Jack,

I respect what your saying, but my point is this:

At its base, the goal of a baseball team is to win ballgames. Win as many as you can, lose as few as you can. The Cardinals were the 6th best in their league at doing this. The fact that their geographically/arbitrarily determined division was the strongest in the league has nothing to do with their standing in the 16 team league they play in.

By your definition, the Cardinals could win 100 games, miss the playoffs because the Cubs and Brewers each won 101 games, and this is a failure. Meanwhile a team in the NL West wins the division with 81 games - this is branded a success by you. I'm trying to be logical.

They should change the award to either:

"Best Player Award"

or

"Best Player on a Team that made the playoffs Award", to end these silly arguments once and for all.

The crux of every pro-Howard person's argument is that his team made the playoffs. This implies that players on teams that didn't make the playoffs should not be eligible. The problem lies in the fact that the award criteria specify nothing about the playoffs requirement.

James K. I really do appreciate your argument and I have no problem with Albert Pujols being named Player of the Year. Just call the award what it really is.

If a team won 100 games, I would concede the MVP award to a player from that team, even if they didn't make the playoffs. But, a fourth place team? That's hard for me to swallow, but, again, I am not losing sleep over it.

I also understand your different scenarios, i.e. the 81 game pennant winner. A player is a member of a team. The MVP relates to his role on the team. Did he help the team achieve success, etc. He is compared against other players.

The argument in support of Pujols is clear to me. It is logical. Maybe Ken can take the lead in getting the award renamed for what it really is.

Considering the season the Yankees had, if A-Rod hit 50 HRs, drove in 140 and batted .335, etc., would an MVP award for him be justified? Just asking.

Obviously, if you took any of these players off their teams the team would have not fared as well.

BTW - I am not a pro-Howard person. We are speaking about Pujols but I am really referring to the general situation itself.

I know there is justified antipathy towards Murray regarding sabrmetrics and its practioners, but why call him out when there are numerous other possibly ill-informed writers out there (remember the NL rookie voting) who demonstrate equal distaste for people who dare disagree with their curious choices?

I find it odd that when Chass starts to critique others it is implied he's old and doddering, but when blogs akin to FJM, etc. take on columnists they are providing some kind of social service for the community.

Murray is wrong and his histrionics (while nowhere near the level of Buzz B) made him this decade's poster boy of sports blog-land animus, which is enough of a punishment.

If A-Rod contributed more to his team's success (i.e. his INDIVIDUAL performance gave his team a greater chance to win than any other player's INDIVIDUAL performance), then yes, he'd be my MVP.

You obviously won't be swayed on this 4th place thing - I'm assuming you'd say Willie Randolph was fired at 3 AM too, right?

Outside of Rob Neyer, Keith Law, and a few Baseball Prospectus writers and their alumni, bloggers simply don't have the storied reputation of the old guard. The FJMs are relevant (i.e., credible) because they carefully dissect the MSM writers sentence-by-sentence and may sprinkle in some humor for good measure. Remember too: it is the old guard (and, regrettably, Sarah Palin) who have long dismissed bloggers as nerds "living in their mother's basement."

James K. you have split more hairs than are on an average head. You have created new definitions for the MVP award.

Pujols won the award. Fine. But, I don't buy all the arguments in his favor. Do I feel it is a gross miscarriage of justice? No. But, I am not blindly falling into line either.

Willie Randolph managed a NY team. The GM allowed him to go on a West Coast trip and then fired him at 3 a.m. NY time when the fans that care were sleeping. That's a fact. Omar could have done it on Sunday afternoon. He didn't. He was a coward.

JE, do you read the bloggers who respond to postings in the NYT? They are 99.99% left wing/extreme left wing. If George Washington came back and said he was a Republican they would want him hung. Palin is on to something. It is pretty well known that there have been organized efforts to get groups of people to bombard papers with postings. Obviously that doesn't go on with sports blogs, but it does occur with the news blogs of major papers.

Hang on a sec, Jack: shouldn't we be differentiating between bloggers and commenters? The authors who we read on Shysterball, Metstradamus, ItsAboutTheMoney, and USSMariner are all respectful bloggers. In contrast, the folks you described are commenters.

Actually, Jack, what you described above is a feature on at least a few sports blogs. It is probably the only aspect of Buzz's beatdown of Will Leitch that had an iota of merit. Deadspin, which operates as kind of an online sports version of Maxim, ought to have in place some sort of filter to root out the most lewd and hateful comments.

The problem with blogs, papers, televison and radio today is that they have morphed into political entities/advocacy groups. We tend to patronize only those with which we tend to agree and therefore come to the debate with different facts. it happens in politics and is happening in sports.

You have to read even those sources with which you disagree in order to get a handle on what the other side of any argument is thinking and challenge a set of facts of which you previously were not aware existed.

Yes, JE, I mean commenters. The way they carry on, they are essentially bloggers.

Agreed, guys. The pros of media decentralization still outweigh the cons, but there is less respectful discourse than ever.

It's an issue that goes back to the beginning of our country.

Thomas Jefferson, who was personally attacked on a regular basis in the press, did not turn away from his advocacy of press freedom. TJ believed that any and all information should be allowed in the public square. However, he also believed people were smart enough to sift through and determine the facts.

And he had a high OPS+ in Charlottesville.

Hehehe. But was he our Most Valuable President of that era? Or just the Most Outstanding Commander-in-Chief?

Luis Castillo is going to play better next year....who gives a hoot about Jefferson, Hemings, et al.

MVP.

Considering his height, TJ was the Ryan Howard of his day, while James Madison was the Davud Eckstein.

Madison? Really? I always thought that Andrew Jackson was more "gritty" and played the political games "the right way," since he was always disrespected by the more blessed power players.

Hmmm, has the quality of our banter been steadily deteriorating over the past hour or two? ;-)

Ken you are not being hypocritical at all. Like you said, Lincecum was on a team that didn't contend at all and Pujols did. Maybe it should be called Most Valuable Player on a team that Contends?? And whether its called that or not, thats probably how I'd vote unless you had a special special year.

I dont think I'm being too strict when I'd vote in Clemens, Schilling, Smoltz, Glavine, Maddux, Johnson and probably Pedro. That's a lot of pitchers from one generation. Mussina falls short, by a lot actually.

Ken, Luis Castillo basically admitted he dogged it last year by the way he showed up to Spring Training. And I think his lethargy were evident to a lot of fans in NY. There is no way he deserves a second chance. They missed by one game in 2008. It was his fault. I will never cheer for him, just like I will never cheer for Delgado. Play hard.

With all due respect, Mr. Davidoff, if you're serious about your contention that Greg Maddux isn't one of the elite pitchers of the last twenty years along with Clemens, Pedro, and the Big Unit, you should mail your BBWAA membership card in for convenient destruction.

As for Mussina's credentials, every post-1900 single starting pitcher who is eligible for Cooperstown and who is more than 100 games over .500 (Mussina is 117 games over .500 for his career) is in the Hall. For that matter, only one post-1900 HOF eligible starting pitcher with 200 wins and a .600 winning percentage (Mussina: 270 wins, .638 winning percentage) isn't in the Hall yet: Carl Mays. . .and we're talking about a guy who:

--killed a batter with a pitch;

--was suspected of throwing World Series games, and;

--might be voted in by the Veterans Committee in a few months.

Enough said. Mussina clearly belongs, and should go in on the first ballot, if clueless BBWAA voters don't drop the ball with all of their "he just doesn't *seem* like a Hall of Famer to me" nonsense.

Mussina is closer to Mike Maddux than he is to Greg. And thats not slighting Moose, its praising Greg.

Greg Maddux was one of the best pitchers in baseball history. His overall #'s are severely diminished because of his longevity but when he was great, there are few pitchers that can ever match what he did.

7 straight years with an ERA well under 3.00 and an ERA plus of over 200 a couple of times. 9 years of 18 or more wins, 4 times he led the league in ERA and came in 2nd three times. 4 straight Cy Youngs (though one shouldn't count bc it was 1994) 1 2nd, two 3rds...how many Gold Gloves??? This guy may not have looked dominant, but his results were. His career is by far better than Mussina's Glavins, Smoltz's, Johnson's or Pedros. Pedro in his best years was amazing, and Johnson had some phenominal years, but the others couldn't come close to matching Maddux.

Maddux's career ERA+: 132
Pedro: 154
Randy Johnson: 137
Clemens: 143

Maddux is a slam-dunk Hall of Famer, but he didn't dominate like Pedro, Big Unit and Clemens did. And he never spent a day in the American League, whereas Pedro (seven years), Johnson (12 years) and Clemens (21 years) spent large chunks of time there.

Bob T., I picked on Murray because Jack asked me to comment on Murray's column. Murray's a big boy. He can handle a little media criticism. What goes around comes around.

Maddux in the postseason was very up and down. So was Moose, Pedro, Johnson, Clemens and Glavine. Smoltz and Schilling were 2 of the best postseason pitchers of all time. Here are the career stats in the postseason for all the pitchers that I just metion.
Maddux: 11-14 3.27 ERA
Moose: 7-8 3.42 ERA
Pedro: 6-2 3.40 ERA
Johnson: 7-9 3.50 ERA
Glavine: 14-16 3.42 ERA
Smoltz: 15-4 2.65 ERA
Schilling: 11-2 2.23 ERA
Clemens: 12-8 3.75 ERA

Smoltz and Schilling might get into the HOF partly because of the record in the postseason. Maddux, Pedro, Johnson, Glavine, Moose and Clemens all had their moments in the postseason. All of them except Moose has a World Series ring.

I just went to baseball reference. I didn't realize that Dan Quisenberry has the 5th best career ERA+ and John Franco's ERA+ is the same as Randy Johnson's. A reliever bias...

Rank Player (age) Adjusted ERA+ Throws
1. Mariano Rivera (38) 199 R
2. Pedro Martinez (36) 154 R
3. Lefty Grove+* 148 L
4. Walter Johnson+ 147 R
5. Dan Quisenberry 146 R
Ed Walsh+ 146 R
Hoyt Wilhelm+ 146 R
Joe Wood 146 R

Ken, me and James K. had a similar argument the last two days. I wouldn't judge Maddux's overall #'s with the others, because since he lost his greatness, he's still an innings eater...so his career #'s are going to be severely hurt. Whereas since Pedro lost his greatness, he hasn't thrown nearly the innings that Maddux has.

When I view someones greatness, I only view them during the time they were actually great. So I throw away the Carlton White Sox days and Jordans Wizadry. And if you compare Maddux to the others only when they were great, Maddux was just as dominant as the others. I dont care if he's pitching in Little League, two straight years with an ERA WELL under 2.00 is freaking insane! Afterall, in the end its not about how many people you strike out, but how many runs you give up. And he just didn't give up any.

Dennis, if I had a HOF vote, I wouldn't punish people that sucked in the postseason bc of the small sample. And I would only reward them if they were truly elite in the postseason, and very good in the regular season. Smoltz and Schilling are the only two players I'd vote in largely due to their postseason success. Jack Morris wasn't good enough in the regular season in my opinion.

From 1992 to 2002, Greg Maddux's ERA+s were: 166, 171, 271, 262, 162, 189, 187, 125, 153, 146, 159, 11 straight years at 125 or higher, 9 of those seasons over 150, and the two monster seasons over 250--and all but three of those seasons (the two strike seasons and 2002) over 210 innings. Johnson never had a single season over 200, much less two over 250--though his own run between 1993 and 2004 was otherwise comparable in quality to Maddux's best years. Pedro is still in his thirties and will either retire younger than the others or will probably give back a good portion of that career ERA+ if he tries to hang on after his last three shaky seasons--he was also far less durable than Maddux, Clemens and Johnson even in his peak seasons when he was probably the best inning for inning starting pitcher ever. As for Clemens--ignoring the steroid cloud over his head--his peak seasons weren't quite as good as Maddux's, and he was inconsistent after his first eight seasons--he mixed good years with average ones in mid career, whereas Maddux has simply declined over time from a great pitcher to an above average pitcher to an average one (albeit durable and with astonishing control).

In short--Maddux has advantages over all three of the other truly great pitchers of his era, and they all have advantages over him. Other than the rather ridiculous implication that no career NL pitcher can be considered in the same breath with pitchers who spent at least some time in the AL, there's no justification for leaving Maddux out of the club.

We're splitting hairs here, M. Scott. Maddux is a slam-dunk Hall of Famer. I've already said that. I agree with you that Maddux's progression/regression was the most organic of anyone on this list.

I hardly think it's "ridiculous" to assert that Maddux's #s were boosted by pitching excluslvely in the National League. I'd call it "factual."

1. When it comes to baseball analysis, Ken Davidoff is one of the best in the country today. What we are getting here is unlike anything else available in New York and similar to what only a few other people in America can provide.

2. I think the fact the Cardinals won 86 games despite obvious team flaws and were kept very competitive thanks to Albert Pujols certainly qualified him to be the MVP. Without him, they would have been toast by late July.

3. Maddux is definitely going into the HOF, but he did play his entire career in what was the weaker of the two leagues for a substantial stretch of time. His career is what it is.

4. The only thing that clouds Clemens' place in history is the steroid issue. He is clearly one of the greatest pitchers ever.

5. As a Yankee fan it is disappointing to see what the club is doing from the standpoint that last year was a completely wasted year/failed experiment if they are going to load up on high priced free agents and turn away from the homegrown youth movement.

6. I enjoy Murray Chass' writing and always have. Yes, from time to time he comes across as if he has an ax to grind, but that's part of the package you get with him. He doesn't offer serious baseball analysis. He is a gifted writer with a particular expertise in certain areas. Although he can be wrong some of the time (like all of us), he still offers something valuable to baseball fans.

The fact that the AL is clearly superior *now* doesn't really tell us much about how Maddux would have fared in the AL in his prime. A couple of points:

--Maddux certainly didn't seem to be having problems with the best the AL had to offer when he faced them in the World Series: his lifetime ERA in 38.2 WS innings was 2.09;

--Pedro's ERA+s in his last two seasons with the Expos (1996/1997) were 117 and 219. He then went to the Red Sox, and followed up in 1998 through 2000 with: 163, 243, 291. Even given that he was obviously hitting his prime at that point, shouldn't he have been having more trouble with the transition if the difference between the leagues was as profound as you are suggesting?

--in his prime, Maddux gave up very few home runs and (as now) walked very few batters: why *wouldn't* he have thrived in the AL, assuming a competent defense behind him?

Anyway, you're right about this being splitting hairs at this point--I do hope you'd agree that it really is ridiculous to group Maddux with that second tier of pitchers, even if you don't want to put him up with Clemens, Pedro, and the Big Unit--his numbers are overwhelmingly superior to Glavine, Mussina, et al, even with the erosion of his ERA+ in recent years.

Yes, clearly, Maddux is better than Glavine, Mussina, Schilling and Smoltz. I should've been more precise there. My apologies

I think the way Pedro thrived in the AL is just a tribute to his greatness. No one else has touched what Pedro has done in terms of NL-to-AL transition. Perhaps Maddux would've done the same thing. But when you're comparing legends, then yes, I am going to give Pedro extra points for doing what he did in the AL rather than the NL.