Franchise Fours

[Dogdeacon]

Yankees
Ruth
Gehrig
Mantle
DiMaggio
Unassailable in my view, would have been pure recency had Jeter made it. Over whom, the Mick?!

Mets
Seaver
Wright
Hernandez
Piazza
Amazing that all but Wright played significant time elsewhere. Too bad that Strawberry & Gooden were undone by drugs otherwise I think both could have made the four. Overall struck by not that many superstars for the Mets. Franco & Gary Carter were the other two on MLB's ballot.

Red Sox
Williams
Yaz
Pedro
Ortiz
Rice, Dewey, Fisk and CY YOUNG! were on the list but didn't make the cut. Love me some big Papi, but I think I would have voted for Cy Young over him. Clemens wasn't on any ballots.

 

[mets1090]

Seaver and Wright are locks. Gooden should probably be on there drugs or no drugs. More years with the team than Keith and Piazza, key player in 86, one of the best seasons ever in 85. It's also silly that Koosman wasn't even on the final ballot.

 

[Dogdeacon]

I'd have gone with Jesse Orosco as next on ballot, then Koos.
Agree though that I would have voted for either Gooden or Strawberry over Piazza. Piazza was only slightly more a Met than he was a Dodger.

 

[storrsroars]

Of all the non-expansion teams, by far the worst FF was from the White Sox. How do you not have Luis Aparicio on there? Luke Appling? Eddie Collins? Al Simmons?

Baines and Konerko were nice players. But c'mon.

 

[mets1090]

I like that the Angels have been around for 50+ years and they put a guy on there that's been in the show for roughly 4 seasons. Granted he's been unbelievable those 4 years but generally longevity factors into these discussions at least a little bit.

 

[storrsroars]

It's also silly that Koosman wasn't even on the final ballot.

Still convinced Koos should've won ROY over Bench in '68.

 

[superjohn]

Piazza's best years were with the Dodgers. All of the other Franchise fours look like a joke next to the Yankees.

 

[Dogdeacon]

Piazza's best years were with the Dodgers. All of the other Franchise fours look like a joke next to the Yankees.

Cardinals are very solid with Gibson, Musial, Rogers Hornsby and Lou Brock. Pirates & Reds are all hall of fame names as well. But I mean duh, the Yankees have three times as many championships as any other team (ok 2.5 times the Cardinals, no coincidence on their 4 then), didya think it was great managers!

P.S. They have the best list of managers too!

 

[zyron]

Red Sox
Williams
Yaz
Pedro
Ortiz
Rice, Dewey, Fisk and CY YOUNG! were on the list but didn't make the cut. Love me some big Papi, but I think I would have voted for Cy Young over him. Clemens wasn't on any ballots.

What about Wade Boggs? He only hit around .340 for the Red Sox. I would have put Fisk and Boggs above Ortiz.

 

[mauconnfan]

No one can take a spot over those 4 Yankee greats. I mean Jeter's lucky to be Top 10.

Ortiz is a joke over Boggs, absolutely ridiculous.

David Wright? There had to be somebody who did more for the Mets no?

 

[mets1090]

David Wright has a career 133 OPS+ and averages over a 4.0 WAR despite missing significant time in 3 of the last 5 seasons. He's been top 10 in MVP voting 4 times and is a 7 time Allstar. Just because he's been surrounded by doesn't mean he hasn't been one of the best 3B over the last 12 years. His number is probably on the wall in left field when his career is over. (hopefully not this year.....)

One last tidbit I always hang my hat on... in the epic collapse of 2007 while the rest of the team crumbled down around him, David Wright posted an OPS of 1.034 in 125 plate appearances with 9 doubles and 6 homeruns (effectively a 45 double/30 homerun pace) while striking out only 10 times . He tried to carry the team into the playoffs but the rest of the players performed basically below replacement level and there's only so much one man can do.

What did he do in September the following year when they again blew their chances at the playoffs? A slightly more mortal .993 OPS with a .340 batting average. He was always been great when the chips were down.

 

[mauconnfan]

He's had 5-6 real good years the rest are either shortened by injury or just not very good years for a "franchise guy". Let's be honest he's not even in Don Mattingly territory with his career. I will say this though, there aren't a lot of other options I guess.

 

[The Viking]

All due respect to Boggs and Fisk, this is probably why Ortiz is on the Mount Rushmore of the Sox instead of Wade Boggs or Carlton Fisk...with the postseason numbers and championships being of equal if not more importance than the regular season:

Ortiz - 7498 PA; 945 OPS (Playoffs 357 PA; 962 OPS, 3 WS Rings)
Boggs - 7323 PA; 890 OPS (Playoffs 174 PA between 2 teams; 720 OPS; 0 WS with the Red Sox)
Fisk - 4353 PA; 837 OPS (Playoffs 62 PA; 762 OPS, 0 WS Rings)

Ask NY fans who scared them more over the last 30 years and anyone who says Boggs or Fisk over Ortiz can't be serious. And yes, I'm aware he is a DH but I'll take a monster DH who owns the clutch as much as anyone over the last 20 years and not think twice about it.

And let's also keep in mind that Boggs was largely a product of his ballpark. Outside of Fenway his lifetime OPS was 781. Ortiz's OPS outside of Fenway is still an enormous 889.

 

[superjohn]

All due respect to Boggs and Fisk, this is probably why Ortiz is on the Mount Rushmore of the Sox instead of Wade Boggs or Carlton Fisk...with the postseason numbers and championships being of equal if not more importance than the regular season:

Ortiz - 7498 PA; 945 OPS (Playoffs 357 PA; 962 OPS, 3 WS Rings)
Boggs - 7323 PA; 890 OPS (Playoffs 174 PA between 2 teams; 720 OPS; 0 WS with the Red Sox)
Fisk - 4353 PA; 837 OPS (Playoffs 62 PA; 762 OPS, 0 WS Rings)

Ask NY fans who scared them more over the last 30 years and anyone who says Boggs or Fisk over Ortiz can't be serious. And yes, I'm aware he is a DH but I'll take a monster DH who owns the clutch as much as anyone over the last 20 years and not think twice about it.

And let's also keep in mind that Boggs was largely a product of his ballpark. Outside of Fenway his lifetime OPS was 781. Ortiz's OPS outside of Fenway is still an enormous 889.

Boggs is largely a product of his ballpark, that's some serious disrespect for a Hall of Famer. Ortiz is largely a product of steroids, Manny and Ortiz were fearsome hitters but it's totally tainted, same for ARod and a host of others. Ortiz reminds me so much of Sosa, a carefully contrived image of the big loveable slugger when deep down anyone can see it's all a façade.

 

[zyron]

Boggs is largely a product of his ballpark, that's some serious disrespect for a Hall of Famer. .

Boggs also hit .313 with a .396 OBP in his 5 years with the Yanks, when he was 35-39 years old. Boggs was a hell of a hitter who walked a ton and barely struck out.

 

[storrsroars]

He's had 5-6 real good years the rest are either shortened by injury or just not very good years for a "franchise guy". Let's be honest he's not even in Don Mattingly territory with his career. I will say this though, there aren't a lot of other options I guess.

Let's look at WAR for each, from each player's best season to worst:
Wright/Mattingly
8.4/7.2
7.4/6.1
7.0/6.1
6.1/5.3
5.8/3.7
4.7/3.3
3.5/2.9
3.3/2.5
2.3/2.0
1.8/1.7
1.7/0.3
0.3/-0.1

Total: 52.2/40.7

I'd say Wright is not only the better player, but decisively so.

 

[zyron]

I'd say Wright is not only the better player, but decisively so.

Over a four or five year period, Don Mattingly was the best player in baseball. David Wright never was.

 

[8893]

Overall struck by not that many superstars for the Mets.

True, but keep in mind that the Yanks and Sox have a 60+ year head start on the Mets. In other words, more years than the Mets have even existed to date.

To that point, three of the Yankees' four retired long before the Mets even existed, and Mantle's heyday essentially ended right as they came into existence.

 

[Dogdeacon]

No one can take a spot over those 4 Yankee greats. I mean Jeter's lucky to be Top 10.

Ortiz is a joke over Boggs, absolutely ridiculous.

David Wright? There had to be somebody who did more for the Mets no?

It was a fan vote and due to the double controversy and Yankee thing for both Boggs and Clemens, they each had zero chance of winning a popularity contest whereas Ortiz was a no-brainer popularity wise. So those two guys weren't on the ballot.

 

[mets1090]

Let's look at WAR for each, from each player's best season to worst:
Wright/Mattingly
8.4/7.2
7.4/6.1
7.0/6.1
6.1/5.3
5.8/3.7
4.7/3.3
3.5/2.9
3.3/2.5
2.3/2.0
1.8/1.7
1.7/0.3
0.3/-0.1

Total: 52.2/40.7

I'd say Wright is not only the better player, but decisively so.

Based on the numbers I think you're using Fangraphs. This list also leaves out the 1990 season where Mattingly played 102 games and posted a -0.2 WAR.

Wright has posted a WAR of 11.5 greater than Mattingly in what is effectively 2 fewer seasons since Wrights first year was less than half a season and he's only played 8 games this year. If Wright ends up retiring this year due to the stenosis you could make the case they were similar. If he manages to play another 300 games in his career it won't even be a discussion, IMO.

 

[storrsroars]

Over a four or five year period, Don Mattingly was the best player in baseball. David Wright never was.

Through Yankee fan goggles?

I just gave you the evidence. Mattingly's best 4 years (84-87) accounted for 24.7 WAR. He never exceeded 4 WAR in any other season.

http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.as...4&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0

As you can see, a handful of players can make a solid argument they were better over that four year span. Heck, Mattingly was never better than third highest in WAR in any single year. At least Wright was 2nd one year, behind ARod.

And yes, even Wright's best four year streak (05-08) was better than Mattingly's. The difference being that Wright managed to tack on back-to-back 6+ WAR seasons a couple of seasons after that run.

Mattingly was an excellent player. And if you said, "best hitter in AL for a four year period" or "best at his position for a four year period", then you probably wouldn't have an argument, as Wright couldn't claim that due to ARod. But "best player"? Nope.

 

[The Viking]

Boggs is largely a product of his ballpark, that's some serious disrespect for a Hall of Famer. Ortiz is largely a product of steroids, Manny and Ortiz were fearsome hitters but it's totally tainted, same for ARod and a host of others. Ortiz reminds me so much of Sosa, a carefully contrived image of the big loveable slugger when deep down anyone can see it's all a façade.

I remember vividly in the whole Boggs vs Mattingly era that NY fans would routinely mock Boggs for being a little slap hitter who feasted on the green monster.
When did you guys change your tone?
Also if we are going to throw steroid accusations around Boggs likely used steroids for at least a couple years with the Yankees when his numbers went from low 700 ops to upper 800's lower 900's when he was 36 or 37.

 

[Dogdeacon]

I remember vividly in the whole Boggs vs Mattingly era that NY fans would routinely mock Boggs for being a little slap hitter who feasted on the green monster.
When did you guys change your tone?
Also if we are going to throw steroid accusations around Boggs likely used steroids for at least a couple years with the Yankees when his numbers went from low 700 ops to upper 800's lower 900's when he was 36 or 37.

Good points.
The steroid outrage is almost over. If sanctimonious baseball writers were honest they'd pick guys being productive beyond early 30's AND a controversy versus stringent testing. I think we've got less than 10 years left with the 'get off my lawn' old baseball writers crowd.

 

[zyron]

Through Yankee fan goggles?

I just gave you the evidence. Mattingly's best 4 years (84-87) accounted for 24.7 WAR. He never exceeded 4 WAR in any other season.

http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.as...4&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0

As you can see, a handful of players can make a solid argument they were better over that four year span.

Mattingly averaged .337 30 HR 121 RBI with the highest slugging % in those four years while averaging 37 K a year. Also playing Gold Glove defense. Wade Boggs, Tim Raines, Cal Ripken and Rickey Henderson were not better than him over those four years.

 

[mets1090]

Mattingly averaged .337 30 HR 121 RBI with the highest slugging % in those four years while averaging 37 K a year. Also playing Gold Glove defense. Wade Boggs, Tim Raines, Cal Ripken and Rickey Henderson were not better than him over those four years.

You are completely devaluing steals and walks. Henderson walked twice as frequently as Mattingly and stole 64 bases per year compared to Mattingly's 1 per year.

Raines was basically Henderson with a step less power and defense and slightly better OBP.

Modern defensive metrics have Boggs as the 4th best defensive 3B in those 4 years. Meanwhile, Mattingly was basically league average at 17. Boggs also hit .353, walked almost twice as often as Mattingly (13.9% to 7.3%), and struck out only 1.6% more often.

Ripken was the worst hitter of the 5 but he was also the 4th most valuable defensive player in baseball.

All 4 have legit arguments as being better players for those 4 years. You're just writing them off because Mattingly hit 5 more homeruns per year and won gold gloves which are basically meaningless as average defenders win them all the time.