I would have liked some of the other great catchers from the "golden era" get mentioned in your piece. Show some love for Russell Martin and Brian McCann and Jorge posada and Jason Kendall. I think all of those guys have cases for the hall
That's interesting that your definition of "golden era" is so recent. I've heard of the 1920's through WWII or the 1950s/early 60s being considered the golden age, but never heard of such as a recent golden era.
A bit surprised/annoyed at the love Posey (90.8%) and Molina (81.6%) get compared to Munson (47.6%) on the survey.
Posey and Munson have very similar credentials: both won ROY, were 7x All-Stars, won an MVP, Gold Gloves (Munson 3x, Posey 2x), Won World Series (Munson 2x, Posey 3x). Posey won a batting title and was a better hitter (129 OPS+ to Munson's 116). They were close in fielding.
But what I don't hear talked about much is Munson's playoff performance. He was a beast.
Here is the comparison between the two:
Munson in 3 ALCS: .357/.378/.496 and OPS .833 with 2 HRs and 10 RBI.
Posey in 3 NLCS: .188/.278.217 and OPS .496 with 0 HRs and 7 RBI.
Munson in 3 WS: .373/.417/.493 and OPS .909 with 1 HR and 12 RBI
Posey in 3 WS: .230/.288/.328 and OPS .616 with 2 HR and 7 RBI
Posey faired better in the Wild Card and NLDS series than he did in the NLCS and WS, bringing his total postseason slash line to .252/.321/.345 with OPS of .667.
In the one WS Munson lost, his batting average was .529 with an OPS of 1.059. The rest of the Yankees batted just .178 as a group.
Given the relative lack of catchers in the Hall of Fame, Munson should probably be in. Especially if Posey is a 1st ballot and Molina gets in.
I agree with. you that Munson should be in the Hall, but when you're discussing Posey's post season credentials you've omitted one of the most important ones - Posey caught 14 shutouts in the post season - second is Yadi with 8. We don't have great data from the 1970s on pitch presentation and framing but Posey has to get significant credit as a game caller for all those shutouts.
I have a confession to make. I do t think I’ve ever heard Greg Maddux referred to as “Mad Dog,” though I do remember “The Professor.” Luckily, Google is my friend.
Thurman Munson typified the hardnosed catcher who could do it all. He was a true leader as a catcher should be. He took charge and guided every team without being a rah-rah example. He also was from Canton, not Akron.
The night after Munson's death at Yankee Stadium from WPIX. The fans reaction begins around 19:00. Don't forget the tissues. https://youtu.be/D7Yhptax06I
I agree that Schilling talked himself out of the Hall. And the Wakefield story was the final nail in the coffin. His best chance was that a Vets Committee filled with old teammates would say, "Yeah, he was a loudmouthed jerk, but he was OUR loudmouth jerk and there was no one we would rather have on the mound for a big game." Now, after betraying Wakefield's confidence, the general attitude of his former teammates is "he's just a jerk."
I really think Schilling is the purest case of the character clause being invoked. Pete Rose and Shoeless Joe were involved in betting activity, which is a red line (for good reason). Bonds, Clemens, ARod, etc., are out for cheating the game, as amorphously as we choose to define cheating. Schilling didn't do anything illegal or unethical during his career. But he was such an obnoxious jerk for so long that no one wants to see him in Hall. It really is amazing.
There’s no real “character” violation Schilling is guilty of other than that the writers don’t like him or his politics. That Schilling has not been voted into the Hall of Fame is not a reflection of his words or character, but is an indictment on the character of the writers.
If that were true, then the Vets Committee would have rectified the mistake by voting him in. The writers gave him a larger percentage of the vote in his final season (71.1) than the Vets Cmte did (43.7). The players' attitude toward him is similar to what Shoeless Joe said about Ty Cobb in Field of Dreams: "Ty Cobb wanted to play, but none of us could stand the son-of-a-bitch when we were alive, so we told him to stick it!"
I assume you are not suggesting Cobb should not have been voted in and in fact Cobb received more votes than Babe Ruth did in that inaugural HOF vote. in spite of people's irrelavant feelings on the subject of how they like Cobb. That the Vets committee did not vote Schilling in is a reflection also on their character and that they are afraid to offend the Left because both on the field and off it (he was and is still known as a philanthropist and won the Clemente Award) Schilling deserves to be in the Hall-of-Fame.
First of all, it was the writers who didn't vote Schilling, not the Veterans Committee.
And secondly, Schilling literally suggested that those same writers should be lynched. Drawing the conclusion that it's simply a matter of not wanting to offend "the Left" is a wild jump in logic.
Schilling never suggested lynching journalists in any serious way. He wore a t-shirt with a crude, anti-journalist comment like Shakespeare who wrote "kill all the lawyers", a line that has made many people laugh out loud. People make jokes - good and bad, appropriate and inapporpriate - but that t-shirt should not disqualify Schilling from the HOF. If Schilling were a liberal wearing that same t-shirt, the faux-offended journalists would not care one iota.
Your buddy Bill James says that Munson is in no way a Hall of Famer. I'll take his word for it. Munson was my most disliked player as a young Red Sox fan, but I was very sad when I heard that he died. In sports, you sort of have a deep respect and strange love for your "enemy" because you know as well as that athlete's fans how good they really are. I rooted for the Yankees one in a half times in my life. I would have been fine with them winning the 2001 World Series. But I rooted hard for them in the first game they played after Munson's funeral. Murcer won the game all by himslef in an extremely emotional game.
Of course, your buddy Bill wrote something that he would have been crucified for now. He said that Munson's replacement , Rick Cerone "was to catching what Munson was to aviation." Actually, his publisher cut it from his abstract, but he printed it in "This Time, Let's Not Eat the Bones."
Statistically, Molina has zero case for the HOF. I realize that WAR underrates catchers, but Molina had exactly TWO seasons with more than 3.2 WAR. To put that into perspective, Freehan had 6 such seasons, and Posada had 7. Jim Sundberg also had 7. Molina was just a good player who played for a long time and had 2 really good seasons. Posada was the better player, and it isn't close.
I’m also lukewarm on Molina as a HOFer, but his case depends on things the stats don’t capture: his effectiveness as an uber-prepared and savant player who made the pitching staff and team better. This has been the hype about him for more than a decade, and a wide array of Cardinals pitchers and position players testify to his greatness. If you believe that hype, you’ll vote in him. If you’re skeptical, you won’t.
But like Utley and Jones, it depends how you evaluate defense or how much you trust defensive metrics. fWAR, which I think includes framing where bWAR does not, has him with EIGHT seasons above your 3.2 WAR cutoff, basically having him as a star from 2008-2016 and a top 10 catcher all-time. By bWAR he's not a top 20 catcher.
Either way, I think people who believe Molina is going to coast in are going to be surprised when writers actual get around to voting.
Agreed. The previously mentioned Munson was a much better player, who had about 12 more WAR at 32 when he died than Molina had. 7 years later when he retired, he still hadn't caught up.
Molina will make the Hall of Fame because of the rabid Cardinal fans and Fangraphs hinky framing stat, but I put him right there in a group with Sundberg, Freehan, Jason Kendall, and Posada, and not at the top of the group either.
Molina was a very good player. He should not be in the Hall of Fame, and the idea of his seemingly inevitable first ballot election is a bad joke.
Yes, you can make the argument for Mantle—and others as well—over Yogi. I have always assumed Yogi got that much play for MVP (he had some seconds along with the 3) because he was a catcher, and I have no problem with that. A good catcher, I think, deserves an edge re viewing the stats, both re MVP votes and HOF votes.
With Posey and Utley I'm a little bit surprised to see so much love for players with such short careers. It makes me wonder if the shift to peak versus compiling will end up helping others such as Mattingly, Santana, and possibly Nomah. It certainly can't hurt.
I think it's about more than being on a major league roster.
Indeed Utley had 16 season in which he played in the majors, but he only had 10 seasons when he was good. His 1937 games played is more like 13 season of 150 games than 16. I guess I'd say 9000 PA is the cutoff for a standard career for a star player.
I was born just as Yogi Berra's career was beginning. I thought of him as a prototype body wise for a catcher, short (5'7") but powerful (185 lbs). Munson was similar (5'11" 190). But when I first saw Freehan I thought "Greek God". 6'3 and 203 pounds. Looked absolutely huge to me. I think Munson and Freehan are both deserving enough I would vote for them but can't say either is a slam dunk.
Here's a quick comparison.
Yogi .285. 358 HR. 1430 RBI. 125 OPS+. WAR 59.5
Munson. .292. 113 HR. 701 RBI, 116 OPS+. WAR 46.1
Freehan .262. 200 HR 758 RBI 112 OPS+ WAR 44.8
One last comparison I find interesting but not particularly pertinent to voting
Yogi 7,555 AB 414 SO
Munson 5,905 AB 571 SO
Freehan 6,073 AB 753 SO
P.S. to clear up some confusion on Joe's statement about Munson being an Akron guy and another reader saying he grew up in the Canton are, both are correct. Thurman was born in Akron, went to high school in Canton and is buried in Canton.
Agreed, they're not slam dunks, hence why they're not in the HOF. I was not in favor of Munson for years, even though he was my first favorite player growing up. An evaluation of where he ranks historically, and better understanding of his value with some modern analysis, has pushed me over the line into believing he should be in the Hall. Freehan is even more underrated because he often doesn't even get mentioned as underrated, if that makes any sense. Freehan played most of his peak years in a very offensively depressed period.
Agreed, although I think I would be O.K. if Munson got in and Freehan did not. I would prefer both but as we seem to agree that neither is a slam dunk. Munson has the edge in offense for everything but HR when you adjust for plate appearances. The argument between the two comes down to whether you like looking at the raw numbers which are essentially a push or decide to give Thurman the edge because his career was unfairly cut short of a few extra career years that presumably would have at least been to league average for catchers.
Yes, and even so still had an edge on Freehan in OPS+ which supposedly includes a ball park factor. Your or other readers can correct, but from what little I've seen does not also adjust that further for right and left handed batters. Part of the problem with that is that not all ball players are dead pull hitters so you would almost need to have the hitters spray chart and a mathematical acumen bordering on that of Russell Crowe's character in A Beautiful Mind to make a proper adjustment.
Surprised Jorge Posada doesn't get more love. I know he wasn't a great defensive catcher and he was on some stacked teams, but I thought he was a much better hitter than Freehan and better overall.
Being a long term catcher is hard enough, based on the position being so demanding. I wonder how many protentional HOF catchers switched to another position because the team didn't want them to get hurt/wear down. I forget why they switched Joe Torre to 3rd, prior to his MVP season, and I know he wasn't a defensive standout, but he possibly makes it as a player if he stayed behind the plate his whole career.
Bryce Harper was a catcher when he was drafted #1 by the Nationals in 2010. He was quickly switched to the outfield ostensibly to minimize the risk of injury and prolong his career.
So, I ran the Win Shares on catchers (because of course I did), and found that catchers tend to be under-valued across the board. I'd been using the scale of 375 = inner-ring HOF / 325 = Fully qualified / 275 = strong candidate / 225 = fringe candidate / <175 = admirable but no. By that rubric, there has been only one inner-ring HOF catcher in the last 75 years, Yogi Berra, and he only barely qualifies. Bench and Fisk do not. Piazza and Simmons were only "candidates," rather than "qualified." Clearly, this scale doesn't work for catchers.
I suspect the problem lies in the fact that catching is a physically demanding job. It wears you down, exposes you to injury, shortens your career. Its greatest contribution is on defense, which is hardest to measure. So, to make the rankings line up with reality, I lowered each tier by 25 pts.
Posey 243, Darrell Porter 222, Brian McCann 222, Bob Boone 210, Campanella* 207, Munson 206, McCarter 204, Howard 203, Sundberg 200
Admirable but no (below 200)
Salvador Perez (active) 190, Santiago 190, Tettleton 184, Roseboro 181, Pena 175, Steinbach 173, Scioscia 168
Notes:
* The site I use doesn't have stats from the Negro Leagues, so no data on Trouppe or Radcliffe, and Campanella's record is incomplete.
* No obvious snubs. Even if Posey gets in and Freehan doesn't, well, Freehan played 3 more years. On a per-season basis, Posey is ahead roughly 23 to 20.
* MacFarlane had 106, in a dead heat with my boy, Jody Davis.
For obvious reasons, mechanically adding in Campy's time in the NeL and trying to recreate WinShares for that time would miss a lot. But beyond the general difficulties of NeL numbers, for Campanella, they would be particularly misleading. He started playing professionally at 15, became a starter at 18 and a star at 19. But then he played professionally in Mexico at age 21 before returning to the NeL at 22 so one would have to incorporate an additional high level league. After that, he signed with the Dodgers but was sent to Nashua and then Montreal for 2 1/2 seasons when he was clearly capable of playing.
It looks like the 75 years isn't quite the cut off for the NeLers you mentioned. Trouppe makes it into the 50s, Double Duty doesn't. So as long as I am nitpicking ... it isn't Win Shares, but the attempts to recreate WAR for the NeL shows Josh Gibson as the leader in the Negro National League every year from '33 to '39 then again in '43 and remaining at an all star level until his final illness and untimely death.
Thanks. Good points, all. I included Trouppe and Radcliffe because Joe had them in the survey.
I updated my post several times. As I read through the comments, people kept mentioning more catchers (Sundberg, Porter) who made the list. Win Shares isn't everything, WAR isn't everything, but it's kind of interesting to see how different players stack up on these lists.
I like the concepts behind Win Shares -- going top down starting from team wins rather than bottom up starting with player components. I think the implementation had some really big issues two decades ago when James published it and his on-again, off-again efforts at fixing it (adding Loss Shares, etc) suffered from a lack of sufficient attention. But showing it as a sanity check against fWAR or bWAR or any other megastat is a good approach and I appreciate you doing so!
Craig Biggio was called up as a catcher in the 80s. I don't know if he makes the hall if he spends his whole career there, but worth noting that in the gap.
My problem with Yadi as a Hall of Famer is much the same as my problem with Omar Vizquel (before he turned out to be a creep) or Harold Baines. Sure they stuck around forever, but relatively speaking, they really didn't hit enough. (Baines obviously *did* hit, but relative to a league where offensive numbers were sky high for like half his career, and for a guy whose job was *only* to hit for most of his career, he really wasn't that good. Vizquel crested the 100 OPS+ mark just twice in 24 seasons, topping out at 111.)
By bWAR, Yadi had two really good seasons: 7.2 and 6.2 bWAR at ages 29-30. His career total for bWAR before 2012 and after 2013 is just 28.9, or about 1.7 bWAR per season. Value-wise, he's Bob Boone with about 10 or 12 more oWAR. Is Bob Boone with an additional 50 HR, 100 doubles, and maybe 300 total hits a Hall of Famer? I don't think so.
If you're going to elect a catcher with just ~42 bWAR total to his credit, one who was just an adequate hitter or worse for ~3/4 of his career, you're letting those 28 dWAR do a LOT of the heavy lifting, and I dunno how much we can trust Baseball Reference's dWAR ratings, especially given the conversation about Andruw Jones vs. Willie Mays yesterday.
Yadi was a GREAT defensive catcher, no doubt. Was he almost half-again better than Johnny Bench?? That seems doubtful. Bench totaled 21.5 dWAR between 1967 and 1980, when he essentially stopped catching. Granted, Yadi caught for five more seasons - over 400 more games than Bench behind the dish - even though he couldn't really hit at all by then. (Bench was still a league-average hitter when he retired at age 35.) But that disparity in games doesn't totally account for it.
One of the ways Yadi's defensive prowess is touted is by showing how many fewer steals he allowed, and especially how many fewer attempts there were against the Cardinals during his career relative to the league. About 500 fewer stolen base attempts were made against the Cardinals from 2005-2023 than against the next closest team, the Diamondbacks (mostly Miguel Montero, Chris Snyder and Carson Kelly), and almost 800 fewer attempts than the league average in that span, or about 42 attempts less than average per season. Which sounds like a lot unless you think of it as ~1 every 4 games.
In Bench's time as a catcher, if you normalize for the number of games (since several expansion franchises came into the league during Bench's career) you find a big disparity from the average again, 452 fewer attempts than the normalized league average, but only a modest disparity from the second place team, the Yankees. Why? Because Thurman Munson was also an excellent catcher. Third lowest was the Royals, who had Buck Martinez behind the plate for most of that time. Fourth lowest was Pittsburgh, with Manny Sanguillen catching through 1976. Fifth was Baltimore, who kinda had a revolving door at catcher in those days (Johhny Oates, Earl Williams, Dave Duncan, etc.) but 6th was Boston with Carlton Fisk and 7th was LA with Steve Yeager.
You see what I'm getting at? The 1970s were (perhaps) a Golden Age of defensive catchers. Johnny Bench was the best of them, and of course he could hit like none of them could, which is why he won a Rookie of the Year and three MVPs.
For most of Molina's career, there has really not been anybody like that, not for as long anyway. As Moneyball seemingly taught us that offense is so much more important than defense, teams have gravitated towards catchers who could hit first, and catch later, if at all. Guys who just put on the mask every day and did a great job behind the plate and could hit a little...? Well, maybe AJ Pierzynski during Molina's career. Kurt Suzuki, to a lesser extent.
But most of the All Star catchers are All Stars because of their bats these days. Molina was a throwback, a defense-first, old-school receiver, easily the best of his era. But in an era where defense behind the plate was not much sought after, and where stolen bases were down ~20% from where they were during Bench's career, maybe that's not as impressive as it seems on the face of it?
I think Molina has just a little Ozzie Smith-ness to him: he was a great defender (not as good as Ozzie, of course) and had a little bit of offense and a whole lot of intangibles. I don't think Yadi is necessarily all that much better than the Boones and Parrishes and even Kendalls of the world...but I do think he belongs in the HOF. A little personality goes a long way, eh?
I would have liked some of the other great catchers from the "golden era" get mentioned in your piece. Show some love for Russell Martin and Brian McCann and Jorge posada and Jason Kendall. I think all of those guys have cases for the hall
That's interesting that your definition of "golden era" is so recent. I've heard of the 1920's through WWII or the 1950s/early 60s being considered the golden age, but never heard of such as a recent golden era.
A bit surprised/annoyed at the love Posey (90.8%) and Molina (81.6%) get compared to Munson (47.6%) on the survey.
Posey and Munson have very similar credentials: both won ROY, were 7x All-Stars, won an MVP, Gold Gloves (Munson 3x, Posey 2x), Won World Series (Munson 2x, Posey 3x). Posey won a batting title and was a better hitter (129 OPS+ to Munson's 116). They were close in fielding.
But what I don't hear talked about much is Munson's playoff performance. He was a beast.
Here is the comparison between the two:
Munson in 3 ALCS: .357/.378/.496 and OPS .833 with 2 HRs and 10 RBI.
Posey in 3 NLCS: .188/.278.217 and OPS .496 with 0 HRs and 7 RBI.
Munson in 3 WS: .373/.417/.493 and OPS .909 with 1 HR and 12 RBI
Posey in 3 WS: .230/.288/.328 and OPS .616 with 2 HR and 7 RBI
Posey faired better in the Wild Card and NLDS series than he did in the NLCS and WS, bringing his total postseason slash line to .252/.321/.345 with OPS of .667.
In the one WS Munson lost, his batting average was .529 with an OPS of 1.059. The rest of the Yankees batted just .178 as a group.
Given the relative lack of catchers in the Hall of Fame, Munson should probably be in. Especially if Posey is a 1st ballot and Molina gets in.
I agree with. you that Munson should be in the Hall, but when you're discussing Posey's post season credentials you've omitted one of the most important ones - Posey caught 14 shutouts in the post season - second is Yadi with 8. We don't have great data from the 1970s on pitch presentation and framing but Posey has to get significant credit as a game caller for all those shutouts.
I have a confession to make. I do t think I’ve ever heard Greg Maddux referred to as “Mad Dog,” though I do remember “The Professor.” Luckily, Google is my friend.
It also took me a while to figure out who he was talking about with Mad Dog.
Same, had never heard that one
Thurman Munson typified the hardnosed catcher who could do it all. He was a true leader as a catcher should be. He took charge and guided every team without being a rah-rah example. He also was from Canton, not Akron.
The night after Munson's death at Yankee Stadium from WPIX. The fans reaction begins around 19:00. Don't forget the tissues. https://youtu.be/D7Yhptax06I
I agree that Schilling talked himself out of the Hall. And the Wakefield story was the final nail in the coffin. His best chance was that a Vets Committee filled with old teammates would say, "Yeah, he was a loudmouthed jerk, but he was OUR loudmouth jerk and there was no one we would rather have on the mound for a big game." Now, after betraying Wakefield's confidence, the general attitude of his former teammates is "he's just a jerk."
I really think Schilling is the purest case of the character clause being invoked. Pete Rose and Shoeless Joe were involved in betting activity, which is a red line (for good reason). Bonds, Clemens, ARod, etc., are out for cheating the game, as amorphously as we choose to define cheating. Schilling didn't do anything illegal or unethical during his career. But he was such an obnoxious jerk for so long that no one wants to see him in Hall. It really is amazing.
There’s no real “character” violation Schilling is guilty of other than that the writers don’t like him or his politics. That Schilling has not been voted into the Hall of Fame is not a reflection of his words or character, but is an indictment on the character of the writers.
If that were true, then the Vets Committee would have rectified the mistake by voting him in. The writers gave him a larger percentage of the vote in his final season (71.1) than the Vets Cmte did (43.7). The players' attitude toward him is similar to what Shoeless Joe said about Ty Cobb in Field of Dreams: "Ty Cobb wanted to play, but none of us could stand the son-of-a-bitch when we were alive, so we told him to stick it!"
I assume you are not suggesting Cobb should not have been voted in and in fact Cobb received more votes than Babe Ruth did in that inaugural HOF vote. in spite of people's irrelavant feelings on the subject of how they like Cobb. That the Vets committee did not vote Schilling in is a reflection also on their character and that they are afraid to offend the Left because both on the field and off it (he was and is still known as a philanthropist and won the Clemente Award) Schilling deserves to be in the Hall-of-Fame.
First of all, it was the writers who didn't vote Schilling, not the Veterans Committee.
And secondly, Schilling literally suggested that those same writers should be lynched. Drawing the conclusion that it's simply a matter of not wanting to offend "the Left" is a wild jump in logic.
Schilling never suggested lynching journalists in any serious way. He wore a t-shirt with a crude, anti-journalist comment like Shakespeare who wrote "kill all the lawyers", a line that has made many people laugh out loud. People make jokes - good and bad, appropriate and inapporpriate - but that t-shirt should not disqualify Schilling from the HOF. If Schilling were a liberal wearing that same t-shirt, the faux-offended journalists would not care one iota.
I would have voted for Schilling. But when you are an unrelenting ass, sometimes there’s a price. Blaming it on liberals feels lazy.
This isn't exactly true. That rule wasn't put into place until 1991. Joe Jackson received a handful of votes over the years.
Your buddy Bill James says that Munson is in no way a Hall of Famer. I'll take his word for it. Munson was my most disliked player as a young Red Sox fan, but I was very sad when I heard that he died. In sports, you sort of have a deep respect and strange love for your "enemy" because you know as well as that athlete's fans how good they really are. I rooted for the Yankees one in a half times in my life. I would have been fine with them winning the 2001 World Series. But I rooted hard for them in the first game they played after Munson's funeral. Murcer won the game all by himslef in an extremely emotional game.
Of course, your buddy Bill wrote something that he would have been crucified for now. He said that Munson's replacement , Rick Cerone "was to catching what Munson was to aviation." Actually, his publisher cut it from his abstract, but he printed it in "This Time, Let's Not Eat the Bones."
Statistically, Molina has zero case for the HOF. I realize that WAR underrates catchers, but Molina had exactly TWO seasons with more than 3.2 WAR. To put that into perspective, Freehan had 6 such seasons, and Posada had 7. Jim Sundberg also had 7. Molina was just a good player who played for a long time and had 2 really good seasons. Posada was the better player, and it isn't close.
I’m also lukewarm on Molina as a HOFer, but his case depends on things the stats don’t capture: his effectiveness as an uber-prepared and savant player who made the pitching staff and team better. This has been the hype about him for more than a decade, and a wide array of Cardinals pitchers and position players testify to his greatness. If you believe that hype, you’ll vote in him. If you’re skeptical, you won’t.
I agree Molina is a weak Hall of Fame choice.
But like Utley and Jones, it depends how you evaluate defense or how much you trust defensive metrics. fWAR, which I think includes framing where bWAR does not, has him with EIGHT seasons above your 3.2 WAR cutoff, basically having him as a star from 2008-2016 and a top 10 catcher all-time. By bWAR he's not a top 20 catcher.
Either way, I think people who believe Molina is going to coast in are going to be surprised when writers actual get around to voting.
Agreed. The previously mentioned Munson was a much better player, who had about 12 more WAR at 32 when he died than Molina had. 7 years later when he retired, he still hadn't caught up.
Molina will make the Hall of Fame because of the rabid Cardinal fans and Fangraphs hinky framing stat, but I put him right there in a group with Sundberg, Freehan, Jason Kendall, and Posada, and not at the top of the group either.
Molina was a very good player. He should not be in the Hall of Fame, and the idea of his seemingly inevitable first ballot election is a bad joke.
Campy and Yogi, 6 MVPs.
Standard gets no higher than that.
Yogi would win 0 zero of those today. Heck, Mick deserved two of those, his own teammate was significantly better than him.
Yes, you can make the argument for Mantle—and others as well—over Yogi. I have always assumed Yogi got that much play for MVP (he had some seconds along with the 3) because he was a catcher, and I have no problem with that. A good catcher, I think, deserves an edge re viewing the stats, both re MVP votes and HOF votes.
With Posey and Utley I'm a little bit surprised to see so much love for players with such short careers. It makes me wonder if the shift to peak versus compiling will end up helping others such as Mattingly, Santana, and possibly Nomah. It certainly can't hurt.
I'm curious: With Utley listed with 16 seasons, although some shortened, what makes his career short? What do you see as the cutoff?
I think it's about more than being on a major league roster.
Indeed Utley had 16 season in which he played in the majors, but he only had 10 seasons when he was good. His 1937 games played is more like 13 season of 150 games than 16. I guess I'd say 9000 PA is the cutoff for a standard career for a star player.
I was born just as Yogi Berra's career was beginning. I thought of him as a prototype body wise for a catcher, short (5'7") but powerful (185 lbs). Munson was similar (5'11" 190). But when I first saw Freehan I thought "Greek God". 6'3 and 203 pounds. Looked absolutely huge to me. I think Munson and Freehan are both deserving enough I would vote for them but can't say either is a slam dunk.
Here's a quick comparison.
Yogi .285. 358 HR. 1430 RBI. 125 OPS+. WAR 59.5
Munson. .292. 113 HR. 701 RBI, 116 OPS+. WAR 46.1
Freehan .262. 200 HR 758 RBI 112 OPS+ WAR 44.8
One last comparison I find interesting but not particularly pertinent to voting
Yogi 7,555 AB 414 SO
Munson 5,905 AB 571 SO
Freehan 6,073 AB 753 SO
P.S. to clear up some confusion on Joe's statement about Munson being an Akron guy and another reader saying he grew up in the Canton are, both are correct. Thurman was born in Akron, went to high school in Canton and is buried in Canton.
Agreed, they're not slam dunks, hence why they're not in the HOF. I was not in favor of Munson for years, even though he was my first favorite player growing up. An evaluation of where he ranks historically, and better understanding of his value with some modern analysis, has pushed me over the line into believing he should be in the Hall. Freehan is even more underrated because he often doesn't even get mentioned as underrated, if that makes any sense. Freehan played most of his peak years in a very offensively depressed period.
Agreed, although I think I would be O.K. if Munson got in and Freehan did not. I would prefer both but as we seem to agree that neither is a slam dunk. Munson has the edge in offense for everything but HR when you adjust for plate appearances. The argument between the two comes down to whether you like looking at the raw numbers which are essentially a push or decide to give Thurman the edge because his career was unfairly cut short of a few extra career years that presumably would have at least been to league average for catchers.
Freehan played in the quintessential hitters ballpark. Munson played where left field was referred to a Death Valley.
Yes, and even so still had an edge on Freehan in OPS+ which supposedly includes a ball park factor. Your or other readers can correct, but from what little I've seen does not also adjust that further for right and left handed batters. Part of the problem with that is that not all ball players are dead pull hitters so you would almost need to have the hitters spray chart and a mathematical acumen bordering on that of Russell Crowe's character in A Beautiful Mind to make a proper adjustment.
Surprised Jorge Posada doesn't get more love. I know he wasn't a great defensive catcher and he was on some stacked teams, but I thought he was a much better hitter than Freehan and better overall.
I suspect one day Posada will be in the HOF, elected by some far off version of a Veteran's Committee.
Being a long term catcher is hard enough, based on the position being so demanding. I wonder how many protentional HOF catchers switched to another position because the team didn't want them to get hurt/wear down. I forget why they switched Joe Torre to 3rd, prior to his MVP season, and I know he wasn't a defensive standout, but he possibly makes it as a player if he stayed behind the plate his whole career.
Bryce Harper was a catcher when he was drafted #1 by the Nationals in 2010. He was quickly switched to the outfield ostensibly to minimize the risk of injury and prolong his career.
Biggio.
I wonder the same thing about my childhood idol, Dale Murphy.
So, I ran the Win Shares on catchers (because of course I did), and found that catchers tend to be under-valued across the board. I'd been using the scale of 375 = inner-ring HOF / 325 = Fully qualified / 275 = strong candidate / 225 = fringe candidate / <175 = admirable but no. By that rubric, there has been only one inner-ring HOF catcher in the last 75 years, Yogi Berra, and he only barely qualifies. Bench and Fisk do not. Piazza and Simmons were only "candidates," rather than "qualified." Clearly, this scale doesn't work for catchers.
I suspect the problem lies in the fact that catching is a physically demanding job. It wears you down, exposes you to injury, shortens your career. Its greatest contribution is on defense, which is hardest to measure. So, to make the rankings line up with reality, I lowered each tier by 25 pts.
* = HOF
Inner-ring HOF (350+ WS)
Berra* 375, Fisk* 368, Bench* 356
Fully-qualified (300-349 WS)
Rodriguez* 338, Carter* 337, Piazza* 324, Simmons* 315, Mauer 306, Molina 301
Strong candidates (250-299 WS)
Freehan 267, Posada 258
Fringe candidates (200-249 WS)
Posey 243, Darrell Porter 222, Brian McCann 222, Bob Boone 210, Campanella* 207, Munson 206, McCarter 204, Howard 203, Sundberg 200
Admirable but no (below 200)
Salvador Perez (active) 190, Santiago 190, Tettleton 184, Roseboro 181, Pena 175, Steinbach 173, Scioscia 168
Notes:
* The site I use doesn't have stats from the Negro Leagues, so no data on Trouppe or Radcliffe, and Campanella's record is incomplete.
* No obvious snubs. Even if Posey gets in and Freehan doesn't, well, Freehan played 3 more years. On a per-season basis, Posey is ahead roughly 23 to 20.
* MacFarlane had 106, in a dead heat with my boy, Jody Davis.
For obvious reasons, mechanically adding in Campy's time in the NeL and trying to recreate WinShares for that time would miss a lot. But beyond the general difficulties of NeL numbers, for Campanella, they would be particularly misleading. He started playing professionally at 15, became a starter at 18 and a star at 19. But then he played professionally in Mexico at age 21 before returning to the NeL at 22 so one would have to incorporate an additional high level league. After that, he signed with the Dodgers but was sent to Nashua and then Montreal for 2 1/2 seasons when he was clearly capable of playing.
It looks like the 75 years isn't quite the cut off for the NeLers you mentioned. Trouppe makes it into the 50s, Double Duty doesn't. So as long as I am nitpicking ... it isn't Win Shares, but the attempts to recreate WAR for the NeL shows Josh Gibson as the leader in the Negro National League every year from '33 to '39 then again in '43 and remaining at an all star level until his final illness and untimely death.
Thanks. Good points, all. I included Trouppe and Radcliffe because Joe had them in the survey.
I updated my post several times. As I read through the comments, people kept mentioning more catchers (Sundberg, Porter) who made the list. Win Shares isn't everything, WAR isn't everything, but it's kind of interesting to see how different players stack up on these lists.
I like the concepts behind Win Shares -- going top down starting from team wins rather than bottom up starting with player components. I think the implementation had some really big issues two decades ago when James published it and his on-again, off-again efforts at fixing it (adding Loss Shares, etc) suffered from a lack of sufficient attention. But showing it as a sanity check against fWAR or bWAR or any other megastat is a good approach and I appreciate you doing so!
Craig Biggio was called up as a catcher in the 80s. I don't know if he makes the hall if he spends his whole career there, but worth noting that in the gap.
My problem with Yadi as a Hall of Famer is much the same as my problem with Omar Vizquel (before he turned out to be a creep) or Harold Baines. Sure they stuck around forever, but relatively speaking, they really didn't hit enough. (Baines obviously *did* hit, but relative to a league where offensive numbers were sky high for like half his career, and for a guy whose job was *only* to hit for most of his career, he really wasn't that good. Vizquel crested the 100 OPS+ mark just twice in 24 seasons, topping out at 111.)
By bWAR, Yadi had two really good seasons: 7.2 and 6.2 bWAR at ages 29-30. His career total for bWAR before 2012 and after 2013 is just 28.9, or about 1.7 bWAR per season. Value-wise, he's Bob Boone with about 10 or 12 more oWAR. Is Bob Boone with an additional 50 HR, 100 doubles, and maybe 300 total hits a Hall of Famer? I don't think so.
If you're going to elect a catcher with just ~42 bWAR total to his credit, one who was just an adequate hitter or worse for ~3/4 of his career, you're letting those 28 dWAR do a LOT of the heavy lifting, and I dunno how much we can trust Baseball Reference's dWAR ratings, especially given the conversation about Andruw Jones vs. Willie Mays yesterday.
Yadi was a GREAT defensive catcher, no doubt. Was he almost half-again better than Johnny Bench?? That seems doubtful. Bench totaled 21.5 dWAR between 1967 and 1980, when he essentially stopped catching. Granted, Yadi caught for five more seasons - over 400 more games than Bench behind the dish - even though he couldn't really hit at all by then. (Bench was still a league-average hitter when he retired at age 35.) But that disparity in games doesn't totally account for it.
One of the ways Yadi's defensive prowess is touted is by showing how many fewer steals he allowed, and especially how many fewer attempts there were against the Cardinals during his career relative to the league. About 500 fewer stolen base attempts were made against the Cardinals from 2005-2023 than against the next closest team, the Diamondbacks (mostly Miguel Montero, Chris Snyder and Carson Kelly), and almost 800 fewer attempts than the league average in that span, or about 42 attempts less than average per season. Which sounds like a lot unless you think of it as ~1 every 4 games.
In Bench's time as a catcher, if you normalize for the number of games (since several expansion franchises came into the league during Bench's career) you find a big disparity from the average again, 452 fewer attempts than the normalized league average, but only a modest disparity from the second place team, the Yankees. Why? Because Thurman Munson was also an excellent catcher. Third lowest was the Royals, who had Buck Martinez behind the plate for most of that time. Fourth lowest was Pittsburgh, with Manny Sanguillen catching through 1976. Fifth was Baltimore, who kinda had a revolving door at catcher in those days (Johhny Oates, Earl Williams, Dave Duncan, etc.) but 6th was Boston with Carlton Fisk and 7th was LA with Steve Yeager.
You see what I'm getting at? The 1970s were (perhaps) a Golden Age of defensive catchers. Johnny Bench was the best of them, and of course he could hit like none of them could, which is why he won a Rookie of the Year and three MVPs.
For most of Molina's career, there has really not been anybody like that, not for as long anyway. As Moneyball seemingly taught us that offense is so much more important than defense, teams have gravitated towards catchers who could hit first, and catch later, if at all. Guys who just put on the mask every day and did a great job behind the plate and could hit a little...? Well, maybe AJ Pierzynski during Molina's career. Kurt Suzuki, to a lesser extent.
But most of the All Star catchers are All Stars because of their bats these days. Molina was a throwback, a defense-first, old-school receiver, easily the best of his era. But in an era where defense behind the plate was not much sought after, and where stolen bases were down ~20% from where they were during Bench's career, maybe that's not as impressive as it seems on the face of it?
I think Molina has just a little Ozzie Smith-ness to him: he was a great defender (not as good as Ozzie, of course) and had a little bit of offense and a whole lot of intangibles. I don't think Yadi is necessarily all that much better than the Boones and Parrishes and even Kendalls of the world...but I do think he belongs in the HOF. A little personality goes a long way, eh?