Pete Rose to Idiots: Get Off My Side, You're Not Helping

Earlier today, Craig kicked at some embers and turned it into a brushfire over at Circling the Bases, arguing that Pete Rose's 20 year exile from Major League Baseball and the Hall of Fame is not enough for an unapologetic serial liar who has worked tirelessly to promote himself and undermine the game he supposedly loves since at least 1989. As you can probably tell, The Common Man tends to agree with Craig on this issue. Over on CTB, The Common Man was not in the majority, however, as dozens of angry idiots with poor sentence structure and historical recall threatened to kill the Internetz with their innanity. Beneath their bile and foolishness, The Common Man left the following extended comment, and reprints it here under the general heading of "how not to argue in favor of Pete Rose's reinstatement":

I wish I had time to write a response to all you idiots, but alas there is not time and most of you can't read at a high enough level for it to make any difference. Let's clear up a few things:

1) If you are tempted to play the "even rapists and murderers get out of jail card," remember that Rose was never put in jail for gambling on baseball (though he was for tax fraud). Going to jail is vastly different from not being allowed to work somewhere. Major League Baseball has never restricted his freedom to make a living anywhere outside of the context of Major League Baseball, which he agreed to in 1989. But just as someone who sells corporate secrets to a rival may get out of jail one day, it's highly unlikely that his original company will want to hire him back. Same situation here.

2) Baseball has had a rule against betting on baseball since 1920. Since 1920, the consequences of breaking that rule have been drilled into its players, coaches, managers, owners, trainers, groundskeepers, batboys, and beer vendors. Rose knew what he was doing and what the consequences of getting caught would be. He made his bed, and has constantly whined about how uncomfortable it is.

3) Rose's stunning lack of honesty and remorse undermine his case significantly. He seems to be a habitual liar, such that nothing he says today, about the nature of his bets or his conversations with Bart Giammatti, cannot be taken at face value.

4) As Craig has noted, his exclusion from the Hall of Fame is the Hall of Fame's decision, not Major League Baseball's. Baseball has no leverage over the HOF. While you might think that Bud Selig, Fay Vincent, and the MLB have had some kind of stick they can hold over the HOF's head, there's no evidence of it. Baseball is at least as beholden to the Hall of Fame (since the MLB isn't going to start a new museum now for itself to funnel players and memorabilia away from Cooperstown).

5) Please get your historical facts straight. Ken Cochran, no one has ever accused Stan Musial of deliberately spiking Jackie Robinson. Quite the opposite; players have raved about Stan's class and kindness to everyone, including his African-American and Latino teammates. VGREISS, Darryl Strawberry is not in the Hall of Fame. And Michael Seibert, Pete Rose quit managing in 1989. Robbie Alomar starting playing in 1988, and the "Spitting Incident" didn't happen until he was playing with the Orioles in 1996. There is no way your version of events is remotely possible.

6) Can we please separate the debate about steroids and the Hall of Fame from the issue of Pete Rose/gamblers and the Hall of Fame? They are two completely different situations, completely different arguments. As far as we know, Rose was acting alone in the game, taking actions that may have compromised the integrity of the game on the field. Steroid users (while morally and ethically wrong) were part of a culture of cheating in which they were universally trying to perform better. We have no such assurance with Rose, aside from his word, which as I've already pointed out, is crap. Have a nice day.

As you can tell, I have nothing but disdain for Pete Rose, and everything he has done since 1989 to stoke the fires of this debate. He is, by all accounts, a first-class jerk. His body of work as a player is astounding, and his achievements will not soon be forgotten, whether he gets into the Hall of Fame, is reinstated into the MLB, or not. But I do not think he has earned himself any leeway in the debate, nor has he tried to. Perhaps a few years out of the limelight and some good works will go a long way toward changing my mind. Pete needs to work on himself in order to change my mind.

Explaing Albert's "Albatross"

On Circling the Bases this morning, contributor Matt Casey pondered Albert Pujols’ second-half performance, which is a significant drop-off from his amazing start. Pujols’ season line has dropped from . 332/.456/.723 to .321/.445/.675 thanks to a .280/.401/.525 “drought”. Casey writes,

“Are we ready to blame the Home Run Derby for squashing Albert Pujols' chance at the Triple Crown, or is that just an easy excuse? We remember players from the past flaming out after taking part in the Derby - David Wright hit only 6 HR after the break in 2006, and of course Bobby Abreu hit a mere 6 dingers in the second half after dominating the slugfest the year before….Did the HR Derby mess up his swing a bit?”

Casey’s article equivocates a great deal, and never really delves deeply into Albert’s performance beyond looking at the surface numbers and wondering aloud whether his two rounds of homerun derby (in which he swung at something like 35-40 pitches) has messed with the man. Of course we can’t be certain, even if Pujols were to complain about the Derby’s effect on him (which he hasn’t), since the data set is small and the subject of the study is probably less reliable a source than The Common Man would like to have. That said, The Common Man hopes that some intrepid soul is going through tape of Albert’s ABs before and after the All Star Break to see if there’s any difference in his swing (ah, the glory of our times, when such things are possible).

The Common Man prefers to look at the issue as a whole. Understanding that even great players have rough patches, it’s important to look at the alleged phenomenon Casey and others have used to explain the performances of Abreu and Wright, and that other players have used to excuse themselves from the Derby. Is this effect real? Does the Home Run Derby unduly affect its participants, as many have been led to believe.

First, a caveat: There is no way for The Common Man to determine with any reliability whether the Home Run Derby has affected the performance of an individual player. It certainly could have. But significant analysis of swing mechanics is probably necessary to address that.

Now then, since 2000, there have been 54 individual participants in the Home Run Derby, but 80 player-seasons are in our data set (8 participants per derby, 10 derbies). Of those 80 seasons, 47 experienced a drop in batting average from the first half to the second, losing an average of .0093 points off of their BA. Forty of the player-seasons experienced a drop in on-base percentage, and the cohort lost an average of .0045 points from their OBP. Forty-five seasons experienced a drop in SLG in the second half, losing an average of .037 in the process. Finally, between the first and second halves, players lost an average of 7.8 homers.

So at first glance, it appears that there is a drop, but there’s some noise in our data. First, the two halves, despite their names, are not the same duration. Teams tend to play somewhere around 90 games in the first “half” (Pujols’ Cardinals played 91 games before the All Star Break this year), meaning that there are fewer available at bats in the second half. This accounts for a great deal of the difference in total homeruns hit, such that the actual difference in terms of homeruns/game ends up being closer to 6.8 HR lost over the course of the season. Second, our data also includes players from 2009, whose HR are drastically down simply because they’ve only played 40 games or so since the break. If we remove these individuals from our analysis of the HR total, we find the difference in HR is something like 4.6 HR lost.

Finally, there’s the case of Ivan Rodriguez and Brandon Inge, both of whose rate stats and home run totals were and have been gutted by injury. In 2000, I-Rod was hitting .366/.393/.708 at the All Star Break, with 26 home runs, on his way to what could have been the greatest season by a catcher ever (perhaps even better than Mauer’s year this year). Eleven games into the second half, however, Pudge broke his right thumb on Mo Vaughn’s bat (is there nothing that behemoth can’t ruin?) as he tried to throw to second base, and missed the rest of the year. He finished the second half hitting .184/.225/.316 with 1 HR. Inge has suffered from knee problems unrelated to his Derby appearance since the break that have robbed him of a great deal of effectiveness. While he continues to play, Inge is hitting .170/.257/.250 in 31 games, and is probably not a good example of typical post-Derby play. I-Rod’s removal (Inge was previously removed from the analysis because he participated in 2009), the difference, adjusted for approximate games played, is approximately 3.8 homers.

Once we remove these significant noisemakers from the data, we see that, in 71 players-seasons, there have been 42 drops in BA, 35 in OBP, and 40 in SLG. This translates to an average drop of .0066/.0006/.029, a very small blip. Indeed, when one considers that the players likely to be part of the Derby had already performed at a level above their normal ability level, and the difference in HR hit, is likely attributable to players finding their truer level, or regressing to the mean, or nagging injuries that weren't there in the first half, rather than some kind of post-Derby swing hitch. So let’s stop wondering about Albert Pujols, who is probably fine aside from his seemingly constant throwing and foot problems. The man, while most uncommon (far more so than The Common Man, I assure you), is still just a man and prone to regression like everyone else. Unlike, for instance, Joe Mauer, who has upped his game since the All Star Break (during which you’ll remember he participated in the Derby), hitting .392/.449/.622.



Note: Other fun stuff in the data (I’m happy to send a spreadsheet around to anyone interested):

Barry Bonds’ line in the second half of 2002 was .404/.608/.825. An OBP of almost 61%? Holy God.

Somehow Hee Seop Choi slipped into a Home Run Derby in 2005 for the Dodgers. It was Choi’s last season in the majors, and he was hitting .236/.318/.458 at the time. He was not on the All Star Team, as a particularly bad Dodgers squad was represented by Jeff Kent and Cesar Izturis.

Another unlikely participant was Pudge Rodriguez in 2005. Pudge had 6 homers at the All Star Break, and would finish with just 14.

The biggest drop in BA was Jim Edmonds in 2003, who hit .303 in the first half and .214 in the second. Based on his playing time, and injury history, he very well may have been hurt. His OBP and SLG dropped as well, but were still perfectly acceptable in the second half (.357/.507). The largest jump in BA was Junior Griffey in 2000, who went from .238 to .317. Griffey’s OBP, however, ticked up just two points from .386 to .388, and his slugging from .550 to .564.

Ryan Howard’s OBP jumped from .341 in the first half of 2006 to .509 in the second half once pitchers stopped throwing him the ball over the plate, the biggest jump in OBP in this study. On the opposite end, Carl Everett dropped .074 in 2000.

The biggest drop in HR between halves (non-I-Rod edition) was Carlos Delgado in 2000, who hit 30 bombs in the first half, but just 11 after the break. Not so coincidentally, Delgado’s drop in SLG (.225 was also the highest in the data set.

The smallest difference between halves in the three rate categories in the data set belonged to Miguel Tejada (who hit .311 in both the first and second halves of 2004), Vlad Guerrero (who slugged .547 in the first half of 2007, and .548 in the second half), and Garret Anderson (.345 and .344 OBPs in 2003) and Grady Sizemore (.374 and .375 in 2008).

A Different Kind of Rifle-armed

The Common Man was surprised to find out, when he got home last night, that his Tivo has been making some strange suggestions. For instance, The Common Man has little use for telenovelas like El Corazon Prohibido, or for something called Degrassi: The Next Generation. However, Tivo was right in its guess that its owner would appreciate a look at the iconic Western The Rifleman. The Rifleman, which aired on ABC from 1958 to 1963, ran for 168 episodes and starred Chuck Connors. It was the story of Lucas McCain, a widower who moves with his son to New Mexico, and uses his modified Winchester rifle (which allows him to fire a bullet in .3 seconds) to help the local Marshall.

The Common Man was excited because Connors, who got his big break playing the original owner of Old Yeller in the Disney classic and led to his role in The Rifleman, also was a bit of ballplayer. Connors was originally signed by his hometown Dodgers in 1940, but enrolled in Holy Cross soon after. After being drafted by the Yankees in 1942, he was drafted by the Army and served as a tank maintenance instructor until 1945. In 1946, he convinced Branch Rickey to sign him again to a minor league contract, and played four years in the Dodgers’ minor league system (and playing in the NBA during the offseason before getting a one at-bat tryout in 1949 (he grounded into a double play).


While Connors had significant success for the Dodgers’ farm clubs through 1949, he took a significant step backward in 1950. In 1951, Connors was shipped with Dee Fondy to the Cubs, where he was assigned to the Los Angeles Angels of the PCL. Connors had great success in LA in the spring of ’51 and was called up by the Cubs to take over for a faltering Fondy at 1B. He was given a disastrous extended trial as a 30 year old rookie, hitting .239/.282/.303 and 2 HR in 215 plate appearances. The next year, Connors was sent back to LA, where he struggled with injuries and eventually retired.

Before he did, Connors’ square jaw, on-field antics, and wavy hair were noticed by a fan in the entertainment industry. The unnamed fan inspired Connors to try acting after his baseball career was over. His success in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s, however, dried up as the public moved on from straight-laced, earnest John Wayne-types and embraced the darker, more rebellious, anti-establishment heroes played by Eastwood, Newman, Beatty, and Redford. Connors retreated to occasional movie roles (as the father in Flipper, and the heavy in Soylent Green, and The Sarge in Airplane II) and guest spots on Spencer: For Hire, The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, and Murder, She Wrote.

The life of Chuck Connors, despite reaching the pinnacle of both of his chosen professions, is something of a disappointment. Connors clearly had the talent to play major league ball; his minor league stats are Andre Ethier-like (low .300s BA, 15-25 HR/year power), particularly impressive given the developmental time he missed in college and in the Army. By the time he got back to playing ball full time, Connors was 25, and only got a real shot at 30. And while his good looks made him a terrific hero for early-TV Western morality plays, his limited range and lack of emotion left him unable to adjust to the changing needs of Hollywood following his short peak. If Connors had debuted in the early ‘40s, in either field, he might have truly become a legend and a household name.

Connors died in 1992 from pneumonia related to lung cancer. He was 71.

The Fork

The Common Man wishes the Twins would just go ahead and make up their freaking minds already. On Saturday night, with the Twins a game under .500 and seemingly inventing new ways to lose against the A's and Angels, The Common Man was all set to trade Michael Cuddyer, the Twins lone tradeable commodity likely to bring back real talent (Mauer and Morneau are fixtures whose trade would timewarp the Twins fanbase back to 2000, and the rotation is doing poorly enough (and has enough health concerns) that dealing a starter is unlikely to get good value back, and most of the bullpen has negligible trade value). With the team floundering, and little on the farm likely to bring back the kind of middle infield upgrade the Twins desperately need (Ben Revere's lack of power makes him less than an ideal chip and he seems to be regarded as the future in Minny, last year's #1 pick, Aaron Hicks, has struggled in A-ball (though he's just 19), and 21-year old Wilson Ramos left his plate discipline in Fort Myers (138 PA for AA New Britain, 3 BB). Shooter Hunt looks lost, Carlos Gutierrez is still learning to be a starter, and Deolis Guerra is suddenly on fire in AA after disappointing for the last year and a half). The Twins have a bunch of flawed prospects, none of whom figure to be centerpiece quality for a blockbuster deal that will help Minnesota leapfrog both Detroit and Chicago.

Then the Twins go off and win 3 straight, including two against the White Sox, and now sit just 2 games back of Detroit. Mark Grudzielanek is hitting .333 in Rookie Ball (just 2 games, of course, but it sounds impressive). Jesse Crain has pitched well since coming back to the majors, lending some stability to the Twins pen. And now The Common Man has visions of October again (they're horrifying visions of being swept out of the playoffs by the Yankees, but still).

This is an exceedingly frustrating and confusing team...and the interwebz bear this out. Gleeman is seemingly waving a white flag (or at least a caution flag), and arguing against giving up farmhands for help. Neyer says it's too early to give up. Bill, from The Daily Something, or somebody really needs to step in here and break the tie. Because The Common Man is paralyzed by his own frustration and fervent fandom here. He wants to see this team win, but this club has angered The Common Man far more than any Twins squad in recent memory (grr...Gomez at the plate, Casilla, Punto, Young everywhere, all the injuries, Luis Ayala before he was jettisoned, Bill Smith's refusal to upgrade the bullpen). What say you, readers? Do the Twins go for broke or sell anything that isn't locked down or has sideburns? This team needs a direction.

Karma Police Strike Again

Karma sucks sometimes (though, by its very nature, The Common Man supposes it's a good thing just as often).

Last night, The Common Man was merrily watching the Twins beat the Oakland A's on his birthday. But because of the game's late start and the fact that The Common Man was bound and determined to spend a few hours of quality time with The Uncommon Wife, a totally hot scientist who has a grant due this week and so is mostly unavailable, The Common Man forsook his Twinkies after the 5th and headed upstairs to the boudoir. After all, how likely was it that the Twins would let an 11 run lead get away?


Huh? Oh.

The good news, I suppose, is that The Common Man didn't find out about it until this morning, when it was already too late to ruin his birthday. But still, The Common Man considers it a karmic bitch slap for embracing his inner Dodger fan and leaving early, and for making fun of Alexi Casilla's miserable birthday (Casilla's horrible day continued, as he and Nick Punto were the only Twins starters not to get a hit yesterday, combining to go 0-for-8 with a walk). Yuck.

Lost in all the talk about the A's comeback (it was epic) and the boning of the Twins by umpire Mike Muchlinski (which, after giving up an 11-run lead, let's face it, they kind of deserved), The Common Man wants to extend a hearty congratulations to the A's bullpen, who held Minnesota to just two runs (one earned) over 6.1 innings (and no runs over the last 4.2). Craig Breslow got some karmic love himself, getting a win in relief over the team that mistakenly cast him aside earlier this year.

And while Breslow and the A's pen deserve credit for silencing the Twins, perhaps their success had less to do with their awesomeness and more to do with them not being Gio Gonzalez. Gonzalez again showed he's not ready for the big time, giving up 10 hits, 4 homers, and 11 runs in just 2.2 innings. In 61 career innings, Gio's got an 8.41 ERA, largely due to 16 homers and 42 walks. At just 23, he's still got time to adjust, but for now it's clear that Gonzalez is not good enough to pitch to hitters like Justin Morneau, Jason Kubel, and Michael Cuddyer. So while all the offense was nice, The Common Man is skeptical given virtually all of it came off a guy who throws beachballs.

Tonight, The Common Man is going to try to get some karma back, watching the contest on Gameday in bed instead of on the big screen in the basement, with The Boy beside him because he doesn't want to sleep in his big boy bed. Stay tuned to see if his good deed goes unpunished.

One Great Birthday Ruins Another

The Common Man figured that there would be no better day for his grand re-blogging than the day of his birth, and this being that, he’s good to go. The Common Man hopes you’ll come back and enjoy the blog. The Common Man regrets his absence, generally caused by the crazy-high level of activity at work, the crazy-high level of activity of a two-and-a-half year old. Blogging, The Common Man is afraid, fell by the wayside. Totes The Common Man's bad, y'all.

Anyway, it's been a good birthday for The Common Man, who got up before The Boy and was able to make and eat his asiago-cheese bagel with no two-and-a-half year olds clamoring for a bite, little fingers stretched upwards, straining toward the grainy goodness, grasping at the air. Grainy Goodness.

The Common Man also had time to make The Uncommon Wife's coffee (The Common Man is not exempt from this sacred ritual, even on his birthday, despite the fact he hates coffee). Then he had some essential help from said Uncommon Wife getting The Boy ready for school and got out of the house relatively close to on time. Work, as The Common Man mentioned, has settled down for the near future to a manageable level. And dinner was enjoyed by all at a local establishment that serves Blatz in a can for $1.50/can. You can't go wrong with Blatz, people.

Blatz. You know you want it.

What made the day great (so fars), however, is the news that the Twins are finally, finally addressing their middle infield deficiency. Now, they're doing it by signing a 39-year old, oft-injured, definition of mediocre free agent who hasn't played since last season, but it's something. If he's capable of playing close to his level last year, Mark Gurdzielanek represents an upgrade. Now, it's not as good as if the Twins traded for the Pittsburgh Pirates' disgruntled duo, but it's a start.

Which one of us has to be Robin?

That said, what is a great birthday present for The Common Man, is the world's worst birthday present for The Common Man's fellow Cancer and July 20 birthday celebrant, Alexi Casilla. Casilla is, of course, the Twins' current second baseman, whose horrific and humiliating play at the plate and in the field has led the Twins to seek help from a creaky-kneed old-timer, who's going to be the singular cause of the team going over its names-on-the-backs-of-uniforms sewing budget.

See? That's a huge name!

Casilla, despite an acceptable performance last year (at least at the plate, where he had a 94 OPS+, in the field he was almost 12 runs below replacement level), has dropped into the abyss, "hitting" .176/.237/.216 (a 25 OPS+!) and managing to be almost 6 runs below replacement level despite playing in only 37 games.

Another bunt? You're not even trying anymore, are you?

Casilla has even received the kiss of death from the great Aaron Gleeman, who pointed out in early May that

"at this point waiting for that guy from early last season to return is wishful thinking. His production in the high minors was anything but impressive and he's basically been a replacement-level player through 187 games in the majors, posting a measly .619 OPS while playing mediocre, mistake-filled defense. Aside from those two months last season, nothing Casilla has done in the past three years predicts long-term success."

Whether it's because of basic crappiness or Casilla never really recovered from his thumb injury last year, it's clear Casilla isn't going to help the Twins soon.

Still, despite the undeniable truth that Casilla has earned being "fired" from the second base job, The Common Man can't imagine a crappier present on your birthday. Twins GM Bill Smith must've come around the corner this morning and smirked,

B.S.: "Congratulations, Alexi, on turning 25. Here's someone we just hired, who does the same exact job as you, but better. Let's see how this works out. Oh, here's a card."

A.C.: "Que? No hay pastel?"

mmmm...cake

Slotting Pujols

Way back in 2001, a plucky young writer named Bill James published his magnum opus, his 1,000 page classic New Historical Baseball Abstract. In it, he traipses across baseball history, providing vignettes and anecdotes about the players and events that tickle his fancy. He also spends a good two-thirds of the book explaining his new analytical tool (win shares) and using it to rank the best 100 players at each position.

The Common Man's buddy Bill brought this all up last week, in his examination of Jeff Bagwell (who comes in at #4 among 1B) and Frank Thomas (#10) and comes to the conclusion that Bagwell was the better all around player (which was James' conclusion as well).


This prompted some confusion for The Common Man, who couldn't mentally get past Jeff Bagwell as the 4th best 1B ever. In the comment section, he wrote, "I love me some Bill James, but we've got to be able to find four better 1B than Jeff Bagwell, can't we? I can't quite wrap my mind around him being an inner circle HOF guy." Bill responded and effectively challenged that, pointing out a lack of candidates to unseat Bags. Gehrig and Foxx are obvious. James puts McGwire at #3 (Bagwell probably moved past him with three good years after the publication of the book). After Bagwell, James has Eddie Murray at #5, Johnny Mize (6, much more reasonable than The Common Man figured, after looking back). Harmon Killebrew was #7, Hank Greenberg is 8, and Willie McCovey is 9. Nobody really stands out as better than Bagwell.

But before anybody on that list really settles down and gets too comfortable, let's talk about this Albert Pujols guy who was not yet a twinkle in Bill James' eye in 2000-2001. Indeed, in 2001, Pujols was unanimously voted the NL Rookie of the Year, and excelled as a four-corners super sub (though he played 161 games) for Tony LaRussa's Cardinals. Two MVPs, four silver sluggers, a gold glove and seven all star appearances later, Pujols is 29 and enjoying his best season yet. His OPS+ is a Bondsian 198. He's homering every 13.5 plate appearances (16 in 216). His defense seems to have taken a hit so far this year, but Albert hasn't ever given back runs in the field in his career and isn't likely to across a full season at age 29. His career hitting numbers .335/.427/.626, 351 2B, 335 HR, 1019 RBI, 989 R, and 1588 hits are incredible for just 8+ years in, not even accounting for his career 171 OPS+. Yesterday, Matt Waters and Rob Neyer ran through their All-'00s team, and Pujols was prominently displayed. Neyer wrote "Pujols has absolutely zero competition, and must be the easiest choice here." Indeed, if he had the requisite 10 years, Pujols would probably be a shoe-in for the Hall, despite playing in an extreme offensive era, particularly because the stain of PED use has yet to touch his golden reputation (though, admittedly, you never know).

So, at this point, the question for The Common Man becomes, where does Pujols belong on James' list? Assuming that no one else is added from this era (yet, though Morneau, Ortiz, Howard, Fielder, Helton, Giambi, Konerko, Thome, Delgado, and Teixeira may have something to say about it already), where can we safely slot Pujols among the greatest of all time?

It's pretty clear to The Common Man that Pujols should already be in the top 12. Given the troubles with assessing 19th century players (which The Common Man has gone into before, he would err on the side of caution with players like Cap Anson (who is #11 for James). And Don Mattingly (#12, James' worst choice in the book), with respect, is not fit to carry Albert's jock. Given the defensive upgrade, and the peak value, and the fact that Pujols has created about 65% of the runs in 55% of the plate appearances as Thomas has, Albert probably edges ahead of The Big Hurt at #10.

McCovey's three best seasons ('68-'71) stack up with the best of Pujols' work very nicely. That said, the body of Pujols' work outside of those years is far less impressive. Stretch has an OPS+ of 146 before those three years, and 126 after. Pujols' lowest single season OPS+ is 151. The sheer dominance of Albert is too much to ignore here (note, Thomas probably also shoots past McCovey).

Hank Greenberg, at #8, is a tougher case. His counting stats (1628 H, 331 HR, 379 2B, 1276 RBI, 1051 R) are remarkably similar to Pujols' (see above). And Greenberg suffers from losing four years in his early 30s to military service. Just because he's 29 though, and still going, and is already marginally ahead of Greenberg, The Common Man's gotta push Albert up past him.

It pains The Common Man to say this, but in terms of peak value (and not even thinking about defense), Albert Pujols is already light years ahead of Harmon Killebrew (James' #7). Partial though The Common Man is to Harmon's plight, and cognizant of his adventures at 3B and LF (which drag down his overall contribution to his team and for which he shouldn't be blamed (Harmon was about as good a LF as a post...or Delmon Young, but the Twins kept looking for ways to create at bats for Rich Reese, among others), Pujols has been a far more complete player, and elite player, than Harmon ever was (The Common Man will now go scourge his back with his Twins-flail).

Johnny Mize is a tough call too. His peak is comparable to Pujols, but it's shorter and not easily bunched together. That said, Mize missed his 30-32 seasons to WWII, which would have presumably extended that peak, helped his overall counting stats, and raised his OPS+. We don't have advanced defensive stats for Mize, but his reputation preceeds him, as one of the sweetest fielders ever around the bag. It's probably fitting that, until Pujols does more to assert himself, he stays right about here. Call him #6b, and Mize #6a.


There's little doubt that Pujols will move past The [Original] Big Cat soon, perhaps by the end of the year. And depending on how you feel about Mark McGwire, he could be sneaking up on #4 as well. Eddie Murray probably is safe for another season or two, which means that Bagwell's ok for now. But with, presumably, 5 more prime or just-off-prime seasons left to go, and maybe another 3-5 beyond that, it's likely that Pujols will move into the top 3 all time before he's done. Whether he's actually able to push aside the twin colossuses of Gehrig and Foxx will be fun to watch.