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Albert Pujols Was Not A Good Enough Pitcher To Win The MVP
I for one can't wait for the deluge of Ryan Howard-for-MVP columns from older dudes wearing RBI Glasses™. RBI Glasses™: Available at ShittyLensCrafters all across the country. Hey, here's the first one, from Bob Klapisch.
Me: Bob Klapisch, you're writing a column about your awards picks. What are you going to call it?
Bob Klapisch (stopping to think for exactly 0.00038 seconds): The Klappie Awards! I'm on break.
Bob Klapisch's Klappie Awards
MOST VALUABLE PLAYER, NL: Ryan Howard, Phillies.
Nope. Wrong. So so so so so so so wrong. You should be criticized on some sort of hypercritical baseball blog for that opinion.
We’re prepared to face the firing squad on this one, having passed over Albert Pujols.
Klapisch is talking about a literal firing squad. He has written his farewell notes to his wife and kids. But he's doing this because he's a man. A man taking a stand. A man choosing another man who is ranked 30th in his league in VORP for MVP. These are the kinds of causes for which a man like Bob Klapisch is willing to stare death in the face.
Mark DeRosa and Cristian Guzman had higher VORPs than Ryan Howard. VORP is not the final word by any means; it obviously has deficiencies. But hey, also: Ryan Howard was 6th on his team in OBP. Think about that.
But as unthinkably dangerous as the Cardinals’ slugger was, he couldn’t get his team to the postseason. Howard did.
You're right. Albert Pujols did not nearly pitch well enough, or for enough innings (Can you believe zero innings? What a bum!) for the Cardinals to to make the playoffs. (The Phillies had a team ERA of 3.88; the Cardinals 4.19. Albert Pujols? More like Albert Not A Very Good Pitching Coach!)
Pujols should have lobbied to have St. Louis the city moved to Oregon, where his Cardinals would have won the NL West by two games and he would be lauded as a clutch MVP baseball superhero with quality intangibles and a leader with the uncanny ability to come through when it counts. But unfortunately, Pujols has never been good at getting entire cities to spontaneously change their geographical locations.
Ryan Howard batted .168 in April. Albert Pujols' batting averages, by month (and I know batting average doesn't matter. Here they are anyway): .365, .373, .302, .347, .398, .321. Bob Klapisch, do you think for some reason that games played in April don't count in the standings? Ryan Howard batted .213 in August.
But Howard was in another reality in September, when impact players make their mark.
But "Hole in the Wall" and one very funny moment where a guy couldn't fit through the hole in the wall, and that is the kind of impact that impact TV shows make when it counts.
While the Phillies were catching and passing the Mets (again), Howard batted .352 and hit 11 home runs — one every eight at-bats.
While the Cardinals were playing baseball, Albert Pujols batted .357.
Ryan Howard hit behind Jimmy Rollins and Chase Utley. If Albert Pujols hit behind Jimmy Rollins and Chase Utley, he would have had 493 RBI. Do the math. It checks out.
He finished the season with a mediocre .251 average, but otherwise led the majors with 48 HR and 146 RBI.
Sure, he hit by far the most home runs. RBI are bullshit. Here are things he didn't lead the majors in:
EqA VORP WARP1 WARP2 WARP3 OBP OPS SLG WPA BB BA R Literally any defensive statistic. Any of them. Just pick one.
You know who led or was damn close to the lead in a shitload of those statistics? Albert Pujols. The 2008 NL MVP.
You're Ryan Howard. You won the Rookie of the Year in 2005. You won the MVP in 2006. You hit 47 home runs and batted in 136 despite missing 18 games last year.
And now, after 196 mediocre at bats, you're cat vomit, according to Gerry Fraley.
Dish: Phillies wise not to meet Howard's demands
Philadelphia Phillies general manager Pat Gillick plans to move on when his contract expires after this season. He will leave his successor, probably assistant GM Ruben Amaro Jr., with a difficult call: Should the Phillies keep first baseman Ryan Howard?
Unless you absolutely can't afford to pay anyone, why are we having this conversation? Throughout his career Ryan Howard has been one of the better hitters in baseball. He's still in his twenties, he gets on base, he hits a home run once every 11.5874126 at bats. That's good stuff. These are the players you want.
Oh wait, no. You're the Phillies. What you want is to pay Adam Eaton $8.125 million.
The safe answer is yes.
"Logic" and "reason" and "numbers" would say yes. But I ask you this: Volvo makes the world's safest cars, and does Volvo use "numbers" to test their cars? No. King Wilhelm VII hand-sculpts each car out of the indigenous Swedish Metal Trees. So you see, sometimes the unsafest choice is the safest.
The bold answer, the one that could do more for the club, is no.
I am fine with this contrarianism if you want to make a rational argument based on MORP or aging curves or some analysis of the current free agent market. That's what, you're going to do, right, Gerry Fraley?
Howard is increasingly becoming a Dave Kingman-esque, one-note player.
Oh boy. Dave Kingman's career OBP was .302. Ryan Howard's is .387. (Kingman's career-high OBP was .343!)
And for those raring to point out that Howard's current slash stats of .209/.316/.469 look like a bad Kingman year, I refer you to Howard's current BABIP, which stands at a shockingly low .252. Howard's career BABIP? .341. So yeah, that batting average is going up. Way up. Because Ryan Howard hits the ball hard and he is a baseball monster who you want to pay to keep on your team unless you're the Pirates or some shit. He began Wednesday's game against the Colorado Rockies tied for fifth in the National League with 14 home runs and tied for seventh with 38 RBIs.
That sounds wonderful. GET THIS ASSHOLE OFF MY TEAM.
But Howard was hitting only .209 with a sickly .785 on-base plus slugging percentage and was on pace for a ridiculous 225 strikeouts, 26 more than his record-setting total of last season.
BABIP. See above. And wow, those strikeouts absolutely killed him last year to the tune of a .392 OBP and the third most home runs in major league baseball.
Ryan Howard is a human-shaped anchor who will drag your team all the way to the bottom of the standings. He has never won a baseball game and never will, until he moves to China, where the fewest runs scored wins the game and the women have sideways vaginas and vertical smiles. But Howard has been going in the wrong direction for more than a year.
He followed up his 2005 rookie-of-the-year performance by hitting .313 with 58 homers and 149 RBIs with a 1.084 OPS in 2006. Then, he dropped to .268 with 47 homers, 136 RBIs and a .976 OPS last season.
A .976 OPS!!! How dare he (multiple interrobangs)?!!??! This was only good enough for 7th in the National League, tied with that other loser, Chase Utley, who I've been meaning to kick off the team as well.
Jimmy Rollins should go. Cole Hamels is dead weight. Give me Pedro Feliz, the ghost of Jim Thome and the corpse of Kris Benson and I'll give you a pennant and a roller-coaster ride of a season!
Howard's chase-everything approach has continued this season. He has been increasingly vulnerable against lefthanders, with 36 strikeouts in his first 84 at-bats against them.
This is a troubling trend. Of course, the possibility exists that Howard is already in the midst of a Hafnerian decline phase, in which case it looks even worse that the Phillies waited until he was like 39 to call him up from Triple A. But Fraley's not talking about denying him a $200 million, 8-year deal. He's saying just cut him loose after this year.
The Phillies are paying $10 million for those strikeouts. With Howard eligible for salary arbitration annually through 2010, that number will continue to rise.
If you can get him year by year until 2010, of course you do it. Of course. I'd sign almost anyone to a one-year deal. I mean, shit, you signed Tom Gordon to a three-year deal worth almost $20 million, and he was a retired 53-year-old jazz saxophonist at the time.
And enough with the "$10 million for those strikeouts" bullshit. Strikeouts are only very very slightly more damaging than regular outs.
If Howard's pattern continues, the Phillies should not continue to meet his price. The next GM will have to make that call. Will he be bold enough to trade Howard and get the offense-choking strikeouts out of the lineup?
If Ryan Howard hits precisely .200 for the rest of the year, sure. But pardon me if I don't have absolute faith in Mr. Fraley's clairvoyance. In fact, in a hypothetical league filled with baseball teams general managed with men like Fraley, I would happily snatch up the following hitters for my team, all of whom finished in the top ten in the major league in strikeouts:
Ryan Howard Adam Dunn Grady Sizemore Dan Uggla B.J. Upton Carlos Pena
The sky would turn black like at the end of 300, except with home run balls instead of arrows. My K-Men would be the most exciting, most infuriating team in baseball. Other teams would start putting infielders in the outfield and outfielders in the first few rows of the crowd. Daisuke Matsuzaka would commit ritualistic seppuku after getting bombed for 14 home runs. Then I would sell the team to Mark Cuban and purchase the lives of the scientists who taught monkeys to control robot arms with their thoughts. Not because I'm angry at them, but because I want them to teach robots to control monkey arms with their thoughts, and then have the monkey-thought-powered robot arms to fight the robot-thought-powered monkey arms.
Have you ever woken up in the morning and thought to yourself: "The hitter who hits third in the line-up ... Must. Look. And hit. And act. A certain way." No, you have not, because you are a normal human being. Repeat offender Bill Conlin is not like you. He's titled his latest column:
Bill Conlin: Utley perfect in 3-hole, so naturally...
The man is angry. Why? Because Chase Utley has been dropped one spot in the lineup for another guy who is also pretty good at hitting, Ryan Howard. But Howard isn't "perfect" like Utley.
I'll let him try to explain this because I cannot:
When I'm King of the World...
A luxury wing will be built at the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown to honor the game's most special breed of batsman: The No. 3 hitter . . . It will pay homage to the great athletes who hit with power and for high average. A majority of them also were above-average runners and defenders. They represent the highest evolution of the baseball art. Their names are the stuff of legend.
Already, Bill, dude: you have a weird number three hitter fetish. Relax. It doesn't matter that much if your third hitter has a really high average if his OBP is high, and it certainly doesn't matter if your third hitter plays good defense. Would you accept David Ortiz as your third hitter? Probably not. When you're king of the world, all designated hitters will be sentenced to death by firing squad.
Visit the Ritz Carlton Three Hole Resort and you will have answered the question: "Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio?"
The Ritz Carlton Three Hole Resort sounds like something a frat guy would call a hot rich girl.
"Dude, I totally spent the night at the Ritz Carlton Three Hole Resort, if you get what I mean!!! I mean I fucked a girl."
Beer, high fives, exeunt.
Joe will be flanked by Babe Ruth (who could flat fly when he was young, before becoming addicted to lager and hot dogs) and Willie Mays.
Babe Ruth: 123 career SB, 117 career CS. Yeah, he tied the Yankee team record for single-season steals in 1921 (with a whopping 17), but he "could flat fly"? Let me ask you, Bill: honestly, who is more similar to Babe Ruth, Ryan Howard or Chase Utley?
Chase Utley is as pure a No. 3 hitter as the Phillies have ever had - average, power, speed. Now Ryan Howard, born for cleanup duty, bats No. 3 in front of Utley. He will steal triples and runs batted in from Utley with his station-to-station gait.
Wrong. Just flat-out wrong. Your claim: that Ryan Howard will steal runs batted in from Chase Utley. Last year, Shane Victorino ended the year batting in front of Utley.
A comparison:
Ryan Howard 2006 OBP: .425 Shane Victorino 2006 OBP: .346
That's 79 points of OBP. 79! A 79-point differential in batting average would have Bill Conlin-types frothing from the mouth. It would turn Pat Burrell from a pariah into a hero. The point is: Ryan Howard will be on base more than Shane Victorino this year, and Utley's RBI opportunities will not be stolen from him.
As for triples, Utley has 13 of 'em -- in his career. He had 4 last year. So yeah, if you want to turn two of those into doubles because you insist on batting fucking shitty-ass Ryan Howard third in the lineup, good luck with that, Charlie Manuel.
I'll be over here in my front yard carving this oak tree into a perfect life-size three-hole hitter. Hopefully, lightning will strike it and it will come to life, and it sure as hell won't be slow on the basepaths. That's what my stone-carved cleanup hitter is for.
You guys are reaching S.I./Madden cover potential.
Ryan Howard was on first base when Utley hit a double into the gap. Howard got tossed out at home.
The point? Howard definitely took away an RBI from Utley (since we all know guys like Howard are made out of stone) and theoretically, he took away an opportunity for a triple.
The front page of ESPN.com, at least right now, poses a terrible question: "So, how did Ryan Howard go from 151 Ks in 2003 to 58 HRs in 2006?"
The answer? By striking out even more. Howard struck out 181 times last year. And was awesome.
Strikeouts are not bad. One hundred and fifty one strikeouts are not bad. That same year (2003, in the minors), Howard also put up an OBP of 374 and slugged 514. He wasn't exactly crapping his pants at the plate.
Sky (The Roc, NY): Buster, I enjoy everything you write and listening to you on the radio. But I have to call your use of Howard's 2003 strikeout total as evidence of a hole in his swing and then neglecting to mention his 2006 strikeout total...
Buster Olney: Sky -- In two years, with the adjustments, he made in his swing, he went from a Class AA question mark to NL MVP, hitting .355 in the second half, with a .751 slugging percentage and a .509 OBP. If you want to shoot holes in that with his strikeout total, that's your call.
Now I'm really confused. He didn't answer the question, right? (Or the statement, or whatever.)
Hard to pin this whole thing on Buster. Who knows who writes those frontpage teasers?
Stephen A. Smith, Mr. Quite Frankly himself, is apparently still slumming it in the newspaper business every now and then. To comment on Stephen’s latest piece, we’ve invited a very special guest blogger to join us here at FJM. Please welcome Stephen’s polar opposite, Dr. Frank Quietly.
Dr. Frank Quietly: … (quietly) Hello. (gently sips a cup of chamomile tea)
Dr. Frank, as is his wont, is going to offer reasonable opinions about reasonable things at a reasonable volume. His thoughts will appear in a normal, reasonable typeface, Stephen A. Smith’s in bold.
Stephen A. Smith | Only one clear choice for National League MVP
Stephen, I respect your opinion, but I’m afraid I’m already going to have to disagree with you here. There are at least two legitimate candidates for the NL MVP, with the most qualified probably being Albert Pujols.
We don't know much about the Phillies these days, and to tell you the truth, we really shouldn't care. When you lose perpetually, give 101 lessons in the art of public non-relations, keep missing the postseason, and evidently are allergic to progress, it's pretty difficult to ask anyone to stand up and take notice.
If you didn't have Ryan Howard.
It seems you will be endorsing Ryan Howard for the award. I’m open to this. I’m sure you’ll provide a well thought-out rationale for your opinion.
Except the Phillies do have Ryan Howard. The same kid who smacked 58 homers, drove in 149 runs, batted .313, and had a .659 slugging percentage.
That’s a good start. These numbers are impressive. Pujols trailed Howard in home runs and RBI but led him in batting average and slugging. Quite a race we have here!
He symbolized the only reason fans had for showing their faces around Broad and Pattison during summertime.
All right, Stephen. Interesting. I’m not sure how heavily we should weigh fan appeal, or more specifically Philadelphia fan appeal, in the MVP selection process, but do carry on.
Oh, did I mention he should also end up as National League MVP?
To be honest, the title of your article gave me more than a little hint. And oh, by the way, if you wouldn’t mind, the proper sports commentary protocol is to employ “And oh, by the way …”, not “Oh, did I mention …”
The result of the voting for the National League's most valuable player is expected tomorrow and, with apologies and respect to Albert Pujols, the vote shouldn't even be close.
I’m only one man, but it strikes me as somewhat disrespectful to Mr. Pujols to say that the vote shouldn’t even be close. He did lead Mr. Howard in WARP3 by the count of 12.9 to 9.4. Your turn, Mr. Smith.
Of course, there are naysayers who'll spew otherwise, vociferously pointing out how the league's 2005 MVP still had 49 homers with a better batting average and slugging percentage than Howard - despite missing 15 games in June because of an injury.
Consider this my vociferous spew, then, my dear Stephen! Pujols also led Howard in VORP, 85.4 to 81.5. VORP does not take into account defense, which even the staunchest Howard supporter will admit is not his strongest suit.
They'll be the same people I accuse of not paying much attention last season.
I … I don’t understand, Stephen. We are all baseball fans here. No need for personal attacks. A civil discourse is all I ask! (Pujols is also a better baserunner than Howard.)
You don't just look at the stat sheets or the box scores to measure the impact of Ryan Howard.
Then where, pray tell, might we look? I must confess I’m growing rather impatient with you.
You view the landscape of MLB then ask yourself, "Where did these fans come from?"
Fan appeal? Again? “Landscape” of MLB? These are your MVP criteria? Pujols EqA: .357. Howard EqA: .346.
Who are all these people who weren't watching the Phillies before? This franchise hasn't made the postseason since 1993, so why on earth are stadiums packed whenever they come to town?
People interested in a playoff race? Also, were stadiums really packed for the Phillies last year? More importantly, you still haven’t convinced me that this has very much MVP relevance.
Where did all the African American fans come from?
Now Albert Pujols has to draw fans of a certain race to compete for the MVP? Good God, Stephen, I don’t mean to shout here, but be reasonable for one second!
Why haven't we heard about steroids? Mark McGwire? Barry Bonds?
Apologies to Mrs. Quietly and those with delicate sensibilities, but WHERE THE FUCK HAVE YOU BEEN LIVING? People were still talking about steroids all year – how the new policy would affect home run rates, the Roger Clemens rumors, even Kenny Rogers’ (re?)surgence. And ESPN was running a Bonds HR count on their ticker all year. People talked about Bonds a little less because he was no longer OPSing 3.000.
The answer would be because there's no need. Because Howard is the real deal. He's the modern-day athlete major-league baseball was starving for.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Ahem. Sorry. FUCK. Stay calm., Quietly. Reasonable. Serene. Ryan Howard saved baseball?!? He’s like the fiftieth most famous guy in the league! According to Quite Frankly over here, he single-handedly stopped people from even thinking about steroids. How is that possible when Mark McGwire is still four hundred times more famous than he is?
"I care about winning," Howard told me several weeks ago, right before he left town to smack homers all over Japan. "I care about winning and doing it the way it's supposed to be done. Everyone wants to get paid, to be successful. But sometimes it's as much about how you do things as well as what you do. I know that. I'm aware of that."
The same can be said of Pujols, who is as big-time as they come.
So even you admit there was no point to that quote.
The St. Louis Cardinals would not have sniffed the postseason without him, let alone captured a World Series championship. But the reality is the talent that is Pujols, while fairly unique, is a dime a dozen in the laundry list of Latin talent that has invaded baseball.
There are so many problems with that last sentence even I, Dr. Frank Quietly, can’t let it go. Pujols, while fairly unique, is a dime a dozen? “Dime a dozen in the laundry list” is an amazing two clichés in seven words. Invaded? Invaded? Jesus, that’s negative. What if someone wrote that African-Americans invaded the NBA? That would sound terrible. Albert Pujols led Ryan Howard in WPA, 9.24 to 8.20.
When you think of Pujols, you also think of Manny Ramirez and David "Big Papi" Ortiz or Alex Rodriguez.
What? What?! What in the -- ? I’m sorry. (Goes to get a drink of water. Paces around a bit. Pets a friendly dog. More water. Sits in an easy chair. Smokes a cigarette. Another cig.) Okay, I’m back. When you think of Pujols, you think of Manny Ramirez, David Ortiz, and/or Alex Rodriguez? What kind of statement is that? Because they all speak Spanish, you lump them all together? A-Rod, by the way, was born in the United States, just like Ryan Howard. When I think of Albert Pujols, I think of Chris Carpenter and Scott Rolen, because they’re his teammates. Or I think of Derrek Lee, because in 2005 they both hit for crazy average and crazy power, which is pretty unusual. I certainly don’t think of fucking A-Rod.
They play great baseball, but that's it.
Yes, David Ortiz plays great baseball and that’s it. No one’s ever talked about David Ortiz’s personality. He has no charisma whatsoever. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him smile. What a lifeless Spanish-speaking fuck, just like Alex Cintron, another Latino-or-whatever man who plays baseball. (Hey, Stephen A. Smith, this is Dr. Frank Quietly, and I’m being a fucking sarcastic asshole because of you. I hope you’re happy.) In Howard's case, not only has he performed, he's single-handedly transformed the focus of a sport, forcing baseball - and possibly the rest of us - to take a closer look at potential African American prospects perhaps through something more than Reviving Baseball in the Inner City (RBI) programs.
Look, Ryan Howard had a great year. Is it possible – possible – that you might admit that what you wrote here is hyperbole, Stephen? Held back - some might say hidden - by the Phillies for far too long, Howard has burst onto the scene in less than two years in the majors. And he's done it with a Magic Johnson-like smile despite the Phillies' unwillingness to show him some money and his being surrounded by limited, wannabe talent.
The Phillies hated and discriminated against Ryan Howard so much they traded away Jim Thome to make room for him. Ryan Howard has had to play in a lineup surrounded by no-talents like Chase Utley, Bobby Abreu and Pat Burrell. Ryan Howard, FRAR: -4. Albert Pujols, FRAR: 28.
Meanwhile, we'll pray they get rid of Pat Burrell and his $27 million over the next two years for a leftfielder who actually looks interested in playing 150 to 162 games a year.
Funny you should mention him. Burrell, 2005: 154 games played. Burrell, 2006: 144 games played.
In the meantime, there's Howard, who ranked either first or second in homers, RBIs and slugging percentage. He's given Phillies fans a reason to hope for a change.
Yes, you made note of his home runs, RBI, and slugging percentage already.
Numbers are being retired all the time. Baseball prides itself on setting precedents while maintaining tradition.
Honestly. I mean – Jesus. What in the fucking bloody vag does a sentence like “Numbers are being retired all the time” have to do with Ryan Howard for MVP? (Ed. note: Please excuse Dr. Frank Quietly’s vulgarity. Dr. Frank Quietly’s words do not reflect the sensibilities of the editors of Fire Joe Morgan.)
Awarding a difference maker on the field - and in the community at large - has always been baseball's version of a home run.
Huh. I always thought that baseball’s version of a home run is the motherfucking home run itself.
Pujols deservedly got his recognition last year.
It's Howard's time now.
It doesn’t matter who won last year. To recap:
Pujols WARP3: 12.9 Howard WARP3: 9.4
Pujols VORP: 85.4 Howard VORP: 81.5
Pujols EqA: .357 Howard EqA: .346
Pujols FRAR: 28 Howard FRAR: -4
Pujols WPA: 9.24 Howard WPA: 8.20
Pujols Number of Times Single-Handedly Saved Game of Baseball: 0 Howard Number of Times Single-Handedly Saved Game of Baseball: 1
I’m not really that angry that Ryan Howard won the MVP. He had a legitimately wonderful season, and after all, it’s just the MVP, so who cares? In the grand scheme of things, there are a lot of far better reasons to become extremely angry. Like Stephen A. Smith.
Junior here. Reader Andrew provides this amusing information: "As a side note, Smith suggests that Howard's success should encourage scouts to focus more efforts on recruiting black, inner-city talent. Please note that Ryan Howard went to the same high school (Lafayette Senior High) as my girlfriend. That school's student population is 84% white."
Alert: Ryan Howard may not actually have been a rich white suburbanite. Brad writes: "I just wanted to let you know that there is a high probability that Ryan Howard is actually from the city of St. Louis . Lafayette is in St. Louis County which is predominately white, but kids from the city are bused out to the suburbs through a de-segregation program in order to make more diverse classrooms."
If anyone's still reading down here, Andrew wrote back in to say that Ryan Howard's father is a doctor who provided a nice suburban home for him. Also, rather humorously, his name is Ron. Ron Howard.
After an extremely cursory search, I didn't find a definitive source to back up the doctor part, but his name is definitely Ron.
Are people of sick of entire posts devoted to readers' emails yet? Too bad. I just got two that are too good to relegate to the comments section ghetto.
The first is about Mike Schmidt's Howard-Bonds comparison. And as reader Robert acknowledges, it reflects a frightening willingness to pour minutes upon minutes of research into refuting Schmidt's totally offhand comment.
I just spent the last 40 minutes or so manipulating data in Excel to give you a touch more unnecessary fodder. I analyzed every two week period of Barry Bonds' 2002 and 2003 seasons (I couldn't find game by game data for 2001, but it won't matter) and Ryan Howard's 2006 season. If we can all agree that a serviceable way to measure a players' "Good" level at this moment in time, or "Dangerous" level at this moment in time is that players' OPS in any two week period, then I have some fun results:
The best two week period Howard has had this season was from 8/3 to 8/17, when he OPS'd a fantastic *1.713(!)*. The next few best periods were (the date given is the start date of the two week period):
DATE OPS Aug. 31 1.674 Aug. 7 1.665 Aug. 30 1.655 Aug. 4 1.631 Aug. 25 1.619 Aug. 24 1.552 Aug. 22 1.500
Mr Bonds is better. His best from 2002:
DATE OPS Aug. 23 2.220 Aug. 27 2.167 Aug. 24 2.164 Aug. 25 2.117 Aug. 26 2.083 Aug. 22 2.000 Aug. 20 1.803
and 2003:
DATE OPS Jun. 7 1.958 Aug. 12 1.858 Jun. 6 1.856 Aug. 10 1.852 Jul. 17 1.793 Jul. 11 1.782 Jul. 7 1.774 Jul. 12 1.767
In fact, between those 2 years, there have been at least 25 individual two week periods where Bonds has been better than Howard at Howard's prime. This doesn't even include 2001 data (or any other year). Got a link to game-by-game data for Bonds in 2001? If you get it to me I will go farther with this colossal waste of time.
Sorry those charts are so ugly. I'm not currently interested in fixing that. Instead let's move on to a more personal, humorous email from Brad: Love the FJM Website and read it everyday. Just thought I would let you know that I work at Wrigley Field almost every home game as a security guard and I can say I rarely if ever see Rogers at the ballpark. I find it funny that he insinuates in that paragraph you shared that he spends every waking moment at one of the two ball yards in Chicago.
Let the reader dialogue continue. Reader Anthony has the following:
First of all, you should let the reader who did the Bonds/Howard analysis know about BaseballMusings.com. They have a day-by-day database for all players going back to 1974. I just checked Bonds's two-week OPS figures for his whole career in about ten minutes.
Actually, it's not necessarily two weeks. I just figured out 14-game stretches since I was too lazy to bother accounting for off days and whatnot. I don't think worlds hang on this question, so whatever.
Anyway, Bonds's best stretch was started on 8/11/04. His OPS was 2364. He was 17-for-28 with 8 HR, 25 BB (11 intentional) and 3 K. His batting line? .607/.792/1.571. Oh, and he stole a base, too.
And just for kicks, Bonds's worst stretch was started on 8/26/87. He hit .122/.200/.122 in 41 AB. So yeah.
At this point I'm just staying out of this whole thing, but here we go. Robert has written back:
*That best OPS (2.364) of his career was not 8/11/04, it was 4/11/04 (that's right, I have COMPLETELY geeked out). Maybe he botched it because he only spent 10 minutes. I spent at least 12 minutes (once I was able to use the BaseballMusings data. Great site.) Also, Bonds has had 60 two week periods in his career which have been better than Ryan Howard's best. So now, I need to shove this in Mike Schmidt's face sometime so he can say, "Dude, what are you doin'?" or something.
Let Us Once Again Revisit the Exploits of Sir Barrold Bonds
If you've been reading FJM for awhile, you know all about our unhealthy fascination with the outlandish hitting statistics posted by the Barry Bonds during the hydrocephalic years of approximately 2000 to 2004. Those were heady, undoubtedly drug-addled days for Mr. Bonds, and a large part of his legacy at least to me will be those marvelous, hilarious .600 OBPs and .800 slugging percentages.
It's certainly not a big deal, but Mike Schmidt is now saying that 2006 Ryan Howard is as good as 2001 Barry Bonds at hitting. Don't believe me? It's in cyber-print right here.
"He's every bit as good a hitter as Barry Bonds was in the middle of his 73-home-run season," said Schmidt on Sunday in Miami, standing outside the Phillies' locker room with a small group of reporters. "It'll take the opposition a little longer to be convinced that he is because of Bonds' history of being a great hitter for many, many years."
Well, ah, hm. Hmmm. If we're totally disregarding who was on what pharmaceutical cocktail at what time, as Schmidt seems to be doing, all we can rely on are the results. And the facts show that Schmidt is unequivocally talking out of his ass. Not because of "Bonds' history of being a great hitter" -- I don't care about that at all. Neither do the numbers.
Added Schmidt, "Right at this moment in time, he might be more dangerous than Barry Bonds ever was in his prime. I've never seen anyone in the major leagues who is treating the game almost like an oversized kid in the Little League World Series. He is transcending the game."
Urgh. Let me put it this way: no one outside of Babe Ruth has matched what Barry Bonds did to major league pitchers in the early aughts. And even Ruth never posted a .600 OBP or a ludicrous .450 EqA. Ryan Howard, who right now probably isn't even the best hitter in baseball, would need to get bitten by a radioactive baseball while getting struck by lightning and drinking a secret superplayer serum to even approach the levels Barry Bonds was hitting at in 2000 to 2004.
Isn't it possible that Mike Schmidt is talking about the recent exploits of Ryan Howard rather than the entire season? If you look at the last 10-12 games Howard's OPS is like 2…an absurd number. Now, there is little doubt Barry had runs like this, and it doesn't really make sense for Mike to extrapolate the best two weeks of Howard's life. But the way I read this, the sin is small sample size, not hometown-colored-glasses/forgetting the unbelievable dominance of the past player in our lifetimes.
Schmidt does qualify his second statement with the phrase "right at this moment in time." But he also precedes his initial claim with "he's every bit as good a hitter as Barry Bonds was..." So that seems pretty unambiguous to me.
You Would Think That If He Mentioned Something So Specific, He Would Have Looked It Up To Make Sure He Was Right
John Kruk, BBTN 9/3/06
Re: Ryan Howard.
"And, and, 133 RBI's like [Steve Phillips] mentioned. And at the start of the season, the first, what, month / month and a half he was hitting seventh in the line-up for Charlie Manuel." (emphasis not mine)
Ryan Howard, this year, batting 7th in the line-up: Two games played. Seven at bats.
What a month.
Also worth noting that following Kruk's piece of misinformation, Phillips chimed in with a quick, off-camera, "that's right!"
