Positions and Patterns

It has occurred to me, in the recent discussions of the weakness of this year’s group of third basemen, that we actually have three of the top ten third basemen ever playing right now, even if they are all in decline (I’m counting A-Rod, assuming that he will soon have more games a 3B than SS). Which seems a little odd. So I made a list, as I am want to do. After long amounts of consideration, I chose years based on peak and service time, since I feel that those are more indicative than my feeling out when we “knew” that they were one of the greatest ever. As always, numbers are from Fangraphs and list is organized by WAR.

Name	Peak	Service Time
Rodriguez	1996-2007	1994-??
Schmidt	1974-1984	1972-1989
Mathews	1953-1963	1952-1968
Boggs	1983-1989	1982-1999
Robinson	1962-1968	1955-1977
Brett	1976-1985	1973-1993
Jones	1998-2008	1993-??
Santo	1964-1967	1960-1974
Rolen	1998-2004	1996-??
Nettles	1971-1978	1967-1988

As I sortof expected, the late-seventies / mid-eighties have great representation. So does the turn of the century (in part because I’m counting A-Rod; you can say mid-2000s if you like), but Robinson and Santo also have virtually identical peaks[1] as well. Which lead me to wonder if we also saw similar wave-like patterns at other positions, which follow (I know the formatting looks really bad on the first table. I blame Blogspot, which would force me to HTML edit it, which I'm unwilling to do, and which screwed it up in the pasting):

C	Peak	Service Time		1B	Peak	Service Time
Bench	1970-1975	1967-1983		Musial	1943-1954	1941-1963
Fisk	1977-1978	1969-1993		Gehrig	1926-1937	1923-1939
Rodriguez	1997-1999	1991-??		Foxx	1929-1939	1925-1945
Carter	1979-1985	1974-1992		Anson	1886	1871-1897
Berra	1950-1956	1946-1965		Pujols[2]	2001-??	2001-??
Torre	1964-1971	1960-1977		Connor	1885-1890	1880-1897
Piazza	1993-2000	1992-2007		Bagwell	1994-1999	1991-2005
Dickey	1937-1938	1928-1946		Carew	1975-1977	1967-1985
Simmons	1973-1978	1968-1988		Brouthers	1886-1892	1879-1904
Hartnett	1930	1922-1941		Murray	1983-1984	1977-1997

2B	Peak	Service Time		SS	Peak	Service Time
Hornsby	1917-1929	1915-1937		Wagner	1900-1912	1897-1917
Collins	1909-1920	1906-1930		Ripken	1983-1991	1981-2001
Lajoie	1901-1910	1896-1916		Davis	1897	1890-1909
Morgan	1972-1976[3]	1963-1984		Appling	1935-1943	1930-1950
Gehringer	1933-1937	1924-1942		Dahlen	1896	1891-1911
Frisch	1921-1927	1919-1937[4]		Cronin	1930-1938	1926-1945
Whitaker	N/A	1977-1995		Jeter	1999-2009	1995-??
Grich	1973-1975	1970-1986		Vaughan	1934-1938	1932-1948
Biggio	1997	1988-2007		Yount	1982	1974-1993
Alomar	1999	1988-2004		Larkin	N/A	1986-2004

OF[5]	Peak	Service Time		OF	Peak	Service Time
Ruth	1919-1933	1915-1937		Bonds	1989-2004	1986-2007
Cobb	1907-1921	1905-1928		Mays	1954-1968	1951-1973
Speaker	1909-1923	1907-1928		Aaron	1955-1971	1954-1976
Williams	1939-1957	1939-1960		Robinson[6]	1957-1969	1956-1976
Mantle	1952-1961	1951-1968		Henderson	1980-1990	1979-2003
Ott	1929-1938	1926-1947		Yaz	1963-1970	1961-1983
Kaline[7]	1955-1967	1953-1974		Clemente	1966-1971	1955-1972
DiMaggio	1937-1948	1936-1951		Griffey	1991-1998	1989-2010

I had always been impressed by how the WAR leaders were all outfielders, but I think if I had gone thirty deep in the OF department, we’d be seeing guys as on the Larkin/Hartnett level (not at all a bad level) instead of the DiMaggio/Griffey level (an insane level) rounding out those lists. But still, it seems to me that there is a marked confluence of guys at the same position starting and/or peaking at around the same time. Mays, Mantle, Kaline, Aaron, Robinson, and Clemente all began their careers in one five-year stretch.[8] Bench, Fisk, Carter, and Simmons all came up in one seven-year stretch.

More interestingly, there are tons of pairs. Cobb/Speaker, Bonds/Griffey, DiMaggio/Williams, Davis/Dahlen, Alomar/Biggio, Morgan/Grich, Piazza/Pudge, Gehrig/Foxx, Connor/Brouthers, and Schmidt/Brett all came up at similar moments. Probably all these guys didn’t feel like rivals, but there has to be something there, something about competing with other guys at your position, because that’s simply too many to be a coincidence: more than HALF of the players above broke into the league around the same time as another all-time great at their position. Maybe my feel test for “at about the same time” is casting too wide of a net, but it doesn’t look like a wave-pattern, it looks like other elite players at a position somehow (mentally, I guess, though I always find it hard to consider that any player wouldn’t want to be the best all the time) encourage players at the same positions to excel.

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[1] Based on my expectations for an MVP, which, since all of these guys are “top ten ever” type players, I would have expected each to have multiple MVP type seasons (i.e., WAR of 7+ for normal players and 6+ for catchers). So the range is their first and last MVP-quality year and everywhere in between. The person who benefits most? Derek Jeter, whose 1999 and 2009 bracket 2000-2008, in which he was really really good but never had a season better than 7 WAR. Also kills guys like Larkin and Whitaker who were just fantastic for many years but never had one year where they were just a bit luckier or happened to hit a few extra home runs.

[2] Wait… look at all these numbers again. There isn’t a single other person who started off their career with an MVP level season and just kept going. Nobody. Except Pujols. Maybe that’s because of his team and his weird call-up, and also because I’m cherry picking and including seasons with 50 PAs as “Service Time.” Still.

[3] By my count, wasn’t just the best player for this stretch (Bench and Rose, #s 2 and 3 and back by quite a bit, were also both on the Reds), but was the best player in the league each year from 1973-1976 and in a virtual heat with Bench for 1972. Runs of dominance like that are basically limited to 1. Barry Bonds (both on steroids and not), 2. pre-World War 2. Wildly underappreciated player.

[4] Pre-WWII was really the time to be a second baseman, and I don’t know why.

[5] Theoretically, the columns are pre-Mays and post-Mays. I screwed up Kaline. Sue me.

[6] Tends to be forgotten in the “great outfielder” conversations.

[7] Ditto.

[8] How weird is this? Six not just Hall of Fame outfielders, but guys who easily make greatest ever lists for the outfield, all started from 1951-1955? And it wasn’t like there was a HUGE talent boom in that era. They just all went into the outfield.