Albert Pujols=Rookie of the Century

All season long I have kept an eye on this year’s rookie hitters, wondering which one would match the incredible achievements of Albert Pujols in his inaugural year at the plate. I have used Pujols as the standard, with 1000 points as his dedicated number. With my modification of Similarity Scores, I have allowed for a player to best that standard, in case it should ever happen. At this moment, two rookies, as seen in the sidebar, are in the incredibly rarified air of 900+ points on the scale.

Rather than allow my assumption to stand unchallenged, I embarked on a quest to crown Albert Pujols as the best rookie hitter ever by comparing him to every other Jackie Robinson award winner listed on the MLB website. Throughout history, I found only fourteen other players who came within 100 points of the pinnacle. They are listed below.

Ladies and gentlemen – the best rookie hitters since 1947:

Name	Team	Position	Year	Score
Albert Pujols	STL	1B	2001	1000
Willie McCovey	SFG	1B	1959	991
Walt Dropo	BOS	1B	1950	973
Fred Lynn	BOS	OF	1974	967
Tony Oliva	MIN	OF	1964	964
Mark McGwire	OAK	1B	1987	961
Dick Allen	PHI	3B	1964	958
Mike Piazza	LAD	C	1993	951
Nomar Garciaparra	BOS	SS	1997	937
Frank Robinson	CIN	OF	1956	926
Orlando Cepeda	SFG	1B	1958	919
Bob Hamelin	KCR	DH	1994	911
Al Bumbry	BAL	OF	1973	910
Tim Salmon	CAL	OF	1993	901
Carlton Fisk	BOS	C	1972	900

Most of these names will surprise nobody. Some will cause either laughter or puzzled head-scratching.

I have a previously mentioned problem with Willie McCovey’s selection, however. He only played in 52 games while amassing those incredible power numbers, so the sample size is a mite suspicious to me. But still, he kicked ass and was chosen, so it’s legit. Walt Dropo at #2 was a complete mystery to me. I’m not much of a historian, so it was great to learn about him.

Bob Hamelin’s inclusion on this list is the greatest argument against the DH I have ever seen.

Boston had four out of the fourteen, which just goes to show that it takes mature talent to win the world series. Though the Idiots were far from mature, they were just older than these guys.

Also surprisingly, the steroid era had little impact on this contest. Mark McGwire was still a comparative stick figure when he won this award, and none of the other juiced-up players of his era made the 900 Club.

There are a million and one ways to argue this data, and I hope you feel free to do so. The journey was the thing for me, and I am satisfied that I can, from here on out, call Albert Pujols the Rookie of the Century. Unless Ryan J. Braun goes on a tear this week….

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Smells Like Pujols – Back to Jack

Today I will be completing my historical Rookie of the Year comparisons. The MLB website only traces the Jack Robinson award, and ignores any awards that might have been given out prior to that, so that’s what I’m doing. Besides, as we creep backward toward the dead ball era, the stats can only get farther away from the Pujolsian stratosphere.

Let’s get started. This last set of data includes ROY stats from the entire decade of the 50’s and then a couple of players from the 40’s. All players have been compared to Albert Pujols’ 2001 season by way of my modified similarity score technique.

PLAYER NAME	TEAM	YEAR	SCORE
Albert Pujols	Saint Louis Cardinals	2001	1000
Willie McCovey	San Francisco Giants	1959	991
Walt Dropo	Boston Red Sox	1950	973
Frank Robinson	Cincinnati Reds	1956	926
Orlando Cepeda	San Francisco Giants	1958	919
Gil McDougald	New York Yankees	1951	881
Roy Sievers	Saint Louis Browns	1949	880
Alvin Dark	Boston Braves	1948	872
Wally Moon	Saint Louis Cardinals	1954	868
Jack Robinson	Brooklyn Dodgers	1947	855
Bob Allison	Washington Senators	1959	849
Willie Mays	New York Giants	1951	844
Harvey Kuenn	Detroit Tigers	1953	840
Sam Jethroe	Boston Braves	1950	837
Jim Gilliam	Brooklyn Dodgers	1953	832
Bill Virdon	Saint Louis Cardinals	1955	831
Tony Kubek	New York Yankees	1957	807
Albie Pearson	Washington Senators	1958	766
Luis Aparicio	Chicago White Sox	1956	764

A fascinating list, to be sure. All along, I’ve kept track of the players who were most statistically comparable to Sir Albert, and I’ll publish a separate post detailing the double handful of players who managed to come within 100 points of the best rookie hitter of all time (it feels good to be able to say that and know it to be true).

One thing that’s bothering me, though I am loath to bring it up: Willie McCovey. Statistically speaking, he is the past player who comes the closest to Pujols. But in his rookie season, McCovey’s stats looked like this:

NAME	TEAM	GAMES	AT BATS	RUNS	HITS	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB	BB	SO	AVG	SLG
Willie McCovey	San Francisco Giants	52	192	32	68	9	5	13	38	2	22	35	.354	.656

Fifty-two games? That’s it? Far be it from me to suggest putting an asterisk next to the name of the man who lent his name to the stadium that the modern era’s greatest asterisk plays in, but that seems absurd. No other player skated to ROY on a smaller sample of his talent. He was a great player throughout his career, but I’m stunned to see him as a ROY. I’ve got my eye on you, San Francisco…

I’ve never been much of a baseball historian. Most of these names are completely unfamiliar to me. But paging back through the archives with a purpose has really awakened me to the joy of baseball’s past. It’s the same thrill I get out of reading any kind of history – the attempt to imagine what it must have been like to live in that era. The vicarious thrill is made more piquant by the narrow focus of the ballpark. I hope some of you have enjoyed it as well.

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My Doctor Made Me Cut Out the Salt

OK, nobody’s making me cut out the Salt. Saltalamacchia, that is. I’m doing it because it’s the right thing to do, like eating oatmeal (thanks, Mr. Brimley!). Salty had a good rookie campaign, but he simply never saw enough at bats. He still hovers well below 200 plate appearances on the season, which puts him way off the pace established by some of the other budding stars in our lineup.

He wasn’t helped by the fact that he shared catching duties with McCann in Atlanta, or by the sudden trade to the AL in the late part of the season. He’s going to be a great player, but Jarrod does not smell like Pujols in his rookie season.

So who does? The usual suspects. Ryan J. Braun (damn you, Ryan Z. Braun! I am tired of having to use that middle initial!) has dropped a little ways, but hit his 30th home run a couple of days ago. His Brewers are atop the league with insanely young talent on the field.

Hunter Pence keeps playing well, though he is firmly lodged in Braun’s shadow. Playing in the same division can’t be helping, but playing for a crappy team is making it much worse. Cincinnati’s Josh Hamilton has had a recent resurgence, and is on the verge of cracking the 900 point barrier for the first time since the first few weeks of the season, when he was on an ungodly power-hitting tear.

The next tier finally leads us to an AL worthy, in the person of pint-sized Dustin Pedroia, who is playing fine offense and defense in his season-long slog. Who knows where he would be in the standings if he hadn’t started the season so weakly? Troy Tulowitzki recently broke a record previously held by Ernie Banks. He is going to be great to watch in Colorado for years to come.

Chris B. Young (Damn you, Chris R. Young!!!) is not really Pujols-like, but his undervalued Diamondbacks club is on the verge of cruising into the playoffs at the expense of the Padres, who employ the paler version of Chris Young. Delmon Young (confused yet?) has done yeoman’s work for Tampa Bay this year, amassing over 550 at bats and counting in a hideously drawn-out losing effort. Ditto Akinori Iwamura, who lost some time due to injury in mid-season.

Bringing up the bottom are Alex Gordon, who has neither saved the Royals nor flamed out in his debut, so he’s done about all you can ask. His numbers have risen steadily throughout the season, and he can team up with fellow youngsters like Brian Bannister, Tony Pena, Jr., and Billy Butler to bring some hope to Royal Blue diehards next year. There’s always next year…

Finally, Kevin Kouzmanoff, the Mashin’ Macedonian, has used his massive forearms to great effect, helping Jake Peavy and Chris Young to keep the Padres in the wild card hunt down to the last.

Those are our contenders. I might still let one or two more go over the remainder of the season, and our final post will be the crowning of our first ever Pujols Smell-Alike and a statistical breakdown that will surely interest literally dozens of people.

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Smells Like Pujols – Groovy, Man. It’s the Sixties.

Still using the wayback machine to compare past ROY winners to Sir Albert Pujols, and today we’ve made our way back to the 1960’s. Clearly, the farther back we go, the more hallowed some of these names become, as they’ve had time to become legendary and adorn plaques on the wall at Cooperstown (are they on the wall? I’ve actually never been there…)

And then there’s the sad story of Ken Hubbs. The Cubs’ second baseman was able to win a Gold Glove as a rookie, and paired his sterling defensive talent with a decent average and 90 runs scored to take the 1962 rookie of the year trophy. He had a slightly less impressive offensive season in ’63. Then, in 1964, in an attempt to get over his fear of flying, Hubbs decided to get his pilot’s license. A few days after earning his license, he celebrated by flying his plane to Utah to visit friends. The return flight only lasted five minutes, and the plane went down in the snow and ice of Provo. Who knows what could have been?

There’s a story behind each of these guys, but for now, let’s just look at the raw numbers.

PLAYER NAME	TEAM	YEAR	SCORE
Albert Pujols	Saint Louis Cardinals	2001	1000
Tony Oliva	Minnesota Twins	1964	964
Dick Allen	Philadelphia Phillies	1964	958
Billy Williams	Chicago Cubs	1961	865
Tom Tresh	New York Yankees	1962	854
Tommie Agee	Chicago White Sox	1966	847
Curt Blefary	Baltimore Orioles	1965	833
Johnny Bench	Cincinnati Reds	1968	831
Frank Howard	Los Angeles Dodgers	1960	831
Rod Carew	Minnesota Twins	1967	826
Lou Piniella	Kansas City Royals	1969	818
Ron Hansen	Baltimore Orioles	1960	816
Tommy Helms	Cincinnati Reds	1966	803
Pete Rose	Cincinnati Reds	1963	795
Ted Sizemore	Los Angeles Dodgers	1969	771
Ken Hubbs	Chicago Cubs	1962	768
Jim Lefebvre	Los Angeles Dodgers	1965	767

As I was typing in Tony Oliva’s stats, I won’t lie – I started to actually believe that someone might be cracking the Pujols barrier. He came really, really close. The thing that seems to derail the comparison every time is the fact that Pujols had over 100 runs scored and batted in. Most competitors had one or the other, but nobody has had both. Still, pretty amazing.

Next time up, I’ll probably finish this off by looking at the 50’s and tail end of the 40’s, which is as far back as the MLB website goes with the award. They start with Jack Robinson (who the award is named for), and so will I. After that, I’ll unveil the top rookie hitters historical leaderboard, with all of the 900 point-and-above contenders lined up for all to see.

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Predicting the Rookie of the Year – American League

All season long, I have been comparing the success of MLB’s rookie hitters to the greatest first-year masher of all time – Albert Pujols. I have a pretty good idea who I would pick as offensive rookie of the year. But the fact is, there’s no guarantee that a hitter will be chosen. There are some marvelous rookie hurlers as well, and I do not have the metrics in place to gauge their success vs. the position players. So, I’ve turned to fellow Voodoo Sabermetrician TC from Mr. Thursday’s Curious Mechanism, who watches pitchers and knows how to rate them.  His NL Rookie of the Year predictions, including my offensive player picks are on his site.

TC and I are doing what we call a simulpost. I will publish the top AL choices, including his recommendtions for pitchers, and he will publish the NL predictions, including my predictions for hitters. We’ll ask you to weigh in in the comment field – which player will it be?

HITTERS, by Extra P

PLAYER NAME	TEAM	GAMES	AT BATS	RUNS	HITS	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB	BB	SO	AVG	SLG
Dustin Pedroia	BOS	122	452	73	147	35	1	6	45	5	43	37	.325	.447
Delmon Young	TB	143	567	60	166	34	0	12	81	7	25	108	.293	.416

The ROY picture in the AL is much harder to read than the NL, where one candidate really stands above the others. Dustin Pedroia had an absolutely horrible start to the season, at one point hitting under .150 on the season. The Red Sox stuck with him, and boy did he blossom. The little guy is now a crucial piece in the Boston playoff plans.

Delmon Young has suffered through another wasted Devil Rays season, but his team could have legitimate dreams for next year, with all of the emerging talent they can put on the field. If Elijah Dukes had had a little more “bat control”, perhaps there would have been enough behind Dmitri’s younger brother to really make something out of this season. As it stands right now, it’s “wait ’til next year”, but with Delmon’s big bat in the lineup, things are looking up in Tampa.  To me, his most amazing stat is the 567 at bats.  The dude does not take a night off…

Pedroia and Young have ground out hundreds of at bats from opening day until today, which is pretty impressive. While looking at Young vs. Pedroia, it becomes obvious that Pedroia is benefiting mightily from his luck in playing for a good team with a huge payroll – he has lineup protection, and DY doesn’t. Despite being a power-hitting outfielder, Young has nearly as many runs scored as Pedroia does as a top-of-the order 2B, and packs on some RBIs on top.

It’s a tough choice, but I’m going with Pedroia. And I’m giving him the nod because of his defense. He’s turned 68 double plays with just five errors, and made an absolutely crucial play to preserve Clay Buchholz’s no-hitter a week ago. For pure hitting, Delmon is probably your man, but Pedroia is the whole package.

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PITCHERS, by TC of Mr. Thursday’s Curious Mechanism

Ladies and gentlemen, your top four AL Rookie Pitchers…

PITCHER NAME	TEAM	IP	BB	SO	ERA	HR
Daisuke Matsuzaka	Boston	184.33	70	179	4.44	23
Hideki Okajima	Boston	66.33	16	59	1.76	4
Brian Bannister	Kansas City	153.33	39	73	3.46	12
Jeremy Guthrie	Baltimore	170.33	46	120	3.65	23

There’s a lot to argue about with these guys. Okajima’s got the best pure numbers of the bunch. He doesn’t allow home runs, and he strikes out everybody. Plus, he pitches for the best team around, and he doesn’t look when he throws, which is just odd and exciting, which can often generate Rookie of the Year votes. However, fun as he may be, and excellent as he may perform, he’s got less than half the innings of the other three guys. It’s almost impossible for a pitcher with 60 innings to be as valuable as one with 150 or 180.

Among the remainder, Bannister is, superficially, the best. He’s got a fine W-L record (voters love that), and an excellent ERA. Matsuzaka, meanwhile, has a fine, but undazzling 4.44 ERA. He, however, has the best secondary stats of the starters, with an excellent K rate. Guthrie sits somewhere in the middle. His ERA is slightly higher than Bannister’s and better than Matsuzaka’s, but he’s got only a 7-5 record. He’s got a better K-rate than Bannister, and it’s worse than Matsuzka’s. He has the worst home runs allowed of the trio, though he keeps his ERA low by keeping men off base, and getting lucky.

So, the question: do we choose on “results” with Bannister, or “performance” with Matsuzaka, or do we split the difference and take Guthrie? Or do we just cry “Damn the innings!” and take Okajima for his fun delivery and his crazy-good performance?

My choice? I’ll Matsuzaka now, and every fifth day, thanks.

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So there you have it – a Beantown Battle. Which Red Sock do you think will pull out the internecine win? Or, if you want to make a case for another entrant, let us know that as well. The comment field is yours for the arguing.

And, please, do yourself a favor and read the NL predictions as well. You’ll be glad you did.

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Smells Like Pujols – Bisected by the Bicentennial

Today I continue my historical quest to determine if there has ever been a rookie hitter as good as Albert Pujols. Check out the Smells Like Pujols archives by clicking on it in the tag cloud in the sidebar, and you can see what we made of the go-go 80’s and the bulked-up 90’s, as well as the hitters of the new millennium.

Today we time-warp back to platform shoes, jive, and disco. It’s the 70’s, baby.

Lots of great names in this decade: Lou Whitaker, Eddie Murray, Fred Lynn, and Carlton Fisk and Thurman Munson in the AL, and Bob Horner, Bake McBride, Andre Dawson and Gary Matthews (Sr.!) in the NL.

Let’s go to the chart:

PLAYER NAME	TEAM	YEAR	SCORE
Albert Pujols	Saint Louis Cardinals	2001	1000
Fred Lynn	Boston Red Sox	1975	967
Al Bumbry	Baltimore Orioles	1973	910
Carlton Fisk	Boston Red Sox	1972	900
Eddie Murray	Baltimore Orioles	1977	866
Mike Hargrove	Texas Rangers	1974	870
Bob Horner	Atlanta Braves	1978	859
Gary Matthews	San Francisco Giants	1973	858
Andre Dawson	Montreal Expos	1977	857
Earl Williams	Atlanta Braves	1971	846
Bake McBride	Saint Louis Cardinals	1974	839
Thurman Munson	New York Yankees	1970	836
John Castino	Minnesota Twins	1979	804
Alfredo Griffin	Toronto Blue Jays	1979	801
Chris Chambliss	Cleveland Indians	1971	800
Lou Whitaker	Detroit Tigers	1978	789

I was surprised to find that, overall, the scores were much higher in the 70s than they were in the 80s or 90s. Only Sweet Lou Whitaker dropped below the 800 point threshhold. I suppose that trend can be attributed to the focus on hitting for average in the 70s, which kept that crucial measuring stick near .300. When chicks started to dig the long ball, averages went down, and slugging % stayed, oddly enough, in the same general range.

So, alert Bill Simmons, Fred Lynn is the best offensive ROY of the 70s. And Pudge Fisk comes in third. Not bad, New Englanders. Next week we get groovy with the 60s.

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Smells Like Pujols – No More Fontenot

I had to make a tough managerial decision this week. The lowest point total belonged to Kevin Kouzmanoff of the San Diego Padres, but I couldn’t bring myself to bench him from SLP. It just goes against my grain to sit a power hitter in the middle of a pennant race. Who knows what he might do in the next couple of weeks?

So I looked around and saw two players who are really likable, and gosh darnit, we want them to succeed, but they really don’t belong in this race. I had to pick one of them to go, and I settled on Mike Fontenot for this week. He has a decent score, but he has less than half as many at-bats as some of our leaders, and doesn’t figure to make up any ground. So, his stats are kind of suspect, because of the smaller sample size.

The other one is Saltalamacchia, who has been traded during the season and had a late call-up in the first place. But I’m giving him a one-week repreive because he’s been raising his score every week. Most of the other guys are in tight races or playing well enough that they need to stay in. Alex Gordon is the only other guy who doesn’t really fit either criteria, so we’ll see how that goes.

It’s obviously still a two-man race, with Braun and Pence at the top.  However, Pedroia jumped up two spots during the recent run of top-notch play by the Red Sox, and might still have a challenge left in him.

God, I love this part of the season.

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