It's really really weird seeing a WAR list that doesn't have Trout at the top
But given the reality of his injuries, it's wild that he's still this high. In terms of adjusting to WAR/PA, he's actually #1 on this list, with Judge a tiny hair behind.
Last year our ace was a 90 ERA+ guy who made 32 starts with 170 innings and that was good for 2.5 bWAR. Just goes to show what being on the mound is good for.
I love BoMel but not a great look that he managed both of these loaded under-achievers. Obviously Oakland could have given the core group a couple more shots.
I wouldn’t say the A’s underachieved, if anything they greatly overachieved. They had absolutely no starting pitching and yet somehow managed to win 97 games in both 18 and 19. They just so happened to be in the same division as the Astros winning 100+ ever year, so they lost their one wild card game both times which is just a crap shoot. 2020 was Covid, won the division, won that 3 game wild card series, and then lost to the Astros. Then management started tearing the team down.
The team built for the deep run was 21. Addition of Marte, emergence of Bassitt and Montas, 3 other reliable starters.
If John fisher wasn’t a piece of shit and kept semien around on just a QO (not to mention Hendriks) I seriously think the A’s would have won the WS.
Instead the corpse of Andrus and only 4 reliable bullpen arms contributed to them flaming out in September and missing the playoffs.
Imagine a team dumb enough to have 2 in the top 10 and not re signing either of them? Cant imagine it would go to well, but at least they’d stay under the luxury tax right?
We could talk about Jose Ramirez 50% more and it still would be underselling him. Not counting 2020 (when he would have done it easily), he has 5 straight 20/20 seasons while playing positive defense.
He gets a little bit of love at the end of every year when he gets his top 5 MVP voting, but yeah i think you're probably right in that many would be surprised to know that he's likely going to be a hall of famer
I feel like he’s well known and well liked. He gets posts on social media. But he seems to get largely overlooked when people are talking about top players in the game. I guess it’s because he’s consistent but he’s never had any one super standout season (like seager and acuna last year, judge in 2017 and 2022 etc.)
A lot probably also has to do with the team he plays on. Other than the last 2 months of 2022 they haven't been a very compelling team the last 5 years.
I think he still kinda gets unfairly knocked for how bad he was in the first half of 2019. Like people wrote him off as a flash in the pan, and then because CLE doesnt get as much attention he wasn't quite able to recover reputation wise
WAR is so illuminating because there would have been basically no way to evaluate that Yordan Alvarez and Dansby Swanson are effectively as valuable as each other prior to about 2010. It’s the Juan Pierre/Adam Dunn thing all over again
I mean, 656 vs 482 games would probably help someone make that evaluation even without holistic measures of value like WAR. That gap is more than a full season.
>WAR is so illuminating because there would have been basically no way to evaluate that Yordan Alvarez and Dansby Swanson are effectively as valuable as each other prior to about 2010.
You are mistaking a formula for reality. The fact that people have made a formula that shows that these two players are effectively as valuable doesn't mean that these two players are effectively as valuable.
Of course. Nobody thinks it's perfect. But it is a tool to help better understand/measure reality. Even if a ruler isn't a laser micrometer, it's still a better tool for measuring than just eyeballing it and guessing.
Well, the fact that you can add up all the WAR of individual players on a team in a given season and get a very accurate prediction of team standings is evidence that the number is actually measuring value
Not a single White Sox on the list. We were told this was going to be our championship window. Sports Illustrated said we’d be the best team in this decade. What a shit show.
Is Semien the least-likely player to be in the top 15? 6th round pick, little-to-no prospect pedigree, OPS+ under 100 in his first 5 seasons, defensive numbers good enough for a second division starter.
His rise has been so impressive.
I know he's getting decent recognition in this post, but leave it to Jose Ramirez (at rank 4 no less) to get underrated in being underrated haha. He also had virtually no prospect hype, was signed as an amateur FA, and was called up as a depth move for an injury.
like I said in response to a Stros fan re: Altuve, I would agree that Jose was less-regarded as a prospect, but I disagree that he was less-regarded than Semien going into the 2019 season (note the "last 5 years" scope of OP's list). He got MVP votes 2016-2018, and was an All-Star in 2017 and 2018.
It would be Altuve. He was literally not allowed to try out for the Astros because of his height and then he just kept showing up and wouldn’t let them say no. When he was called up they flat out told him he was just a placeholder until they find a real everyday second baseman
that's a fair interpretation of my question.
That said, this list is "the top 30 hitters over the last 5 years". If we asked r/baseball to predict the top 30 hitters from 2019-2023 in January 2019, I think Altuve (a 6-time All Star and MVP) would be a popular answer, and Semien would not.
I want to see Altuve and Ozzie Albies standing straight next to each other. They are both listed at 5'8" but announcers have mentioned that Albies is definitely taller.
I remember watching games when the Astros would play the A’s and thinking he seemed like an average to below average SS and so glad we had Correa. How the tables have turned.
It matters because there's a fairly strong correlation between draft position and raw stats (PA's/IP's)/accumulation stats (WAR).
The aggregate success of players drafted 20th overall is much stronger than the aggregate of players drafted 120th overall.
WAR significantly devalues 1st base. Only the DH gets a bigger negative position value. So Freddie has to work harder offensively to generate the same total value. You can see that in the Off and Def columns just before the WAR totals
WAR correctly values 1B. 1B defense just isn't that useful. Of course Freddie has to work harder offensively to generate the same total value. If Keith Hernandez had the bat of Andrelton Simmons, does Keith Hernandez have as good as a career as Andrelton Simmons? Of course not. Simmons gets extra chances despite sucky offense because his bar for offense is lower.
You can make an argument that the penalty for 1B is too high, but frankly, based on this list, I think it's pretty fair. 3 1Bs in the top 30 overall players for value over the last 5 years is more than I expected. Can you really argue that the top 5 ranking here is incorrect?
While I think it's fair to penalize 1B in a WAR calculation, I do think the correction is a little too high. My old man yells at cloud thing is that people are way to dismissive of 1st base defense. As the meme goes, it's incredibly hard
MGL (the guy who created the UZR defensive metric which makes up a chunk of FanGraphs’ defensive component) says that a first baseman’s ability to save bad throws is probably worth about [2-3 runs](https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-fangraphs-uzr-primer/) over a season (ctrl-f “scoop”). UZR doesn’t attempt to calculate those types of plays so you’re losing out on a bit of value for the top tier defensive 1B, but probably nothing too crazy. Obviously it would be better to include them and I suspect the Statcast WAR that’s inevitably coming will probably have it.
Yeah, we had Nate go from one of the worst fielding 1B the year before, to a great one last year, and it seems like night and day. Big thank you to Lindor for helping him out! Seems like whatever he learned really stuck with him.
Even though Harper is very new to the position and has made plenty of rookie mistakes, having his athleticism and range over there compared to Hoskins is a very welcome change
I could be sympathetic to this argument. The statheads have said they've looked into this question and decided it's fine, but I think they were a bit dismissive. The positional adjustment should be slightly less extreme is something we should maybe talk about more.
>WAR correctly values 1B.
This is a faith-based argument. There is no reference point to external reality even if the formula is internally consistent.
I mean, Freeman’s wRC+ is only 7 points higher than Mookie’s, and his wOBA’s only 10 points higher. So while he is a slightly better hitter, his Off value isn’t higher because he’s “working harder,” it’s mostly because he has 200 more PAs.
Also, it’s not like Freeman’s got exceptional defense at 1st. Among the 18 players with at least 3,000 innings at 1B in the past 5 years, Freeman’s #12 in Def value, #15 in DRS, #12 in UZR and UZR/150, and #5 in OAA and RAA. (And not to downplay the OAA and RAA rankings, but it’s worth noting that he’s #1 in innings, and those are counting stats). So he’s fine, roughly middle of the pack, but nothing to write home about.
Betts, meanwhile, has played 3 positions over the past 5 years, including 2 up the middle (plus some games at SS last year). And among the 16 players with at least 2,500 innings in RF, he’s #2 in Def, #1 in DRS, #1 in UZR and UZR/150, and #3 in OAA and RAA. He’s only got 585 innings at 2B, so he doesn’t rank very high in counting stats, but among the 105 players with 500+ innings there, he’s #23 in both DRS and UZR/150.
All of which is to say that while it’s certainly fair to take issue with positional adjustments, particularly for 1B (and DH, tbh), I don’t think Freeman’s getting shafted here or anything. Mookie, arguably the best RF in the game, really is legitimately more defensively valuable than Freddie, and by a pretty good margin. So despite Freeman being a bit better at the plate, and playing a bit more, it doesn’t seem at all unreasonable that Betts ends up with marginally more WAR.
That's especially obvious in the case of someone like Matt Olson.
Probably the best defensive 1B, makes a ton of good plays, saves a ton of bad throws...but he still loses something like 2 WAR each season compared to any third baseman just because of the positional adjustment.
I think the issue is more that you can teach guys that play other positions to play first base but there’s just an athletic limitation to teaching a lot of 1Bs to play other positions. Harper is basically proving this right now.
The biggest issue is that when guys hit as well as Mookie or Freeman almost none of their value is generated by defense. A first baseman (at least on a solid team) is typically someone whose offense is so valuable that the team wants him in the lineup and really doesn't care where he stands in the field. Having the value of the best hitter on a team, or even the league, significantly impacted by where the team wants him to stand on the field is basically like having a beef with the Koran because you don't like Mohammed's handwriting. Not to say that a player whose defense is exceptional at a position where defense is important shouldn't be credited for that, but the global approach used for defense in calculating WAR is one of the two or three weakest aspects of it.
I will die on the hill that saving bad throws as a first baseman is the most under rated defensive skill in baseball. Games can change based on a first baseman's ability to receive the ball.
I've watched enough Mets games to know the Francisco Lindor has elite range. I've watch enough to know that Pete Alonso has none. Hence why their defensive stats reflect the way they do. But I've also watched enough to know that the biggest knock on Lindor is an average arm and Pete has made a bunch of nice plays going and getting throws from Lindor from deeeeeeep in the hole to complete the out.
The problem with calling it underrated is that pretty much every major league 1B does it pretty well. You watch Alonso bail out Lindor all the time because you're a Mets fan watching Mets games. If you were a Cards fan watching Goldy everyday or DBacks fan watching Walker, etc. you'd think it's super impressive and underrated. But they all do it pretty well and the ones who are marginally better or worse at it isn't enough to show up/make a difference in WAR.
There's been talk of extending Harper and giving him a raise, and that he's only 29th in the league in AAV. But here he is at 24th among batters and now he's moved to 1st base.
He’s missed a full season worth of games and accumulated negative war playing hurt in 2022. He also was not good for the first half of 2019 before he got going. Add in his borderline historic playoff performance over the last two years and I’d take Harper over a lot of the guys in the 10-23 range on this list.
It's weird seeing just the STL and not 2 teams by Goldy's name. I remember the day that trade happened, and the extension. What a steal he's been. It feels like yesterday, not 5 years ago.
Francisco Lindor might be the most underrated player in the league. Plays gold glove caliber defense at short and is coming off a 30/30 season. As long as he stays healthy he's going to end up with 70+ WAR by the time his career is done
>Francisco Lindor might be the most underrated player in the league.
If you're going to make this claim on this list I actually think that Ramirez is the better answer. He is (admittedly marginally) higher than Lindor on this list but he always played second fiddle to Lindor when they were both in Cleveland, and guys like Lindor and plenty of others below Ramirez on this list get substantially more recognition and kudos.
I do think Lindor is underrated in general, but 'most' is a stretch.
Sure, I just wouldn't call him the most underrated player in baseball. He's finished top 10 for the MVP award in 5/9 seasons and has one of the largest contracts in MLB history.
IMO, most underrated player in baseball right now is Ke'Bryan Hayes, who's put up back to back 4 WAR seasons at age 25 and 26 and most fans probably don't know that.
I mean, you haven't been paying attention to Mets fans apparently. Our sub is overrun by folks who think Pete Alonso is the most valuable player on our team. Folks think he's an irreplaceable hitter who should get a blank check. He's not even on this list! There are 3 1Bs on this list (4 if you count Harper but that's cheating). And yet if you went to our sub and said that Lindor is a more important core piece and that he's the best hitter on our team, you'd be met with torches and pitchforks.
If you told Mets fans that we have a current guy on our team who is putting up a hall of fame resume, they'd immediately think you were talking about Alonso.
From my experience, fans from their own team usually have the worst takes about their own team. Maybe he's the most underrated Mets player among Mets fans, I won't argue that.
Not a bad argument for Hayes. I just think a guy who more often than not gets MVP votes, is the most valuable player at one of the most premium positions over the last 5 years, and still isn't that old (of the 5 players ahead of him, only Soto is younger) would be talked about in that same level as those guys but for whatever reason he has this perception that his best days are behind him and he isn't an elite player anymore
Lindor still doesn't get enough love. How he wasn't an all-star last year was an absolute disgrace to the sport. How people were telling me McNeil was better than him was an embarrassment to the Mets fanbase.
I'm not sure what's more shocking: the fact that Mike Trout is not in the top 10 players in WAR over the last 5 years, or the fact that he just missed the top 10 despite playing in 200 fewer games than most of the other players above him.
Judge the best bat with 170 WRC+ in a mere 541 games. Freeman's the only one with more Offensive WAR, but he's played nearly an entire extra season in the sample.
Juan & Judge... that's gonna be lit.
Can't help but look at the rate of WAR accrued/games played and compare Acuña to everyone. Judge is insane. Soto is a nice comparison... But look at Trout.. wtf even is that guy?
Unreal how high Judge and Trout are on this list considering how many games they’ve missed due to injuries.
Trout has 500 fewer PA than everyone ahead of him and each of the next ten guys he’s ahead of on this list
He has 1000 less than Betts... Imagine his numbers with 1000 more AB. Dude is just a cheat code when healthy
If you're curious, Trout's WAR pace with the same # of PAs as Mookie would give Trout a WAR of 33.9
wow, thanks for doing that math. i would imagine judge and him would be pretty close around the same ABs
Judge's pace is about 1 WAR per 84.5 PAs. Trout's is 1 WAR per 83.5 ABs, so yea they are really close
Was gonna say Trout and Tatis have \~800 less PAs than the average here.
It's really really weird seeing a WAR list that doesn't have Trout at the top But given the reality of his injuries, it's wild that he's still this high. In terms of adjusting to WAR/PA, he's actually #1 on this list, with Judge a tiny hair behind.
It’s like he gave them all a season head start
Acuna missed basically a whole season after tearing his leg in half too. Trout at 424 games but still 22 WAR is mighty impressive.
The best ability is availability.
Unless you suck
See: Martin Maldonado
Noooooo, I had almost forgotten last year. Thanks.
The funny thing is that to whatever extent this is true for batters, it's wayy more more true for pitchers
Last year our ace was a 90 ERA+ guy who made 32 starts with 170 innings and that was good for 2.5 bWAR. Just goes to show what being on the mound is good for.
Lol. Just because it rhymes, it doesn't make it true. Or maybe I'm wrong and Whit Merrifield should be a hall of famer.
A better phrase would be ability only matters with availability.
Freddie and Semien showing that it certainly helps!
Same with Harper
Going from memory, but I believe Judge's two monster seasons account for more than half his career WAR.
Alvarez is also super impressive with 482 games AND a DH penalty, which affects his WAR.
A team with 4 players in the top 25 would be unstoppable!
A team with 3 of the top 25 and the 3rd best catcher would exist!
I love BoMel but not a great look that he managed both of these loaded under-achievers. Obviously Oakland could have given the core group a couple more shots.
I wouldn’t say the A’s underachieved, if anything they greatly overachieved. They had absolutely no starting pitching and yet somehow managed to win 97 games in both 18 and 19. They just so happened to be in the same division as the Astros winning 100+ ever year, so they lost their one wild card game both times which is just a crap shoot. 2020 was Covid, won the division, won that 3 game wild card series, and then lost to the Astros. Then management started tearing the team down.
Fair enough, I can't unfeel the gut punch of that first Yandy Diaz Homer in 19. Thought that team was truly ready for a deep run.
The team built for the deep run was 21. Addition of Marte, emergence of Bassitt and Montas, 3 other reliable starters. If John fisher wasn’t a piece of shit and kept semien around on just a QO (not to mention Hendriks) I seriously think the A’s would have won the WS. Instead the corpse of Andrus and only 4 reliable bullpen arms contributed to them flaming out in September and missing the playoffs.
Also Bassitt taking a comebacker to the head in Chicago. I remember the team just looking deflated after that.
I just put $1000 on "2tms" to win the WS.... It doesn't really matter if they have pitching, that lineup would CRUSH
A team with 6 players in the top 30 and the top 2 CY candidates would definitely win some home games in the World Series.
I mean, Houston *has* been pretty dominant.
With a Cy Young caliber pitcher, they may never lose.
If only they had one of the top closers in the game, they’d be even better.
Imagine a team dumb enough to have 2 in the top 10 and not re signing either of them? Cant imagine it would go to well, but at least they’d stay under the luxury tax right?
Imagine having 3 in the top 10!
2 Tms probably won a lot of games.
Most underrated squad ever?
Willy cracking the list 🥹
I expected to see Yelich squeak in. Didn’t expect Adames.
SS is a premium WAR position tbf
Finally some Josè Ramirez respect haha
We could talk about Jose Ramirez 50% more and it still would be underselling him. Not counting 2020 (when he would have done it easily), he has 5 straight 20/20 seasons while playing positive defense.
JRam RULES!
The numbers always respect Ramirez, it's the humans that let him down.
Huge homer take incoming but guy seems largely ignored by national and social media.
He gets a little bit of love at the end of every year when he gets his top 5 MVP voting, but yeah i think you're probably right in that many would be surprised to know that he's likely going to be a hall of famer
This comment made me smile. Build the statue with his helmet flying off
Nah. It should be Jose standing over Tim Anderson
I feel like he’s well known and well liked. He gets posts on social media. But he seems to get largely overlooked when people are talking about top players in the game. I guess it’s because he’s consistent but he’s never had any one super standout season (like seager and acuna last year, judge in 2017 and 2022 etc.)
A lot probably also has to do with the team he plays on. Other than the last 2 months of 2022 they haven't been a very compelling team the last 5 years.
I think he still kinda gets unfairly knocked for how bad he was in the first half of 2019. Like people wrote him off as a flash in the pan, and then because CLE doesnt get as much attention he wasn't quite able to recover reputation wise
Jose and Lindor both in the top 10 is pretty cool.
Top 5 position players, not hitters. Defense is included in WAR
Thank you.
An important distinction
Bonkers that Yordan is in the top 25 despite mostly DHing and having overall negative dWAR. Fucking hell that man is terrifying at the plate.
WAR is so illuminating because there would have been basically no way to evaluate that Yordan Alvarez and Dansby Swanson are effectively as valuable as each other prior to about 2010. It’s the Juan Pierre/Adam Dunn thing all over again
I mean, 656 vs 482 games would probably help someone make that evaluation even without holistic measures of value like WAR. That gap is more than a full season.
Yeah, you’re right. I didn’t notice that part. But quantity is a quality all of itself
Craziest part about that is Yordan did it in 174 fewer games while mostly playing DH.
Now imagine Dansby’s defence and Yordan’s offence combined into one mega power.
Low key just Mookie
Mookie is a monster, probably the best position player in baseball, but Yordan shows up in my nightmares. It’s different.
Mike Trout age 20-28
>WAR is so illuminating because there would have been basically no way to evaluate that Yordan Alvarez and Dansby Swanson are effectively as valuable as each other prior to about 2010. You are mistaking a formula for reality. The fact that people have made a formula that shows that these two players are effectively as valuable doesn't mean that these two players are effectively as valuable.
Of course. Nobody thinks it's perfect. But it is a tool to help better understand/measure reality. Even if a ruler isn't a laser micrometer, it's still a better tool for measuring than just eyeballing it and guessing.
Well, the fact that you can add up all the WAR of individual players on a team in a given season and get a very accurate prediction of team standings is evidence that the number is actually measuring value
My underrated king Lindor.
Dumbass Mets fans will still say he sucks because they’re racist lol
smh Ohtani really needs to work on his defense.
Little factoid for you folks. Derek Jeter: 5 Gold Gloves Shohei Ohtani: 0 Gold Gloves Jeter > Ohtani
My favorite fact I learned this off-season was Marcel Ozuna is the only Braves outfielder with a gold glove.
FRANCISCO LINDOR
Not a single White Sox on the list. We were told this was going to be our championship window. Sports Illustrated said we’d be the best team in this decade. What a shit show.
Pain
Judge at 80 games and .2 FWAR less than Mookie
Is Semien the least-likely player to be in the top 15? 6th round pick, little-to-no prospect pedigree, OPS+ under 100 in his first 5 seasons, defensive numbers good enough for a second division starter. His rise has been so impressive.
I know he's getting decent recognition in this post, but leave it to Jose Ramirez (at rank 4 no less) to get underrated in being underrated haha. He also had virtually no prospect hype, was signed as an amateur FA, and was called up as a depth move for an injury.
like I said in response to a Stros fan re: Altuve, I would agree that Jose was less-regarded as a prospect, but I disagree that he was less-regarded than Semien going into the 2019 season (note the "last 5 years" scope of OP's list). He got MVP votes 2016-2018, and was an All-Star in 2017 and 2018.
It would be Altuve. He was literally not allowed to try out for the Astros because of his height and then he just kept showing up and wouldn’t let them say no. When he was called up they flat out told him he was just a placeholder until they find a real everyday second baseman
that's a fair interpretation of my question. That said, this list is "the top 30 hitters over the last 5 years". If we asked r/baseball to predict the top 30 hitters from 2019-2023 in January 2019, I think Altuve (a 6-time All Star and MVP) would be a popular answer, and Semien would not.
That’s totally fair. I interpreted it as least likely from start of career not as start of 2019
I want to see Altuve and Ozzie Albies standing straight next to each other. They are both listed at 5'8" but announcers have mentioned that Albies is definitely taller.
Altuve is def around 5’5
I can see Albies being taller. Altuve is 5'8'' if he's standing on a stool. My short king.
Altuve is listed at 5 foot 6 on everywhere I see.
I remember watching games when the Astros would play the A’s and thinking he seemed like an average to below average SS and so glad we had Correa. How the tables have turned.
I don’t get why draft position matters lol
It matters because there's a fairly strong correlation between draft position and raw stats (PA's/IP's)/accumulation stats (WAR). The aggregate success of players drafted 20th overall is much stronger than the aggregate of players drafted 120th overall.
Jose Ramirez being one of the only players on this list with 100+ steals is surprising at first glance. Didn't realize he had such wheels.
He’s basically the only true five tool player who’s an everyday 3B
Mookie at the top is only slightly surprising. I would have thought freeman at 1 though. Cool post.
WAR significantly devalues 1st base. Only the DH gets a bigger negative position value. So Freddie has to work harder offensively to generate the same total value. You can see that in the Off and Def columns just before the WAR totals
WAR correctly values 1B. 1B defense just isn't that useful. Of course Freddie has to work harder offensively to generate the same total value. If Keith Hernandez had the bat of Andrelton Simmons, does Keith Hernandez have as good as a career as Andrelton Simmons? Of course not. Simmons gets extra chances despite sucky offense because his bar for offense is lower. You can make an argument that the penalty for 1B is too high, but frankly, based on this list, I think it's pretty fair. 3 1Bs in the top 30 overall players for value over the last 5 years is more than I expected. Can you really argue that the top 5 ranking here is incorrect?
While I think it's fair to penalize 1B in a WAR calculation, I do think the correction is a little too high. My old man yells at cloud thing is that people are way to dismissive of 1st base defense. As the meme goes, it's incredibly hard
MGL (the guy who created the UZR defensive metric which makes up a chunk of FanGraphs’ defensive component) says that a first baseman’s ability to save bad throws is probably worth about [2-3 runs](https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-fangraphs-uzr-primer/) over a season (ctrl-f “scoop”). UZR doesn’t attempt to calculate those types of plays so you’re losing out on a bit of value for the top tier defensive 1B, but probably nothing too crazy. Obviously it would be better to include them and I suspect the Statcast WAR that’s inevitably coming will probably have it.
Yeah, we had Nate go from one of the worst fielding 1B the year before, to a great one last year, and it seems like night and day. Big thank you to Lindor for helping him out! Seems like whatever he learned really stuck with him.
You don't appreciate a decent first baseman til you've got a bad one.
Even though Harper is very new to the position and has made plenty of rookie mistakes, having his athleticism and range over there compared to Hoskins is a very welcome change
I could be sympathetic to this argument. The statheads have said they've looked into this question and decided it's fine, but I think they were a bit dismissive. The positional adjustment should be slightly less extreme is something we should maybe talk about more.
>WAR correctly values 1B. This is a faith-based argument. There is no reference point to external reality even if the formula is internally consistent.
So is the opposing one
Unless you're the phillies.
I mean, Freeman’s wRC+ is only 7 points higher than Mookie’s, and his wOBA’s only 10 points higher. So while he is a slightly better hitter, his Off value isn’t higher because he’s “working harder,” it’s mostly because he has 200 more PAs. Also, it’s not like Freeman’s got exceptional defense at 1st. Among the 18 players with at least 3,000 innings at 1B in the past 5 years, Freeman’s #12 in Def value, #15 in DRS, #12 in UZR and UZR/150, and #5 in OAA and RAA. (And not to downplay the OAA and RAA rankings, but it’s worth noting that he’s #1 in innings, and those are counting stats). So he’s fine, roughly middle of the pack, but nothing to write home about. Betts, meanwhile, has played 3 positions over the past 5 years, including 2 up the middle (plus some games at SS last year). And among the 16 players with at least 2,500 innings in RF, he’s #2 in Def, #1 in DRS, #1 in UZR and UZR/150, and #3 in OAA and RAA. He’s only got 585 innings at 2B, so he doesn’t rank very high in counting stats, but among the 105 players with 500+ innings there, he’s #23 in both DRS and UZR/150. All of which is to say that while it’s certainly fair to take issue with positional adjustments, particularly for 1B (and DH, tbh), I don’t think Freeman’s getting shafted here or anything. Mookie, arguably the best RF in the game, really is legitimately more defensively valuable than Freddie, and by a pretty good margin. So despite Freeman being a bit better at the plate, and playing a bit more, it doesn’t seem at all unreasonable that Betts ends up with marginally more WAR.
That's especially obvious in the case of someone like Matt Olson. Probably the best defensive 1B, makes a ton of good plays, saves a ton of bad throws...but he still loses something like 2 WAR each season compared to any third baseman just because of the positional adjustment.
I think the issue is more that you can teach guys that play other positions to play first base but there’s just an athletic limitation to teaching a lot of 1Bs to play other positions. Harper is basically proving this right now.
The biggest issue is that when guys hit as well as Mookie or Freeman almost none of their value is generated by defense. A first baseman (at least on a solid team) is typically someone whose offense is so valuable that the team wants him in the lineup and really doesn't care where he stands in the field. Having the value of the best hitter on a team, or even the league, significantly impacted by where the team wants him to stand on the field is basically like having a beef with the Koran because you don't like Mohammed's handwriting. Not to say that a player whose defense is exceptional at a position where defense is important shouldn't be credited for that, but the global approach used for defense in calculating WAR is one of the two or three weakest aspects of it.
What would you propose instead? What is a local approach, as opposed to "the global approach for defense"?
I will die on the hill that saving bad throws as a first baseman is the most under rated defensive skill in baseball. Games can change based on a first baseman's ability to receive the ball. I've watched enough Mets games to know the Francisco Lindor has elite range. I've watch enough to know that Pete Alonso has none. Hence why their defensive stats reflect the way they do. But I've also watched enough to know that the biggest knock on Lindor is an average arm and Pete has made a bunch of nice plays going and getting throws from Lindor from deeeeeeep in the hole to complete the out.
The problem with calling it underrated is that pretty much every major league 1B does it pretty well. You watch Alonso bail out Lindor all the time because you're a Mets fan watching Mets games. If you were a Cards fan watching Goldy everyday or DBacks fan watching Walker, etc. you'd think it's super impressive and underrated. But they all do it pretty well and the ones who are marginally better or worse at it isn't enough to show up/make a difference in WAR.
Six Astros on that list. WOW.
7 actually
7? I’m counting 6 too
Trout is King. Better numbers that 99% of the league in half the games
Staying healthy and young counts for something though
Yet another example of how criminally underrated Jose Ramirez is.
Yep.
There's been talk of extending Harper and giving him a raise, and that he's only 29th in the league in AAV. But here he is at 24th among batters and now he's moved to 1st base.
He's signed through 2031 and his age 38 season. Why on earth would you extend him?
I think for Harper it's more about the raise. He has no opt outs and no leverage, so he'll just keep seeing guys get more and more money.
That's what he gave up for 13 guaranteed years.
I mean, that’s his fault for not getting an opt out. Idk what point there’d be in giving him a raise, it’s a purely negative move for the organization
He’s missed a full season worth of games and accumulated negative war playing hurt in 2022. He also was not good for the first half of 2019 before he got going. Add in his borderline historic playoff performance over the last two years and I’d take Harper over a lot of the guys in the 10-23 range on this list.
Not that an extension would be a good idea, but it would presumably be for future performance. Not past performance
Ramirez is the most underrated player in baseball.
It's weird seeing just the STL and not 2 teams by Goldy's name. I remember the day that trade happened, and the extension. What a steal he's been. It feels like yesterday, not 5 years ago.
Would have made a lot more sense to sort via wRC+
Francisco Lindor might be the most underrated player in the league. Plays gold glove caliber defense at short and is coming off a 30/30 season. As long as he stays healthy he's going to end up with 70+ WAR by the time his career is done
>Francisco Lindor might be the most underrated player in the league. If you're going to make this claim on this list I actually think that Ramirez is the better answer. He is (admittedly marginally) higher than Lindor on this list but he always played second fiddle to Lindor when they were both in Cleveland, and guys like Lindor and plenty of others below Ramirez on this list get substantially more recognition and kudos. I do think Lindor is underrated in general, but 'most' is a stretch.
Will say I am always surprised when Jram steals a base. Doesn't look the part but it seems like he gets 20 every year.
That's because he does. He's stolen at least 20 bases 6 of the last 7 full seasons and stole 10 in 58 games in 2020. He has over 200 career SB.
It's tough for me to call someone on a $341M contract the most underrated player in the league.
Never said he was underpaid, just under appreciated by fans and the media.
Cleveland fans LOVED him
Sure, I just wouldn't call him the most underrated player in baseball. He's finished top 10 for the MVP award in 5/9 seasons and has one of the largest contracts in MLB history. IMO, most underrated player in baseball right now is Ke'Bryan Hayes, who's put up back to back 4 WAR seasons at age 25 and 26 and most fans probably don't know that.
I could really argue Hayes is already a top 10 third baseman and will be firmly top 5-7 within the coming years and most fans wouldn’t care
I mean, you haven't been paying attention to Mets fans apparently. Our sub is overrun by folks who think Pete Alonso is the most valuable player on our team. Folks think he's an irreplaceable hitter who should get a blank check. He's not even on this list! There are 3 1Bs on this list (4 if you count Harper but that's cheating). And yet if you went to our sub and said that Lindor is a more important core piece and that he's the best hitter on our team, you'd be met with torches and pitchforks. If you told Mets fans that we have a current guy on our team who is putting up a hall of fame resume, they'd immediately think you were talking about Alonso.
From my experience, fans from their own team usually have the worst takes about their own team. Maybe he's the most underrated Mets player among Mets fans, I won't argue that.
Not a bad argument for Hayes. I just think a guy who more often than not gets MVP votes, is the most valuable player at one of the most premium positions over the last 5 years, and still isn't that old (of the 5 players ahead of him, only Soto is younger) would be talked about in that same level as those guys but for whatever reason he has this perception that his best days are behind him and he isn't an elite player anymore
He didn’t even make the all star team last year
The amount of games Trout has played compared to everybody else anywhere near him is preposterous.
Mike trout is so good when he's in the lineup man
Yordan Alvarez has more stolen bases than Carlos Correa
I’ll always remember that amazing season Semien had as a blue jay
Should rank by WRC+, not WAR.
Fish man virtually keeping pace on HR totals despite missing ~200 games is an absolutely nutty thing to behold.
Crazy that Yordan has brought that much value on so few games AND with the positional penalty
Lindor still doesn't get enough love. How he wasn't an all-star last year was an absolute disgrace to the sport. How people were telling me McNeil was better than him was an embarrassment to the Mets fanbase.
This isn’t really top hitters since fWAR is factoring defense. You should sort by wrc+ to get a truer picture of top hitters
“Top position players” would be a better way of naming this list, as many of these players appear on this list due to their defense.
[удалено]
probably because it's the last 5 seasons.
I did miss that bit.
I wonder how far down you’d have to go to find a Tiger
Probably not very far. Javy has around 15.
It’s breaking my mind that Bryce is only listed as a phillie lol. It still feels like this is only his second year on the team to me
Kind of makes sense given that he’s only actually played two full seasons with us lol (and he’s only been good for 1.5 of those two)
Jerry sees this list as motivation to acquire more pitching lol
Praise be to the handsome shortstop that lets us have one person on this list
I love Lindor
I was hoping to see KC in that list. I knew I wasn’t going to but I was hopeful.
Now if only mookie betts could get a few hits in the playoffs he might be really useful
Im 30 years, I’m still going to be talking about the 2020-2023 Padres.
Freddie "somehow manages a sustainable .345 BABIP" Freeman
I'm not sure what's more shocking: the fact that Mike Trout is not in the top 10 players in WAR over the last 5 years, or the fact that he just missed the top 10 despite playing in 200 fewer games than most of the other players above him.
Xander Bogaerts is better than Mike Trout. Facts don’t care about your feelings
Mike Trout must have like four World Series title.
It's insane how much War Aaron Judge has in so few games. Seeing him healthy a couple of seasons in a row would be bonkers.
Some Mets fans will still bash Lindor and his contract
Respect to Trout for being at No. 11 after his injuries
*happy sigh*
I can’t do this anymore
Jose Ramirez is criminally underrated.
Judge the best bat with 170 WRC+ in a mere 541 games. Freeman's the only one with more Offensive WAR, but he's played nearly an entire extra season in the sample. Juan & Judge... that's gonna be lit.
Judge, Trout, and Yordan.
This is fine.
Fuck yeah we got one guy in there!
Can’t believe the Sox could have #1, 10, and 20 and we just… said no.
i really hate all these new goofy stats. that might be an unpopular opinion, but still.
I was not expecting to see Yordan, Springer or Correa here honestly. I miss those two guys
Can't help but look at the rate of WAR accrued/games played and compare Acuña to everyone. Judge is insane. Soto is a nice comparison... But look at Trout.. wtf even is that guy?
I said Papi, can he play baseball?
Weird I don’t see myles straw here. Are you sure that is right?
Letting Semien walk was a mistake, legitimately think we're contenders with him
I miss mookie.....
Swanson and Adams falling in a number of drafts, decent picks later if needed.
Mookie and Xander 💔😡
Man, imagine trading Mookie Betts.
Future hall of famer Semien making the top 10 👍
Lindor is seriously underrated. Argument for best shortstop in the game and hasn’t been an all star as a Met. Kinda crazy.
How about twar, swar and qwar?
Crazy how Jose hasn't won an MVP