The first thing that I should
point out about the third basemen rankings is that Paul Molitor
and Edgar Martinez are on the list. I rated them there because
that's where Bill James put them. I think that they should be
rated as first basemen, but since James put them here, so did I.
Bobby Bonilla was also rated by James here, so that's where I
put him. I think he should be rated as an outfielder. I don't
think that he is one of the 20 third basemen ever.
Third base is generally considered to be a power position played
by power hitters. That wasn't always the case. Third base used
to be where a team put there best infielder because the bunt was
one of the primary offensive weapons until the 1920's. There
really weren't many great power hitting third basemen other than
Home Run Baker and Eddie Mathews until the 1960's. Even Brooks
Robinson was an all glove/weak bat player for most of his
career. The fact that third base was primarily a defensive
position in the 19th century and for most of the first half of
the 20th century is evident in the rankings. There are so many
contemporary players on the list and I'm not sure if that's due
to the players actually being better than their predecessors or
if it shows the limited ability of Win Shares to evaluate
defensive contributions. I think that it's probably a
combination of both. Pie Traynor and Jimmy Collins were both
excellent defensive players. Second base was where teams used to
hide their worst defensive infielder in early baseball. If you
don't believe me, see: Hornsby, Rogers. If Hornsby played today,
he would be a first baseman.
There are so many contemporary players on the list that I don't
know who surprised me the most. What I will say is that Ron
Santo belongs in the Hall of Fame. Al Rosen would rank in the
top 5 if he had a career that was longer than it was. He was as
good as Schmidt, Baker, Boggs, and Brett. Baker might rank at #1
if he didn't retire as often as Michael Jordan. I don't think
that any active players has a chance to catch Schmidt, but Rolen
and Chipper will probably both make it into the top 5. I guess
that Beltre could catch Schmidt, but he would have to keep
playing like he did last year until about 2010, but we won't get
an idea of where he belongs on the list until around 2008 or so.
ARod is rated as a shortstop so he will be found on that list. I
think that he will probably find his way back to SS as soon as
baseball writers stop giving gold gloves to shortstops who don't
deserve them. Sheffield is rated as a right fielder and Chipper
is back at 3rd so he will probably be rated as a third basemen
when his career is through. Harmon Killebrew rated at #11 as a
first baseman and if he was on this list, he would be #6.
Maybe Ron Santo should be considered for
the Hall of Fame, huh? It is very impressive to see him stacked
up against all of the other top 3B in baseball's history, and
stack up very well. Certainly no surprise with the top five on
the list. My first thought in looking at this list is that there
are a lot of names that even I don't really know. But, here are
some of my other thoughts:
Paul Molitor is listed as a 3B. I just had
to check out how much 3B he played versus the other positions.
Here is the breakdown: DH - 1,174, 3B - 791, 2B - 400, 1B - 197,
SS - 57, OF - 50. So, I guess 3B is the right place to put him.
My first thought was to say that he doesn't receive a lot of Win
Shares because of his defense, so doesn't that make his Win
Share totals even more impressive?
Fathers and Sons (and Grandsons) - The 3B
position is the home to a couple of three generation major
league families:
Boone's
Pos. Pos. Rank
WS Points
Ray Boone
3B
68 166
99.88
Bob Boone
C
45 210
90.27
Bret Boone
2B
25 203
114.22
Aaron Boone
3B
90
86 85.80
Bell's
Pos. Pos. Rank
WS Points
Gus Bell
CF
95 175
92.36
Buddy Bell
3B
31 299
114.74
David Bell
3B
100
97 78.31
Watch Your Heinie! There are two guys with the
name of Heinie on this list! Heinie Groh ranks #14 on this list
while Heinie Zimmerman ranks 35th. In major league baseball
history, there have been 22 players with the name "Heinie." As
I'm sure you would guess, it has been awhile since any with that
name have actually played though. Heinie Heltzel was the most
recent and his final big league season was 1944, sixty years
ago!
Puddin' and Pie - Harold "Pie" Traynor is
a known name in the baseball world. The Hall of Famer played all
17 of his big league seasons with the Pittsburgh Pirates. He was
a career .320 hitter. Willie Jones played 15 big league seasons
between 1947 and 1961 with Philadelphia, Cleveland and
Cincinnati. He hit .258 with 190 home runs. He got his nickname
as a child from the 1930s Alfred Bryan and Lou Handman song
"Wooden Head, Puddin' Head Jones."
Was Joe Dugan the manager of the Rockford Peaches
of the the All-American Women's Baseball League?
As I mentioned above, there are a number of
player's names that I really don't recognize. My assumption was
then that most of those guys must have played WAY back in the
old days. So, I took a look at how many 3B in the Top 50 were
born before 1930. Then, to further make my point, I checked how
many of those players were born before 1900. Then, to be fair
and compare, I wanted to know how many were born after 1950,
meaning they could have played in the '80s or '90s. I
thought the numbers were interesting, so I looked back and the
previously studied positions and did the same. Here are the
results:
(Out of Top 50)
Position Before 1930
Before 1900
After 1950
3B
21
11
17
2B
29
14
13
1B
19
8
19
C
15
5
17
Apparently there was just an average number of
old-time players in the 3B list. There were a lot more in the 2B
category!
Twins rankings:
#7 - Paul Molitor
(Twins 1996-1998)
#25 - Craig Nettles
(Twins 1967-1969)
#54 - Gary Gaetti (Twins 1981-1990)
#73 - Corey Koskie
(Twins 1998-?)
Will the Twins keep Koskie? We can hope so, but
if not, Terry Tiffee would be an alright option until Matt Moses
is ready. Nettles was a top prospect in his day. Gaetti was
actually very good! Molitor, of course, never played 3B for the
Twins.