See...
stever said:
Offensively he was a dangerous player and he played most of his career at 2B, but he also played 1B and 3B which adds to the stats. Defensively, to say he was adequate is generous. Like Rice, and especially Tony Perez, I dont believe they deserve the HOF.
...this is my thinking. And I decided yesterday to do just a tad bit of research.
Ryne Sandberg
http://www.baseball-reference.com/s/sandbry01.shtml
Jeff Kent
http://www.baseball-reference.com/k/kentje01.shtml
Now, I think it is well documented around here that I am a big Ryne Sandberg fan, and felt he was the most deserving person missing from the HOF until he was inducted, obviously.
Now, the first "myth" of sorts that perhaps should be busted is that Kent was "barely" a second baseman. In fact, in his 2300 game career, he played 2000 games at 2B. I think that is enough that we can just think of him as a second baseman, and it is not significantly different than the 2000 games Sandberg played at second base out of a 2100 game career.
However, there is NO disputing the Jeff Kent couldn't carry Sandberg's glove out to 2nd base. Not only do we know this intuitively from watching, but the stats bear it out...Kent had a lower fielding percentage and displayed less range. Really glaring is the fact that Sandberg had nearly
800 more assists at 2B in 40 fewer games....but committed only 56% of Kent's errors.
We don't need Sandberg's nine to zero Gold Glove count to tell us who was the better fielder.
The thing is though....while Kent's almost 100 home runs and 450+ RBI advantage in only one additional season would seemingly make him a total overdog with the stick (including a 50 point career slugging average edge), he wasn't. He only averaged 15 more total bases per season, and 5 points on his batting average.
And from a HOF analysis stand point Kent has NO Black Ink (Sandberg only had 14 points, while the average HOF player has 27, but hey, he played 2B), only 71 Gray Ink points versus Sandberg's 134, and his HOF Monitor ratings is 122.5 in comparison to Sandberg's 157.5. It is only with the HOF Standards metric where Kent has a 50.9 to 41.9 edge.
By these measures, it does in fact seem that Sandberg was the more HOF worthy player. And he barely made it in.
Hmmm....add steroid era bias (though I don't think anyone ever accused or even suspected Kent used PEDs) and Mr. Kent could be in for a LONG wait.
Again, personally, I could live with him never getting in. I always thought of Kent as a 3rd baseman playing 2B (and poorly at that)....another player who, like Rice (not to pick on Jimbo again) only helped his team when he had a bat in his hand.
