Tuesday, February 10, 2009

An Open E-Mail to James Deacon on...Mark McGwire's abysmal on base percentage

Hello Mr. Deacon!

Just heard you on the podcast of the PTS Roundtable where you reiterate about a half dozen times that Mark McGwire had a lousy on base percentage.

As a handy reference, we thought we'd provide the names of a handful of Hall of Famers who have a worse career OBP than McGwire's .3942 (which is good enough for 77th on the all time list).

Rod Carew+* .3930
Cap Anson+ .3926
Joe Morgan+* .3921
Honus Wagner+ .3910
Alex Rodriguez (32).3891 (not and HoFer, we realize, but it makes a point, don't it?)
Frank Robinson+ .3890
Tony Gwynn+* .3882
Larry Doby+* .3859
Willie Mays+ .3839
Mike Schmidt+ .3802
Duke Snider+* .3797
Al Kaline+ .3756
Harmon Killebrew+ .3756

So, yeah, we can see how you get this idea that McGwire was a one-dimensional player. Because all he did was get on base and hit home runs and drive in the guys in front of him. But he totally SUCKED at dragging a bunt down the first base line for a single.

Until next time, keep on keepin' on,

Your pal,

The Tao of Stieb

11 comments:

Navin Vaswani (@eyebleaf) said...

If this isn't the equivalent of an internet blogging bitch slap, I'm not sure what is.

Darren Priest said...

Indeed. PTI shouldn't talk hockey and I guess PTS shouldn't talk baseball.

The Southpaw said...

So here's my question:

Did Deacon pull it out of his ass without knowing McGwire's stat was so high, or did he actually contend that an OBP in the 390's was not HoF caliber?

I'm assuming the former.

Anonymous said...

Former for sure.

Hey Ack, I would like to talk to you about something, email me if you can : dave@aquabooks.ca

Anonymous said...

Robbie Alomar is being sued.

Ex says he has AIDS.

http://blogs.usatoday.com/gameon/2009/02/lawsuit-claims.html

brainiac said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
brainiac said...

Yeah, thats nuts about Roberto! Best all around positional player the Jays ever had.

McGuire's number warrent a trip to the HOF...his .265 career average would prolly be the lowest there but hey, someone has to set the HOF Mendoza line...

Anonymous said...

Good thing this site is not called The Tao of Alomar.

Anonymous said...

Indeed. PTI shouldn't talk hockey and I guess PTS shouldn't talk baseball.
___________________________________

DP don't cha think that moron Kornholeheiser and Cubby Dickhead Wilpon should stop talking 'bout anything at all? And Tao, don't worry about Mark"Steroid Boy" McGuire's OBP etc. what Topronto should worry about is what their fuckin OBP will be. JUdging from Cito's new offense first regime, OBP will sink into oblivion AND maybe aids infested hitter Alomar will make a welcome return to the Jays......
Bruno Von Rottweiller

Darren Priest said...

I generally like PTI, Bruno, but there are definitely certain subjects that they are so hopelessly ignorant on that they look foolish when they discuss them.

One of those topics is hockey and another is MMA, but I am in the minority talking in glowing terms about MMA here on the Tao.

Anonymous said...

I agree ABB does rule