Uncategorized

Friday Fungoes: The Best Defense is a Good Defense

62 Comments

For the next couple weeks I plan to post a little online water cooler fodder on Fridays, just to provide Citizens the opportunity for some fun, low-stress baseball-related commenting before things get serious and spring training is finally here. We certainly wouldn't want anyone Citizen to pull or strain anything diving into a spring training game log without having properly stretched his fingers. Below you'll find the initial installment of Friday Fungoes.

Occasionally I go drink beer at a neighborhood joint with a close friend of mine who is every bit the baseball fan as anyone on this site. Owing partially to an older family member who played minor league ball in the Pittsburgh farm system in the Thirties, he grew up a Pirates fan, rooting with youthful intensity for Roberto Clemente and the rest of the Buccos in the 1960 World Series. Originally from Colorado, these days he's a staunch Rockies fan. What follows is a fun thought experiment, which he proposed to me last week over our second or third pitcher of Alaskan Amber:

Your team is carrying a one-run lead into the ninth inning. As the manager, you need to construct the best defense you can put on the field, manned by players of any era, with the proviso that they must be players you have watched during your time as a baseball fan. Pay no attention to a player's offensive prowess - the goal here is to prevent the tying run from scoring, not to win the game in your next at-bat.

My defense:

C Ivan Rodriguez
1b John Olerud
2b Rey Sanchez
3b Gary Gaetti
SS Ozzie Smith
LF Barry Bonds*
CF Devon White
RF Ichiro
P Greg Maddux

*Unless Sid Bream is due up.

Obviously answers will vary depending upon the age of the individual supplying them, or the age baseball fandom set in, or both. Who would you send out to guard your lead?

EDIT: sean suggested also posting your worst defense, which I heartily second. In that spirit:

C Todd Hundley
1b Frank Thomas
2b Jose Offerman
3b Bobby Bonilla
SS Cap'n Dreamboat
LF Manny B Manny
CF Bernie Williams
RF Gary Sheffield
P Mitch Williams

62 thoughts on “Friday Fungoes: The Best Defense is a Good Defense”

  1. Great idea. I decided to try for a best and worst list.

    Best
    C Ivan Rodriguez
    1b Albert Pujols
    2b Placido Polanco
    3b Scott Rolen
    SS Omar Vizquel
    LF Barry Bonds
    CF Andruw Jones
    RF Ichiro
    P Pedro Martinez

    For the worst, I attempted to pick players who were bad at a position but were kept there. For instance, I skipped over Ryan Braun as a third basemen since it was only one season before being moved.
    Worst
    C Jorge Posada
    1b Prince Fielder
    2b Dan Uggla
    3b Edwin Encarnacion
    SS Derek Jeter
    LF Adam Dunn
    CF Nate McLouth
    RF Michael Cuddyer
    P Just about anyone

    1. I like your worst list, once I thought about your criteria some more. I'd say they mostly make sense, though there's probably a worse RF option than Cuddyer.

      1. Brad Hawpe probably, but I wasn't sure I've actually seen him play. I tried to find players that were consistently bad for their entire career at the position. Cuddyer consistently had poor numbers in right field while Hawpe varied some. He had his epic -40 run season with a -24 run season following that, but wasn't all that bad outside of those two seasons. It's a tricky thing, since few players are allowed to flounder in the field at one position like Dunn or Jeter. Posada wasn't that bad either for instance, but I picked him because he was a full-time catcher for so long.

        1. Yeah, initially I thought Cuddy and Fielder really didn't belong on that list, but when I looked at the whole list and considered that most of those players kept their defensive jobs more for the way they batted and their "reputations", what with Jeter, Uggla and Posada, I think I could really agree with the way you constructed that. That's a defensive team I wouldn't want out there protecting a one-run lead, that's for sure.

  3. Just a question before I spend too much time on this: should our defensive list be based on our perception/memory of the players, or based on actual sabermetrics? I can throw out a list based on the former no problem...the latter, well, we all know that I'm a bit of an outlier among the Citizenry - not much of a "numbers" guy.

    1. This was pitched to me as more of an impression-based exercise. If I looked at the stats I'd bet at least one of my guys wouldn't be the category leader. I certainly wouldn't mind if someone wanted to do a sabermetric list, though.

    2. It's obviously easier with fielding numbers, but I don't think how you build the list matters much.

  4. C Yadier Molina
    1B Albert Pujols
    2B Bobby Grich
    SS Ozzie Smith
    3B Mike Schmidt
    LF Barry Bonds
    CF Mike Cameron
    RF Jesse Barfield
    P Kenny Rogers

    1. I missed just enough of Schmidt's career that I didn't feel right having him on my squad. I'm really happy to see Barfield on your list. Man, did that guy have an arm. Right field was actually the position I took the longest to decide.

      1. For me it was second base and left field. Shortstop took a little while trying to decide between consistent excellence or just a high peak (Adam Everett). I think right field was easiest with center field right behind once I remembered Andruw Jones.

        1. I left Andruw Jones off mine simply because every time I watched a Braves game (and in western Wisconsin when I grew up, your options for regular baseball viewing were either the Braves on TBS/TNT, the Brewers' local affiliate, or whichever Chicago team was on WGN (my hatred of Hawk is long indeed)). Anyway, Andruw always seemed to be dogging it - it was clear he had immense talent, but watching him was occasionally maddening.

        2. Didn't Andruw Jones have a peak just like Everett? It's not like Jones has been known for his fielding in his 30s

          1. Andruw Jones averaged 24 fielding runs a season from 1997-2006. Then he fell off a cliff. Adam Everett meanwhile had +10 fielding runs in 2004, +11 in 2005, 40 in 2006, and then never topped 10 in any other season. I have no doubt he was a great fielding short stop, but it feels to me that it was a short peak of excellence while Jones had a much longer peak.

            Great, feels like I'm arguing about a Personally Witnessed Fielding Hall of Fame.

      2. To be honest, I missed most of the careers of Schmidt, Grich, and Barfield. But I did actually see them live, and I've seen enough clips on top of that to cement what I've seen. It's not like I've seen Mike Cameron in hundreds of games either. It's why I love Tangotier's defensive poll each year; fans of a team who watch 160 games are much better with eyeball defensive ratings than any analyst.

        And yes, Barfield had a cannon. He also had range. I almost took Larry Walker.

  5. C Drew Butera
    1b Drew Butera
    2b Drew Butera
    3b Drew Butera
    SS Drew Butera
    LF Drew Butera
    CF Drew Butera
    RF Drew Butera
    P Michael Cuddyer

    1. You raise an interesting question with your list. Do you really want the best defensive pitcher you've seen on the mound, or do you want one that'll prevent runs?

      Also, wouldn't Butera get awfully tired?

      1. That was one of the questions I asked, and I suppose I should have mentioned it in the post. My friend suggested just the best defensive pitcher (in the spirit of the exercise), but if you wanted to pick, say, an extreme ground ball pitcher, you could do that.

      3. I would, personally, want the pitcher on the mound who excels at preventing runs. The SS and 2B are there so the pitcher doesn't have to field his position well, and, 2006 Tigers excepted, it seems to me the number of times a pitcher needs to field a slow roller or bunt well won't have a particularly significant effect on the outcome of most every game.

        Also, wouldn't Butera get awfully tired?

        Too much hustle to get tired. Besides, everyone keeps telling me he's great at defense and as bad as his offense is, I assume that means he's great at all positions equally.

  6. Best:
    C: Yadier Molina
    1B: Carlos Pena
    2B: Mark Ellis
    3B: Adrian Beltre
    SS: Ozzie Smith
    LF: Franklin Gutierrez
    CF: GoGo!
    RF: Ichiro!
    P: Mariano Rivera

    Worst:
    C: Jason Varitek
    1B: Paul Konerko
    2B: Dan Uggla
    3B: Mark Reynolds
    SS: Trevor Plouffe
    LF: Raul Ibanez
    CF: Bernie Williams
    RF: Mark Quinn
    P: Phil Dumatrait

    1. Bernie Williams is a great choice. Leave it to the Yankees to keep players at a position no matter what.

      1. I think I cheated with Mark Quinn, but he had to make the team. Every single time the Royals came to the Dome, he lost at least one ball in the lights. I've never seen anything like it.

      1. It's hard to really stand out at first base (both positively and negatively), but I'll always remember Span's triple somehow sneaking past him down the line in 2008.

          1. But there was also the play in the WS (Game Two maybe?) when he completely botched his role in the cutoff and then pouted about it afterwards. Pujols is very good defensively, don't get me wrong, but Carlos Pena is pretty amazing as well.

            1. I'll buy either, and like you say (paraphrasing), the difference between "good firstbaseman" and "stationary pylon that can catch a thrown baseball" is rarely that great.

      2. I was thinking Jose Offerman, but (cheating!) looking at fangraphs UZR/150, he really wasn't that bad at 1B. Then I decided to really cheat and look at the leaderboards in defense. According to that, the worst 1B in the recent past is Prince Fielder, coming in at -6.4.

        For your overall enjoyment, here's what the stats say for the worst fielding team in recent memory: (UZR in parentheses)

        C: (No UZR Data - Let's just say Matt LeCroy...)
        1B: Prince Fielder (-6.4 - Eric Hosmer actually comes in at -8.3, but only has 1135.2 innings)
        2B: Skip Schumaker (-12.1)
        3B: Mark Reynolds (-10.6 - Ryan Braun (-41.5!!) and Travis Fryman actually "beat" him, but have less than 1000 Innings at the position)
        SS: Tony Womack (-9.3)
        LF: Delmon Young (-14.0)
        CF: Craig Biggio (-10.0)
        RF: Jermain Dye (-16.3)
        P: No Pitcher data... oh well...

    4. I really appreciate the Varitek disdain. That way I don't have to make a "Worst" list just to put him on it.

  7. Biased, no numbers, strength of memory*

    c Ivan Rodriguez
    1b Pujols
    2b Brandon Phillips
    3b Gary Gaetti
    ss Ozzie Smith
    lf Barry Bonds
    cf Gary Pettis
    rf Ichiro
    p Maddux

    * which is a terrible idea, because my memory of baseball fielders is overpowered by childhood nostalgia

  8. C Joe Mauer
    1B Douchera
    2B Ryne Sandberg
    SS Ozzie Smith
    3B Adrian Beltre
    LF Darin Erstad*
    CF Ken Griffey Jr.**
    RF Ichiro
    P Greg Maddux

    *Easily could have gone with Bonds, but for some reason I remember Erstad better as an outfielder.
    **Kirby would be my favorite, but Jr. was so smooth out there.

    1. Erstad's weird in that I bet he played more games at first throughout his career than any single outfield position, thanks in part to Jim Edmonds' penchant for highlight reel catches, and in part to the potent Anderson/Edmonds/Salmon outfields the Halos had there for a number of years. But I'll bet he was a better pure fielder in the outfield than any of those guys.

    1. Delmon at least has a strong, accurate arm. And I think Ibanez has a career of sustained pukecellence to go from.

  10. My best list has a lot of older players on it, which may be colored by childhood memories/expectations. Still, as the oldest regular around here, it'll at least be different:

    C: Johnny Bench
    1B: Vic Power
    2B: Steve Lombardozzi
    SS: Ozzie Smith
    3B: Brooks Robinson
    RF: Roberto Clemente
    CF: Ken Griffey, Jr.
    LF: Carl Yastrzemski
    P: Jim Kaat

    1. Dan Gladden might come to your house and fight you in the front yard for including Lombardozzi.

      1. I have no idea what the numbers might show (which I probably have in common with Dazzle), but in my memory he's the best defensive second baseman I've seen.

  11. C - Johnny Bench (I don't really remember seeing him play but I remember him as the host of The Baseball Bunch)
    1B - Keith Hernandez
    2B - Roberto Alomar
    3B - Mike Schmidt
    SS - Ozzie Smith
    RF - Ichiro
    CF - Ken Griffey, Jr.
    LF - Rickey Henderson
    P - Jim Kaat

    If I'm starting the inning with no one on base, I want a speedy outfield. If you were saying there were already men on base, I'd probably go with a different outfield.

  12. Thanks for mentioning Bench. He was indeed great.

    Without all too much thought about this:

    P G. Maddox
    C Bench
    1b JT Snow
    2b Frank White
    SS Ozzie
    3b Brooks
    LF Barry Bonds
    CF Paul Blair
    RF Dwight Evans

  13. I have must a block in my brain right now, or I've really never paid attention to any defenses other than the Twins after 2001:
    C
    1b Mientkiewicz
    2b
    SS
    3b Punto
    RF
    CF Gomez
    LF
    P Chuck James Kenny Rogers

    Which corner OF was Endy Chavez in? (I know he wasn't a Twin and I'm probably way overrating one play.)
    I have no idea if any of those guys are objectively good.

  14. I am a little late to the party but I thought I'd play too.

    C-Asumus
    1b- Overybay
    2b-Alomar
    ss- Adam Everett
    3b-Beltre
    lf-Bonds
    cf- Gomez
    rf-Ichiro!
    p- Chuck James

    I can't believe AMR missed Chuck James.

    1. I did put CJ in there, but I though Kenny Rogers was better.
      I wanted to put Ausmus and Everett in there, too, but I didn't really see that much of them to really feel good about it. (Well, I saw a lot of Everett when he wasn't good.)

          1. CH said it was the ninth inning with a one run lead. The pitcher doesn't need to go a full game, just one inning.

Comments are closed.