The Underground Insight 07.23.07: Deconstructing the Iron Man

Posted by JD Koziarski on 07.23.2007

With Cal Ripken, Jr. less then a week away from induction into the Hall of Fame, The Insight examines the career of the “Iron Man” and questions just how Hall-of-Fame-worthy his numbers are, and how much more Hall-worthy would he be without The Streak.


The Show

Want to raise the ire of a die-hard baseball fan? Walk up to him or her and say you're not sure that Cal Ripken's numbers are a definite indicator of a player who deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. Now, this isn't to say there's any surprise that Ripken was a near-unanimous first-ballot selection. On the contrary, Ripken is a lock for two reasons: The Streak is one of the most famous records in all of sports, and, undoubtedly, that alone makes him worthy of being recognized in the Hall of Fame. The other is that, according to br.com his Hall of Fame Monitor number is 236. To be considered a likely HOFer, a guy should have a number somewhere over 100. So yeah, all those All-Star games, MVPs, Silver Slugger awards, etc. guarantee Ripken a spot.

But are his numbers Hall-worthy?

This is really an exercise that has no practical value. I have already said that I think Ripken deserves to be in the Hall based solely on the Streak. But let's say that Streak didn't exist. Let's say he took a day off in August 1988 and isn't known for playing for more than a decade and a half straight. Then what?

Ripken finished his career with 431 home runs. For a guy who played the majority of his career at shortstop, that is impressive. Not as impressive since Alex Rodriguez is rapidly approaching 500, but it's still a feat that makes him a probably Hall of Famer based on that number alone. The problem is, aside from the 431 homers – a number greatly inflated because he played a few years longer than he should have (only one of his last five seasons was all that good offensively, and he had declined defensively to the point where he was moved to third). His career rate stats are .276/.340/.447. A .787 OPS is hardly spectacular, even for a shortstop. He was simply a very good player for a long time.

This isn't meant to debate peak vs. longevity, so perhaps Ripken playing in 21 seasons and putting up the 3000 hits, 400 home runs, 600 doubles, etc. makes him a Hall of Fame player. I have not decided where I stand on the peak vs. longevity debate, but I suspect in the end I will always view it on a case-by-case basis. The reason for bringing up Ripken's Hall worthiness in the first place is to examine a hypothesis I have: Cal Ripken would have better career numbers, and possibly would have even had a slower decline, if The Streak never existed. He would then be a more worthy Hall candidate based on his numbers, but would have likely gotten fewer votes for enshrinement.

According to Retrosheet, Ripken's two worst months (excluding March and October) were August and September. In August, Ripken hit .275/.333/.433. He followed up those numbers with .265/.323/..430 in September, a decline across the board. While there is no way to actually prove it, it stands to reason that Ripken's August and September drop off is the result of everyday wear and tear that was never supplemented by a random day off. His final two months .270/.328/.431 is not only below his own career averages, it's basically average among all players.

So what would happen if Ripken had 2 days off every month? I don't know. I have no idea how playing 150 instead of 162 games would have helped his career. Over the course of the Streak, that's about a full season of days off. So the question is: would the possible better play in August and September compensate for the loss of a season of production?

If I were going to do this right, I'd only look at the Streak years. But, quite frankly, I'm not that motivated. So looking at Ripken's entire career, removing an average season would take away around 160 hits and 20 home runs (as none of his other counting stats are anything that would get him voted in or out of Hall consideration, I won't look at those). Ripken is still at 3000+ hits and 400+ homers without this season of games. That means that even if my hypothesis is wrong and Ripken would not have improves one iota from twelve days off a year, he'd still have reached certain benchmarks that make him a very likely candidate for the Hall of Fame.

But let's do something crazy and assume I'm right. Let's assume that those days off would have served two purposes. 1) Ripken's August and September would have been better and 2) The post-Streak years of decline would have been a little bit better.

Ripken averaged 78 home runs between May and July: that adds 21 to his career total so he's now over 450. I excluded April from the numbers just because April is rarely a full month and it skewed the totals too much. He's also "earned" about 65 more hits over the final two months of the season based on May-July averages to give him more than 3200 for his career.

The reason for the idea that his post-Streak years would be slightly better is because the numbers accumulated during these hypothetical days off need to be recouped somewhere; in this case, it's in the twilight of his career.

I realize that the number crunching I did here is hardly the most scientific. But what it proves is that Ripken's Streak, while making him more famous and possibly more likely to be in the Hall, may have actually hurt the merit of his numbers. And, in the end, it's the on-field performance that matters most.

I guess Ripken is probably a lock for the Hall regardless of the Streak. His numbers are still pretty good for a guy whose primary position is not known for offense. But it's not his performance that makes him a no-brainer. In less than a week, Ripken will be praised primarily for The Streak. Ironically, I believe this made him less of a player. There's nothing wrong with taking a day off every now and again.

Enter the Sandman

This is going to be my shortest column to date, I think, but that's because I have plans for a rather in-depth look at the Trading Deadline for next Monday. At that time, I anticipate a few trades will have been made already and more will be on the verge of happening. But one trade has happened already.

Jason Kendall is a Cub!
Jason Kendall is a Cub!
Jason Kendall is a Cub!
Jason Kendall is a Cub!
Jason Kendall is a Cub!

As an A's fan, you don't realize how exciting this is. I had recently allowed for the possibility that Kendall was worth his roster spot based on his defensive ability, but that doesn't mean I'm not excited to see Kurt Suzuki get his shot as an everyday catcher. And, in addition, the A's got a solid minor league left-handed reliever in the deal.

All that said, this is still a fine trade for the Cubs. Kendall is the best all-around catcher the Cubs have had all season and he will undoubtedly help the pitching staff. He's not much of a hitter, but then again, neither are Henry Blanco, Rob Bowen, or Koyie Hill. Michael Barrett is a better offensive player than all those guys, but he's half-retarded behind the plate – and on the bases. In fact, he's so bad that he turned Jake Peavy into a mediocre pitcher.