MLB.com's Five Best 2nd-Basemen in O's History

[LA2]

Grich; Roberts; Alomar; Johnson; Dauer.

https://www.mlb.com/news/best-second-basemen-in-orioles-history

Disagree on the players or ranking?

I don't know if Dauer was better than Jerry Adair. Villar might have bumped both if he had stayed in town long enough.

[DrungoHazewood]

When you dip down this far into a niche some of the differentiation is going to come from definitions.  Dauer and Alomar were within a few wins of one another in career value as an Oriole, but could hardly have been much more different.  Dauer never had a 3-win season, while Alomar's worst as an Oriole was over three wins in a short season. 

Jonathan Schoop should be on this list.  His 3rd-best (of 4.5) seasons in Baltimore was as good as Dauer's best season.  Dauer gets a lot of bonus points for having great teammates.

But I think Dauer was clearly better than Adair, who really only had three years as an average or average-plus player for the O's.

Villar could have joined this list, but only played 147 games at second while in Baltimore.  Robert Andino had more than that.

Top career value by bb-ref WAR (min 100 games at 2B):

                                                                                        
Rk             Player WAR/pos From   To   Age    G   PA   AB   R    H  2B 3B  HR RBI  BB
1         Bobby Grich    36.0 1970 1976 21-27  786 3344 2790 432  730 137 27  70 307 457
2       Brian Roberts    28.8 2001 2013 23-35 1327 5905 5214 810 1452 351 35  92 521 581
3       Davey Johnson    20.1 1965 1972 22-29  995 3929 3489 382  904 186 16  66 391 365
4     Jonathan Schoop    14.6 2013 2018 21-26  635 2506 2360 306  615 126  2 106 312  91
5          Rich Dauer    14.4 1976 1985 23-32 1140 4218 3829 448  984 193  3  43 372 297
6      Roberto Alomar    12.5 1996 1998 28-30  412 1825 1588 282  496 102  7  50 210 189
7      Jerry Hairston     7.1 1998 2004 22-28  530 2086 1825 241  477  98 12  26 160 162
8         Jerry Adair     6.6 1958 1966 21-29  736 2751 2568 257  663 118 15  43 234 140
9          Tim Hulett     6.0 1989 1994 29-34  343 1047  950 119  248  45  4  19 111  83
10       Billy Ripken     5.5 1987 1996 22-31  724 2461 2222 236  541 100  5  15 180 146

Best individual seasons (min 80 games 2B):

                                                                                  
Rk             Player WAR/pos Year Age  Tm Lg   G  PA  AB   R   H 2B 3B HR RBI  BB
1         Bobby Grich     8.3 1973  24 BAL AL 162 700 581  82 146 29  7 12  50 107
2       Brian Roberts     7.3 2005  27 BAL AL 143 640 561  92 176 45  7 18  73  67
3         Bobby Grich     7.3 1975  26 BAL AL 150 655 524  81 136 26  4 13  57 107
4         Bobby Grich     7.3 1974  25 BAL AL 160 707 582  92 153 29  6 19  82  90
5     Jonathan Schoop     6.3 2017  25 BAL AL 160 675 622  92 182 35  0 32 105  35
6         Bobby Grich     6.1 1976  27 BAL AL 144 615 518  93 138 31  4 13  54  86
7      Roberto Alomar     5.3 1996  28 BAL AL 153 699 588 132 193 43  4 22  94  90
8       Brian Roberts     5.2 2008  30 BAL AL 155 704 611 107 181 51  8  9  57  82
9       Davey Johnson     4.4 1971  28 BAL AL 142 574 510  67 144 26  1 18  72  51
10      Brian Roberts     4.2 2007  29 BAL AL 156 716 621 103 180 42  5 12  57  89

Oldtimer edition (NL-AA Orioles):

                                                                                   
Rk               Player WAR/pos Year Age  Tm Lg   G  PA  AB   R   H 2B 3B HR RBI BB
1    Gene DeMontreville     5.0 1898  25 BLN NL 151 641 567  93 186 19  2  0  86 52
2          Heinie Reitz     3.4 1897  30 BLN NL 128 544 477  76 138 15  6  2  84 50
3          Heinie Reitz     2.7 1894  27 BLN NL 108 502 446  86 135 22 31  2 105 42
4          Heinie Reitz     2.1 1893  26 BLN NL 130 562 490  90 140 17 13  1  76 65
5        Bill Greenwood     1.7 1887  30 BAL AA 118 550 495 114 130 16  6  0  65 54
6          Heinie Reitz     1.3 1896  29 BLN NL 120 527 464  76 133 15  6  4 106 49
7          Jack Farrell     1.3 1888  30 BAL AA 103 426 398  72  81 19  5  4  36 26
8           Kid Gleason     1.0 1895  28 BLN NL 112 465 421  90 130 14 12  0  74 33
9              Sam Wise     0.9 1891  33 BAL AA 103 459 388  70  96 14  5  1  48 62
10          Tim Manning     0.9 1884  30 BAL AA  91 374 341  49  70 14  5  2   0 26

Also... Jimmy Williams was the second baseman for the 1901-02 AL O's.  Over six wins in two years, with 21 triples each season.  Williams was someone who might be a HOFer if he was born 20 years later.  He had three seasons in the top 10 in slugging early in his career, then the real depths of the deadball era came.  I think he'd have been a 20-homer guy in the 1920s, but from '03-on he had a 103 OPS+ but just a .656 overall OPS.

[DrungoHazewood]

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention Max Bishop.  He was the regular second baseman on the IL Orioles from 1918-1923, after which he immediately became the Philadelphia A's second baseman.  In a 12-year MLB career he was worth 37 wins.  The IL Orioles were an indepenent team that kept its stars for years.  Bishop was pretty clearly a MLB-quality player in his time in Baltimore.  Even if he was just a two- or three-win player in MLB terms, he would have been worth maybe 15 wins as an Oriole.  Which would put him neck-and-neck with Schoop for the 4th-highest career value in city history.

[Big Mac]

So what in the world happened to Davey Johnson in 1973? In his first year with the Braves in his age 30 season he hit 43 HRs and yet never topped 18 in any other season.  Looking at the park effects it seems like Atlanta Stadium was a bandbox that year and three members of that team topped 40 HRs, but that still seems just absolutely wild to me. 

[DrungoHazewood]

14 minutes ago, Big Mac said:

So what in the world happened to Davey Johnson in 1973? In his first year with the Braves in his age 30 season he hit 43 HRs and yet never topped 18 in any other season.  Looking at the park effects it seems like Atlanta Stadium was a bandbox that year and three members of that team topped 40 HRs, but that still seems just absolutely wild to me. 

We talked about this in another thread recently.  He was hurt in '72, but in '71 he hit 18 homers with Memorial Stadium being a bit of a pitcher's park. Fulton County had a HR park effect on par with Colorado.  So from '71 to ''73 he went from 10 road homers to 17.  Which isn't that crazy, I guess.

[Number5]

On 4/8/2020 at 9:32 AM, DrungoHazewood said:

When you dip down this far into a niche some of the differentiation is going to come from definitions.  Dauer and Alomar were within a few wins of one another in career value as an Oriole, but could hardly have been much more different.  Dauer never had a 3-win season, while Alomar's worst as an Oriole was over three wins in a short season. 

Jonathan Schoop should be on this list.  His 3rd-best (of 4.5) seasons in Baltimore was as good as Dauer's best season.  Dauer gets a lot of bonus points for having great teammates.

But I think Dauer was clearly better than Adair, who really only had three years as an average or average-plus player for the O's.

Villar could have joined this list, but only played 147 games at second while in Baltimore.  Robert Andino had more than that.

Top career value by bb-ref WAR (min 100 games at 2B):

                                                                                        
Rk             Player WAR/pos From   To   Age    G   PA   AB   R    H  2B 3B  HR RBI  BB
1         Bobby Grich    36.0 1970 1976 21-27  786 3344 2790 432  730 137 27  70 307 457
2       Brian Roberts    28.8 2001 2013 23-35 1327 5905 5214 810 1452 351 35  92 521 581
3       Davey Johnson    20.1 1965 1972 22-29  995 3929 3489 382  904 186 16  66 391 365
4     Jonathan Schoop    14.6 2013 2018 21-26  635 2506 2360 306  615 126  2 106 312  91
5          Rich Dauer    14.4 1976 1985 23-32 1140 4218 3829 448  984 193  3  43 372 297
6      Roberto Alomar    12.5 1996 1998 28-30  412 1825 1588 282  496 102  7  50 210 189
7      Jerry Hairston     7.1 1998 2004 22-28  530 2086 1825 241  477  98 12  26 160 162
8         Jerry Adair     6.6 1958 1966 21-29  736 2751 2568 257  663 118 15  43 234 140
9          Tim Hulett     6.0 1989 1994 29-34  343 1047  950 119  248  45  4  19 111  83
10       Billy Ripken     5.5 1987 1996 22-31  724 2461 2222 236  541 100  5  15 180 146

 

Best individual seasons (min 80 games 2B):

                                                                                  
Rk             Player WAR/pos Year Age  Tm Lg   G  PA  AB   R   H 2B 3B HR RBI  BB
1         Bobby Grich     8.3 1973  24 BAL AL 162 700 581  82 146 29  7 12  50 107
2       Brian Roberts     7.3 2005  27 BAL AL 143 640 561  92 176 45  7 18  73  67
3         Bobby Grich     7.3 1975  26 BAL AL 150 655 524  81 136 26  4 13  57 107
4         Bobby Grich     7.3 1974  25 BAL AL 160 707 582  92 153 29  6 19  82  90
5     Jonathan Schoop     6.3 2017  25 BAL AL 160 675 622  92 182 35  0 32 105  35
6         Bobby Grich     6.1 1976  27 BAL AL 144 615 518  93 138 31  4 13  54  86
7      Roberto Alomar     5.3 1996  28 BAL AL 153 699 588 132 193 43  4 22  94  90
8       Brian Roberts     5.2 2008  30 BAL AL 155 704 611 107 181 51  8  9  57  82
9       Davey Johnson     4.4 1971  28 BAL AL 142 574 510  67 144 26  1 18  72  51
10      Brian Roberts     4.2 2007  29 BAL AL 156 716 621 103 180 42  5 12  57  89

 

Oldtimer edition (NL-AA Orioles):

                                                                                   
Rk               Player WAR/pos Year Age  Tm Lg   G  PA  AB   R   H 2B 3B HR RBI BB
1    Gene DeMontreville     5.0 1898  25 BLN NL 151 641 567  93 186 19  2  0  86 52
2          Heinie Reitz     3.4 1897  30 BLN NL 128 544 477  76 138 15  6  2  84 50
3          Heinie Reitz     2.7 1894  27 BLN NL 108 502 446  86 135 22 31  2 105 42
4          Heinie Reitz     2.1 1893  26 BLN NL 130 562 490  90 140 17 13  1  76 65
5        Bill Greenwood     1.7 1887  30 BAL AA 118 550 495 114 130 16  6  0  65 54
6          Heinie Reitz     1.3 1896  29 BLN NL 120 527 464  76 133 15  6  4 106 49
7          Jack Farrell     1.3 1888  30 BAL AA 103 426 398  72  81 19  5  4  36 26
8           Kid Gleason     1.0 1895  28 BLN NL 112 465 421  90 130 14 12  0  74 33
9              Sam Wise     0.9 1891  33 BAL AA 103 459 388  70  96 14  5  1  48 62
10          Tim Manning     0.9 1884  30 BAL AA  91 374 341  49  70 14  5  2   0 26

 

 

Also... Jimmy Williams was the second baseman for the 1901-02 AL O's.  Over six wins in two years, with 21 triples each season.  Williams was someone who might be a HOFer if he was born 20 years later.  He had three seasons in the top 10 in slugging early in his career, then the real depths of the deadball era came.  I think he'd have been a 20-homer guy in the 1920s, but from '03-on he had a 103 OPS+ but just a .656 overall OPS.

 

Interesting.  Thanks.

I had always thought of Kid Gleason (who later managed the 1919 Black Sox) as a pitcher.  He pitched over 500 innings in 1890, winning 38 games that year.  But when I saw your post, I checked, and he switched to primarily a 2B with the Orioles in 1895 and remained so the remainder of his career.  He also played some OF, 3B, SS, and 1B.  Versatile guy.  He was the oldest player in the NL in both 1905 and 1908.

[BohKnowsBmore]

On 4/8/2020 at 12:13 AM, LA2 said:

Grich; Roberts; Alomar; Johnson; Dauer.

https://www.mlb.com/news/best-second-basemen-in-orioles-history

Disagree on the players or ranking?

I don't know if Dauer was better than Jerry Adair. Villar might have bumped both if he had stayed in town long enough.

Agree with Drungo that Schoop should probably be the fifth guy on this list over Dauer.

[Aristotelian]

I would go with Alomar #2 over Roberts. His only strike against is that he only played three years, but during that time he was more productive than Roberts and he played a key role on two playoff teams. Had more GG's and All Star teams with the O's than Roberts had his whole career. If I had to choose, I would rather keep Alomar on the 96-97 O's than Roberts on the 2001-13 O's. 

[DrungoHazewood]

1 hour ago, Number5 said:

Interesting.  Thanks.

I had always thought of Kid Gleason (who later managed the 1919 Black Sox) as a pitcher.  He pitched over 500 innings in 1890, winning 38 games that year.  But when I saw your post, I checked, and he switched to primarily a 2B with the Orioles in 1895 and remained so the remainder of his career.  He also played some OF, 3B, SS, and 1B.  Versatile guy.  He was the oldest player in the NL in both 1905 and 1908.

Gleason is listed at 5' 7", 158, and from 1890-1894 he threw 506, 418, 400, 380, and 230 innings.  They switched to allowing overhand pitching in '84.  It took a while for folks to catch on to the idea that 55 starts, 500 innings wasn't going to work so well throwing overhand, even if it wasn't max-effort like today.  The record for innings pitched is very dependent on when you draw the back line.  Bill Hutchison*, Amos Rusie, Sadie McMahon, and Gleason were the last of the 500 inning pitchers, none of them hit that mark after they moved the pitching distance to 60' 6".

The 1800s were an era of continuous transitions, and there were a lot of pitchers whose careers never made it to 30.  Some not to 25.

Gleason hurt his arm in '95 with the Orioles, and he transitioned straightaway to second base.  Thing was he wasn't really any good as a position player.  Career OPS+ of 78, and was at best an average fielder.  He hit .300 a couple times, but with no power and few walks.  From 120+ years away it's kind of hard to see why he was a regular for 12+ years after he quit pitching, he was a 0-to-2 win player almost every year. 

* I need to read up on Hutchison.  He apparently didn't throw a pro pitch until 24, didn't have a season of more than a couple starts until 27, then threw 300-625 innings a year for almost a decade.  Once had a minor league season where he allowed 271 runs in 305 innings.  In 1892 he faced 2639 batters, which is more than twice Jim Palmer's highest total.  By Tom Tango's basic pitch count estimator he threw almost 10,000 pitches.  Or roughly three times what a modern ace does.

[ScGO's]

On 4/8/2020 at 12:13 AM, LA2 said:

Grich; Roberts; Alomar; Johnson; Dauer.

https://www.mlb.com/news/best-second-basemen-in-orioles-history

Disagree on the players or ranking?

I don't know if Dauer was better than Jerry Adair. Villar might have bumped both if he had stayed in town long enough.

Switch Schoop for Alomar and that's your list. Alomar had a great season which he capped off by spitting on an ump, a shortened season, and a mediocre season for the O's.  Alomar did more in his career than Schoop, but I feel like Schoop did more for the O's.

[Frobby]

1 hour ago, ScGO's said:

Switch Schoop for Alomar and that's your list. Alomar had a great season which he capped off by spitting on an ump, a shortened season, and a mediocre season for the O's.  Alomar did more in his career than Schoop, but I feel like Schoop did more for the O's.

But did he, really?     In the three years Alomar was here we won a division title and a wild card berth.    In the 4.67 years Schoop was here, we won a division title and a wild card berth.    We had losing seasons in 2017-18 and were .500 in 2015.    

[LA2]

2 hours ago, Frobby said:

But did he, really?     In the three years Alomar was here we won a division title and a wild card berth.    In the 4.67 years Schoop was here, we won a division title and a wild card berth.    We had losing seasons in 2017-18 and were .500 in 2015.    

So would you go with: Grich; Roberts; Alomar; Schoop; Johnson (followed by Dauer; Adair)? Or if the teams' seasonal success is weighted that heavily, along with stats and length of term with the O's would you put Davey above Schoop and/or Alomar?

[OsFanSinceThe80s]

19 hours ago, LA2 said:

So would you go with: Grich; Roberts; Alomar; Schoop; Johnson (followed by Dauer; Adair)? Or if the teams' seasonal success is weighted that heavily, along with stats and length of term with the O's would you put Davey above Schoop and/or Alomar?

Johnson should be ahead of Schoop and I would probably place him ahead of Alomar. Alomar only played with the O's three seasons, and missed 50 games in 1997 and was only league average offensively in 1998. 

[Moose Milligan]

It's an interesting question, a bit frivolous.  I mean, you can look at WAR WAR WAR and get your answer that way.  WAR is nice and everything but it's always seemingly used as the trump card for any baseball debate.  Like, "...the player I just named has more WAR than anyone you're bringing to the table so....I win."

But if you had a Game 7 to play.  Or if you had a stretch in August and September and were in the playoff hunt...who would you rather have?  

I never saw Grich.  For me, it's Alomar, though.  Yeah, he didn't play here all that long but if we're talking about the BEST, it's him. 

[Can_of_corn]

16 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

It's an interesting question, a bit frivolous.  I mean, you can look at WAR WAR WAR and get your answer that way.  WAR is nice and everything but it's always seemingly used as the trump card for any baseball debate.  Like, "...the player I just named has more WAR than anyone you're bringing to the table so....I win."

But if you had a Game 7 to play.  Or if you had a stretch in August and September and were in the playoff hunt...who would you rather have?  

I never saw Grich.  For me, it's Alomar, though.  Yeah, he didn't play here all that long but if we're talking about the BEST, it's him. 

WAR is a cumulative stat.  If player A produces 20% more WAR over 50% more games played WAR isn't going to help you.