Gunnar Henderson's Career Start Compared to Cal Ripken Jr's

[Just Regular]

I like this thread as with Ohtani helpfully gone, Gunnar gets ready to try for the Rookie to MVP leap.    The current register of Player Seasons by Orioles Bats age 23 and younger (zero Adley Rutschman returns) still neatly fits on one Fangraphs screen with just 29 occurrences, before Gunnar and Holliday and Mayo and Basallo push it >30 these next few years.

https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders/major-league?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=c%2C4%2C6%2C11%2C12%2C13%2C21%2C-1%2C34%2C35%2C40%2C41%2C-1%2C23%2C37%2C38%2C50%2C317%2C61%2C-1%2C111%2C-1%2C203%2C199%2C58%2C3&ind=1&team=2&startdate=&enddate=&season1=1954&season=2023&v_cr=202301&sortcol=22&sortdir=default&age=14%2C23

fWAR pegs '82 Cal and '23 Gunnar 4.6 on the dot.      Wow does Cal's 27th place finish in his 1984 MVP defense look absurd.

I had a chuckle that the youngest Oriole graced with a full-time job at that young of an age who was a little bit overwhelmed by it was Billy Ripken.    I'm sure that was a complete coincidence.

 

[spleen1015]

31 minutes ago, Just Regular said:

Wow does Cal's 27th place finish in his 1984 MVP defense look absurd.

 

I had to go look this up.

1984 AL MVP Voting

1984 Leaders sorted by fWAR

How is this even possible? Cal was abolutely robbed.

[Moose Milligan]

50 minutes ago, spleen1015 said:

I had to go look this up.

1984 AL MVP Voting

1984 Leaders sorted by fWAR

How is this even possible? Cal was abolutely robbed.

Cause WAR wasn't a thing then.  

[Can_of_corn]

9 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

Cause WAR wasn't a thing then.  

 

1 hour ago, spleen1015 said:

I had to go look this up.

1984 AL MVP Voting

1984 Leaders sorted by fWAR

How is this even possible? Cal was abolutely robbed.

Relief pitcher threw 140 very solid innings for the runaway best team in baseball.  Hoss pitched in 80 games.  Had a WHIP under one, ERA under 2 ERA+ of 204.

It's silly that Cal was that low but I can the 1984 logic of it.

[OriolesMagic83]

54 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

 

Relief pitcher threw 140 very solid innings for the runaway best team in baseball.  Hoss pitched in 80 games.  Had a WHIP under one, ERA under 2 ERA+ of 204.

It's silly that Cal was that low but I can the 1984 logic of it.

No drop off from Cal or Eddie in 1984, it was pretty much everyone else. 

[BRobinsonfan]

On 5/29/2023 at 8:01 AM, DirtyBird said:

More rationalization for Gunnar hurting the team. Great

This is one of those posts that just didn't age well.  

[DrungoHazewood]

12 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

 

Relief pitcher threw 140 very solid innings for the runaway best team in baseball.  Hoss pitched in 80 games.  Had a WHIP under one, ERA under 2 ERA+ of 204.

It's silly that Cal was that low but I can the 1984 logic of it.

 

Hernandez wasn't as ludicrous a choice as might appear at first glance. He had an 8.7 WPA, which is the 10th-highest total of all time, and the highest of any reliever in history.

But the rest of the ballot reflected the fact that nobody had any consistent, logical way to combine or compare different types of production. Kent Hrbek finished 2nd? In what universe is a first baseman with 27 homers who was like 8th in the league in RBI on an 81-81 team the 2nd-best player in the league? Eddie was also a first baseman on a .500-ish team, but had more homers, RBI, walks, runs, steals.

Cal's value was so, so high in part because of otherworldly defensive metrics which were unavailable then. Nevertheless, Cal hit about as well as Hrbek, while being a GG-caliber shortstop, on a team that won four more games, but Hrbek beat Cal in MVP vote points 247-1. Steve Balboni, an overweight DH/1B with 77 RBI in 126 games, got more MVP votes than Cal.

Sometimes you just can't justify old award votes, because they were a few hundred writers subjectively making stuff up as they went.

[The B&G]

Age 22 Season OPS:

Cal Ripken Jr: .888

Manny Machado: .861

Gunnar Henderson: .814

 

Some non Shortstops just for fun:

Adam Jones: .711

Nick Markakis: .799

 

 

[baltfan]

18 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

 

Relief pitcher threw 140 very solid innings for the runaway best team in baseball.  Hoss pitched in 80 games.  Had a WHIP under one, ERA under 2 ERA+ of 204.

It's silly that Cal was that low but I can the 1984 logic of it.

He also was ridiculously unbeatable. I remember that year and there was a feeling of futility when he came into the game. 

[Billy F-Face3]

On 2/11/2024 at 9:34 AM, BRobinsonfan said:

This is one of those posts that just didn't age well.  

That post is a microcosm for what a significant number of fans were saying at the time, which is what inspired me to create this thread in the first place. It's like the Orioles Bench Coach, Freddi Gonzalez, said back then: "I think people are going to have to be patient." 

We see now that the patience has paid off and rewarded with a Rookie of The Year season.

[OsFanSinceThe80s]

On 2/10/2024 at 10:45 PM, OriolesMagic83 said:

No drop off from Cal or Eddie in 1984, it was pretty much everyone else. 

The 1983 Orioles were an old team and for many of the core players who had been with the team since the mid 70's it was their last season of being a useful player.

 

[Orioles West]

3 hours ago, Billy F-Face3 said:

That post is a microcosm for what a significant number of fans were saying at the time, which is what inspired me to create this thread in the first place. It's like the Orioles Bench Coach, Freddi Gonzalez, said back then: "I think people are going to have to be patient." 

We see now that the patience has paid off and rewarded with a Rookie of The Year season.

Work kept me offline most of last season, so this was a really fun thread to catch up on and read all of the way through. Comparing reactions people initially had to the first post, and then the reactions as Gunnar picked up the pace. The funny part is, from my fandom corner, I was one who was worried Henderson wasn’t quite ready for the Bigs. Glad I missed out on disagreeing with your initial post!

[Brooks The Great]

On 2/11/2024 at 9:34 AM, BRobinsonfan said:

This is one of those posts that just didn't age well.  

Not surprising, considering that post was coming from one of the board's biggest trolls. He's the king of horrible one-sentence takes. His ratio of incorrect and inflammatory opinions per typed words in posts is atronomical.

[bpilktree]

I saw Gunnar just announced he got engaged today from the other day.  So congrats to him and future Mrs. Henderson 

[Billy F-Face3]

2 hours ago, bpilktree said:

I saw Gunnar just announced he got engaged today from the other day.  So congrats to him and future Mrs. Henderson 

Indeed. Congratulations to the future Mr. and Mrs Gunnar Henderson.

He joins Jackson Holliday in doing the same for his high school sweetheart.