Hal Richman's 2009 fielding rankings

[AeroDave10]

I'm looking back at 2008 data and I don't understand how Hal voted for some of these guys versus how their ratings turned out. A few examples:

He says Juan Pierre was the 3rd best LF; he gets a 3(+3)e6.

He says Mark Ellis was the 3rd best 2B; he gets a 2e6 and Pedroia, ranked 4th, gets a 1.

[Palmtana]

........not to mention..........In the 2005/6/7 seasons Garret Anderson was given two 3's and a 4 for his rating in left. GA got Hal's 6th place vote last year among LF's while finishing 5th overall. Maybe he was on [i:104e278dc2]Plays of the Day[/i:104e278dc2] in September a lot. When the numbers were crunched, however, he ended up with a 3 in the 2008 game, behind 30 other 1 & 2 rated LF's. Generally speaking though, the FB awards seem to be a good predictor of SOM's state of mind.

[Mean Dean]

[quote:f3b98cc6c1]He says Mark Ellis was the 3rd best 2B; he gets a 2e6 and Pedroia, ranked 4th, gets a 1.[/quote:f3b98cc6c1]Well, the Gold Glove is a huge thing. You shouldn't expect anyone in a league (with regular playing time) to have a better range rating than the GG winner. Usually, that means the GG winner gets a 1. If Hal doesn't think the GG winner was all that impressive, that means he will get a 2, but no other regular in the league will be better than a 2. Presumably since Hal did have Pedroia 4th in MLB, Hal did like him well enough to go along with the GG and to give him the 1.

When thinking about corner OF specifically, also consider that the regular SOM rules allow CF to play LF and RF at no penalty, and RF to play LF at no penalty. Thus, Torii Hunter, Ichiro, etc. are LF-1. Ranking high among full-time LF is not necessarily that impressive, since if you were really an excellent fielder, you wouldn't normally be in LF to begin with... there are plenty more talented fielders than you, they just usually play CF or RF.

Also, just in general, the fielding ratings are group decisions and Hal is only one member of the group.

[AeroDave10]

When was the last time there wasn't at least one "1" at every position?

[Palmtana]

[quote:3d35ea8942="AeroDave10"]When was the last time there wasn't at least one "1" at every position?[/quote:3d35ea8942]

Never, for the 200X games.