Trout Now One Of 13 Players With A WAR Of 4.8 Or Higher At Both Ages 20 & 21

With about one-third of the season left, he could get to a WAR of 7.0. No one has had 7+ WAR at both ages 20 & 21. He would be the first.

Here are the 13 players. The table also shows their career WAR and rank among position players. 10 of the previous 12 are in the top 50. The worst is 149th. He already has more WAR at both ages combined than all of these guys. And in only 236 games played.

Player	WAR	Year	Age	Career WAR	Rank
Al Kaline	8.3	1955	20	92.7	28
Al Kaline	6.6	1956	21
Alex Rodriguez	9.3	1996	20	115.5	12
Alex Rodriguez	5.6	1997	21
Frank Robinson	6.5	1956	20	107.1	18
Frank Robinson	6.9	1957	21
Johnny Bench	5	1968	20	75.2	46
Johnny Bench	6.1	1969	21
Ken Griffey	5.2	1990	20	83.7	34
Ken Griffey	7.1	1991	21
Mel Ott	7.4	1929	20	107.9	16
Mel Ott	6.4	1930	21
Mickey Mantle	6.4	1952	20	109.7	15
Mickey Mantle	5.3	1953	21
Mike Trout	10.9	2012	20
Mike Trout	4.8	2013	21
Rogers Hornsby	4.8	1916	20	127	9
Rogers Hornsby	9.9	1917	21
Sherry Magee	5.1	1905	20	59.1	122
Sherry Magee	5.6	1906	21
Ted Williams	6.7	1939	20	123.2	11
Ted Williams	6.3	1940	21
Ty Cobb	6.8	1907	20	151.1	4
Ty Cobb	6.2	1908	21
Vada Pinson	6.5	1959	20	54.2	149
Vada Pinson	5.7	1960	21

Here is the top 10 in WAR for ages 20 & 21 combined

Player	WAR	From	To	Age	G
Mike Trout	15.7	2012	2013	20-21	236
Alex Rodriguez	14.9	1996	1997	20-21	287
Al Kaline	14.9	1955	1956	20-21	305
Rogers Hornsby	14.7	1916	1917	20-21	284
Mel Ott	13.8	1929	1930	20-21	298
Frank Robinson	13.4	1956	1957	20-21	302
Ted Williams	13	1939	1940	20-21	293
Ty Cobb	13	1907	1908	20-21	300
Jimmie Foxx	12.6	1928	1929	20-21	267
Ken Griffey	12.3	1990	1991	20-21	309

How Great A Fielder Is Andrelton Simmons?

So far this year he has 3.3 defensive WAR, according to Baseball Reference. With just a little more than a third of the season left, it seems like he could end up with 4.9 or even slightly higher. Here are the top 3 seasons ever. This includes all positions

Terry Turner	5.4	1906	147 games
Art Fletcher	5.1	1917	151 games
Mark Belanger	4.9	1975	152 games

Simmons has played in 94 games this year. In his career, he has played in 143 games and has a defensive war of 5.7. That is comparable to what the guys above did. And simmons was 4th in the NL last year with a defensive WAR of 2.4 even though he only played in 49 games.

Ranking Pitchers By Fielding Independent ERA Adjusted For The League Average And Park Effects

I am not sure how much sense this makes and someone else may have done this. There may be problems with this approach that I have not thought of (and there are some that did occurr to me that maybe I could discuss in the future).

Here is how it works: I used Fielding Independent ERA from Fangraphs. But first I used RSAA or "Runs Saved Above Average" from the Lee Sinins Complete Baseball Encyclopedia. It adjusts for the league average and park effects.

Take Pedro Martinez, for example. He had 2,827.33 IP and an RSAA of 496. So he saved about 1.58 runs per 9 IP. Suppose we are in a league that has an average of 4 runs per game. It means he would allow about 2.42 runs per game.

But, according to Fangraphs, Martinez had an FIP ERA of 2.91, .02 lower than his actual ERA. So I subtracted .02 from 2.42 to get 2.40. Below is the top 25 pitchers with 2500+ IP from 1876-2011.

Pedro Martinez	2.40
Roger Clemens	2.63
Randy Johnson	2.75
Lefty Grove	2.77
Curt Schilling	2.82
Roy Halladay	2.86
Rube Waddell	2.99
Mike Mussina	3.07
Bret Saberhagen	3.08
John Smoltz	3.10
Greg Maddux	3.11
Bob Gibson	3.17
Dazzy Vance	3.18
Cy Young	3.20
Hal Newhouser	3.20
Kevin Brown	3.21
Walter Johnson	3.21
Andy Pettitte	3.22
Bert Blyleven	3.26
Kevin Appier	3.29
Kid Nichols	3.31
Dizzy Trout	3.31
Dennis Eckersley	3.33
Christy Mathewson	3.34
Rick Reuschel	3.34

If I get time tomorrow, I will create a link with all 238 pitchers. Koufax is at about 3.08. But he only had  2325 IP. Catfish Hunter was 229th at 4.25.

I also used relative runs allowed. Martinez, for example allowed 1006 runs in his career. Since he saved 496, that means the average pitcher would have allowed 1502. Since 1006/1505 is about .67, I gave him about 2.68 runs allowed per game (since .67*4 = 2.68). But then I lowered it by .02. To get 2.66. Here are the top 25 using the relative method

Pedro Martinez	2.66
Roger Clemens	2.85
Curt Schilling	2.94
Randy Johnson	2.95
Rube Waddell	2.99
Roy Halladay	3.06
Lefty Grove	3.12
Bret Saberhagen	3.18
John Smoltz	3.18
Walter Johnson	3.18
Bob Gibson	3.19
Mike Mussina	3.20
Greg Maddux	3.23
Ed Walsh	3.25
Dazzy Vance	3.27
Christy Mathewson	3.30
Bert Blyleven	3.30
Hal Newhouser	3.31
Kevin Brown	3.32
Andy Pettitte	3.34
Eddie Plank	3.37
Cy Young	3.37
Rick Reuschel	3.37
Dennis Eckersley	3.38
Chief Bender	3.38

Trout's Relative Slugging Percentage For Ages 20-21 Near An All-Time High

Last year his SLG was .564 while the league had .409. This year he has .568 and the league has .411. So he is about 38% above the league average. That gives him a relative score of 138 (since each year his SLG divided by the league SLG is about 1.38 and multiplied by 100 you get 138).

The table below shows the top 20 in relative SLG for ages 20-21 with at least 800 plate appearances.

 

The 138 would put him in 5th place and in some very great company. He also has 523 total bases combined in 2012-13. That is already the 16th best total at ages 20-21. I have him on a pace to get 368 this year. Then his total for the two years would be 683, an all-time high. Here is the top 16:

 

Ted Williams	677
Alex Rodriguez	670
Al Kaline	648
Mel Ott	647
Frank Robinson	642
Vada Pinson	638
Orlando Cepeda	625
Eddie Mathews	599
Ken Griffey	576
Buddy Lewis	567
Ty Cobb	559
Cesar Cedeno	543
Jimmie Foxx	542
Tony Conigliaro	539
Hank Aaron	534
Mike Trout	523

 

It should not be too hard for him to reach Cepeda. He would just need to SLG about .362. Slugging about .444 would get him to Kaline. He needs to slug about .547 to tie Williams, assuming he plays every game and gets about the same ABs per game he has so far this year.



Players Who Have Gone For 6 For 6 In A Major League Game

Click here to see the list that I maintain on this. I just updated it since Alex Rios went 6 for 6. A few years ago I downloaded the list the Sporting News had compiled and that is basically what this is. If there are any missing, let me know (that includes any other 6 hit games as well). Please let me know if you spot any mistakes.

Click here to see the list of all AL & NL 6-hit games at mlb.com

Update On Trout

Three weeks ago I had a post about Trout having another season of at least 160 OPS+. If he did, he would join Ty Cobb and Ted Williams to be the only players to have two such seasons through the age of 21. If I used 150, there would only be two more guys to join the list, Mel Ott and Rogers Hornsby. See Trout Could Join A Group That Includes Only Ted Williams And Ty Cobb.

Trout now has a 164 OPS+. If he could get around 134-136 the rest of he way, he would finish with at least 150. Then he would be on the list of Cobb, Hornsby, Ott and Williams. Four of the greatest hitters ever.

How Well Did Carl Yastrzemski Hit In Clutch Situations During September And October Of 1967?

Very well, as you will see in the table below. This does not include World Series games. I used the Baseball Reference Play Index. My definition of Close and Late here is from the 7th inning on with the batting team ahead by 1, tied or behind by 1.

Clutch Stats For Sept/Oct 1967

Notice how well he hit in the clutch late in the season, even compared to his great full-season stats. He did not make a habit, though, of exceeding his normal performance by so much in the clutch during his entire career. The next table shows this. But we can see that he certainly did not let the pressure of a very tight pennant race get to him.

Clutch Stats For Entire Career

Chris Davis Has A .710 SLG In His Last 401 ABs

That includes this year and September and October of last year. He has .728 this year. The AL average is .409 this year. So Davis is 78% better than the league aveage. That would be the 17th best ever. See Chris Davis Has A .722 SLG Over His Last 302 ABs. He is actually slugging .747 in road games and .711 in home games this year. But according to the Bill James handbook, Camden Yards has a HR rating of 129 for lefties over 2010-2012, meaning their HR rate is 29% higher there than average. So he could be helped by his park.

He also has a 202 OPS+ this year as does Miguel Cabrerra. The last time there was a season with 2 guys getting at least 200 was 2001. Before that 1994 and before that is was 1961. Prior to this year, there have been 59 seasons of at least 200 in OPS+, going back to 1876.

Click here to see the all-time leaders at Baseball Reference. Here are all the years when at least two guys reached 200 in OPS+.