Monday, October 08, 2007

The Worst RBI men

Today, I'll continue with the RBI theme by looking at some of the worst seasons and careers for players who had large numbers of RBI. As I did in a recent article about Magglio Ordonez, I will use Runs Created Above Average (RCAA) to evaluate each player's season. Table 1 looks at the lowest RCAAs among players with 100 RBI in one season. The table illustrates that the 100 benchmark does not guarantee a good season.

All of the players on the list created 13 or more runs less than league average. Without looking at every case, I would guess that most, if not all of these players, played on teams which gave them a lot of opportunities to drive home runs. Here are some highlights:
  • Vinny Castilla's 102 RBIs was not a good total in a season where so many players were hitting for power and on a team (the Rockies) which gave him a very large number of base runners.
  • Moose Solters of the St. Louis Browns had 134 RBI in 1936 so he must have had a great season. Right? Nope, he created 20 runs below league average.
  • Joe Carter, who played for the Blue Jays during the 1990s, appeared on the list 3 times. Ruben Sierra is on the list twice.
  • The lone Tiger on the list is Marv Owen who drove in 105 runs for the 1936 Tigers.

Table 1: Lowest RCAAs for players with 100+ RBI in Season

PLAYER

YEAR

AB

RBI

AVG

OBP

SLG

RCAA

Vinny Castilla

1999

615

102

.275

.331

.478

-34

Tony Armas

1983

574

107

.218

.254

.453

-29

Joe Carter

1997

612

102

.234

.284

.399

-21

Tony Batista

2004

606

110

.241

.272

.455

-20

Moose Solters

1936

628

134

.291

.336

.467

-20

Sammy Sosa

1997

642

119

.251

.300

.480

-19

Jeff Francoeur

2006

651

103

.260

.293

.449

-19

Joe Carter

1990

634

115

.232

.290

.391

-19

Roy Pepper

1934

564

101

.298

.333

.399

-18

George Kelly

1929

577

103

.293

.332

.428

-17

Butch Hobson

1977

593

112

.265

.300

.489

-16

Gee Walker

1939

598

111

.291

.330

.443

-16

Paul O'Neill

2000

566

100

.283

.336

.424

-16

Ruben Sierra

1987

643

109

.263

.302

.470

-15

Ruben Sierra

1993

630

101

.233

.288

.390

-15

Joe Carter

1996

625

107

.253

.306

.475

-14

Ray Jablonski

1953

604

112

.268

.308

.427

-14

Rico Brogna

1998

565

104

.265

.319

.446

-14

Marv Owen

1936

583

105

.295

.361

.389

-13

Joe Pepitone

1964

613

100

.251

.281

.418

-13


Table 2 lists the players with the lowest RCAAs among players with 1,000 or more career RBI. Here are the highlights:
  • Vinny Castilla heads this list as well with 187 runs created below average for his career.
  • Joe Carter knocked in 1,445 runs in his career but was still barely above average.
  • Two popular Tigers made this dubious list: Lance Parrish and Travis Fryman.

Table 2: Lowest RCAAs among players with 1000+ Career RBI

PLAYER

AB

RBI

AVG

OBA

SLG

RCAA

Vinny Castilla

6822

1105

.276

.321

.476

-187

Gary Gaetti

8951

1341

.255

.308

.434

-126

Jimmy Dykes

8046

1071

.280

.365

.399

-77

Charlie Grimm

7917

1078

.290

.341

.397

-64

Dante Bichette

6381

1141

.299

.336

.499

-31

Bill Buckner

9397

1208

.289

.321

.408

-26

Tim Wallach

8099

1125

.257

.316

.416

-26

B.J. Surhoff

8258

1153

.282

.332

.413

-22

Bret Boone

6683

1021

.266

.325

.442

-16

Lance Parrish

7067

1070

.252

.313

.440

-15

Todd Zeile

7573

1110

.265

.346

.423

-5

Travis Fryman

6481

1022

.274

.336

.443

14

Ruben Sierra

8044

1322

.268

.315

.450

20

Mike Higgins

6636

1075

.292

.370

.427

25

Joe Carter

8422

1445

.259

.306

.464

28

Stuffy McInnis

7822

1060

.308

.343

.381

30

Garret Anderson

7432

1208

.297

.327

.471

36

George Scott

7433

1051

.268

.333

.435

46

Eric Karros

6441

1027

.268

.325

.454

47

Brooks Robinson

10654

1357

.267

.322

.401

51

1 comment:

  1. These are great lists.

    Gaetti's "body of work" is even more interesting when you consider the fact that his name doesn't appear on the list of worst 100 RBI individual years. It didn't come as a surprise to see that Castilla was unproductive, but the numbers show that he was inept to a degree far beyond the subjective impression that I had formed. And Carter, well, he is the undisputed poster boy for overrated hitters who were "RBI men". I'm surprised that his RCAA was positive even by that narrow margin.

    ReplyDelete

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