Clearing the Bases: Best team in baseball?

Clearing the Bases: going through some of the most notable links from the past week...

Buster Olney had this interesting nugget of information in a recent blog:

By the way, I e-mailed this question to a number of talent evaluators, general managers, scouts, other executives and players: Who is the best team in baseball? Got back 20 responses within a 12-hour period.
Here's the breakdown:
Detroit Tigers -- 11
Boston Red Sox -- 6
Los Angeles Angels -- 3

That's pretty interesting. No mention of the Indians? I think they're right up there with the Tigers and Red Sox, and possibly a bit ahead of the Angels. I'm not surprised that there are no NL teams on the list, though...

A message to the media: Don't steal from blogs, especially when the stories are made-up...

A proposal to fix the HR Derby that I'm sure we'll all support…

American League pitchers, take note: Tony Pena doesn't want your charity (via Rob Neyer's blog)

Deadspin, with this great take on the All-Star game fiasco: "As tends to be the case with La Russa anymore, he's so busy thinking about how he's three steps ahead of everyone else that he walks smack dab into a pole."

Baseball Prospectus' All-Star Game recap…

THT with an analytical (you know, actually involving research) look at the Buehrle signing…

Braves reliever Wilfredo Ledezma is stuck in Venezuala, thanks to an unfortunate laundry accident…

An in-depth look at the two-horse NL Central race.

Random Video of the Week: I really don't think these kids are eight years old, but still, this football highlight video is impressive. By the way, that #20 sure can block…

Stark Criticism

Jayson Stark does some great work compiling his Rumblings and Grumblings, a collection of rumors from around the world of baseball. And I do enjoy his Useless Info work; here's one example of the kind of stuff he finds. But I read his Midseason Awards column, and it seemed like something you'd find from a less knowledgable baseball writer. So I'll take my cue from Fire Joe Morgan and go through some of the more puzzling parts of the column, with the intent of...well, I'm not sure exactly what this could accomplish.

AL MVP of the half-year -- Magglio Ordonez, Tigers
Alex Rodriguez may have had a more eye-popping year, especially if you factor in home runs and back-page tabloid appearances.

Jayson, you didn't know that Back-Page Tabloid Appearances was a criteria for the MVP voting? Last year, Derek Jeter led the league in BPTA for the fourth consecutive year with 132, just a couple shy of his all-time record of 141 back in 2004. That was one of the reasons it was so surprising that Justin Morneau edged him for the MVP award. Some critics have argued that BPTA is unfair to people who play in smaller markets, but MLB has yet to change the rule. A-Rod currently is on pace for a record-shattering 167 BPTA. I fully expect this to be the most interesting subplot of the second half of the season.

By the way, I love how Stark throws "home runs" into this sentence, to make it seem like they aren't important. What is the best thing anybody can do in any given time at bat? Hit a home run. So you should probably factor home runs into the MVP equation.

But the Yankees haven't been a factor in the division or wild-card races for more than about 20 minutes all season.

Okay, here we go again. I don't have nearly enough time here to discuss this, but my feeling is that the team that a player is on should have absolutely no bearing whatsoever on who wins the MVP voting. For example, I would vote for a .320/.400/.530 hitter on the Royals before I would vote for a .290/.360/.500 hitter on the Red Sox. But that's a debate for another time.

The more pressing issue here is that the Yankees are still in the race. Depending on whose odds you check, they have roughly a 10-20% chance of making the playoffs. (Here's two odds sites: Baseball Prospectus and coolstandings.com.) And, to make matters worse, you can make a very good case that Alex Rodriguez is the only reason they are even in the race. Even if you're going with the conventional definition of "value", you'd have to say that A-Rod's been pretty valuable to the Yankees, wouldn't you?

Meanwhile, right there in the middle of the most lethal lineup in baseball, Ordonez is headed for a season that not even Ty Cobb ever duplicated in Detroit. And you can look that up.

Another little-known criteria for the MVP voting: To win the MVP, a player must have a season that even Ty Cobb never duplicated. Although Magglio still has a lot of catching up to do in fistfights and Racially Insulting Statements (although he could make up some ground in the former category the next time Ozzie Guillen comes to town). By the way, Ordonez's OPS+ is currently 177. Cobb bested that for ten straight years, from 1909 to 1918. This isn't what Stark is talking about (see the next paragraph), but it makes the point that Stark's statement is stupid.

If Ordonez keeps mashing at his current clip, he'd finish with 68 doubles, a .369 average, 137 RBIs, 135 runs scored, 93 extra-base hits, a .445 on-base percentage and a 1.053 OPS. And even if we lower the doubles threshold to 50, no one has matched all those numbers since Hugh Duffy did it for the 1894 Boston Beaneaters.

That's completely irrelevant. If in 1921 Tris Speaker hits 83 doubles, drives in 160 runs and scores 170, gets 140 XBH, OBP's .507 and OPSes 1.200, but his batting average is just .368, he doesn't qualify. People come up with these types of comparisons all the time (often to make a case for somebody to get into the Hall of Fame), and it's a bad way of looking at numbers. If I looked through enough categories, I think I could come up with some numbers to group Neifi Perez with Cal Ripken, Jr. and Honus Wager as the best shortstops of all-time. By the way, almost all the numbers Stark mentions are either related (doubles and XBH; AVG, OBP and OPS) or unimportant (doubles, AVG, RBI/runs).

Oh, and we didn't even mention Ordonez is hitting .443 with runners in scoring position. Almost makes you want to run out and visit an Austrian knee surgeon, doesn't it?

Here are Ordonez's slugging percentages for the past four seasons: .485/.436/.477/.608. If this were 2004, you know the s-word (steroids) would be coming out in droves regarding Magglio. My point: this is a remarkably fluky year, and there's no reason to expect him to perform this well in the second half.

NL MVP of the half-year -- Matt Holliday, Rockies
How come most people look at Rockies hitters and automatically disqualify them from consideration for all honors, trophies, awards or emphatic high-fives?

Uh...because Coors Field is played at an altitude above 5,000 feet, making balls carry more and making it easier to get hits and home runs? Because Coors Field's park factor is always at or near the top of the list of the best hitter's parks? By the way, Todd Helton may not have won any MVP awards, but his 1,386 career Emphatic High-Fives Received (EHFR) are good for fifth all-time among first basemen, making him a strong Hall Of Fame candidate.

All right, don't bother answering that. We know why.

Oh, sorry. You should have said this sooner.

But anybody who thinks Holliday is just another figment of baseball's most pervasive altitude sickness clearly hasn't been paying attention. True, he's hitting over 100 points higher at home (.405) than on the road (.301).

Yes, Holliday is a great hitter, and yes, he is underrated by the public. But you're not really helping yourself by mentioning his home/road splits; the impression I'm getting is that he'd be "just" a .300 hitter in any other ballpark. His stats are inflated by Coors Field, and even his raw numbers aren't as good as those of a bunch of other players.

But his road OPS (.828) is still higher than the road OPS of Chase Utley, Carlos Lee, Derrek Lee, Jason Bay, Torii Hunter or Grady Sizemore.

So, this is cherry-pick-random-players-who-fit-your-argument time? Cool. That road OPS is lower than the road OPS of Kelly Johnson, Casey Blake, Josh Willingham, Xavier Nady, Shannon Stewart, Randy Winn, Corey Hart, and Brandon Phillips. It's 34th among qualifiers in the NL alone. Bay's having a terrible year overall, by the way.

Plus, it was hard not to notice that it was Holliday who got more votes in the players' all-star balloting than any other player.

How was that hard not to notice? Do you really believe these guys are the most knowledgable and impartial people to decide who the best players are? Why not just let them vote for the MVP, then? These same players voted Brian Fuentes into the All-Star game as well, by the way (it wasn't La Russa's decision, it was the players'; La Russa made plenty of questionable decisions, but you can't blame him for this one).

We admit we were leaning toward Prince Fielder in this MVP race for a long time.

That would be smart. Fielder's OPS is .980, fourth in the NL, and he doesn't get the park effect boost that Holliday does. Plus, in case you care, Fielder's team is leading the division and has the best record in the league.

But in reality, both Holliday and Utley have had more of an all-around impact on their teams than Fielder, who is batting just .232 with men in scoring position and only .154 with RISP and two outs. So why Holliday over Utley? Because Utley's home-road splits (.387 home average, .266 road) are even wider than Holliday's, among other reasons.

Utley would be a good choice because he plays second base, which is a much tougher defensive position than first or left field. But, as Stark mentions, he also gets help from an extreme hitter's park; my personal MVP ballot would go Fielder-Utley-Holliday, with Bonds fourth. But, more importantly, why does Stark say that Holliday and Utley "have had more of an all-around impact" than Fielder...and then just go on to talk about more hitting stats? How about mentioning that Utley plays a tougher defensive position, or that he runs better, or something? And Fielder's had exactly 26 at-bats with RISP and two outs...sample sizes don't get much smaller than that.

Even though the Rockies may be only hanging around the periphery of the NL West and wild-card races, they do have a better record since May 15 than the Dodgers, Mets, Phillies or Brewers. You think that might have something to do with that left fielder of theirs who's hanging with the league leaders in batting, RBIs, slugging, doubles, multi-hit games, hits and OPS? We do.

Woohoo! Holliday plays half his games at the best hitter's park in recent history, and he's "hanging with the league leaders" in seven random stats, of which two or three are meaningful? He must be the MVP!

NL LVP -- Pat Burrell, Phillies
When a team is paying a man 13 million bucks a year, it would kind of like him to be one of the best players in the league. But in this case, the Phillies aren't asking that of Burrell anymore. They'd just settle for having the guy actually seem worthy of starting a game once in a while. That isn't how it's worked out, though.

Well, if you've been reading my blog (very unlikely), you'd know that I'd jump all over this one, as I just wrote about Burrell a couple days ago. And I was much more positive than Stark was. Burrell gets underrated for the same reason Adam Dunn gets underrated: lots of fans still look just at batting average, and think strikeouts are bad.

The one-time No. 1 pick in the whole 1998 draft has fallen so far, he just got benched nine times in a span of 13 games.

And the reason for that is that Charlie Manuel is an idiot. Burell's OPS+ is 101 - that means he's giving you basically league-average production. You can talk about the money all you want, but this guy should never be getting benched. By the way, here's a list of every #1 draft pick from the '90s: Chipper Jones, Brien Taylor, Phil Nevin, Alex Rodriguez, Paul Wilson, Darin Erstad, Kris Benson, Matt Anderson, Burrell, Josh Hamilton. I'd take Burrell over any of them except Jones and A-Rod. My point: Being a #1-overall draft pick in baseball is no guarantee of success, so a #1 pick shouldn't be labeled a "bust" if he's not a perennial All-Star.

Which might have something to do with the fact that he's hitting .159 since April 26, with 42 strikeouts and only 26 hits. (Sheez, that means his missing average is 100 points higher than his batting average.)

In a related story, Bud Selig just announced that all stats before April 26 don't count for this year. Burrell's hitting just .209, but his OBP is .373 (very good), and his slugging percentage is .391 (not great, but that's mostly a function of his low BA). By the way, here's a list of the top ten strikeout leaders in baseball last year: Adam Dunn, Ryan Howard, Curtis Granderson, Bill Hall, Alfonso Soriano, Jason Bay, Richie Sexson, Grady Sizemore, Johnny Peralta, Nick Swisher. All these guys except Peralta and Granderson OPSed above .840. Next on the list is Jim Thome and his 1.014 OPS. Strikeouts are not necessarily bad.

There's still hope, though. Burrell did have more homers and a higher slugging percentage last year than Magglio Ordonez, Prince Fielder or Adrian Gonzalez. And boy, do the Phillies need another productive right-handed bat. So since $13-million men tend to get lots and lots of chances, we're betting you won't be seeing Burrell slip into oblivion any time soon.

Burrell also had a .388 OBP last year, significantly better than any of the other guys you listed. Meaning he was better than any of those three guys last year. Meaning it's not a stretch to say he'll be better, or at least as good, as these guys will be in the second half. (Weird comparables for Stark to choose, though...it was Fielder's and Gonzalez's first full year in the big leagues, so it makes sense they wouldn't have done very well.)

That was fun. Again, no ill will against Stark...he's usually a great writer, but I had to call him out for this article. It was fun.

The most underrated player in baseball...

Okay, that title is a lie; there are probably a dozen or so players more underrated than the player I'm going to talk about. But I will still contend that Pat Burrell is very underappreciated. He is Philadelphia's version of A-Rod, albeit with less talent; he is the whipping boy for the franchise, all the fans hate him for some reason, and he's actually a good player.

What? Pat Burrell is a good player? How can that be? He's hitting just .207! He has "only" 10 homers and 34 RBI? How can you defend someone like that? Well, if you use numbers that more accurately measure a player's offensive ability, you'll find that his OBP is .371, and you'll find that RBI is a dumb statistic. Burrell's been hated and the fans have wanted him traded for years, but he's been a really good offensive player pretty much his entire career; fans just can't look past the low batting average numbers. Burrell's OPS+ this year is 101; 100 is league-average, so he's basically been an average hitter this year (by that metric). This has been a down year for him, too; his career OPS+ is 116, and he was at 124 and 125 in the last two years. He strikes out a lot, but does that really matter? Most of the time, it doesn't matter at all what kind of out you make; it's still an out, and those are bad. And Burrell has been good at not making those outs, as his OBP is .371. His slugging percentage is down this year, but most of that difference can be explained by his low BA (even for his standards), which is .207 right now.

Some critics like to say that Burrell's high OBP does not matter because they can't steal bases. This doesn't make sense; as long as he gets on base, it's possible for him to score, while if he does not get on base, he can't score, and he costs his team an out. For examples of people who think OBP is a bad stat for people with no speed, I'll refer you to Fire Joe Morgan's "clogging up the bases" category. The short answer is that these people are idiots. Getting on base = not making outs = helping your team score runs.

For the more nerdy fans, Burrell's EqA is currently .273, 14th among full-time left fielders in baseball. That says pretty much the same thing that the OPS+ statistic said; Burrell has been pretty much league-average this year. And he's been even better in the past. So, are the Phillies fans' expectations so high of Burrell that they expect him to be an All-Star caliber player, or are they just not looking at the whole pitcure? (Actually, this isn't just a rhetorical question; I do really want to know this. Why does Burrell get hated on so much? Is it as simple as his low BA and high K rate?)

All-Star Reaction

All-Star rosters were released on Sunday...here's some belated reaction to the selections. Here are the links to the AL and NL rosters, and because the starters didn't really change in the last week of the voting, my plan for filling out the rosters still works as well.

The American League roster was very well-done, in my opinion. Orlando Cabrera has been named as the biggest snub, but I'm really not sure he should be there, given that there just aren't enough roster spots due to teams like Tampa Bay and Texas not having any real All-Stars. Michael Young is fine from Texas; I thought Mark Teixeira was going to be back from his injury soon, in which case he would have been a much better choice, but Young is still a good player, although he's not showing a whole lot of it this year. All the pitchers who should be on the team are there, although I would have personally gone with Mark Buehrle over Bobby Jenks from Chicago. The only reserve choice that I don't get is Manny Ramirez; he was voted in by the players more on reputation than on his performance this year. I would have rather seen Kevin Youkilis or Curtis Granderson (both of whom are more deserving than Gary Sheffield, by the way), but that's kind of splitting hairs.

MLB decided to go with all pitchers for their 32nd man ballots, which is kind of strange; the nominees are Hideki Okajima, Jeremy Bonderman, Pat Neshek, Kelvim Escobar, and Roy Halladay. Halladay is the most talented of the five, but is also having the worst year; Bonderman and Escobar are both okay, but certainly not great. I'm personally voting for Neshek, but there's not a whole lot of difference between him and Okajima. Okajima leads the voting right now, and he's going to win it - he gets the vote of both Red Sox Nation and the nation of Japan. (Although Neshek does have the blogger's vote...) If MLB had let some position players in on the voting, Granderson, Sheffield, Youkilis, and Orlando Cabrera would have all been good candidates.

The NL roster, to put it bluntly, is a disaster. Usually the difference between players on the roster and the snubs is small enough that it doesn't make any practical difference, but I believe the NL is actually much weaker than they could be. If they had the right players, I believe their offense could give the AL a good game, even though the AL's pitching is better, but with the roster that they actually have, I can't see them winning this game. I really can't. Here's a list of the bad selections by La Russa and the players:

Brian Fuentes is the obvious one. Did La Russa forget about Matt Holliday and think he still needed someone from the Rockies? He lost the closer job on Sunday, the day the rosters were announced. Now, La Russa probably had to make these decisions a few days before, when Fuentes was still somewhat solidly in the closer role, but he still doesn't deserve this. And there's really no way Jose Valverde belongs on the team, either. I know Tony La Russa loves his relievers, but this is overkill.

Aaron Rowand has no business being on this team either. Look, I know he's "scrappy" (read: white), but he's probably not one of the top ten outfielders in the NL. There's no way he should be on the team ahead of Eric Byrnes. There were other Phillies that had a much better resume - Ryan Howard and Jimmy Rollins. Here's Keith Law's take (insider-only):

The NL's shortstop crop right now is tremendous. Jose Reyes is a star and a deserving starter. J.J. Hardy is emerging as a star and has every reason to be on this team. Edgar Renteria is having his second straight superb year for Atlanta. Hanley Ramirez is having a monster year -- we'll come back to him in a moment -- after winning the Rookie of the Year award last year. But other than Reyes, there's probably not an NL shortstop with a better combination of current-year performance, track record and defensive prowess than Jimmy Rollins. The fact that only two shortstops are on the NL roster is ridiculous, and the exclusion of Rollins only makes it more so.

But the fact that Rollins was snubbed while Aaron Rowand was added makes it worse. Rowand has reached 500 at-bats just once in his career. He's a part-time player who just happens to be hitting 30 points over his career average and who gets on "SportsCenter" because he runs into walls. Players like Rowand do not belong on an All-Star Game roster unless it's to fill the requirement that each team get one representative -- and the Phillies already had Chase Utley on the team. He probably never will make another All-Star team because he's not an All-Star-caliber player.

And just to put it in some perspective, manager Tony La Russa chose the scrappy outfielder having an out-of-character fluke year while omitting the star shortstop having his typical year -- and then MLB added insult to injury by leaving that star shortstop off the fan ballot for the final spot.

Freddy Sanchez is another really strange selection. There were already four middle infielders on the team, and Sanchez is definitely not one of the top ten middle infielders in the NL. Ian Snell would have been a much better representative of the Pirates. If La Russa still wants middle infielders, take another shortstop - Rollins, Hanley Ramirez, and Edgar Renteria all have great cases. I personally would have taken one of these shortstops over Orlando Hudson, too, and let them play second.

Carlos Lee was voted in by the players despite the fact that he really doesn't deserve it. Hunter Pence is a better outfielder from the Astros, and Roy Oswalt is one of the four most talented pitchers in the NL. Lee's having a pretty good year, but not All-Star quality. There are some other strange pitching selections, mostly along the lines of too many relievers; I'm not really sure Takashi Saito belongs on the team, and I already mentioned Fuentes and Valverde. The result? Deserving starting pitchers such as Oswalt, Chris Young and John Maine get left off the team.

Here are the NL final vote candidates: Chris Young, Brandon Webb, Roy Oswalt, Tom Gorzelanny, and Carlos Zambrano. Those are some great pitchers, all left off so that Brian Fuentes can face one hitter in the seventh inning. Big Z is pitching really well of late, but he was so bad at the beginning of the season that I don't feel ashamed about not voting for him. Gorzelanny isn't even the most deserving pitcher on his own team; Ian Snell has slightly better numbers across the board. Of the other three, Webb and Oswalt are more talented, but I have to vote for Young's 2.41 ERA, even if he is pitching in PETCO park half the time. And how was John Maine not on this list? There are a bunch of great position players who could make this list as well, if MLB hadn't decided to go all pitchers; Rollins, Ramirez, Renteria, Howard, Byrnes, Adam Dunn, Aramis Ramirez, Todd Helton...Rollins is the only one of these players not currently in the top 20 in NL OPS.

I don't really know how it happened, but this NL roster is terrible. I'll look into this more closely as we hit the weekend, but right now I'm taking the AL, something like 9-2.

Filling out the All-Star Rosters...

I already went through who deserves to start the all-star game earlier in the week, but let's take things one step further and fill out the entire 32-team rosters for each league. Obviously, you have to take into account the rule that each team must have at least one representative in the All-Star game. Yes, this is a dumb and outdated rule (my opinion: it should be required that the host team has somebody on the roster, but that's it), but it does make things a little more interesting for people like me who try to create the roster.

American League:

MLB hasn't released yet who the starters will be; for some reason, they're waiting to announce the entire team on a special show today on TBS that will attract probably 13 viewers (although I'll probably be among them). So, according to the most recent results (from a couple days before voting ended), here's what the starting lineup would look like:

C: Ivan Rodriguez
1B: David Ortiz
2B: Placido Polanco
3B: Alex Rodriguez
SS: Derek Jeter
OF: Vlad Guerrero
OF: Magglio Ordonez
OF: Ichiro Suzuki

Those could have changed by the end of the voting, though the only positions in which the voting was close were catcher and outfield. Anyways, that leaves 24 more spots to fill...

Step 1: Pick the best pitchers: Usually, teams will carry 11-12 pitchers on their ASG rosters. I'll leave a couple of those slots open, for now, but here are the pitchers who absolutely have to be on the all-star roster:

Dan Haren leads all of baseball with a 1.91 ERA; he's just been dominating. He's the starter for the AL. Johan Santana's record is only 9-6, but he's gotten no run support; his 2.76 ERA is third in the AL, and he's second in the league in strikeouts. You can't have an all-star team without Santana. (Here's a link to something I wrote on Santana yesterday.) Justin Verlander's 3.18 ERA is great, and his no-hitter was the pitching performance of the year so far. C.C. Sabathia leads the league in wins (12-2), and his 116:17 K/BB ratio is just insane. The Angels' John Lackey is often underrated, but he's got 10 wins and an ERA under three. And as far as relievers go...Seattle's J.J. Putz has a 0.95 ERA, a WHIP of 0.61, and is tied for the league lead with 23 saves. Francisco Rodriguez also has 23 saves; he's probably the best closer in all of baseball at this point. And the Twins' Pat Neshek is as dominating as a middle reliever can be; he has a 1.37 ERA and is holding opposing batters to a .124 batting average. That's eight pitchers; we'll fill out the rest later.

Step 2: Select all the deserving backups: Aside from the starters, who absolutely has to be on the roster? We don't have to fill out all the backup slots yet, but we have to take all the players we can't possibly leave off.

We need at least two catchers on the roster, probably three. Fortunately, there are two very deserving backups after Pudge: Jorge Posada and Victor Martinez. Both of them would be better choices to start than Pudge is (and Posada may have passed Pudge in the voting), but they both have OPSes above .900 and both absolutely have to be on the team. At first, I can't leave reigning MVP Justin Morneau and his 20 homers off the roster. Kevin Youkilis is having a career year as well; his .416 OBP gets him onto the team also. There aren't really any other second or third basemen having spectacular seasons, but Carlos Guillen has to be Jeter's backup at short; Guillen really should be the starter, but voters like Jeter's pinstripes more than they like Guillen's 100-point edge in slugging percentage. Curtis Granderson is having a breakout year, and Torii Hunter is playing great in his contract year; their .900 OPSes are certainly worthy of roster sports, and they both play center field. There are some other outfielders who could certainly make the team, but let's stop for now.

Step 3: Fulfill the "one player from every team" requirement: So far, we have 23 players on the roster, and still no representatives from the following teams: Toronto, Baltimore, Tampa Bay, Chicago, Kansas City, Texas.

Toronto: Roy Halladay would normally make the team, but he just hasn't been himself this year; I considered Aaron Hill for his versatiity, but in the end, you have to go with Alex Rios, who is having a career year (17 HR, .522 SLG).
Baltimore: Jeremy Guthrie is having a fantastic year, but he was in the bullpen for the first month of the season, and besides, we still have only one second baseman. Brian Roberts is the pick.
Tampa Bay: With apologies to James Shields, A-Rod is still the team's only third baseman, and I'm starting to run low on roster spots. I'm taking B.J. Upton and playing him at third for a couple innings; he played some third last year, although he was moved off the position because he sucked there defensively.
Chicago: Since nobody besides Jim Thome is hitting at all, we've pretty much got to take the best pitcher on this team. Surprisingly enough, that pitcher is none other than Mark Buehrle, who has a 3.33 ERA and a somewhat respectable 5.94 K/9 (not good, but at least okay). By the way,, Jon Garland somehow has a 3.36 ERA despite striking out less than four batters every nine innings...don't bet on that to continue.
Kansas City: For once, the Royals actually have somebody somewhat deserving of an All-Star spot - starter Gil Meche, who has posted a 3.28 ERA and has some nice strikeout numbers.
Texas: We certainly aren't getting any pitchers here...trade bait Mark Teixeira easily deserves this spot, as he's hitting really well (.959 OPS). By the way, John Kruk seriously mentioned on Baseball Tonight last week that Sammy Sosa deserves the Rangers' spot. Sosa's OBP is .309, and he doesn't currently play a defensive position; he's hurting the Rangers, and he would certainly hurt an All-Star team.

Step 4: Fill out any open positions, get 31 players on the roster: We've got 29 players and 10 pitchers, so we should select one more pitcher and one more position player. For the pitcher, I'm going with Jonathan Papelbon - he hasn't been spectacular, but he's been very good, and relievers tend to be good choices because all the pitchers are in relief roles anyways. And one more position player...there aren't really any major holes to fill, so I'm going with Grady Sizemore - he's posted a .401 OBP hitting leadoff for the Indians, he has 23 steals, and he's a good defensive center fielder. You could make the case for another infielder here, though.

Step 5: Select five nominees for the fans' vote: For whatever reason, MLB decided that the fans need to be involved more, so they added this vote for the 32nd player on each team. Here are my five nominees:

Manny Ramirez, OF - .286/.385/.468 (BA/OBP/SLG)
Gary Sheffield, DH - .290/.401/.530
Orlando Cabrera, SS - .342/.380/.463
Casey Kotchman, 1B - .307/.382/.511
Josh Beckett, P - 3.07 ERA, 11-1

Of those five nominees, I'd probably choose Sheffield, and I'm guessing he would win (every Tigers player has done really well in the voting so far, and Beckett and Manny would split the Red Sox Nation votes).

National League:

Here's the starters, from the most recent voting:

C: Russell Martin
1B: Prince Fielder
2B: Chase Utley
3B: David Wright
SS: Jose Reyes
OF: Carlos Beltran
OF: Ken Griffey Jr.
OF: Alfonso Soriano

Some of these (SS, OF, 3B) were close, though, so there might be a couple different players when the voting is released in a couple hours.

Step 1: Pick the best pitchers: My starter is Jake Peavy; he gets the because of his strikeout numbers. I can certainly see the case for Brad Penny, though - basically the same ERA, except he doesn't play half his games in spacious PETCO Park. Chris Young's numbers are also PETCO-inflated, but his 2.14 ERA is impressive regardless. John Maine has been a very pleasant surprise for the Mets, posting a 2.74 ERA. Cole Hamels' ERA is a little high (3.87), but he's 9-4 and is second to Peavy in strikeouts. Francisco Cordero has been outstanding in the closer role for Milwaukee; he leads baseball with 27 saves. Trevor Hoffman has to be on the team; the all-time saves leader has added 23 to his total this year, as well as a 2.03 ERA. And I'm putting Billy Wagner on the team as well - he only has 16 saves, but he's given up just seven earned runs this year (1.73 ERA).

Step 2: Select all the deserving backups: First base is absolutely loaded in the NL; Albert Pujols and Ryan Howard both have to be on the team. There are plenty of other great players at the position, but let's wait and see how the roster shakes out. Miguel Cabrera should be starting at third; if he doesn't beat out Wright in the voting, we'll make room for his .979 OPS as a backup. Shortstop in the NL is even more loaded; J.J. Hardy, Edgar Renteria, and Hanley Ramirez all really should be on the team. That's a lot of shortstops, but there really aren't any other deserving second basemen besides Utley; we'll play one of these guys (Renteria?) at second. It's tough to leave Jimmy Rollins off the team, too; we'll see if we can fit him in anywhere. I don't care if you don't like the guy, Barry Bonds absolutely deserves to get on the team - he gets on base literally more than half the time he bats (.513 OBP). His 1.112 OPS is second-best in all of baseball. And the game's in San Francisco. He absolutely has to be there. Matt Holliday is also having a breakout year; he and Bonds are the two best hitters in the league, but neither will be starting. And I'm not leaving Adam Dunn off the team, either; I know he hardly ever makes contact, but he walks enough, and when he does make contact, it usually goes a long way (23 HR so far).

Step 3: Fulfill the "one player from every team" requirement: Three teams with no representatives yet: Washington (duh), Pittsburgh (duh), Houston, Arizona

Washington: God, this team is awful. I guess you have to go with Dimitri Young, who has an un-Dimitri-Young-like .893 OPS, as he's pretty much the only good player on the Nationals.
Pittsburgh: Jason Bay's a good player, but he's not performing very well this year, and besides, there's some good pitching on this team. I'm going with Ian Snell, who has a 2.90 ERA and is striking out a bunch of hitters. Tom Gorzelanny is pitching really well, too, although his numbers are slightly worse than Snell's in pretty much every category.
Houston: I'd like to put Hunter Pence on the team, but he just hasn't quite had enough at-bats, and besides, we still need some more pitching. You can never go wrong with Roy Oswalt, who is having a solid year this year (7-5, 3.42). Carlos Lee's putting up good numbers as well.

Step 4: Fill out any open positions, get 31 players on the roster: Three empty roster spots at this point. We need another catcher, and unfortunately, there really aren't any other catchers who are even close to being All-Star worthy. I'll go with Brian McCann because he's more talented than he's shown this year, but McCann, Johnny Estrada, and Bengie Molina all have pretty much the same stats. We need another pitcher - I'll take John Smoltz and his 2.98 ERA. And I'd really love to get Rollins on the roster, but there aren't any center fielders on here besides Beltran. Do you really want to see an outfield with Holliday in center, Dunn in right, and Bonds in left if the game's close in the ninth? Me neither. So I have to take Eric Byrnes, who is putting together career-high numbers in a contract year - .878 OPS, 13 HR, 15 steals - and he's a plus defensively in center.

Step 5: Select five nominees for the fans' vote: Here are my five:

Jimmy Rollins, SS - .283/.329/.507
Hunter Pence, OF - .330/.358/.562
Derrek Lee, 1B - .340/.415/.502
Matt Cain, P - 2-9, 3.38 ERA
Derek Lowe, P - 8-7, 3.03 ERA

My vote would easily be Rollins, but the voting would probably be pretty close - Rollins, Pence, and Lee could all muster some support, the Dodgers have backed a lot of their players (Lowe), and Cain would be in his home park if he got voted in.

All-Star Voting: National League

Only three days left until the All-Star voting closes...you can still vote on MLB.com. But don't do that just yet - take a minute to read through the following analysis of who you should vote for. I already covered the AL in an earlier post; here's the NL:

Catcher: This one's rather easy. Russell Martin's OPS is almost 100 points higher than anyone else's, and his is just .822. He leads all NL catchers in just about every offensive category (especially steals, where he has about as many as everybody else combined), and he's at least decent defensively. Brian McCann is having kind of a down year, hitting just .256, and there just aren't any other great catchers in the league.

How the voters are doing: Martin is leading the voting, but Paul Lo Duca is within striking distance. Lo Duca, by the way, has a .680 OPS - that's even worse than Brad Ausmus. He has 3 homers and 20 RBI in almost 250 at-bats. The only way he should be a part of the All-Star game is maybe as a catcher in the HR derby.

Who I'm voting for: Russel Martin.

Acceptable to vote for: Nobody else. There's just no argument to vote for anybody else here.

First Base: Prince Fielder's 1.003 OPS is third-best in the NL, and tops among first basemen. He's got 27 HR - 11 more than anybody else at the position - and his 62 RBI lead that category by an equally comfortable margin. This is a loaded position, though; six players have an OPS at or above .900. Derrek Lee is quietly putting up great numbers, last year's MVP candidates Ryan Howard and Albert Pujols are stellar again, and Todd Helton and Dimitri Young are doing very well also. Padres 1B Adrian Gonzalez seems to be in the middle of a breakout season, too; he's not getting on base quite as much as you'd like, but he's slugging .512 and has 51 RBI.

How the voters are doing: Prince Fielder, Albert Pujols, and Derrek Lee are #1, 2, and 4 respectively - all are solid choices. Carlos Delgado (batting just .225) at #5 is not such a good choice. And Nomar at #3 may be the worst choice at any position in either league, given the depth of this position. He's slugging just .332, and his .648 OPS is last - that's right, last - among all starting first basemen (in either league). The Dodgers are planning to move him to third to make room for James Loney, which is a great move, and one that should have been made three months ago (if not last year).

Who I'm voting for: Prince Fielder.

Acceptable to vote for: You can't really go wrong voting for D-Lee or Howard, and you can never go wrong voting for Pujols. After that, it gets harder to justify voting for anybody else.

Second Base: Just as easy as catcher was. Orlando Hudson's having a good year, but Chase Utley is at another level. Utley's .320 BA, .399 OBP and .553 SLG all lead the position, as well as his 58 RBI. Dan Uggla and Kelley Johnson are all playing well, too, but you've gotta go with Utley.

How the voters are doing: Utley leads the way, with 1.3 million votes. Jeff Kent is in second place; he's doing pretty well, but nowhere near Utley. Craig Biggio (.279 OBP - just get to 3,000 hits already!) is third, somehow.

Who I'm voting for: Utley.

Acceptable to vote for: Nobody else. In an alternate universe, where Rickie Weeks is healthy and hitting well, maybe he at least challenges Utley, but right now there's nobody close.

Third Base: A really tight race between Miguel Cabrera and Chipper Jones. Jones has a slight edge in OPS (1.014 to .998), but Cabrera's done it over 75 more at-bats, so his counting stats are much higher. Milwaukee rookie Ryan Braun has done really well since his callup, but he hasn't played nearly as much as the first two guys. Aramis Ramirez and David Wright are both having pretty good years, but there just isn't really a case to be made for either of them over Cabrera or Chipper. (I honestly haven't looked at the totals yet, but I guarantee you that Wright's leading the voting, though.)

How the voters are doing: Hey, I was right! Not surprisingly, Wright leads the voting, with about 300,000 more votes than Cabrera. Chipper is third.

Who I'm voting for: Miguel Cabrera. He's hit extremely well over more at-bats than Chipper, which gives him the edge in my opinion.

Acceptable to vote for: I can't really argue much with Chipper, either. I guess one could make a case for Ramirez and Wright, but it would be hard to convince me.

Shortstop: Talk about a loaded position. Edgar Renteria, Jimmy Rollins, Hanley Ramirez, J.J. Hardy, and Jose Reyes are all great hitters at the toughest defensive position (plus Rafael Furcal, who's having a down year). And Troy Tulowitzki and Stephen Drew will probably jump into that group within the next year or two, if they continue to develop well. Christian Guzman is having a good year for the Nationals, though there's no way you can vote for him at a position this loaded. Hardy was easily the right choice through the first month and a half, but he's fallen off some since then; his OBP is a rather average .340, and his batting average isn't helping his cause (.285). Rollins is actually slugging exceptionally well this year (.514), but he also isn't getting on base much. It gets really hard to separate Renteria, Ramirez, and Reyes; Renteria's rate numbers are slightly better, but we're talking about very, very small differences here. Reyes has the most speed, followed by Renteria, and I think Reyes is the best fielder as well.

How the voters are doing: Reyes leads the voting, of course, although Hardy is pretty close behind him. Furcal is third, despite having a down year (lots of Dodgers seem to be doing well in the voting), and Rollins is fourth. Fifth? Oh my god, don't make me say it...it's none other than David Eckstein. That's right - 571,000 people think that David Eckstein is the most qualified shortstop to start the All-Star game. I can't even think of anything to say here. That's more votes than Ramirez or Renteria. Let's just move on.

Who I'm voting for: Reyes, just barely ahead of Ramirez and Renteria.

Acceptable to vote for: Ramirez and Renteria definitely, and Rollins and Hardy are also fine choices.

Outfield: Outfield in the NL is kinda tough. Matt Holliday has to be in - his .993 OPS is impressive anywhere, even at Coors. He's really underrated, but he is probably the best corner outfielder in the NL right now. Barry Bonds has 75 walks and a .498 OBP - he gets on base literally half the time he comes to bat. I don't care if he's likeable or not, that's extremely valuable. Picking a third OF is tricky. Ken Griffey Jr. actually has a .964 OPS, which surprised me; the Great American Ballpark is a hitter's park, but that's still good. Hunter Pence has OPSed .984 this year, but he was called up during the season, so he doesn't have as many plate appearances as the others. Alfonso Soriano started off really cold, but he's heated up lately. Adam Dunn is having a really good year amidst the trade rumors. Eric Byrnes is having a really good year; he's not an ASG candidate but I felt like pointing that out.

How the voters are doing: Beltran, Griffey, and Soriano are the starters as of today; Beltran's OPS is below .800, but the other two are fine choices. Bonds is fourth, but he's within 120,000 votes of Soriano. Andrew Jones is fifth despite having an absolutely atrocious year (.197 BA), and Holliday is sixth.

Who I'm voting for: Holliday definitely, Bonds definitely, and...crap, this is hard. I'll go with Griffey.

Acceptable to vote for: Hunter Pence, Dunn, Soriano, and probably a few others.

And, just for the hell of it, here are my ASG starting pitchers: Dan Haren in the AL, Jake Peavy in the NL. Now go vote!

All-Star Voting: American League

Just three days left until the All-Star voting closes...you can still vote on MLB.com. But don't do that just yet - take a minute to read through the following analysis of who you should vote for...(just the AL in this post)

Catcher: One of the easiest choices on the ballot...you pretty much have to go with Jorge Posada. He's second in OBP, to Joe Mauer, but he's first in BA, SLG, and OPS. And Mauer was hurt for pretty much the whole month of May. Victor Martinez does have a huge edge in homers and RBI, but Posada's still slugging better and RBI is a pretty meaningless statistic. Plus, Martinez is a terrible defensive catcher, and Posada is probably about average. Here's something kind of interesting - KC catcher John Buck has 13 homers, but only 26 RBI - obviously a function of the KC lineup. (He's actually second among catchers in HR despite having almost 100 less at-bats than V-Mart and the other top candidates.) Posada has won in the past just because he's a Yankee (like last year, when he somehow beat out the infinitely more deserving Joe Mauer), but this year he actually does deserve it.

How the voters are doing: For once, they actually haven't elected the Yankee...and they've gotten it wrong in doing so. Pudge Rodriguez holds more than a 200,000 vote edge on Posada, with both Varitek and Mauer close behind Jorge. Pudge isn't having a terrible year, but there isn't a single meaningful or even semi-meaningful category in which he leads Posada. Martinez is fifth, way behind the top four.

Who I'm voting for: Jorge Posada.

Acceptable to vote for: Victor Martinez, I guess - his offensive numbers are just about as good as Posada's. I can't really see voting for anybody else, given that Mauer got injured.

First Base: This one gets sort of tricky, because the game's in an NL park, so DHs like David Ortiz and Travis Hafner are on the ballot as first basemen. Carlos Pena's 1.026 OPS is very enticing, but he hasn't had as many plate appearances as some of the other guys, and besides, do you really want Carlos Pena starting in the All-Star game? Casey Kotchman's quietly putting up a great year, as he's third in OPS among true first baseman. Mark Teixeira was doing well, but he's hurt now. For a while, it looked like Kevin Youkilis was the right choice, but he's fallen off over the past couple weeks, and now has "only" a .920 OPS. That's good, because he's just a write-in candidate now that Ortiz is on the ballot, so it's not like there was any chance of him starting anyways. I'm not really sure I see any standouts here...Justin Morneau was having a pretty good year; he got hurt last Friday in a collision at home plate but it looks like he'll be back pretty soon. David Ortiz probably has the best numbers, including a 1.016 OPS, but you could really go with a lot of people here. Travis Hafner is having a surprisingly average year, OPSing just .838.

How the voters are doing: Pretty good. Ortiz leads, by a pretty large margin. Morneau is second, and he's done pretty well also. The Tigers must be pushing their guys pretty hard, because there's no way in hell Sean Casey belongs anywhere near the #3 spot - he's hitting just .289 with one homer, and his .730 OPS is 12th among starting first basemen. Typical Yankee bias shows up with Giambi in the top four despite not really doing all that well.

Who I'm voting for: David Ortiz. Plus, you get the comedy of him trying to play first base for the first three innings.

Acceptable to vote for: A long list here...Youkilis, Pena, Teixeira, Morneau, and Kotchman are all solid choices.

Second Base: This one's tough. There's nobody on this list I really want starting for me if I'm Jim Leyland. B.J. Upton has a huge lead in OPS, with an 80 point edge over anybody else at the position, but he's missed most of June with an injury. Plus, he's been pretty lucky to get the stats he has; he has struck out a ton, and he doesn't have enough power and doesn't walk enough to balance that out. He'll probably start a couple all-star games in the future if he stays at second base, as this is his first full season in the big leagues, but I have a hard time voting for him this year. The problem is that there isn't really another deserving candidate. Nobody at the position has good counting stats - Ian Kinsler leads the group with 14 homers, and he's the only one in double digits. Brian Roberts is second in OPS, and he's swiped 24 bases, which is an overrated statistic but it's still kind of notable. Dustin Pedroia's having a good year (3rd in OPS).

How the voters are doing: It's hard to do really poorly at this positino, because you can make a case for just about everybody. Placido Polanco leads by a fairly comfortable margin, which is a combination of the pro-Tigers and pro-batting average biases that appear in the voting. Polanco leads all 2Bs in batting average (.329), but that's pretty much his only skill. Robbie Cano is second (of course) despite having a pretty poor year. Pedroia's third and Upton is fifth, sandwiching the random Luis Castillo (.336 SLG, 12 RBI).

Who I'm voting for: I'm leaning towards Brian Roberts...he's probably got the best overall numbers.

Acceptable to vote for: Pretty much anybody, frankly. Except Luis Castillo. Upton, Pedroia, Kinsler, Polanco, and Aaron Hill are all reasonable candidates.

Third Base: The easiest vote on the ballot...it's gotta be Nick Punto, of course. Seriously, if you don't vote for A-Rod and his league-leading 1.140 OPS, you're crazy. Troy Glaus and Mike Lowell have been pretty good, also, but there's no rationale for not voting A-Rod.

How the voters are doing: A-Rod leads all AL vote-getters with over 2.5 million votes, and deservingly so. Lowell is second, Tigers 3B Brandon Inge is third.

Who I'm voting for: A-Rod. He's slugging .707!

Acceptable to vote for: Sorry, A-Rod is the only answer. Well, maybe Nick Punto.

Shortstop: With apologies to Jhonny Peralta and Brendan Harris, this is a two-man race. Carlos Guillen and Derek Jeter each are having good years, with OPSes over .900. Jeter has a slight edge in batting average, but Guillen has almost a 100 point edge in slugging percentage. AL shortstop used to be a loaded position, but A-Rod's move to third combined with Tejada's relatively poor year mean that there isn't a whole lot left.

How the voters are doing: Jeter #1, Guillen #2, Jeter has a big edge. But I absolutely love the fact that Julio Lugo is fifth. Over 500,000 people voted for a guy whose batting average is .191! His OPS is .541 (third-worst of any AL regular)! You don't think there's anything wrong with the voting?

Who I'm voting for: I'm going with Guillen. He's a better defender, too.

Acceptable to vote for: Jeter. And absolutely not Julio Lugo.

Outfield: Let's see...Magglio Ordonez has to be on anyone's ballot. His 1.096 OPS is a hundred points better than any other outfielder's, and is second in the league to A-Rod. He leads all OFs in all the rate stats (BA, OBP, SLG) and is second in RBI. Vladimir Guerrero is second in OPS (.989), with a pretty significant edge over anybody else. Vlad is also third in HRs and leds all OFs in RBI. Torii Hunter is quietly having a monster year - .306/.353/.557, with 15 HRs and 11 steals - in the last year of his contract; someone (probably Texas) is going to give him a lot of money this winter. Manny started off slowly, but he's gotten back to his usual self of late. Ichiro's still doing what he does best, and Alex Rios has 17 homers, most among OFS. Gary Sheffield is listed as an OF, although he's been primarily DHing this year; his .922 OPS deserves consideration. Curtis Granderson is slugging really well (also .557), although that 24:71 K/BB percentage is awfully ugly. Here's something interesting, though: Granderson has 14 triples so far this year. That puts him on pace for about 30 for the season, if he were to keep it up. Well, 30 triples would place him fourth on the all-time single-season list (the record is 36). And almost everybody on the list playhed in the dead-ball era or shortly thereafter, when triples were much more common. The leader post-WWII is Dale Mitchell (who?), with 23 triples in 1949. Lance Johnson's 21 in '96 are the most in the past 50 years.

How the voters are doing: Vlad #1, Magglio #2, Ichiro #3, with Manny just a handful of votes behind Ichiro and Hunter also in the running. Gary Sheffield (of course, another Tiger) is sixth.

Who I'm voting for: Magglio, Vlad, and Hunter. I dock Sheffield a few points for not really playing outfield.

Acceptable to vote for: Ichiro, Sheffield, Granderson, Manny, Rios, and Grady Sizemore are all reasonable selections. Lots of good outfielders in the AL.

That's all for the AL...I'll be back with the NL pretty soon.

Best Player?

Here's the current poll question on the front page of ESPN.com today:

Healthy and in his prime, which player would you want on your team?
-Barry Bonds
-Ken Griffey Jr.
-Alex Rodriguez

I thought about it for a second...and then for another couple minutes...and I still couldn't decide. I'm a little young to remember Griffey in his prime, but I know he was an outstanding player. Bonds' offensive numbers are unbelievable, but that was in an era (21st century) where lots of people were putting up great offensive numbers, and he was a bad defender (at a relatively easy defensive position), while the other two were excellent defenders at tough positions. Let's break this thing down, stat-wise, using a player's five best consecutive years as his "prime".

Barry Bonds: Bonds was a great player in the 90's, but according to his stats, his peak years were his 2000-2004 seasons. During these years, his average line was .341/.535/.782 (BA/OBP/SLG), which is absolutely ridiculous. For five years, he was getting on base more often than he was getting out. That's just amazing. His OPS for those five years - again, five whole years - was 1.317. I try to refrain from hyperbole, but I honestly don't think I'll see anyone string together five offensive seasons like that in my lifetime.

Young Bonds was a great defender, but 21st century Bonds was nothing close to that. During these peak years, Bonds was a combined -8 FRAA (Fielding Runds Above Average), which is actually a bit better than I thought. His baserunning skills were obviously almost gone by this time as well, but neither defect really comes close to cancelling out his hitting skills.

Let's look at some of the more advanced stats. His OPS+es from 2002, '01, and '04 are first, second, and third respectively all-time at 275, 262, and 260. (An OPS+ of 100 is league-average; the stat is adjusted for the league so it is comparable between eras.) And his 2003 OPS+ was 231, tied for 10th all-time. His 2000 OPS+ was "just" 191, good for 90th all-time, meaning that Bonds was in the top 100 for all five of his peak years. Neither A-Rod or Griffey have any seasons in the top 100. That's pretty good. Bonds' adjusted EqA was over .400 every year from 2001-2004, including two years above .450 ('02, '04). EqA takes into account all offensive contributions from a player, and is evaluated on the same scale as batting average; i.e., a .260 EqA is about average and a .300 EqA is roughly all-star caliber. So when a player posts a .456 EqA, like Bonds did in 2004, it means he's having possibly the greatest offensive season of all-time. Let's take a stat that includes defense as well: WARP3. WARP (Wins Above Replacement Player) takes into account all contributions by a player, including defense, and it is possibly the most complete measure of a player's value avaliable. Bonds' WARPs during his peak ranged from 11.7 to 16.2, meaning that, for those years, Bonds alone gave the Giants 12-16 more wins than a replacement player (i.e., a AAA player or a mediocre utility guy) would have.

Here's Bonds' Baseball Prospectus player card, where I got all the info from; all the stats I used were adjusted for all-time.

Ken Griffey Jr: Griffey is known as the best all-around player in the 90's, and that is probably an accurate label. We have to cheat a little bit for Griffey, as he was hurt in 1995, so I'm going to use 1993-1998, excluding '95, as his prime years. This does include the strike-shortened '94 season, but all the stats I'm using are rate statistics, so that shouldn't make a difference. His average stat line over those years was .304/.390/.635, which isn't really even comparable to Bonds' raw line. Griffey was playing in the rather spacious Kingdome and in a less hitter-friendly era, but his OPS+ numbers still don't really compare - a peak of 172 in '93.

Still, Griffey gets a lot of points for being a great defender at a very important defensive position (center field). His FRAA is less than I thought it would be (a combined +12 over those five years), but he still gets a lot of points for being above average at a position that is tough to play. This is kind of off-topic, but Griffey's defense has been awful since 2001 - a combined -75 since then.

Griffey's EqA over those five seasons was very consistant - a low of .325 in '98, and a high of .345 in '94. Those are great numbers - a five-year peak like that, combined with a couple other good seasons, should make you a hall-of-famer. But they aren't even in the same spectrum as Bonds' EqAs. If you look at WARP3, the numbers get closer, however. Because Griffey's defense is factored in, the two players are actually comperable - Griffey's numbers range from 10.5 to 12.6, with three of his five years being above 12. Those are five great seasons, but they're still pretty significantly less than Bonds'. Looking at the numbers, I can't find any way to justify choosing Griffey over Bonds.

A-Rod: A-Rod's 2007 may change things somewhat, but for now, his peak years are 2000-2004, ironically the same years as Bonds'. His average line: .304/.396/.593. Again great numbers, very similar to Griffey's, but nowhere close to Bonds. His OPS+ numbers are even less impressive, But remember, A-Rod was a shortstop (the toughest defensive position besides catcher) for the first four of these years, peaking at "only" 167 in 2000. A-Rod gets kind of unfairly hurt by this system because his 2004 season wasn't that great; if I was able to include his 2005 MVP season, all his numbers would go up. But at this point I'm kind of stuck with the system I arbitrarily made up.

However, you have to remember that A-Rod was a shortstop (the toughest defensive position besides catcher) for the first four of these years, and he was a great shortstop to boot. His combined FRAA for those four years: +31, including an amazing +15 in 2000, his last year in Seattle. (Random note: he was awful last year at third, with a -18 FRAA - that means he cost the Yankees almost two full wins with his glove. Random note #2: In 2003, the year before A-Rod came to the Bronx, he posted a +8 FRAA. Jeter posted a -23. Guess who moved to third base?)

A-Rod's EqAs are relatively uninspiring for those five years, trending downwards from a .346 in 2000. But WARP3 likes him much better, because of his outstanding defense. His low was 10.0 in 2004 (although he went on to post a stellar 12.9 the next year), but his 14.6 in 2000 was outstanding. Overall, here's the average WARP3 for these three players during their peak years:

Bonds: 14.3
Griffey: 11.7
A-Rod: 12.9

So, based on these numbers and the others, I have to go with Bonds #1, A-Rod #2, and Griffey #3, and it's actually not even that close. Sure, Bonds probably used steroids, but that doesn't really matter in this discussion (and how can you be positive the other two didn't?).

Naturally, here's how the voting looks: Griffey - 57%, A-Rod - 30%, Bonds - 13%. What did you expect?