Are there any players from your childhood that you thought were the same player or is that just me?

I always thought Craig Monroe and Marcus Thames were the same guy for some reason.

its just you

I always confused Kenny Lofton and (insert random Hall of Fame player here).

Weird, huh?

Lou Brock?

Sure. Why not.

No. But I'm not dumb.

That said, BL will insist that I confused Edgar Martinez and Bernie Williams when I simply said "Both guys are .300 hitters with 25 homers and 100 RBI." But BL doesn't like to let facts get in the way.

If you're comfortable with massive generalizations maybe that's true...

But Edgar's lifetime AVG is 15 points higher than Bernie's. .300 is a very rough approximation for Edgar. And the fact that Edgar walked quite a bit more often and hit quite a few more doubles are probably somewhat relevant as well.

Of course, Bernie played defense.

On simsports chat board, I'm pretty comfortable with most everything.

Do you disagree that "Both guys are .300 hitters with 25 homers and 100 RBI" doesn't apply?

This:

Quote post by dahsdebater on 11/30/2012 9:02:00 PM:

Posted by MikeT23 on 11/30/2012 8:29:00 PM (view original):
I haven't tried to convince you. If you think a DH with 22 OPS+ is worth more than a CF, I'm not sure you understand baseball. So why would I bother attempting to convince you of anything?

It's not just 22 OPS+, maybe you don't have a strong enough understanding of the history of baseball to realize that. 147 OPS+ is elite. It's tied for 41st all-time. The guys tied with him there are Jim Thome, Ryan Braun (who knows what will happen with that number at this point), Sam Thompson, Willie McCovey, Mike Schmidt, and Willie Stargell. The 4 eligible players from that group are all already in the hall. And again, it puts him in the top 50 all time.

125 OPS+ is MUCH more marginal. It's tied for 233rd all time. A couple of the guys at that number are impressive - Yogi Berra, Ron Santo, George Sisler. Some of the others are Rick Monday, J. D. Drew, and Josh Willingham. Any of those guys sound like Hall of Famers to you?

You can call it a difference of 22 points of OPS+ and call that small. I would argue that 20% of a league average batting line is actually quite substantial, it's not 22 points of OPS but 22 points of OPS+, which is actually pretty huge. But regardless of your opinion on that, I'd say the difference between 41st all-time and 233rd all-time speaks for itself. I'd think the difference between the worst guys with an equivalent OPS+ being Sam Thompson and Ryan Braun instead of Josh Willingham and Leon Durham speaks volumes as well.

Of course, you probably won't read this anyway, it's too many words for you...

A better question would be were there players from your childhood that you grew up believing were great players but now realize were nothing special at all?

When I was growing up and first started watching baseball, I thought Bobby Bonds was the greatest player ever. You could see all five tools in action just about every day. Much better than that Mays guy who was staggering around the bases...

I was stunned to learn later that Bonds had the top two strikeout totals of all time (since surpassed), and that Mays was really one of the best players ever, just in the twilight (or sunset) of his career.

Strikeouts are just outs. Ask BL.

But, yeah, I thought the Bonds for Murcer trade was a steal for the Yankees. Maybe not so much.

Posted by edsortails on 6/8/2016 3:18:00 PM (view original):
A better question would be were there players from your childhood that you grew up believing were great players but now realize were nothing special at all?

Bill Lee. He had such an 'aura' about him when I was a teenager because of his personality. Truth is though he was pretty much an average pitcher who threw a lot of innings on a team that scored a lot of runs. He'll always be the Spaceman though.

Posted by MikeT23 on 6/8/2016 4:52:00 PM (view original):
Strikeouts are just outs. Ask BL.

But, yeah, I thought the Bonds for Murcer trade was a steal for the Yankees. Maybe not so much.

Someone bookmark mike's first sentence. It's not everyday that he is right about something.