Bonds begins HOF campaign

and for argument's sake, carew was a better-hitting second baseman than bagwell was a power-hitting first baseman. much, much better. so carew's overall value at the plate far surpasses bagwell.

 

and actually, it appears as though the great rob randall of the twins chased carew to first base in 1976.

 

You are welcome to your argument, but I don't see the position making up for the lack of power, not when Bagwell brought such a complete game to the field.

 

hey, i prefaced this conversation on who i would take if i was picking players if i owned an expansion team ... a young carew or a young bagwell. carew's numbers sure as to shit are a lot better than morgan's who some say was the best second baseman of all time.

your attention span seems to be lagging tonight. you been talking with boom or something? ; P

 

If these are the top two players on the board and I have the No. 1 pick in the expansion draft ... I'm picking Bagwell. Carew's not the type of hitter you can build your team around.

On the other hand, it is a lot easier to find a power-hitting first baseman. So if I have seven other decent guys at the other positions ... maybe I pick Carew just because his value as a great second baseman is higher than Bagwell's as a great first baseman.

If Carew had spent the latter half of his career at second base, he'd probably be among the top 10-15 second basemen of all time. Of course, he didn't ... which is a big part of the reason why I think his career value isn't as high as it otherwise would be.

 

Let's put this argument on a different stage. Suppose Rod isn't in the Hall and he and Bagwell were on the ballot at the same time. Who gets in first? I think #29 in a landslide.

 

if carew had spent the last half of his career at second base ... he's what, one of the top four guys at his position in the past 60 or so years with sandberg, morgan and alomar? i'm having a difficult time coming up with other names to add to the list.
shame he moved to first base, actually.

 

Agreed. My list would be:

1. Morgan
2. Alomar
3. Biggio
4. Carew
5. Sandberg
6. Mazeroski
7. Kent
8. Grich
9. Whitaker
10. Utley

 

good list. if carew played i'd raise him one, maybe two spots, and i'd also raise lou two, maybe three spots.
and i'd swap out utley with dave lopes ... but then again, my oldest's name is brooklyn. ; )

*EDIT - yeah, after further review, kent just had too many RBI to bump lou past him.

 

Maybe interesting that the fan comparison (batting) feature at Baseball Reference has Bagwell and Carew listed at #40 and #41 all-time.

And that Bagwell-Carew sounds like a piece of international trade legislation.

 

I kept up just fine. I just disagree with you.

 

Now? The only way Carew even has a shot at getting in first is guys leaving Bagwell off due to steroid accusations, which is probably why he isn't in already. Otherwise, even Hall of Fame voters have come around enough to stop overly inflating the value of batting average and realize that Bagwell was the far more productive hitter.