BaseRunner Kills

Wednesday, September 10 2008 @ 11:30 AM EDT

Contributed by: Magpie

It's one of my favourite plays in baseball.

And it's always a big play. When an outfielder throws out someone, at a minimum he's turning an opposition base runner into an out. He's not retiring a hitter, he's removing someone who's already reached base and is therefore a threat to score. When an outfielder throws out a runner at home plate, it's the next best thing to actually taking a run off the scoreboard.

As it happens, the Blue Jays once employed the man who may well have possessed the finest outfield arm ever. Ever. In the history of the game. Not enough people understand this, and while we all knew while we were watching him play that Jesse Barfield had a remarkable arm, I don't think we fully understood quite how historically great he was.

In the updated edition of his Historical Baseball Abstract, Bill James presents the following little Data Table

                      BK   Innings  Rate
Chuck Klein          195   13,740   14.2
Jesse Barfield       162   11,547   14.0
Roy Cullenbine       100    7,268   13.8
Bob Johnson          208   15,302   13.6
Mel Ott              257   20.043   12.8
Roberto Clemente     266   20.755   12.8
Paul Waner           247   19,887   12.4
Ben Chapman          159   12,994   12.3
Dom DiMaggio         147   12,089   12.2
John Callison        175   14,997   11.7

It's simply a chart of BaseRunner Kills per 1000 innings (about 111 games). The list is confined to men born in the 20th century. This is sadly necessary. Outfielders who played before 1920 were able to throw out many, many more baserunners than a modern outfielder. With the scuffed dirty baseballs, and opposing hitters simply trying to put the ball in play, they could play much shallower than a modern outfielder. They could play shallow enough to field a ground ball and get the force at second base. Tris Speaker (449 career BaseRunner Kills, approximately 20 per 1000 innings) did it all the time. So you have to draw a line to eliminate all those outfielders active before 1920. It's too bad - one would like to know how Speaker would stack up under modern conditions (pretty damn well, I'm thinking - he was Tris Speaker, after all). Unfortunately this also counts out Bob Meusel, who was active after the Ruth Revolution but born in 1896. Meusel was universally regarded as having the best outfield arm of his time (the 1920s). Had he been listed here he would have come in third, just behind Klein and Barfield.

And as for Chuck Klein, there's something we need to know about his home field. This is the Baker Bowl in Philadelphia:

The right field line was just 270 feet from home plate, and the wall itself was 40 feet high - higher than the Green Monster in Fenway, with a 20 foot high screen on top.  The Phillies right-fielder played much, much closer to the infield than any modern outfielder. A modern right fielder takes up a position shading towards the right-centre alley - he's about 270 feet from home plate, and at least 75 feet from the wall. If Klein took up a position just 40 feet in front of the wall - well, he may have had a shorter throw to first base than the third baseman.

Klein did spend two seasons with the Cubs, and did enough to demonstrate that he did indeed have a good arm - with Chicago he threw out 20 runners in about 2145 innings - a rate of 9.32 per 1000 innings. But as a Phillie, Klein threw out 174 runners in about 11,583 innings - 15.02 per 1000 innings. There's obviously a pretty massive park illusion to account for here.

Klein's BaseRunner Kill rate as a Cub is a little bit better than Vladimir Guerrero's (Vlad is at 9.3 per 1000) and quite a bit better than Ichiro Suzuki's (7.0 per 1000). He's not quite as good as Larry Walker (10.3 per 1000). Klein had a fine arm, obviously. But Barfield's was much, much better. None of these other guys are even close to Barfield.

Only one current outfielder, by the way, active in the years since James published his book, is in a position to carve out a place on this list. That's Jeff Francoeur of the Braves, who has 56 BaseRunner Kills in just 4,632 innings. At 11.9 per 1000, he'd just edge John Callison off the Top 10.

One of the things that got me interested in looking into the subject was a passing remark made by Mike Green (I think - was it you, Mike?). Oddly enough, the subject had very little to with outfielders. Under discussion were the respective strengths and weaknesses of the Jays' two catchers, and I remember Mike (I think!) saying something to the effect that while Barajas had a better arm, Zaun was better at blocking the plate. And I thought - okay, that may be true, but for some reason I think Barajas is much better than Zaun at catching the long throw and making a play. So I was going to look into BaseRunner Kills at home plate, and find out how often each catcher was involved.

Well, I didn't do that! Sorry! I need to wait until the season is in the books, and Retrosheet gets updated! But I still wanted to find out where BaseRunner Kills happen. So I did, for the Blue Jays outfielders, anyway. And that brings us to our Data Tables!

Now it would have been fun to make these tables complete, just so you can chuckle at the very weird names you'd find at the bottom of these llists. Garth Iorg and Willie Upshaw in centre field? Yes, that happened. Domingo Cedeno and Dave Stieb in left? Who could forget!  Manuel Lee and Dave Collins in right? You're chuckling right now, aren't you.

But alas - it simply ain't worth the bother to format all those zeroes. So we'll stick with the 15 men who played the most at each of the three outfield positions.

These are the numbers for their careers as a Blue Jay. I've just sorted them by innings played. The final four columns give you which base each of these BaseRunner Kills seems to have taken place at (occasionally it's hard to decide!), along with the rate of BKs per 1000 innings.

First the left fielders:

	Player	  POS	G    INN   PO   BK  ERR  DP    PCT   1b  2b  3b	Home   BK per 1000
															
 1 George Bell	   LF  963  8279  1804  68   71  10   .963    3  31  10  25	 8.2
 2 Shannon Stewart LF  698  5909  1346  26   23   4   .984    1   8   6  11	 4.4
 3 Al Woods	   LF  523  4290  1072  30   30   5   .973    1  15   7   7	 7.0
 4 Joe Carter	   LF  389  3201   686  15   26   2   .964    2   4   4   5	 4.7
 5 Reed Johnson	   LF  398  2516   541  20    5   1   .991    0   8   7   5	 8.0
 6 F. Catalanotto  LF  314  2290   461  19    3   4   .994    3   6   4   6	 8.3
 7 Dave Collins	   LF  217  1709   435  16    5   4   .989    0   6   5   5	 9.4
 8 Candy Maldonado LF  207  1704   377  15    8   1   .980    0   7   3   5	 8.8
 9 Jose Cruz	   LF  183  1497   349  13    3   4   .992    0   3   1   8	 8.7
10 Barry Bonnell   LF  173  1085   263   7    4   0   .985    2   3   1   1	 6.5
11 Adam Lind	   LF   82   668   141   5    0   0  1.000    0   3   1   1	 7.5
12 Otto Velez	   LF   82   540   139   8    6   3   .961    0   4   0	  4	14.8
13 Robert Perez	   LF   83   509   118   3    2   0   .984    0   1   1   1	 5.9
14 Mookie Wilson   LF   60   488   112   2    3   0   .974    0   1   1   0	 4.1
15 Carlos Delgado  LF   58   454    90   3    2   0   .979    0   2   0   1	 6.6

Of the men who spent a decent amount of time in left, the two who threw out baserunners most frequently were Otto Velez in extremely limited time and Dave Collins. Dave Collins, of course, didn't throw very well at all. However, Collins had exceptional speed and outfielders with great speed often are able to throw out a great many base runners - they get to balls the runner does not expect him to reach, or they get to the ball much more quickly than the runner expects. Omar Moreno, the old Pirate and Yankee centre fielder (affectionately remembered as "Omar the Out-Maker"), had one of the weaker throwing arms of his time but in 1980 he managed more BaseRunner Kills than his teammate Dave Parker. In 1984, by then a Yankee, Moreno threw out three times as many baserunners as his teammate Dave Winfield, in considerably less playing time. Parker and Winfield, of course, were widely (and justifiably) regarded as having among the very finest throwing arms in the game while they were active. But this happens, and it's not to be mocked  - the BaseRunner Kill is a Big Play, always, and whether it's the speed of the leg or the strength of the arm that makes it possible doesn't much matter.

It's also true, of course, that runners didn't exactly hesitate before challenging the arms of Collins or Moreno.

The distribution by base for outs recorded is quite similar for left fielders and right fielders. The main difference is that left fielders don't get as many of their BaseRunner Kills at third base, which means that second base and home account for a somewhat larger proportion of their total BaseRunner Kills. This is mainly because nobody goes first to third on a ball that lands in front of a left fielder. Blue Jays left fielders have thrown out 17 men at first (5.5%), 129 at second (41.9%), 61 at third (19.8%), and 118 at home (38.3%). George Bell's numbers are quite typical - Shannon Stewart got a somewhat larger than expected share of his BaseRunner Kills at home, and I'll bet there was an outstanding relay from Alex Gonzalez on at least half of them.

And of course left fielders don't throw out nearly as many baserunners overall, because left field is where you put the guy who doesn't throw very well.

It's a little surprising to see how poorly Joe Carter does, although we may be seeing a small sample size effect as well as the fact that as he threw well enough to play right field, and posted quite decent numbers in this respect as a right fielder.) It may have been sufficient to discourage enemy baserunners from going for the extra base with the same abandon that they would have had if Stewart or Nixon was fielding the ball.

And in centre, we have:

    Player        POS    G  INN     PO  BK  ERR  DP    PCT   1b  2b  3b  Home   BK per 1000
 1 Lloyd Moseby    CF 1222 10436  3087  52   46   8   .986    3  23  13  13      5.0
 2 Vernon Wells    CF  945  8131  2178  45   16   9   .993    3  16  11  15      5.5
 3 Devon White     CF  650  5631  1809  33   20   7   .989    2  12  11   8      5.9
 4 Jose Cruz       CF  520  4460  1219  26   14   4   .989    3   7   8   8      5.8
 5 Rick Bosetti    CF  361  3109  1040  38   21   5   .981    1  13  15   9     12.2 
 6 Otis Nixon      CF  227  1971   595   6    3   2   .995    1   1   4   0      3.0
 7 Mookie Wilson   CF  160  1405   406   6    3   3   .993    0   2   1   3      4.3 
 8 Barry Bonnell   CF  141  1089   314   8    9   2   .973    0   5   1   2      7.3
 9 Bob Bailor      CF  105   834   266  14    9   7   .969    0   2   6   6     16.8
10 Shannon Stewart CF  109   825   221   4    5   1   .978    0   1   1   2      4.8
11 Jacob Brumfield CF   98   736   213   6    4   0   .982    0   1   2   3      8.1
12 Gary Woods      CF   61   510   160   5    1   0   .994    0   0   3   2      9.8
13 Junior Felix    CF   52   444   120   6    1   2   .992    2   2   1   1     13.5
14 Reed Johnson    CF   64   440   115   3    0   1  1.000    1   0   2   0      6.8
15 Jesse Barfield  CF   65   414   139   7    1   3   .993    0   1   2   4     16.9
This is our first encounter with the wonder of Bob Bailor, whose ability to rack up the BaseRunner Kills was quite otherworldly. Bailor spent four seasons in Toronto, and played all three outfield positions - he was more or less the regular right-fielder in 1979 and 1980, and a super-sub the rest of the time. He also accumulated a little more than 100 games in centre, although he never played more than 47 games there in a single season. Bailor had both of the ingredients that help a fielder throw out baserunners: a strong, accurate arm and good speed. He also had a couple of things going for him that Jesse Barfield, say, didn't have. One was the element of surprise - for more than half of his games as an outfielder, he was a guy filling in rather than the regular. Backups on terrible teams don't carry reputations around the league. The other factor, of course, was that the opposition during the years 1977 through 1980 had a zillion baserunners, advancing merrily from base to base. The Law of Large Numbers says you're going to throw some of them out - there were days when it was more likely than the pitcher retiring a hitter.

This also helps account for the tremendous showing given here by Rick Bosetti, who was indeed a fine defensive player who ran and threw well, and also had no shortage of runners to try to erase.

Uniquely among the three outfield positions is the fact that centre fielders throw out roughly the same number of people at second base, third base, and home plate. This is not true for the other two outfield positions, as we've already seen for the left fielders. But as a group, Blue Jays centre-fielders have thrown out 17 men at first (6.4%), 96 at second (36.2%), 87 at third (32.8%), and 82 at home (30.9%).

Finally, in right:

    Player        POS   G    INN   PO   BK  ERR  DP    PCT   1b  2b  3b  Home   BK per 1000
                                                            
 1 Jesse Barfield  RF  957  7776  1987  110  41  36   .981   11  38  20  41     14.1
 2 Shawn Green     RF  569  4681  1130   43  17  14   .986    4  17   9  13      9.2 
 3 Alexis Rios     RF  517  4202   923   35  10   8   .990    1   9   6  19      8.3
 4 Joe Carter      RF  440  3775   839   33  17   5   .981    3  13  10   7      8.7
 5 Raul Mondesi    RF  307  2700   583   26  17   5   .973    3  10   5   8      9.6
 6 Bob Bailor      RF  250  1942   491   32  10   8   .981    2   9  11  10     16.5
 7 Junior Felix    RF  185  1561   370   14  16   1   .960    1   7   3   3      9.0
 8 Reed Johnson    RF  197  1475   304   12   5   2   .984    0   6   4   2      8.1
 9 Barry Bonnell   RF  160  1225   285   14   7   2   .977    1   5   4   4     11.4
10 Otto Velez      RF  152  1169   286   10   5   3   .983    1   4   1   4      8.6
11 Lloyd Moseby    RF  112   939   228    8   3   0   .987    1   4   0   3      8.5
12 George Bell     RF  114   886   209    6   5   2   .977    0   1   1   4      6.8
13 Orlando Merced  RF   96   827   190   10   3   4   .985    3   4   1   2     12.1
14 Rick Leach      RF   98   600   137    3   2   0   .986    1   1   0   1      5.0
15 Hosken Powell   RF   98   597   160    2   3   0   .982    0   1   0   1      3.3
Bailor, again - while his work often gathers a bunch of small samples, in 1979 he played 113 games in RF and gunned down 15 baserunners. Barfield himself only tops that rate of eliminating baserunners once. Bailor's most remarkable performance came in one of his small sample seasons - in 1980, he threw out 6 baserunners from right field in just 208 innings, which is beyond phenomenal.

Barfield, of course, has the best career numbers of the men who played a few hundred games here. By a mile, and then some. While Barfield ran well enough to play centre field, Jesse's special gift was the strength and accuracy of his arm, and his remarkable totals on the long throws, to third and home, testifies to that. He completely blows away Raul Modesi, who did a very good job of throwing out enemy baserunners while he was a Blue Jay - Mondesi's 9.6 BaseRunner Kills per 1000 innings is excellent (slightly better than his career average of 9.0 per 1000 innings). It's better than Vlad, better than Ichiro, better than almost any active outfielder in the game today.

Overall, Toronto right fielders have thrown out 39 men at first base (9.8%), 157 (39.6%) at second. 93 (23.5%) at third , and 146 (36.9%) at home. Almost all BaseRunner Kills at first base are the second half of a double play - a runner in motion gets doubled off when the outfielder catches the ball in the air. I noticed only once a Jays outfielder throwing out the batter at first base, the old 9-3 groundout - it was Orlando Merced, by the way, although it's possible I missed another one or two. Anyway, right fielders make this play far more often, simply because they're much closer to first base - Barfield, with his combination of speed and arm strength naturally makes this play more often than anyone else as well.
 
Finally, here are the single season numbers for each outfield position. This list actually has some pretensions to completeness - it includes everyone who played at least 70 games at one of the three outfield spots in a season, and the seasons are ranked in order of Frequency of BaseRunner Kills. 

        Player         POS    G     INN    PO     A   ERR  DP    PCT    1b   2b   3b  Home     BK per 1000
                                                         
2006    F. Catalanotto  LF    101   760    140   10    0    3   1.000    2    1    3    4       13.2
1986    George Bell     LF    147  1297    268   17   10    1    .966    1    6    5    5       13.1
1987    George Bell     LF    148  1267    249   15   11    2    .960    0    8    2    5       11.8
2006    Reed Johnson    LF    100   635    129    7    1    0    .993    0    1    4    2       11.0
1992    Candy Maldonado LF    129  1123    257   12    7    1    .975    0    6    2    4       10.7
1983    Dave Collins    LF    111   827    239    8    3    1    .988    0    2    3    3        9.7
1985    George Bell     LF    157  1375    318   13   11    3    .968    2    5    1    6        9.5
1984    Dave Collins    LF    106   882    196    8    2    3    .990    0    4    2    2        9.1
1981    Al Woods        LF     77   663    180    6    5    0    .974    0    3    1    2        9.0
1979    Al Woods        LF    127  1059    250    9    9    2    .966    0    7    2    0        8.5
2007    Adam Lind       LF     80   651    137    5    0    0   1.000    0    3    1    1        7.7
1996    Joe Carter      LF    115   935    165    7    7    1    .961    1    2    2    2        7.5
1977    Al Woods        LF    107   871    206    6    7    1    .968    1    2    2    1        6.9
2005    Reed Johnson    LF    118   590    134    4    1    0    .993    0    2    1    1        6.8
1980    Al Woods        LF     88   756    206    5    3    1    .986    0    3    0    2        6.6
1995    Joe Carter      LF    116   943    226    6    7    1    .971    1    2    2    1        6.4
1988    George Bell     LF    149  1271    251    8   15    1    .945    0    2    1    5        6.3
2001    Shannon Stewart LF    142  1216    257    7    5    0    .981    0    4    2    1        5.8
2005    F. Catalanotto  LF    111   761    163    4    0    0   1.000    0    2    0    2        5.3
2000    Shannon Stewart LF    136  1171    299    6    2    2    .993    0    3    1    2        5.1
2007    Reed Johnson    LF     70   503    108    2    0    0   1.000    0    1    0    1        4.0
1998    Shannon Stewart LF    110   843    207    3    5    0    .977    0    0    2    1        3.6
2002    Shannon Stewart LF     99   861    190    3    2    1    .990    0    1    0    2        3.5
1989    George Bell     LF    134  1188    257    4   10    1    .963    0    1    1    2        3.4
1990    George Bell     LF    106   922    224    3    5    1    .978    0    3    0    0        3.3
1982    Barry Bonnell   LF     98   624    157    2    2    0    .988    0    1    1    0        3.2
1999    Shannon Stewart LF    140  1207    244    3    5    1    .980    1    0    1    1        2.5


1978    Rick Bosetti    CF    135  1187    415   16    6    1    .986    1    2    8    5       13.5
1979    Rick Bosetti    CF    162  1386    463   18   13    4    .974    0   11    5    2       13.0
1983    Lloyd Moseby    CF    147  1221    399   11    7    1    .983    0    5    4    2        9.0
2005    Vernon Wells    CF    155  1358    351   12    0    4   1.000    2    3    0    7        8.8
1995    Devon White     CF     99   862    261    7    3    0    .989    0    3    3    1        8.1
2002    Vernon Wells    CF    146  1240    358   10    2    1    .995    0    3    4    3        8.1
1999    Jose Cruz       CF     97   787    248    6    3    1    .988    1    1    2    2        7.6
1998    Jose Cruz       CF    103   871    239    6    4    1    .984    1    1    1    3        6.9
1992    Devon White     CF    152  1307    443    9    7    2    .985    0    6    1    2        6.9
1984    Lloyd Moseby    CF    155  1355    470    8    4    2    .992    0    3    1    4        5.9
1981    Lloyd Moseby    CF     80   687    224    4    4    0    .983    0    2    1    1        5.8
1991    Devon White     CF    156  1384    439    8    1    2    .998    0    0    6    2        5.8
2000    Jose Cruz       CF    162  1423    407    8    3    1    .993    1    2    3    2        5.6
1987    Lloyd Moseby    CF    153  1311    294    7    6    1    .980    1    3    2    1        5.3
1985    Lloyd Moseby    CF    152  1326    391    7    8    1    .980    0    3    1    3        5.3
1993    Devon White     CF    145  1265    399    6    3    2    .993    1    2    1    2        4.7
1986    Lloyd Moseby    CF    147  1292    371    6    6    1    .984    0    3    1    2        4.6
1996    Otis Nixon      CF    125  1079    342    5    2    2    .994    1    1    3    0        4.6
2004    Vernon Wells    CF    131  1135    327    5    1    0    .997    0    2    1    2        4.4
2001    Jose Cruz       CF    133  1168    270    5    3    1    .989    0    2    2    1        4.3
1990    Mookie Wilson   CF    133  1170    351    5    3    2    .992    0    2    1    2        4.3
2007    Vernon Wells    CF    148  1279    321    5    3    0    .991    0    2    1    2        3.9
1994    Devon White     CF     98   812    267    3    6    1    .978    1    1    0    1        3.7
1982    Lloyd Moseby    CF    145  1163    358    4    2    0    .995    0    2    2    0        3.4
2006    Vernon Wells    CF    150  1290    332    4    4    3    .988    1    1    1    1        3.1
1989    Lloyd Moseby    CF    120  1051    284    3    4    1    .986    1    1    1    0        2.9
2003    Vernon Wells    CF    161  1416    381    3    4    0    .990    0    2    1    0        2.1
1988    Lloyd Moseby    CF    117   968    278    2    5    1    .982    1    1    0    0        2.1
1997    Otis Nixon      CF    102   892    253    1    1    0    .996    0    0    1    0        1.1

1983    Jesse Barfield  RF    118   873    212   17    8    4    .966    1    5    3    8       19.5
1979    Bob Bailor      RF    113   850    197   15    3    2    .986    0    5    4    6       17.6
1985    Jesse Barfield  RF    147  1290    328   21    4    7    .989    1    6    5    9       16.3
1984    Jesse Barfield  RF     79   648    177   10    9    5    .954    4    3    2    1       15.4
1982    Jesse Barfield  RF    136   973    216   14    9    4    .962    1    2    3    8       14.4
1991    Joe Carter      RF    101   871    191   12    3    2    .985    2    4    2    4       13.8
2001    Raul Mondesi    RF    149  1318    263   18    8    2    .972    0    8    3    7       13.7
1986    Jesse Barfield  RF    147  1297    335   17    3    7    .992    1    7    4    5       13.1
1987    Jesse Barfield  RF    153  1250    313   16    3    3    .991    1    6    1    8       12.8
1997    Orlando Merced  RF     96   827    190   10    3    4    .985    3    4    1    2       12.1
1998    Shawn Green     RF    128  1080    235   13    6    4    .976    3    4    3    3       12.0
2004    Alexis Rios     RF    108   943    217   11    2    4    .991    0    2    1    8       11.7
1980    Lloyd Moseby    RF     84   709    168    8    3    0    .983    1    4    0    3       11.3
1995    Shawn Green     RF    109   867    209    9    6    3    .973    0    3    2    4       10.4
1978    Bob Bailor      RF    102   874    229    9    7    3    .971    1    3    5    0       10.3
1996    Shawn Green     RF    127   991    254   10    2    3    .992    0    5    2    3       10.1
1989    Junior Felix    RF     86   701    186    7    7    0    .965    0    4    1    2       10.0
1992    Joe Carter      RF    123  1044    247   10    8    2    .970    1    4    4    1        9.6
1988    Jesse Barfield  RF    132  1053    294    9    4    4    .987    1    5    1    2        8.5
1990    Junior Felix    RF     99   860    184    7    9    1    .955    1    3    2    1        8.1
2007    Alexis Rios     RF    147  1250    243   10    5    1    .981    0    3    0    7        8.0
1977    Otto Velez      RF     78   625    140    5    4    1    .973    1    3    0    1        8.0
2003    Reed Johnson    RF     71   532     88    4    3    1    .968    0    2    1    1        7.5
2006    Alexis Rios     RF    124   953    218    7    1    2    .996    1    2    3    1        7.3
1993    Joe Carter      RF     96   825    183    6    4    0    .979    0    2    3    1        7.3
2005    Alexis Rios     RF    138  1056    245    7    2    1    .992    0    2    2    3        6.6
2000    Raul Mondesi    RF     96   831    202    5    7    2    .967    2    2    1    0        6.0
1994    Joe Carter      RF    110   945    202    4    2    1    .990    0    3    1    0        4.2
1984    George Bell     RF     90   717    168    3    5    1    .972    0    0    1    2        4.2
1999    Shawn Green     RF    152  1333    341    5    1    1    .997    1    3    1    0        3.8
Happy birthday, Liam! You da Man!

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