Jim Rice
Posted by Andy on December 26, 2007
Dan Shaughnessy used to be one of my favorite writers, be he certainly has changed over the years and is now just a mouthpiece for the Red Sox, given that he writes for the paper partially owned by the team. Remember last year when the Globe had a front-page story (front of the main section, not the sports section) about the wonderful Red Sox Travel Packages? It was nothing more than a huge advertisement.
Anyway, check out his column about Jim Rice's HOF candidacy right here. It's full of all the usual grandstanding, and is just about devoid of any real facts. I especially like how he mentions Tim Rice only to say that Rice was better, when by every available decent metric, Raines is actually quite superior.
The one thing that bothers me about all of this is that I now seem to agree with Curt Schilling about something, which I find disgusting.
December 26th, 2007 at 7:04 pm
Jim Rice led the league in Total Bases four times. Who else has done that? Besides ARod, only Hall of Famers have done it.
*8 times, Hank Aaron (1956-1957, 1959-1961, 1963, 1967, 1969)
*7 times, Rogers Hornsby (1917, 1920-1922, 1924-1925, 1929)
*6 times, Honus Wagner (1900, 1904, 1906-1909)
*6 times, Ty Cobb (1907-1909, 1911, 1915, 1917)
*6 times, Babe Ruth (1919, 1921, 1923-1924, 1926, 1928)
*6 times, Ted Williams (1939, 1942, 1946-1947, 1949, 1951)
*6 times, Stan Musial (1943, 1946, 1948-1949, 1951-1952)
*4 times, Dan Brouthers (1882-1883, 1886, 1892)
*4 times, Chuck Klein (1930-1933)
*4 times, Lou Gehrig (1927, 1930-1931, 1934)
*4 times, Jim Rice (1977-1979, 1983)
*4 times, Alex Rodriguez, (1996, 2001-2002, 2007)
December 26th, 2007 at 7:12 pm
Jim Rice led the league in Total Bases three times in a row. Who else has done that? Only Hall of Famers have done it.
*Honus Wagner, 4 (1906-1909)
*Ty Cobb, 3 (1907-1909)
*Chuck Klein, 4 (1930-1933)
*Rogers Hornsby, 3 (1920-1922)
*Joe Medwick, 3 (1935-1937)
*Johnny Mize, 3 (1938-1940)
*Hank Aaron, 3 (1959-1961)
*Jim Rice, 3 (1977-1979)
December 26th, 2007 at 7:30 pm
3 years does not a HOF career make.
December 26th, 2007 at 9:59 pm
Cheer up! He'd probably be disgusted to agree with you too! 🙂
December 26th, 2007 at 10:41 pm
Not too long ago I read "Whatever Happened To The Hall Of Fame" by Bill James (for the third time, one of my favorite books). James spends the better part of chapter comparing the careers of Jim Rice and Roy White. On the surface (before reading it) I thought to myself there is no comparison, Rice's career was more productive hands down. But James makes a very good argument for White. And after reading it Rice took a step back in the HOF debate in my mind because I NEVER thought of White as a HOFer. For the most part I try to look at a player's career & judge wheather or not he deserves to be enshrined on his own merrit as opposed to comparing him to other players in & out of the HOF. But James' comparison left a huge impression on me in this case.
Jack