Scholarship table
Strange season. Seems like every division has a team that looked like solid playoff contenders that really lost ground in the 2nd half (Blue Jays, Tigers, A's, Braves, Brewers, Giants, though it looks like the Tigers, A's and Giants are going to hang on at least for the wild card game).My condolences to you Brewers fans. No worse or more helpless sports fan feeling than than when your baseball team seems to lose a game in the standings every day in late August/September. Congrats to Chico's for the Angels. If I had to pick a World Series I'd say Angels-Nats, with the Orioles and Dodgers as best alternatives. Angels-Dodgers or Nats-O's would be great area grudge matches. There's even an outside chance of an A's-Ginats Series. Not to start another 5 page argument, the baseball playoffs are a real crapshoot because of the nature of the sport, and once you get to the postseason, everybody has a pretty good chance.
A little harsh but...yeah...
A little? Way too harsh. Sure Jeter is overrated, the same way Ripken was in Baltimore and Puckett was in Minnesota and Gwynn was in San Diego and Ortiz is in Boston. Of course the media gushing over him is over the top. He's a first ballot Hall of Famer who played for great teams throughout a 20 year career in New York City who had some iconic moments in some very big games. He is the perfect storm of excessive hyping. But all that hype is still grounded in the fact that he was a great player. (Just perhaps not as great as he's being made out to be.)
However, statistics deem him to not be a 'great' player. A good player at best.He's not a first ballot hall of famer if had the same career in any other city. Hell, he wouldn't have played this long in any other city.
I would say you are wrong on all counts. Not sure what statistics you're looking at. 3,461 hits (6th all-time)1,922 runs (10th all-time).309 Lifetime batting average95.2 Offensive WAR (20th all-time) - He actually has negative defensive WAR (meaning he was below a replacement level defensive SS), which is the biggest knock against him.He was still supplying well above average offensive value for a shortstop in 2011 (.297) and 2012 (.316, 99 runs, led MLB with 216 hits). He was hurt most of 2013, but you'd be hard-pressed to find a team that wouldn't have let him play and play a lot this season if it were one of their guys. Look at the last seasons of other Hall of Famers. Pretty much all of them were below average players their last season or two. Jeter hasn't hung on longer after losing productivity than most players of his stature. The Yankees let him stay at SS too long, I'll grant you that.Anyway, all of the above would make him a no-doubt first ballot Hall of Famer regardless of where he played. I would like to point out that I am a Red Sox fan and as such I pretty much hate Derek Jeter.
Compare him to the era he played in, he's a good player. Keep the counting stats. Runs? Really, runs? Worthless stat.
Good to see Yankee & Red Sox fans can come to an agreement from time-to-time. Fans who think he's not a hall-of-famer is code for wish he was "my" shortstop for the last 19 seasons.
Robin Yount was a first ballot Hall of Famer. Jeter should be too. However Robin Yount didn't get this completely undeserved over-the-top retirement treatment that Yount did. Yankee fans have trouble keeping this stuff in context.
I found this. Derek Jeter vs. Hall of Fame shortstopshttp://www.newsday.com/sports/baseball/yankees/derek-jeter-vs-hall-of-fame-shortstops-1.8899728Updated July 29, 2014 12:49 PMBy PHIL D'ABBRACCIO Derek Jeter will retire at the end of the 2014 season. How will his career numbers compare with the 23 Hall of Famers who played at least 500 games at shortstop? Using a cumulative ranking of the players' career WAR, batting average, home runs, on-base percentage and stolen bases compared to one another's, here is how they stack up, in true countdown order. (Players were ranked 1-24 based on their stats in each category, then we added up all the rankings.)
Forget Jeter, as a Sox fan im really going to miss Konerko. For the first time I got to that age where my favorite players that I grew up watching are retiring.
And Jeter gets a walkoff hit in his last game at Yankee stadium. Like him or not, you gotta admit the guy has a flare for the dramatic.
The Commissioner's office Hollywood could not have scripted that any better.