Book Review - High and Tight: Hank Greenberg Confronts Anti-Semitism in Baseball

Tigers first baseman Hank Greenberg was one of baseball's premiere sluggers in the 1930s and 1940s.  He was a two-time Most Valuable Player Award winner and still holds the American League record with 183 Runs Batted In.  His accomplishments earned him election to the Hall of Fame in 1956.

Greenberg was also the first Jewish superstar in American Professional Sports.  His Jewish heritage earned him the admiration of the Jewish community in America.  However, others inside and outside the game were not always as respectful.  For example, when he refused to play on Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement, it was not well received by the Detroit press or by fans.

In the e-book "High and Tight: Hank Greenberg Confronts Anti-Semitism in Baseball", baseball writer and historian Ray Robinson details the anti-semitism encountered by Greenberg as a player.  He writes about the many individuals who made Greenberg's life in Detroit difficult.  Among them were Henry Ford, the founder of the Ford Motor Company, and Father Charles Coughlin, a Catholic Priest in suburban Detroit.  Most revealing were Mr. Robinson's accounts of opposing players who hurled insults at Greenberg, especially in the 1934 and 1935 World Series.

Through it all, Greenberg's performance on the field did not seem to be affected.  If anything, he claimed that the anti-semitic sentiment of opponents challenged him to be a better player: "Being one of some two million Jews in America, among 100 million Gentiles, became a special responsibility for me.  When some son of a bitch called me a filthy name, I couldn't fail to make good, and when I hit a home run, I felt that I was hitting it against Hitler."  In general though, Greenberg did not react angrily to opponents hatred and instead carried himself with grace and dignity on and off the field.

At ninety-one years old, Mr. Robinson has been in the business of baseball writing for a long time.  He is the author of several baseball biographies including books on Lou Gehrig, Christy Mathewson and Stan Musial.  His writing also appears frequently in the New York Times.  High and Tight is a fairly brief e-book, but it's informative and well written.  I had read a lot about Greenberg previously, but there were still several incidents in the book which I had not heard about before.  If you have an interest in baseball history or Jewish history in America, then you should find the book worthwhile at an inexpensive price ($1.99 at Amazon). 

You can learn more about the book here or you can go directly to Amazon.

Best Pitching Rotations Ever

Last year, I used the Baseball-Reference WAR statistic to determine the best infields and outfields in the history of baseball.  Now, I'm going to attempt to do the same thing with pitching rotations.  Pitching is more difficult for a couple of reasons.  In any pitching analysis, there is the challenge of separating run prevention into pitching and fielding.  Lots of statistics have been proposed over the years - ERA, Pitching Runs, FIP, SIERA, WAR, etc.  All are useful but none are perfect or even close to perfect. 

A historical comparison of pitching rotations is even trickier because of the changing use of pitchers over time.  Starting pitchers used to pitch a lot more innings in the early 1900's compared to today where they share a great deal of the workload with relievers.  Determining the quality of a team's starting rotation is an art as well as a science, but when looking at every team between 1901-2011, it's useful to have a formula.  So, I'm going to use the Baseball-Reference Wins Above Replacement (rWAR) system.  This won't give us a definitive leader board, but it is as good a system as any. 

The rWAR statistic was developed by Sean Smith, now a statistician for a major league team.    It is an estimate of the number of wins a pitcher is worth over a replacement level pitcher (e.g Brad Penny in 2011).  For example, Tigers ace Justin Verlander had 8.6 WAR last year, so he was worth an estimated nine wins more than a pitcher such as Penny.    The rWAR metric is based on a pitcher's innings, ERA and league average ERA.  It also adjusts for the estimated runs saved by the defense behind a pitcher as well as the pitcher's home park.   A very accessible explanation of the measure can be found at Beyond The Boxscore. 

Most of my analysis uses a database purchased from Mr. Smith a couple of years ago.  The data are now housed at Baseball-Reference.  There may be a few small discrepancies between the old database numbers I'm using and Baseball-Reference due to recent upgrades of the system, but nothing that should significantly change the conclusions.  By the way, the r in rWAR stands for "Rally" which was Sean's screen name. 

Now that we've established that rWAR is the statistic of choice, the next step is to develop a set of criteria qualifying a staff as one of the best.  Because five-man rotations have not always been used, four-man rotations will be selected.  I wanted each of the four pitchers in a rotation to have some level of both quantity and quality so the following criteria were chosen for each pitcher: at least 20 starts, 162 innings pitched and two rWAR. 

The top quartets of all time according to rWAR and the stated qualifications are listed in Table 1 below.  The best rotation was the 1912 Boston Red Sox with 24.1 rWAR.  That foursome was headed by right-hander Smoky Joe Wood (9.6 rWAR) who posted a 1.91 ERA in 344 innings.  Other top starters on that team were Buck O'Brien (5.3 rWAR), Ray Collins (5.1) and Hugh Bedient (4.1).

 Table 1: Best Starting Rotations by Baseball-Reference WAR, 1901-2011

Year	Team	Pitcher 1	WAR	Pitcher 2	WAR	Pitcher 3	WAR	Pitcher 4	WAR	Total
1912	BOS	Smoky Joe Wood	9.6	Buck O'Brien	5.3	Ray Collins	5.1	Hugh Bedient	4.1	24.1
1946	DET	Hal Newhouser	9.0	Dizzy Trout	7.2	Virgil Trucks	3.9	Fred Hutchinson	3.8	23.9
1969	CHN	Bill Hands	8.8	Fergie Jenkins	7.6	Ken Holtzman	4.7	Dick Selma	2.7	23.8
1909	CHN	Mordecai Brown	8.7	Orval Overall	7.1	Ed Reulbach	5.5	Jack Pfiester	2.3	23.6
1956	CLE	Early Wynn	8.2	Herb Score	7.6	Bob Lemon	5.4	Mike Garcia	2.4	23.6
1967	PHI	Jim Bunning	8.4	Chris Short	6.6	Rick Wise	3.7	Larry Jackson	3.6	22.3
1985	NYN	Dwight Gooden	11.7	Ron Darling	4.4	Sid Fernandez	3.7	Ed Lynch	2.4	22.2
1966	LAN	Sandy Koufax	10.8	Don Sutton	4.3	Claude Osteen	3.7	Don Drysdale	3.2	22.0
1949	DET	Virgil Trucks	7.2	Hal Newhouser	5.9	Fred Hutchinson	4.4	Ted Gray	3.5	21.0
1991	ATL	Tom Glavine	7.4	John Smoltz	4.7	Steve Avery	4.5	Charlie Leibrandt	4.3	20.9
1913	NY1	Christy Mathewson	6.8	Rube Marquard	5.1	Jeff Tesreau	5.0	Al Demaree	4.0	20.9
1968	SLN	Bob Gibson	11.9	Ray Washburn	4.0	Nelson Briles	2.5	Steve Carlton	2.5	20.9
1997	ATL	Greg Maddux	7.3	Tom Glavine	5.0	John Smoltz	4.5	Denny Neagle	4.1	20.9
1901	BSN	Vic Willis	7.2	Bill Dinneen	5.1	Kid Nichols	4.9	Togie Pittinger	3.6	20.8
1987	KCA	Bret Saberhagen	7.0	Charlie Leibrandt	5.5	Mark Gubicza	4.6	Danny Jackson	3.6	20.7

The second best staff was the 1946 Detroit Tigers with 23.9 rWAR.  They were led by Hall-of-Fame southpaw Hal Newhouser (9.0 rWAR).  Prince Hal had a league-leading 1.94 ERA in 293 innings and earned his second consecutive MVP that year.  Other major contributors were Dizzy Trout (7.2), Virgil Trucks (3.9) and Fred Hutchinson (3.8).  The same cast except for Ted Gray replacing Trout finished ninth with with 21.0 rWAR in 1949.  

 In a later post, I'll concentrate just on the Tigers listing their best rotations of all time.

Justin Verlander Wins Another One

On Friday, Scripps Howard asked a long list of celebrities to give their Super Bowl predictions.  This was Justin Verlander's prediction:

JUSTIN VERLANDER, AL MVP, Cy Young Award winner, Detroit Tigers: New York, 21-17. 

The man can do no wrong. 

Detroit Tigers Top 20 Seasons: #1 1968

In reviewing the history of the Detroit Tigers, I often think about the best seasons to be a Tigers fan.  So, I am writing a series of posts listing the top 20 seasons in Tigers history.  There is no specific formula for determining the best seasons, but there are some criteria which I consider carefully.  Playoff appearances, especially those leading to world championships are, of course, important.  Team dominance as measured by winning percentage and run differential also carries a lot of weight.  

While most of the teams on the list did win a lot of games, this is not simply a ranking of the best teams statistically.  Sometimes, a non-winning season stands out because of great individual achievements or because the team was unique in some way.  I wanted every decade to be represented and since the Tigers have had a couple of poor decades, this was a challenge.  However, the Tigers have managed to put together at least one campaign each decade which was memorable even if it was not a great year in terms of wins and losses and some of those seasons will also be included.   

The entire list of 20 seasons can be found here.

In a city still troubled by the 1967 riots, the 1968 Tigers gave people something to rally around.  After being eliminated on the last day of the regular season in 1967, they destroyed the competition in 1968 finishing with a 103-59 record, 12 games ahead of the second-place Orioles.  The Tigers then capped the season with a thrilling come-from-behind victory over the St. Louis Cardinals in the World Series.

So, the 1968 season had social significance, one of the most dominant Tigers teams ever and a suspenseful finish.  It was only one of four championship seasons for the franchise, but all those elements together were enough to make 1968 the best year to be a Tigers fan.  In fact, most fans that I have talked to who experienced both the 1968 and 1984 seasons believe that1968 was the more memorable season of the two.

The 1968 season is called "The Year of the Pitcher" for good reason.  The MLB batting average was just .237 and teams averaged 3.42 runs per game, the lowest since 3.38 RPG in 1908.  Red Sox outfielder Carl Yastrzemski led the AL with a .301 average and Cardinals fire baller Bob Gibson led the majors with a 1.12 ERA.  There was so little offense that the pitchers mound was lowered and the strike zone was shrunk after the season.  

The Tigers allowed a league low 492 runs and ace right hander Denny McLain led the way.  McLain won 31 games that year making him the only MLB pitcher in the last eight decades with at least 30 wins in a season.  He posted a 1.96 ERA in 336 innings, struck out 280 batters and led the league with 28 complete games.  The Tigers also received strong contributions from Earl Wilson (19 ERA+ in 224 innings), Mickey Lolich (17 wins, 197 K) and swing man John Hiller (126 ERA+).

Offensively, the Tigers led the league with 671 runs scored despite an injury limiting star right fielder Al Kaline to 350 at bats.  They batted just .235 but their total of 185 home runs was about 40% higher than any other team in the league.  Leading the home run parade were outfielder Willie Horton (36), catcher Bill Freehan (25), first baseman Norm Cash (25) and outfielder Jim Northrup (21).  Horton also led the team and finished third in the league with a 165 OPS+. They had enough offense to overcome an anemic .135 batting average and 20+ OPS from starting shortstop Ray Oyler. 

The Tigers faced the Cardinals in the World Series in what would be billed as the battle of aces - McLain versus Gibson.  However, McLain didn't have a great series and Lolich stole the show with three victories.  The series is also remembered as the one where Tigers manager Mayo Smith boldly moved center fielder Mickey Stanley to shortstop so that a healthy Kaline, Northrup and Horton could play the outfield.

The Cardinals toyed with the Tigers in taking a three to one series lead behind a 17-strikeout performance from Gibson in game one and easy wins in game three and four.  Lolich kept the Tigers alive with a win in game two.

The Tigers then made one of the greatest comebacks in World Series history winning the last three games.  In game five, they scored three runs in the seventh to beat the Cardinals 5-3 with Lolich earning his second win of the series.  The Bengals then scored 10 runs in the third inning in a 13-1 rout in game six.  finally, Lolich out pitched Gibson as the Tigers won 4-1 in game seven.

Thus, the Tigers won their third world championship in dramatic fashion to end what was the most memorable season in franchise history.  
 
Some of data for this article were gathered from Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org