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I'm Even Madder About This Than the Bible Stuff

Nov 10, 2010
By .
Sports

Derek Jeter won a Gold Glove award. At shortstop. Arrrrggggh!

Derek Jeter is not even the best shortstop on his own team, much less in the AL. His range is nothing, and he actually demonstrably costs his team runs defensively.

Now, I know that Gold Gloves have as much to do with offensive stats as they do defensive ones (especially since defense is one area where advanced metrics have lagged a little) but even taking into account his offense, Jeter should not be in the top 5.

We all know that Jeter won this award (for the 5th time!) because he plays for the most famous team. But (as Bill James has pointed out) it's entirely possible that he is "the least effective defensive player at any position." His choice as the best fielding shortstop in the AL is a joke. He does not deserve it.

Last 5 posts by Ezra

7 Comments
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7 Comments

  1. Professor Coldheart  •  Nov 10, 2010 @11:24 am

    Yeah, but he's got great fundamentals.

  2. Scott  •  Nov 10, 2010 @12:10 pm

    Hear, hear! Yuck the fankees!

  3. Grandy  •  Nov 10, 2010 @12:19 pm

    It's not offense that drives is so much as star power and inertia. Yes, offense does lend itself to increased star power, but it's also things like having success in a post season series here or a great season there (And Jeter is a great post season player, never mind the actual stats. A good postseason or two early in your career can cement such things; in truth last I looked he had performned pretty close to career averages across all post seasons). And then Eleventeen SI covers, and so on. And then once you win one, it's easier to win more. This is 5 for Jeter, correct?

    It's often true that people keep on winning Gold Gloves long past the point they should have, once they start winning (and looking at Baseball Reference this is now 5 in 7 years). Andruw Jones – who in his prime was beyond amazing – won a couple even after he was playing CF at 260+ lbs and clearly showing diminished range and skills (this was a guy who had a 500 put out year on a team that got an above league average number of strikeouts and ground outs). In a sense I feel like we should be thankful. If you simulate baseball Jeter's career 1000 times and keep peformance close to the historical output, I think there are far more seasons where he wins more than 5 GGs than less.

  4. Exodor  •  Nov 10, 2010 @2:16 pm

    Don't forget Rafael Palmiero once won a gold glove at first base despite only playing 28 games there that year.

    The Gold Glove awards are a joke.

    And yet Jeter winning it makes me seethe with barely restrained rage.

  5. N P  •  Nov 10, 2010 @2:37 pm

    I think that Andruw Jones' extra Gold Glove doesn't really compare to Jeter in terms of bad award choices. Andruw was legitimately great for a while, and even in his last GG season (2007) he was still a decent fielder — fangraphs.com rates him the 5th best OF in the league that year, othe advanced stats have him as averageish for CF. He's in the top 3 by most all measures every year he won. Jeter, OTOH, has never been a good fielder. At his best he was about average, and now he's old. And none of this requires sophisticated statistical analysis to understand — he has poor footwork and can't get to balls hit a few feet to his left, and the Yankees have always shaded their third basen towards the hole to cover for him.

    But Jeremy Giambi didn't slide in the Game 3 of the 2001 ALDS, and then Jeter dove into the stands and came out bloody against the Red Sox in 2004. After that he started winning Gold Gloves. Those two plays are all that matter to the voters, really, not all of the routine grounders trickling into center field. Those only count against the pitching staff's ERA, not against Jeter's aura.

  6. Rich Rostrom  •  Nov 10, 2010 @4:25 pm

    "Derek Jeter is not even the best shortstop on his own team, much less in the AL."

    That reminds of a comment made when Joe DiMaggio was touted as the best outfielder in baseball. One curmudgeon objected "He ain't even the best outfielder in his family!"

    (Joe's brother Dom, who had a respectable career of his own, was considered the better fielder.)

  7. Grandy  •  Nov 11, 2010 @9:24 am

    NP, I was using that to point out how people who win gold gloves can more easily keep winning them. I like the advanced fielding metrics but none of the GG voters know what those are, and consensus – rightly or wrongly – was that Andruw wasn't as good as he used to be. That didn't matter, because he was a legacy winner and an easy choice. It isn't as bad as Jeter, I agree.

    Palmiero had won the previous two GGs while actually playing first and was, IIRC, accounted a good fielder. The GG voters, being who they are, went with the lazy choice, oblivious to the fact that he missed most of the year hurt. Winning one, no matter how legitimate, makes it much easier to win more.