While we wait patiently, or in some cases not so patiently, for version 10 to be released, I thought I would have a little fun looking at the All-Time Greatest
Players Disk aka the AGP. Some of you may think that I have a weird concept of "fun", in which case you would be correct but I am doing it anyway.
This post may also be seen as a blatant effort to convince DMB to update the AGP, once version 10 is done of course. I'll be dealing with position players
in this thread and, if anyone finds this at all interesting, I can do something similar for the pitchers.
According to the notes, a position player must have 4,000 career plate appearances (PA) or more to qualify for the disk. Furthermore, the player's statistics and ratings are based off the player's 6,000 PA peak, assuming the player lasted that long. The last update for the AGP was in 2006, which included statistics from 1876 (the first season of the National League) through 2005. It is unclear if the AGP uses all the official major leagues in its computations. If I were to make an educated guess, I would say that the American Association and Players League definitely are, the National Association is definitively not, and I don't know about the Federal League or (ack!) the Union Association. There are some players on the disk that would not meet the minimum qualifications without their time in the FL and UA so I would tentatively say they count, at least for qualification requirements.
The AGP has 1,760 players, of which I would classify 1,000 of them as position players. There are a handful of 19th century men who qualify as both position players and pitchers so the actual division is open to interpretation. However, perhaps to your surprise, there are 24 position players included on the disk that did not meet the minimum requirements. They are, in alphabetical order along with their career PAs, OPS+ and fielding positions:
(Fielding positions are listed in most often played to least often, from left to right. The minimum requirements are 100 games for catcher, 50 games for all other positions, and 200 games for DH. If a player played at least 50 games in the outfield, but not 50 games in any particular field, he will be ranked as OF.)
Most of these players were ranked in the top 100 in the New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract and a number of others were in the top 125. 14 of them are catchers, which makes sense since catchers typically rack up less PAs that other position players. (Personally, I would advocate a lower qualification standard for catchers, perhaps 3500 PAs or even 3000). Of the non-catchers, most of them have an excuse, if you will. Jones played in the NA before the NL was formed, O'Doul pitched 34 games before he figured out that his future was in the outfield, Irvin was blocked by the color barrier, Reiser lost 3 seasons to WWII and more due to running into walls, Milner lost some games to the 1981 strike, Felsch was banned as one of the Black Sox, and Barrett played when a season was typically 140 games. That leaves George Stone, who did not get a chance until he was 28 and still ranks #63 in LF; Hollocher who rates #66 at shortstop; and Kurowski, who ranks #50 at third.
NEXT UP: Who's New for 2006-2009.
According to the notes, a position player must have 4,000 career plate appearances (PA) or more to qualify for the disk. Furthermore, the player's statistics and ratings are based off the player's 6,000 PA peak, assuming the player lasted that long. The last update for the AGP was in 2006, which included statistics from 1876 (the first season of the National League) through 2005. It is unclear if the AGP uses all the official major leagues in its computations. If I were to make an educated guess, I would say that the American Association and Players League definitely are, the National Association is definitively not, and I don't know about the Federal League or (ack!) the Union Association. There are some players on the disk that would not meet the minimum qualifications without their time in the FL and UA so I would tentatively say they count, at least for qualification requirements.
The AGP has 1,760 players, of which I would classify 1,000 of them as position players. There are a handful of 19th century men who qualify as both position players and pitchers so the actual division is open to interpretation. However, perhaps to your surprise, there are 24 position players included on the disk that did not meet the minimum requirements. They are, in alphabetical order along with their career PAs, OPS+ and fielding positions:
Name PA OPS+ Positions Barrett, Jimmy 3835 116 CF/LF Bassler, Johnny 2858 104 C Bateman, John 3585 77 C Danning, Harry 3194 104 C Davis, Jody 3984 92 C Felsch, Happy 3129 123 CF Ferguson, Joe 3624 116 C/RF Gowdy, Hank 3143 104 C/1B Hollocher, Charlie 3390 110 SS Hundley, Randy 3797 77 C Irvin, Monte 2893 125 LF/1B/RF Jones, Charley 3958 150 LF/CF Kurowski, Whitey 3691 125 3B Masi, Phil 3946 96 C Meyers, Chief 3226 117 C Milner, John 3985 112 1B/LF O'Doul, Lefty 3659 143 LF/RF Reiser, Pete 3053 128 CF/LF/3B Rodgers, Buck 3353 74 C Romano, Johnny 3256 122 C Stone, George 3668 143 LF Sullivan, Billy 3981 63 C Tresh, Mike 3637 71 C White, Sammy 3788 79 C
(Fielding positions are listed in most often played to least often, from left to right. The minimum requirements are 100 games for catcher, 50 games for all other positions, and 200 games for DH. If a player played at least 50 games in the outfield, but not 50 games in any particular field, he will be ranked as OF.)
Most of these players were ranked in the top 100 in the New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract and a number of others were in the top 125. 14 of them are catchers, which makes sense since catchers typically rack up less PAs that other position players. (Personally, I would advocate a lower qualification standard for catchers, perhaps 3500 PAs or even 3000). Of the non-catchers, most of them have an excuse, if you will. Jones played in the NA before the NL was formed, O'Doul pitched 34 games before he figured out that his future was in the outfield, Irvin was blocked by the color barrier, Reiser lost 3 seasons to WWII and more due to running into walls, Milner lost some games to the 1981 strike, Felsch was banned as one of the Black Sox, and Barrett played when a season was typically 140 games. That leaves George Stone, who did not get a chance until he was 28 and still ranks #63 in LF; Hollocher who rates #66 at shortstop; and Kurowski, who ranks #50 at third.
NEXT UP: Who's New for 2006-2009.

