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Jaffe WAR Score system (JAWS) for HOF Evaluations – Baseball-Reference.com

Posted by sean on November 19, 2012

Jaffe WAR Score system (JAWS) - Baseball-Reference.com.

Baseball-Reference.com has added Jay Jaffe's JAWS system to our suite of Hall of Fame evaluation tools.

JAWS appears on every player page.

Lou Whitaker HOF stats

And we've added leaderboards by position.

JAWS:: C / 1B / 2B / 3B / SS / LF / CF / RF / SP / RP.

Big thanks to Jay for permitting us to use this stat. Happy HOF arguing!

11 Responses to “Jaffe WAR Score system (JAWS) for HOF Evaluations – Baseball-Reference.com”

  1. Scottso Says:

    I understand the concept of JAWS and of JPos. It looks great but something surprised/shocked me.

    Here's my issue:
    Kenny Lofton, who was a better than average player, has a JAWS # of 53.5 based on a WAR of 64.9 and a WAR7 of 42.
    The JPos of CF is 54.8. 67.1 career WAR/42.5 7yr-peak WAR
    So Kenny Lofton is just shy of average CF Hall of Famer?

    Bernie Williams who is not a HOFer, and shouldn't be, has a lower JAWS number than Kenny of 40.8.
    Dale Murphy's JAWs is 40.8.
    Andruw Jones is currently 52.2
    Jim Edmonds 49.1

    In fact, Lofton is listed as 8th on the CF JAWS Leaderboard. Am I the only one who thinks Lofton is not a HOFer?

    You get the point. Is Kenny Lofton then a HOFer?

  2. LeeTro Says:

    @1

    The average mark is for those in the HOF, as you said. Whether or not the bottom half of those CFs in should be there or not is another story. Guys like Lloyd Waner really bring that average down. Lofton isn't a "Small Hall" guy, but his OBP, defense, and baserunning warrant legitimate consideration for most.

  3. Scottso Says:

    Here's where I'm surprised:
    Lofton has the 7th highest WAR total among all CFs
    the 8th best JAWS and the 10th best WAR7.
    I'd never have thought Kenny Lofton should be considered for the HOF. However, those are impressive numbers. It's better than Andre Dawson.
    And everyone above Lofton in all 3 of the catergories are bonafide HOFers. All of them are among the best of the best of position players ever.
    In the JAWS catergory, only Mays, Cobb, Speaker, Mantle, Jr, JoeD, and Duke Snider are better than him.

    this is crazy to me.

  4. jason Says:

    every stat has some outliers against perception when you rank the stat.

    if you heavily weight a pitcher rating to whip against league average, and still scale by IP, babe adams becomes a top-20 starter all time. kevin brown, bret saberhagen also.

    maybe these should be seen as illuminative rather than defying logic. who knows.

  5. Baseball things to be thankful for this year | Hit and Run - SI.com Says:

    [...] on a desert island. Even cooler: something I built is now part of it. As of a few days ago, my JAWS Hall of Fame metric is on nearly every player page, with positional leaderboards as well. Look for plenty of content [...]

  6. Much To Be Thankful For | Fan-Spot.com Says:

    [...] on a desert island. Even cooler: something I built is now part of it. As of a few days ago, my JAWS Hall of Fame metric is on nearly every player page, with positional leaderboards as well. Look for plenty of content [...]

  7. tomfromnorton Says:

    I think this is a great example of the issue that many of us with the WAR statistic. I am going to venture to say that no one who ever watched Kenny Lofton play thought they were watching a HOF player. He was solid, made 6 all-star teams but only cracked the top 10 in the MVP vote once. But beyond that, he doesn't even come close to passing the litmus test of what a HOF player looks like, I know that is old school but I think it still counts.

  8. Scottso Says:

    Here's another wacky thing about Kenny Lofton.
    He was often a key piece to a playoff contender's puzzle. From 1995-2007, every team he was on, became a playoff team except for 2000 and 2005. This is 7 separate team (including 3 separate stints with the Indians)
    However, generally speaking he was inconsistent in the playoffs. In 20 series, he batted .200 or less in 9 of them (45%). While he also above .300 in six of them.

  9. LeeTro Says:

    @8

    It's really about how big you think the HOF should be. If you only think the special players should be in, Lofton probably isn't a HOFer. However, Lofton and Richie Ashburn are nearly the exact same player, minus Ashburn's faster fade. I was born over 20 years after Ashburn retired, but I doubt many thought he was a HOFer when he played.

    If by Litmus test you mean power, then you're right. Lofton did everything else well, but I don't think he will ever get in due to that perception.

  10. Sean Forman Says:

    Scottso,

    It's funny you think it is wacky, but maybe just maybe Kenny Lofton was way underrated and was a great player pushing his teams to the playoffs.

    How many playoff teams was Tony Gwynn on? Gwynn did one obvious fabulously well, but Lofton did everything well.

    Players who do a lot of things well are notoriously underrated. He only didn't look like a HOFer because you were focused on HR,RBI and BA. He did everything else very well.

    Lofton slugged at lg avg had a .372 OBP in a .341 lg context.

    He stole 622 bases at 80% and added a lot of other baserunning runs. He played CF his entire career even at age 40. He GIDP'd only 9x per year on a very good offensive teams (so lots of opps).

    And he was a great fielder through Age 33. He was also robbed of a full prime season in 1994 when he led the league in WAR.

    The argument against Lofton is a bit like the Cabrera over Trout argument, IMO.

  11. Jeff J. Says:

    @11 "How many playoff teams was Tony Gwynn on?"

    How many playoff teams were Ferguson Jenkins, Gaylord Perry, Joe Torre as a player, Ernie Banks, Nap Lajoie, Ron Santo, Luke Appling, Ed Delahanty or Billy Williams on?