Courtesy of blog co-host and resident New York Mets fan, Tino Evangelou:
The whole debate/article this refers to is a few weeks old now, but gosh darn it, I couldn’t resist throwing my hat in the ring and attempting to emulate Fire Joe Morgan once an old friend of ours made his case. Perhaps I was inspired by FJM’s recent jump into the “overrated” debate. Don’t bother counting how many times I link to them here, I’m aware it’s excessive. Take it away, Frank!
Derek jeter Overrated? NO WAY!
I should end this post right now. You have convinced me through skillful use of caps lock and exclamation points alone. Also, why is “overrated” capitalized but not “Jeter”?
Sometimes there are times where there are things I feel I need to address. Today, I feel the need to take something to task.
Frank is mad and he’s not going to take it anymore! Look out! What could have possibly drawn the wrath of such a levelheaded and objective baseball analyst?
Here is what I’m referring to:
In a Sports Illustrated survey of 495 Major League Baseball players in its June 23 issue, Derek Jeter was voted the most overrated with 10% of the vote. Struggling Giants lefthander Barry Zito was second at 9%, while Alex Rodriguez and Red Sox outfielder J.D. Drew were tied for third with 7%. Mets third baseman David Wright and Red Sox first baseman Kevin Youkilis tied for fourth at 4%.
If the basic premise of this article was “this is a stupid and meaningless poll” and was left at that, I’d tend to agree. Jeter, as we’re about to find out, may still be overrated by some people but has had a fantastic career. But Barry Zito? Can you be overrated if nobody thinks you’re good anymore? Alex Rodriguez is listed here, rather laughably, as the best player in the world, and if Frank had written this article about him I’d be totally on board. JD Drew? Eh, he’s having a pretty damn good season, though he’s been overpaid for much of his career. David Wright was perhaps the best player in the National League last season (even allowing that his Gold Glove is probably undeserved) and Kevin Youklis is a cheap, pretty decent hitter for a pretty good team. So yes: the poll is dumb, and unscientific, and if the player selections for the All-Star Game are any indicator, players themselves are pretty bad at judging which other players produce the most runs for their teams. Joe Sheehan did a pretty good job tearing them apart on BP, but unfortunately it’s a pay article.
It was offered to me (by a Yankee fan) that this could be taken as a “most overpaid” poll, but then it makes even less sense - sure, Jeter, Zito, and Drew could all be considered overpaid, but Wright and Youklis don’t make much money (in relative, millionaire baseball player terms). Anyway, back to Frank:
Now how in the world is Jeter overrated? Sure he doesn’t deserve to be paid $18 million, but neither does anyone else for that matter. So how else is he overrated? What are you judging him by? He’s a leader, he’s consistent, he’s clutch, and he’s a proven winner.
Using the argument “no baseball player deserves to be paid $18 million dollars” isn’t a good start in debunking any “Derek Jeter is overrated” arguments, although we’ve established it probably doesn’t have much to do with money in this particular case. Then, a parade of meaningless buzzwords used to, well, overrate players: consistent, clutch, proven winner. The kind of silly things people say that athletes like Kevin Garnett aren’t until they get surrounded by a top flight surrounding cast, and then, voila! They’re winners. Shocker.
Derek Jeter is a future Hall of Famer. If he had gotten drafted by the Pittsburgh Pirates, he’d be a future Hall of Famer with no World Series rings, barring a mid-career megadeal with a big market team. It wouldn’t necessarily invalidate his ability as a player, just like it doesn’t inherently mean he’s a better player than Alex Rodriguez or any of the other superior players who didn’t have his good fortune.
He hustles on every play, he shows up to work and goes about his business the right way and does everything that is asked of him. He ALWAYS has a team first mentality, something lost on the game these days.
“Hustle” is another totally subjective and meaningless adjective people throw out to support players who aren’t very good, like David Eckstein. Not a good argument. As for the team first mentality, that was evidenced when he volunteered to move to third base so that Alex Rodriguez, a vastly superior defender, could remain at shortstop.
Oh, wait, that never happened.
Frank then goes on to list a whole bunch of awards Jeter has won. Some are more meaningful than others; I would argue that “All-Star Game MVP” and any minor league accolades mean slightly less than nothing. No award is really more important than objective analysis, which reveals that, yes, Jeter was at various times in his career a premiere offensive shortstop, and is a deserving future Hall of Famer. This is when Frank’s argument starts to really go off the rails, however:
The timing of this poll is questionable. It is taken at a time when the Yankees were struggling, Now if this poll had been conducted in October, when Mr. Jeter has been playing for the last 13 years then I think the results would be different.
Derek Jeter, regular season career: .316/.387/.459
Derek Jeter, postseason career: .309/.377/.469
His OPS is literally identical. The idea that he’s a superior player in the postseason is one of the myths about him, I think, that leads people to overrate him. Also, it’s been made abundantly clear Jeter wasn’t the only reason the Yankees made the playoffs every season. Implying as such may be one way in which he is, get ready for it, overrated!
I think that a lot of this is based on jealously. Jeter is THIRD on the Yankees ALL-TIME hit list. Now think about that. Think of everyone who’s put on the pinstripes and think how Derek is only behind Ruth and Gehrig. That’s amazing. But according to most people this is a feat that just any ol’ joe can do.
Impressive. He’s not nearly the player Ruth, Gehrig, or a number of guys behind him on the list were, but still impressive. Also, I don’t think anyone implied that “any ol’ joe” could play Major League Baseball, much less have as good a career as Derek Jeter. That’s a bit of a strawman argument, don’t you think?
But then again jealously rears it’s ugly face again. Why? Because he plays in New York, plays for the most storied franchise in professional sports, has fame, fortune, looks, women and the list can go on and on. I’m jealous of Derek too but I don’t think he’s overrated.
You’ve made that abundantly clear.
Maybe I’m still living off the Yankee dynasty of the late 90’s, but he’s still here and still performing.
Nothing you say makes me believe you’re in any way living off the 1990’s, not at all (except when you mentioned all the stuff Jeter did in the 1990’s). And if by “still performing” you mean “posting a .729 OPS this year”, then sure. I think this is the crux of why a few people say things like “Derek Jeter is overrated” - he’s had a great career, starred on several great teams, and now that he’s in the decline phase of his career and anyone dares question his ability, people like Frank bring up antecdotes about the 1990’s and how much of a “proven winner” he is and they invariably mention “the flip” or some other play he made because he had a chance to play in dozens and dozens of postseason games. Those things are all completely and utterly irrelevant to how good a baseball player Derek Jeter is in the year 2008.
Maybe it’s the fact he gets to live out his boyhood dream of playing shortstop for the Yankees.
A dream he generously agreed to continue living. For a mere $18 million a season! Another thing: people always act like Derek Jeter is devoid of greed or of ego. He probably deserved whatever he could get from the Yankees, but please don’t act like it matters that his dream was to play for the Yankees and he has an “aw shucks” demeanor about the game, unlike any other player. It’s insulting.
Maybe it’s because he’s dated women such as Jessica Biel, Jessica Alba, Mariah Carey, Vanessa Minillio. Maybe it’s because he has his own cologne.
Uh oh, you found me out! If it wasn’t for Jeter, I’d have a shot with any of those women! And so would Chris Coste! And Marlon Anderson! And Miguel Cairo! Also: irrelevant to the argument.
Whatever the case may be, everyone should get off the Hater-ade. It just makes you sound ignorant and like you have no idea what you’re talking about. If he’s overrated then please tell me who’s better and who has a resume in today’s game better than Jeter?
A Hater-ade reference! If Tiger Woods gets his own brand of Gatorade, does Derek Jeter get “Hater-ade: Yankee Shortstop, Captain, and Hero of the Free World” edition? Also, while I can’t find players with Jeter’s specific resume you posted (I mean, Yankees’ Minor League Player of the Year in 1994? I don’t think anyone else can make that claim to fame) I can find a few with pretty decent ones that are also better players. Like this guy or this guy or this guy.
If we want to put resume aside (Rickey Henderson, come back! Frank wants you on his team!) Hanley Ramirez is better right now, and so is a player that Frank trashed last year and proposed as overrated this year, Jose Reyes (.845 OPS, as of this second, and 2nd among shortstops in VORP). Jeter is ranked 12th in baseball in VORP currently…among shortstops.
See? You just said Jeter wasn’t overrated and then basically implied he’s the best player in the sport. Way to blow up your own argument.
I want to add that by the same measure, Jeter should’ve been the MVP in 2006 - I wouldn’t argue with you there. He’s also, historically, a better second half player. But during a decline year, if you’re going to say he’s not overrated, then subsequently overrate him using a totally nebulous argument and claim anyone who disgarees is jealous - well, sorry, you deserve the ridicule.
This isn’t a pleaseant revelation to people who bristle at any suggestion that Jeter isn’t one of the game’s elite, or that he’s overrated based on past success. He’s making $18 million dollars to be a middle-of-the-pack SS this year and yet is still beyond reproach to some (non-stathead) people. How does that not make him “overrated” in some sense?
I’ve stated this many times in the past…Derek Jeter has the best life in the world. He plays for the New York Yankees (his boyhood dream), makes millions of dollars, has a list of women that would put any man to shame, is still young, he performs at a high level and enjoys what he does. Doesn’t get any better than that. Yep, I said it, he has the best all around life of anyone you could think of. Now try and debate that.
I’m sure there are some computer programmers out there who think Steve Jobs’ life is totally sweet. I also imagine there’s an argument to be made for any number of professional athletes or celebrities. Either way, still not relevant. That is, unless we take his VORG (Value Over Replacement Girlfriend) into account, which, if it tops Tom Brady’s, makes him the World’s Greatest Man.
Also, this highlights the irony of all of this: the man probably doesn’t need Frank making a bizarre argument to defend his present status as one of the game’s elite, and he probably doesn’t care that I’m tearing apart said argument, either. The dude has a pretty sweet life.
He’s still got a lot of baseball in him and there’s no question he is a sure future Hall of Famer.
Probably, and certainly. He’s no longer the player he was though, with his offense slipping and his defense as bad as ever.
The day he gets inducted in, we’ll remember him for so many things:
Please, God, say “The Flip”.
hitting the first HR in November,
They lost that World Series. Jeter’s supposed to be about winning. Boring. Not “The Flip”.
being the first to be named MVP of the All-Star Game and World Series in the same season (2000),
Two relatively meaningless awards. Good job picking up the slack, but I guess people will remember this just like they remembered Jeff Conine winning the All-Star Game MVP in 1995, or Scott Brosius winning the World Series MVP in 1998. When are you going to mention “The Flip”, anyway?
making one of the most memorable plays in postseason hisoty [sic] (The Flip),
YES! YES! THE FLIP! The only player in the entire world that could have conceivably made that play! I take it back. I take it all back. I hope they rename New York “Jeter City” and carve his face into the fucking moon so every time Jeremy Giambi looks up at it, he can cry tears of endless regret for not fucking sliding.
the guy that was face of the latest Yankee dynasty
I’ll give you that.
but most importantly..he will always be remembered as a Yankee.
Is that really most important? Doesn’t Luis Sojo get invited to Old Timer’s Day and get “remembered” as a Yankee too? You could do way better than this in defending the guy.
Now I know that makes people jealous…. but he earned it.
Other things I am jealous of: uncritical fanboy adulation on the internet.
The odds that Derek Jeter will see any of this is close to zero; the odds that Derek Jeter will continue to have a pretty sweet life regardless is pretty much the opposite of that. What does that have to do with his current ability as a baseball player?
A whole lot of nothing.
Update: I want to take the time to clarify that my lampooning of Frank’s article shouldn’t be held as an endictment on Hot Stove New York. There’s a good deal of pretty good writing over there and they’ve put a lot of work into their site, and if the Leitch/Bissinger slugfest taught us anything its that we bloggers (even lazy, sparsely-read part-timers like me) are all kind of on the same team. That said, I just couldn’t resist the temptation to have a little bit of fun.
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