Best and Worst Seasons by Jay Shortstops According to WAR

by Tom Dakers on May 30, 2009 11:58 PM EDT in Toronto Blue Jays Analysis

Here's the next installment of our look at best seasons by position by Wins Above Replacement. An idea researched off of Amazing Avenue, the Met's blog here at SB Nation. The numbers are taken from Sean Smith's WAR Database.

Anyway here are the best seasons by Jay shortstops, according to WAR values:

Rank	Year	Player	WAR
1	1987	Tony Fernandez	5.3
2	1986	Tony Fernandez	4.9
3	1990	Tony Fernandez	4.3
4	1988	Tony Fernandez	4.2
5	2008	Marco Scutaro	4.0
6	1999	Tony Bautista	3.8
7	1989	Tony Fernandez	3.7
8	1985	Tony Fernandez	3.7
9	1992	Manny Lee	2.9
10	1993	Tony Fernandez	2.8

And the worst....

Rank	Year	Player	WAR
27	1982	Alfredo Griffin	-0.4
28	1977	Hector Torrez	-0.5
29	1983	Alfredo Griffin	-0.6
30	1980	Alfredo Griffin	-0.8
31	2008	John McDonald	-0.9
32	2006	Russ Adams	-1.6
33	~~2007~~	~~John McDonald~~	~~-1.7~~
34	1981	Alfredo Griffin	-1.7
35	1978	Luis Gomez	-1.8
36	1984	Alfredo Griffin	-2.1

A few quick thoughts....

- yeah, Tony Fernandez was the best shortstop we've had, by far.

- Scutaro played some third and second last year but since he played more short I put him in this group. A lot of his value was defensive last year. This year might turn out to be even better.

- I'm sure you all remember this but Tony Bautista had the most open stance I've ever seen at the plate. I always wondered if he had a vision problem in his left eye that caused him to look directly at the pitcher. I'm sure not, he just tracked the ball better that way. He was terrible in the field and moved to third the next season.

- Afredo Griffin rookie season is number 11 on the list at 2.7, he was never that good again for the Jays

- Chris Woodward and Alex Gonzalez had the 12 and 13 spots.

- I have no memories at all of Hector Torrez or Luis Gomez.

- Feel bad about Johnny Mac's name listed, since he didn't really play a full season but that's what the numbers say. Eckstein was a 1.0 last year.

We'll do the third basemen when I'm procrastinating from doing something else that would take more writing.

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