HOFer (inevitable) Ichiro Suzuki

[bpj]

From 2001 to 2011 the Mariners ranked 24th in Runs scored.

Just a shame that Ichiro's type of game doesn't lead to more runs because singles and stolen bases have such a low correlation to scoring.

He was pretty useless overall, especially when he was 20% of our payroll in the later years.

Would have made a great CF or 2B, but he never gave us an advantage while taking up a power position.

Pretty bizarre that he was averse to playing CF given his speed. Maybe he thought his refusal to dive would be more obvious.....

He'd have double the WAR he has if he played CF.

[bpj]

I know there's going to be some Ichiro groupies mad about what I said so I'll explain.

When you add up the runs that Ichiro had a part in, Runs + RBI's, here's how he stacked up:

In 2001 he had 127 Runs and 69 RBI for a total of 196.

Comparing that to the Top 30 players (sorted by Runs scored, then adding their RBI's in), Ichiro ranked:

2001: 25th/30 (despite being 6th in Runs scored himself)
2002: 30th/30
2003: 24th/30
2004: 33rd/35
2005: 24th/30
2006: 30th/30
2007: 25th/30
2008: 30th/30
2009: 49th/50
2010: 85th/85
2011: 58th/60

That's all despite being closer to the top in Runs scored most seasons (you can see some years he wasn't in Top 30 in Runs so I expanded).

His type of game didn't push runs across the plate. And what was worse is that on top of that he was taking RF away from adding a power bat so we had to carry another weak CF on top of it all.

Which, is a good part of the reason that from 2001-2011 the Mariners ranked 24th/30 in Runs scored as a team.

[D-train]

In his 11 seasons with the M's he averaged a 112 wRC+ with a high of 131 the year that we lost 99 games.

For reference JP Crawford had a higher wRC+ in 2023 than Ichiro ever had in his ENTIRE career. 134

Cade Marlowe who was demoted in September had a 112 wRC+ this season. Same as Ichiro's average for his M's career.

[Donn Beach]

John McLaren claimed it was his idea to move Ichiro back to right field

“I had actually talked to Ichiro when we came back from New York, because I have had this idea for a while,” McLaren said. “Again, it’s not that he can’t play center. But he’s always been the best right fielder in baseball for me. I’ve always had that thought in the back of my mind. I’ve always had that thought, that, at some point, that’s where he belongs.
“Nothing whatsoever has been dictated from up top,” he added. “Nothing. Ever. Bill never did that. Lee hasn’t done that. Howard and Chuck haven’t done that. They’ve left me alone. I respect that and I appreciate that. But the Ichiro thing is something I’ve been thinking about for a long time and I just went with it. I just went with it.”
OK, that’s the first part. Fair enough. But the Yankee Stadium game, if you’ll remember, is where Ichiro had a fly ball to right center drop between him and right fielder Wladimir Balentien for the game’s ultimate winning run in the eighth inning after Seattle had taken a 5-2 lead into that frame. How much did that play — and some others this year where balls have dropped in to center — impact McLaren’s decision to think about a shift of Ichiro?
“I knew he didn’t see that ball good but that wasn’t the deal,” McLaren said. “It was just something I’d been thinking about. Timing was just such that I just talked to him when the plane landed. It wasn’t that ball so much. I’d been thinking about that. I actually thought about it last year a little bit. There’s something about 51 out there, that’s where he belongs.”
Did Ichiro have to think about playing center field too much, I asked McLaren. Did he have to focus on defense and did it take away from other aspects of his game?
McLaren went on to say: “As soon as I said it, his face lit up. He got a sparkle in his eye.”
At that point, Ichiro walked over to the dugout for one of his bats.
“Right field, huh?” McLaren called out.
“Yeah,” Ichiro said, smiling and nodding.
“That’s what he did, right there,” McLaren told us. “That’s exactly what he did right there. There was no b.s. about it. As soon as the question was presented to him and I saw his eyes, I knew it was right. I was going to do it, but I wanted to show respect to him, telling him what I was thinking. And as soon as his eyes lit up, there was no explanation to it.”
McLaren was they think ‘Well, he’s got it”. Well, he doesn’t have it. So, this way here, it takes a little pressure off that. Everybody’s got their turf out there to go get it.”

[Captain 97]

From 2001 to 2011 the Mariners ranked 24th in Runs scored.

Just a shame that Ichiro's type of game doesn't lead to more runs because singles and stolen bases have such a low correlation to scoring.

He was pretty useless overall, especially when he was 20% of our payroll in the later years.

Would have made a great CF or 2B, but he never gave us an advantage while taking up a power position.

Pretty bizarre that he was averse to playing CF given his speed. Maybe he thought his refusal to dive would be more obvious.....

He'd have double the WAR he has if he played CF.

I don't think that's true. he wasn't that great in center.
in 2007 he played 155 games in center field he had a 0.8 dWAR. The year before and the year after he had a 1.0 and a 0.9 dWAR respectively playing primarily in right field.

[bpj]

Pretty bizarre that he was averse to playing CF given his speed. Maybe he thought his refusal to dive would be more obvious.....

He'd have double the WAR he has if he played CF.

I don't think that's true. he wasn't that great in center.
in 2007 he played 155 games in center field he had a 0.8 dWAR. The year before and the year after he had a 1.0 and a 0.9 dWAR respectively playing primarily in right field.

All that says is his defensive value was about equal.

It's the positional adjustment that gains CF extra value, not their defense.

[Donn Beach]

Ichiro's 3,000 hits, if you look carefully up by the 390 marker, you can find a single red dot. His single opposite field home run

[bpj]

Pretty bizarre that he was averse to playing CF given his speed. Maybe he thought his refusal to dive would be more obvious.....

He'd have double the WAR he has if he played CF.

I don't think that's true. he wasn't that great in center.
in 2007 he played 155 games in center field he had a 0.8 dWAR. The year before and the year after he had a 1.0 and a 0.9 dWAR respectively playing primarily in right field.

I should add that "double" is definitely an exaggeration.

I'd say for every 8 WAR he got, it would have been 10+ in CF.

[D-train]

He'd have double the WAR he has if he played CF.

I don't think that's true. he wasn't that great in center.
in 2007 he played 155 games in center field he had a 0.8 dWAR. The year before and the year after he had a 1.0 and a 0.9 dWAR respectively playing primarily in right field.

All that says is his defensive value was about equal.

It's the positional adjustment that gains CF extra value, not their defense.

Yup. Playing CF has huge value relative to the Corners. If Julio was in RF he would like be a 3-4 WAR player.

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[DavidGee24]

One thing about the 60 WAR argument on Ichiro is that he was just as good at 20 as he was at 27, hitting .385 in Japan. If he starts his career in the majors he's a 90-100 WAR player, easily.

Same with Edgar beginning at age 21 and if we want to play the IF game then lets not have him get injured in BC place and he has an above average career defensively at 3B. 110 WAR easy.

I don't know if I'd go that far, it took him quite a while to develop into a power hitter, and in looking at his minor league stats he didn't really come around until he was 23-24. He probably would have had a few more 5-WAR seasons, maybe got to 85-90 overall. That damned Jim Presley.