In appreciation of Ken Griffey Jr.

Here's what Manny Acta says in today's Post about Ken Griffey Jr.:

"He's just amazing. He's a guy that, no contest, if he wouldn't have gotten hurt and lost all those games, he probably would be chasing 800 home runs now."

Acta seems to be saying that had injuries not slowed him, Griffey would be neck-and-neck with Bonds in the home run race. Griffey was once thought of as the next Willie Mays, but his stock has taken a tumble as he has fallen prey to debilitating injuries over the past five years. It's commonly thought that the injuries kept him from becoming a latter-day Willie Mays, but is that really true?

I must admit that I was skeptical when I read Acta's comments, but I've got to say now that it's undoubtedly correct that Griffey would have compared favorably to Willie Mays had he played without injury, although he probably would not have approached a Bondsian level of performance.

Here are some of his career numbers from baseball-reference.com. OPS+ is an adjusted OPS calculation normalized for the park effects and the league; it essentially expresses as a percentage the rate a player performs above or below league average, with 100 being average. The last column is my calculation of the number of the average number of at bats it took Griffey to hit a home run.

Year	G	AB	HR	OPS+	AB/HR
1989	127	455	16	108	28.44
1990	155	597	22	135	27.14
1991	154	548	22	155	24.91
1992	142	565	27	148	20.93
1993	156	582	45	172	12.93
1994	111	433	40	170	10.83
1995	72	260	17	120	15.29
1996	140	545	49	153	11.12
1997	157	608	56	164	10.86
1998	161	633	48	149	13.19
1999	160	606	40	138	15.15
2000	145	520	22	128	23.64
2001	111	364	8	130	45.50
2002	70	197	13	100	15.15
2003	53	166	20	140	8.30
2004	83	300	35	128	8.57
2005	128	491	27	138	18.19
2006	109	428	10	96	42.80

A few conclusions emerge from the data. First, Griffey is undeniably a great hitter, one of the game's best.

Second, his power gradually increased during the first few years of his career, and then dramatically improved beginning in 1993 and stayed generally consistent through 1998. Those were Griffey's best years and among the best years most hitters could ever hope to have.

Third, Griffey's power reached its peak in 1997 and began a slow decline in 1998 that reached its nadir in 2001. Interestingly, though, Griffey's OPS+ was fairly consistent throughout the rise and fall of his home run rate. It was below the level of the 1993-1997 years, but it was still well above the league average.

Fourth, Griffey appears now to be in the twilight years of his career. He's had a steep drop-off in both his home run and OPS+ rate, and he appears unlikely ever again to approach his power levels of even a few years ago.

Finally, had Griffey performed between 2000 and 2003 as he did in 1999 and 2004, he would have hit another 89 home runs, meaning that instead of 573 career home runs today, he would have 662. That's definitely at the level of Willie Mays, who hit 660 career home runs, but it's about 85 behind Barry Bonds. Given Griffey's greatness with the glove in center field, he probably would have been every bit the equal of Willie Mays had he not been injured.

But Barry Bonds? Sorry, Manny, but we don't think so.