Pete Rose is the most over-rated player in the history of baseball. His career slugging average was .409, one of the lowest of any hall-of-fame position players... and he was a first baseman with below-average defensive skills. And first base in the National League was where you stuck the guy with the bat that was too good not to play him, but not a good enough defensive player to stick anywhere else.
Even his nickname, “Charlie Hustle” is a crock of reds: he was caught stealing 149 times, while he stole only 198 bases.
To me, Slugging percentage is the end-all, be-all stat, if you make a few adjustments: add to the number of bases half the number of steals (because unlike hits, you don’t advance anyone else) and subtract the number of times caught stealing. That adjustment shaves 200 more bases off Rose’s already decidedly mediocre slugging pct. (I also add half a base and half an at-bat for each walk.)
Bench had an unadjusted slugging pecentage — that is to say an official one — of .476; Rose’s was .409. Bench’s was among the best ever for catchers; Rose’s was below average for a first baseman. And again... Rose only played first or outfield only because he wasn’t good enough to remain at second after he was 25.
OPS is. Slugging + on-base percentage.
Rose's OPS is pretty low at .784 by HOF standards.
That is partly because he hung on so long.
Nonetheless, he had more hits than any other player and that makes him a HOFer.
Nicely documented post.
I still do enjoy and relish while I can the occasional head-first slide — in softball. :-)
They won’t let us slide into home anymore though.