Open Thread: Jorge Posada

November 8, 2011 by Mike Axisa 91 Comments

I’m going to remember Jorge Posada for a lot of things. He battled through slump after slump in 2011, but he was an MVP caliber hitter in 2000, 2003, and 2007, and was no worse than above-average pretty much every other season of his career. Jon Heyman reports that the Yankees have yet to contact Jorge yet this offseason, but I have to believe they’ll touch base at some point. Even if the team plans to turn the page and move on, which I assume they will, I can’t imagine they’ll just give Jorge the cold shoulder. Posada is an all-time great Yankee, a borderline Hall of Famer in my book, but all good things must come to an end. I just hope it isn’t an ugly divorce, not that I expect it will be.

Anyway, here is tonight’s open thread. The Devils are the only local hockey team in action, so you’re pretty much stuck finding a way to entertain yourself. Talk about whatever you want here, go nuts.

jjyank

Hip Hip!
- Mickey S
  
  Jorge!!!
http://bleedingyankeeblue.com Jesse

Since there’s no discussion question (Again!), here’s mine:

Would you vote Jorge Posada into the Hall of Fame?
- http://historyandfutility.wordpress.com the Oberamtmann
  
  Definitely.
  - Dalelama
    
    No way, Jorge is too stupid to be in the Hall, he could be the worst baserunner in baseball history.
- Pat D
  
  No.
  
  He’s very borderline, and he’s not the best catcher not in the HOF, either.
  - Thomas Cassidy
    
    Nobody said he was the best catcher. I would vote him in. One of the best catchers of all time. He would be even higher if Pudge and Piazza (probably) never cheated.
    
    Berra
    Bench
    Howard
    Pudge
    Piazza
    Posada
    
    He should be in. It’s borderline and it will probably take him a few tries, but I think he gets in one day.
    - Jimmy
      
      Read the post. He said “Not the best catcher not in the HOF, either”. He didn’t say “not the greatest catcher”
      
      Also, your list leaves off Roy Campanella, Bill Dickey, Mickey Cochrane, Carlton Fisk not to mention Josh Gibson.
      
      I’m a big Posada fan, but keep it in perspective.
      - Thomas Cassidy
        
        Yeah, I noticed I left a few off after I posted it.
        
        I am keeping it in perspective. I think he gets in, maybe in 8 years or so.
        
        Pat D
        
        Go look at Joe Torre’s HOF vote totals year by year. That’s what Jorge is doomed to getting every year.
        
        RetroRob
        
        Are you rating Torre ahead of Posada as a catcher? Or are you talking about someone else, such as Ted Simmons?
- http://www.yankeeanalysts.com/ Steve S.
  
  Considering the offensive era he played in, no.
  - Mike c
    
    Posada’s career OPS is 5th all time among catchers (5000 PA), I’d say that puts him in the discussion for HOF
    - http://www.yankeeanalysts.com/ Steve S.
      
      http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=c&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=5000&type=8&season=2011&month=0&season1=1871&ind=0&team=0&players=0
      
      He’s 14th all time in RC+, 15th in WAR, 12th in wOBA. Very good, very productive with the bat, but I don’t think he’s a HOFer.
      - mike c
        
        right, I was looking at stats from 1901-2011 on BR actually so this list is a little deeper… but to be fair this list shouldn’t have players included who didn’t play more than 50% of their games at C. I don’t think there’s a way to filter this on fangraphs is there?
      - Pat D
        
        And here’s where you get the answer to my earlier post about the best catcher not in the HOF: Ted Simmons.
        
        mike c
        
        he should be… being #2 in hits all time at the position with 2400 should be a good enough reason for HOF
      - I am not the droids you’re looking for…
        
        Actually, if you are in the top 12-15 at your position all time then I would say absolutely positively yes you belong in the hall. That’d mean a hall of 100-125 people.
        
        Personally I consider him borderline but this info makes me ponder.
NEPA Yankee

It’s sad to see an era come to an end. If this is in fact it, thanks for everything Jorge, we ARE gonna miss ya!
DERP

What the hell is wrong with the Phillies? 4 years plus a vesting option for Ryan Madson? lol
- Freddy Garcia’s 86 mph Heat
  
  They’re trying to out-Levine Levine.
- YankeesJunkie
  
  Now Levine will just have to give Papelbon a five year 70 million dollar deal.
- dean
  
  madness
Kiko Jones

I was never a fan of Posada’s—he and Jeter always rubbed me the wrong way—but I appreciated and respected his contributions to the team. This year, however, he got me in his corner. Mortality hit him like a ton of bricks and although he royally screwed up initially by pulling himself out of the lineup in that Sux game, he subsequently redeemed himself and went out like a true Yankee: getting the job done when it mattered. Although the circumstances are not quite the same, Posada’s situation reminded me of Bernie’s ’06 season; another long goodbye to a big part of the ’90s dynasty.
- http://www.yankeeanalysts.com/ Steve S.
  
  I was never a fan, either. His defense was worse than most people realize, because most people don’t know the difference between a good catcher and a bad one. He stabbed at the ball constantly with his mitt, which tells me he never lost his infielder’s instincts. His stubbornness on pitch selection was so stupid on so many levels I don’t even know where to start. He was a truly horrendous base runner with typical Catcher’s speed. I like smart baseball players, and that wasn’t Jorge.
  
  The best thing about him was his fabulous ability to destroy even the best fastballs, and that’s what made him a big league player. He also did some basic things that some Catchers don’t do (for example, always tagging a batter after a 3rd strike he didn’t field cleanly) which I liked.
  
  But Jorge gave back a lot of the positive stuff you got from his bat with his sub par glove. So overall I don’t think he was as good as the folks who just look at the offense seem to think.
- MannyGeee
  
  You know… For all the good times he provided us, I feel Jorge was the most unlinked ‘beloved’ Yankee… He just sorta had this air of douchey about him… I get it..
Plank

Has there ever been a bigger sports scandal than the Penn State situation going on right now?

The only one that is possibly bigger is the OJ Simpson murder trial. Time will tell how big this one gets, but right now I would have to say this one is and will be bigger.
- YankeesJunkie
  
  Black Sox? However, molesting children is more horrid.
  - Plank
    
    I would count a coach raping children at work and the team and administration covering it up for over a decade as a bigger scandal than some players throwing a baseball game for money.
    - toad
      
      +1
- Brian S.
  
  Yeah I told them that Brett Pedroia wasn’t a good hire but did they listen?
  - YankeesJunkie
    
    A terrible +1
  - MannyGeee
    
    WOW… (ok, well played)
- Pat D
  
  It’s sad in so many ways.
  
  Penn State is one of the precious few schools that has never had big recruiting violations, and now the legendary coach is going to be out the door because he showed blind loyalty to a guy who worked with him for so long. He just couldn’t look past that and see how disturbing the accusations truly were.
  - fin
    
    I’m a huge Penn st. fan and huge Joe Pa fan. However, who cares if he never had any recruiting violations, turning you’re back to child molestation, is far far far worse and not even in the same relm of worng doings. Anything Joe Pa claimed he stood for is all crap IMO. “I alerted the higher ups”, there are no higher ups in Penn State than Joe. It happend in his locker room and on his watch and he just lets it go away.
    - Plank
      
      Paterno hired the guy who saw Sandusky raping a boy in the shower after he told him. To me it seems like it was a job given in order to ensure his silence.
      
      No part of this isn’t disgusting.
      - fin
        
        Yea, I think this is going to get a lot worse as more information comes out. It seems pretty clear that a cover was going on. It may be why Sandusky retired out of the blue. It is hard to even imagine that anyone let alone the leaders of a University could turn their backs on something like this. Its hard to wrap your head around the gravity of the situation.
      - http://www.yankeeanalysts.com/ Steve S.
        
        If you read the report, I don’t think that’s what went down at all. This has been GREATLY misreported on some news outlets and the sports talk shows that are shading the info to be even more inflammatory than it already is.
        
        Quick recap of events. The assistant hears ‘slapping’ noises, walks into the shower where he sees Sandusky with a 10 year old boy up against the wall. He calls his Dad, the father calls his bosses and the Penn State officials launch an investigation. They interview McCreary and Sandusky. Sandusky claims he and the boy were just “horsing around” in the shower. McCreary is not as definitive upon being questioned. The Penn State officials believe Sandusky, but tell him not to bring any kids to the school with him anymore to avoid future incidents. That’s what the officials were talking about when they said “They didn’t believe it was that serious”. Not that they were downplaying rape, rather that they didn’t think one actually happened. That’s why they’re saying they didn’t report it.
        
        We’ve heard LOTS of other things that make the Penn State officials claim tough to believe, but their account is very plausible. Don’t forget that Sandusky was a pillar at that school. He was a professor emeritus, ran a charity for kids, and adopted (I think) 8 kids himself. It was unthinkable that he was capable of doing what he was accused of.
        
        Its the same thing that happened with Bernie Madoff. Before the scandal broke, it was unthinkable that someone as respected as Madoff could possibly be running a Ponzi scheme. After the fact everyone wonders how he wasn’t caught sooner, and it looks like some of his victims (like the Wilpons) must have been in on the scam. Things look very different after the fact. At the time, the Penn State officials may not have known what we know now. I seriously doubt Joe Pa knew he was raping boys in his shower, then gave the GA a promotion to silence him. There’s a lot of conspiracy theories flying around right now. Again, the situation makes more sense to me if you take the Penn State officials at their word.
        
        Plank
        
        You are mixing up a few different shower instances. Read the grand jury report. It’s disturbing. He was found by the GA anally raping a boy he believed to be between 11 and 13. He went to Joe Paterno with this information. Paterno says he brought it to the AD and miraculously the GA was hired as a coach.
        
        Dale Mohorcic
        
        I can think of zero situations where it is appropriate for a grown man to be horsing around with a naked boy between 11 and 13 so I’m fairly certain that any investigation that concluded that is not a good one. And I believe that anyone who doesn’t call the cops after seeing that or becoming aware of it should get whatever punishment the attacker gets as being complicit in a sexual assault.
        
        Plank
        
        “According to the grand jury report, a graduate assistant-subsequently identified as Mike McQueary, who is now the team’s wide receivers coach and recruiting coordinator, saw Sandusky having anal sex with a boy of about 10 in the team showers and walked away to call his father. I don’t know how your fingers dial any number other than 911 in such a situation. Nor do I know how the result of McQueary’s conversation with his father could have resulted in anything other than immediately marching into the shower to rescue the boy and reporting the incident to the police. Instead, McQueary said something about a former coach, a boy and a shower to head coach Joe Paterno the next day.”
        
        The209
        
        dumbest post ever?
    - Pat D
      
      I wasn’t trying to excuse him at all for this. I was pointing out the irony that most college coaches are brought down by recruiting scandals and JoePa’s going to see his career end because of something far less likely to happen and so much worse.
  - steve (different one)
    
    SERIOUSLY??
    ….
    
    SERIOUSLY??
    
    http://www.amazon.com/Touched-Jerry-Sandusky-Story/dp/1582613575/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1320802487&sr=8-3
    - Mickey S
      
      Wow, what a suck fuck!
    - Pat D
      
      I was pretty horrified when I saw that.
- MannyGeee
  
  Duke lax scandal got more air time…. This is much worse, but Just sayin
  - fin
    
    Wait till a trial starts, it will be as big as OJ.
    - Mickey S
      
      Perhaps this Sandusky fellow is a card carrying member of NAMBLA. This is one of the most disturbing stories ever. My boss actually posted up a Joe Pa quote on a meeting agenda yesterday, not the best choice right now.
CapitalT

If this were the Redsox org they would have disparaging articles filled with rumor and innuendo written about him.
dean

Jorge stacks up rather favorably to some other catchers already in the hall. He’s not all the borderline to me.
- Kiko Jones
  
  Well, at the very least he was the top offensive C of the ’00s.
- Soriano Is A Liar
  
  I think Mauer falling off is helping him too. A lot of people compared Posada to him, as id Mauer was a surefire hall of famer. But with Mauer dealing with injury problems and ineffectiveness, Posada looks even better.
- Pat D
  
  Only 3 HOF catchers show up on Posada’s BRef similarity score: Bill Dickey, Gabby Hartnett and Gary Carter. Dickey and Hartnett also played in big-hitting eras and Carter has overall numbers than Posada and was better regarded defensively.
  
  His similarity score also includes decidedly non-HOF catchers like Lance Parrish, Javy Lopez, Bill Freehan (an underrated guy, to be fair) and Benito Santiago.
  - Ed
    
    If you look at the B-Ref pages for any of the players you mentioned, the similarity lists look similar. 4-5 HOF players listed, and a few not so impressive guys mixed in. Lots of overlap in the lists as you flip between the players.
    
    If you look at Posada’s similarity by ages, you get Carlton Fisk as most similar from 33-39. Similar thru age 39 has Fisk, Hartnett, Ernie Lombardi, and Yogi Bera in there.
    - Pat D
      
      By age similarity doesn’t do anything for me in determining if he’s a HOF player, though.
D-Rob’s Great Escape

Buster says the Yanks likely won’t make a serious run at Buehrle. It seems if you piece together these little reports and comments the Yanks either love Darvish and are putting all eggs in that basket or they like Wilson, Jackson plus the trade market, they don’t seem intrested in anyone with age or stuff concerns.
- YankeesJunkie
  
  Considering all the young pieces the Yanks have, paying Buehrle the money he will want is too much for a position where the Yanks have a lot of depth and can get more depth on the cheap.
Monteroisdinero

Thank you Jorge for a great career. I would have preferred you signed a 3 year rather than 4 year contract 4 years ago so I did not have to spend April and May in freezing Scranton and dumps even further north. It is tough to hit in those towns on cold days. Next year will be better for me at warmer stadiums.

i will make it easier for Yankee fans to deal with you no longer being on the roster.

Sincerely,
Jesus
- Plank
  
  Did you just sign your post “Jesus”?
BamBino

I’ve spent the whole season weeping for Jorge, he really just needs to retire and not go out the Bernie Williams limbo route. He’s not a Hall of Famer, just an all time Yankee great and a class act. Jorge will most definitely be missed. Won’t it be weird to potentially see Pettitte, Bernie, and Jorge in the old timers game next year?
http://bleedingyankeeblue.com Jesse

Is anyone watching Clubhouse Confidential on MLB Network? It’s pretty good stuff.
- The Big City of Dreams
  
  Good to have Brian Kenny on MLB Network
  - http://bleedingyankeeblue.com Jesse
    
    Agreed. He was misused on ESPN, aka the network that only uses the basic stats such as average, RBI, and wins…Especially wins.
    - The Big City of Dreams
      
      Yea he hosted ESPN and had a radio show but was he ever on baseball tonight? You almost forgot he was apart of the company.
    - RetroRob
      
      Forget about him being misused on ESPN;I’m just happy MLBN has hired a professional to join the jock club. I mean, a network built around Mitch Williams, Harold Reynolds, Kevin Millar(OMG), Dan Pasqua, Joe Magrane and other members of the jock strap club is just way too much to take. There is zero balance.
      
      I’m not blown away by ClubHouse Confidential, but I like what they’re trying to do, and I think once they get it down it’ll be a good addition.
Plank

The Twins are apparently going into rebuilding mode. Any players interest you? Nothing really stuck out to me. Maybe Liriano.
- jjyank
  
  Liriano would be interesting as long as he comes pretty cheap. Like a Phelps type, maybe Warren, straight up.
- http://bleedingyankeeblue.com Jesse
  
  Yeah no one really sticks out. Maybe Glen Perkins as a second lefty in the bullpen.
- http://www.riveraveblues.com Joe Pawlikowski
  
  Liriano would be a great super buy low guy, but now that Terry Ryan is back in charge I don’t think we’ll see those shenanigans from the Twins.
  - http://www.twitter.com/steveh_mandaura Steve H.
    
    What’s the name of that restaurant you like with all the goofy shit on the wall and the mozzarella sticks?
Dan2

Yanks should retire 71 and take care of Bernie and Jorge in one move.
Tipsie

Jorge has not been celebrated as much as Mariano or Derek, but his contributions with the bat may not be matched at that position for a long time. From 1998 through 2010 (only missing significant time in 2008), pretty darn amazing numbers. Career OBP 374? Wow.

I must admit, however, that Martin’s defensive prowess was a breath of fresh air. #20 was pretty bad for the past few years back there.

Thanks, Jorge. Amazing ALDS. Go out gracefully.
Chuck

Jorge may get a one year deal to pinch hit against righties. I’m not in favor of it but I could see it. He played okay 1b.
Baltimore Yankee

What ever happend to TommieSmithJohnCarlos?
- Plank
  
  He ruined his life by having a baby.
- http://bleedingyankeeblue.com Jesse
  
  No idea. But if you go back to previous posts and just click on his handle it’ll take you to his Twitter where you could try to contact him, and on his Twitter is his link to his facebook account.
- Pat D
  
  I miss him so.
fin

Jorge, has never sounded like a guy ready to hang em up. I wouldnt be suprised if he can find a team that he plays for another year or two. I wish him the best, it his life and if he can keep living the dream for another year or two god bless him.
http://NYBronxBombers24-7 Brian

I’m with you I think Jorge will find a place to play
Foghorn Leghorn

Here’s a question for everyone…

Who do you think the Red Sox will hire as a manager for 2012?
- MannyGeee
  
  Dale Sveum … They will have fully forgotten about him being the scapegoat for bad base running in 2005 and anoint him the savior of RSN… As well they should.
Mantle28

My own discussion question:

We all know about the problem with pitching for the Yankees, but is are there any position players in the majors that you would trade Montero for, if so, who and why?
- Foghorn Leghorn
  
  That’s a good question. When the Yanks traded for Granderson there was a feeling that Granderson was already the player that Jackson MIGHT turn into. Not a bad way to view a transaction especially if the guy you bring in is young, has proven himself and isn’t way overpaid AND the guy you have hasn’t shown the progression that you expected..
  
  With Montero its a bit different. Sure, he projects to be similar to Miguel Cabrera but damn….he’s so young and cheap…let’s see what he can do!
- https://twitter.com/TheRealJeromeS Jerome S
  
  Sure. Longoria, Tulo, still sorta Pujols, just to name a few. The list isn’t very long, but there’s a few obvious ones you have to take.
Avi

If the Yankees added Halladay, Cliff Lee and Pujols this offseason their odds of beating a team like the tigers would be about 60/40.
- http://www.youcantpredictbaseball.com bexarama
  
  Wat
Hal

Jorge Posada retiring? http://bit.ly/vq3nVT
- Plank
  
  Is that the right usage of stalwart? I don’t think so.
  
  “Whether it was engaging in verbal headhunting with Pedro Martinez in the 2003 ALCS or mixing it up with stalwarts like teammate Kyle Farnsworth, Posada never backed down from whatever or whomever the game threw at him.”
  - I am not the droids you’re looking for…
    
    Not correct at all.
    
    Maybe it was an iOS spelling autocorrect thing. Like he wanted to write shitheads or crapfarts or something and his iPad wouldn’t let him :)
Avi

Anyone know how to view this website on the iPhone without it going to the iPhone mode? I’d like to be able to view it in the same format you see it on a computer with pictures and all..