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Top 100 Angels: Garret ANDERSON #7

#7 GARRET ANDERSON - OF (1994-2008)

Garret Anderson is the epitome of Counting Stats and a cautionary tale of overvaluing them in the face of Rate Stats.

He might have been your favorite Angel, and he holds oh so many records. So many.

Games, At-Bats, Plate Appearances, Runs, Hits, Total Bases, Singles, Doubles, RBI, Extra-Base-Hits, Times On Base and Sacrifice Flies

He is 2nd in Angels history in HR and stands 3rd in Triples.

That is pretty awesome and that is why he is a Top Ten Angel, that and his bases-clearing double in Game 7 of the 2002 World Series.

But many fans will grumble that topping all of those categories is a clear indicator that Garret should be ranked #1, or at least higher than #7. But those records listed above are due to his record 8,480 Plate Appearances. Where Garret's achievements are measured as a percentage, he holds no franchise records. But he is still a stud:

.296 Batting Average (3rd), .469 SLG, (5th), .796 OPS (10th), 226.9 WIn Shares (2nd)

So that is a Top 100 Angel and a Top 10 Angel, but despite all of his accomplishments as an Angel, his Win Shares per Plate Appearance was .026, similar to Don Baylor and a little lower than Rod Carew. But Anderson was critical in the 2002 season as well as helping to carry the team to the 2007 AL West title with a monstrous 2nd half.

And no matter what anyone tells you, he may have looked lazy in the field, but he was a damn good outfielder.

CAREER STATS

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Comments

RANGE FACTOR

jesus people, its not fielding % or errors that make him lazy, its his RANGE FACTOR<@@#(_!U%)(FJIPKDAGNIP}AGBIOP{GB

How do we STILL Talk about this?

If GA wasn't so lazy he would have proof read my post.
Range Factor isn't a great way to judge fielders

as it’s dependent on any number of outside influences.

Never the less, if you insist on using it as a stat

2002- GA is 4th among all Left Fielders in Range Factor.
2003- GA is 2nd among all Left Fielders in Range Factor.

During his prime, he was an awesome outfielder.

I think that this is a fair place to put GA, one of the Angels greats, no doubt
GA was a classy Angel

He is the only reason I hope the Braves are respectable this year. Go GA.

Plus, now he gets to continue mentoring Kotch

Garret is definitely one of my favorite Angels, and I think the presence he brought to the clubhouse will surely be missed this year.

My Stats are Better than your Stats

I basically make and analyze stats for a living. And let’s say that at best, stats can define about 65% of what makes a baseball player great or not. For example, stats do not tell the whole story of what miserable ballplayers Dave Kingman or Jose Guillen were. Conversely, stats do not tell the whole story of the greatness of Kirk Gibson, especially in the impact on the club [and please do not go out and create a new stat for me to measure this]. It’s my feeling that Garret was a great influence on the culture of the Angels. Before there was a Scioscia on the scene, there was a GA. And he was all about the following qualities: Professionalism. Team-first. Show up and work hard every day. Situational hitting, not stat-padding. GA epitomizes, to me, the very essence of a professional athlete. So you can tell some of your stats to shut up — in my mind, he’s a top 5 Angel.

35% Remaining

what do you think comprises the other 35%.

I think he said what made up the other 35% in his mind:

Professionalism. Team-first. Show up and work hard every day. Situational hitting, not stat-padding.

so apparently over at Talking Chop

they refer to GA as “satan”.

i really hope he has an amazing season, just to shut them up.

When he does do well...

does that mean the Talking Choppers will be classified as s@t@n worshippers? Yikes.

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