Dave Winfield

Baseball Player Won-Loss Records
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Dave Winfield

Hall-of-Famers as Seen Through Player Won-Lost Records: Dave Winfield

Dave Winfield was elected to the Hall of Fame in his 1st year of eligibility, 2001, with 84.5% of the vote.

Five highlights of Dave Winfield's career:

Dave Winfield was drafted by four teams in three professional sports. He was a fifth-round pick of the Atlanta Hawks in the NBA draft, a fourth-round pick of the Utah Stars in the ABA draft, and a 17th-round pick by the Minnesota Vikings in the NFL draft. Finally, Winfield was drafted in the first round, fourth overall, by the San Diego Padres, with whom he signed.

Winfield was named to twelve All-Star teams and received MVP votes nine times with seven top-10 finishes. Winfield also won seven Gold Gloves and six Silver Sluggers in his career.

Winfield ranks in the top 25 in major-league history in plate appearances (13th all-time with 12,358), total bases (16th all-time with 5,221), RBI (18th all-time with 1,833), and hits (23rd all-time with 3,110).

Dave Winfield’s best season was 1979 when he batted .308/.395/.558, led the National League in RBI (118) and total bases (333), with a career-high 10 triples, 34 home runs, and 97 runs scored, and won his first Gold Glove. Winfield finished third in MVP voting that year, the highest finish of his career.

In 1978, Winfield was named the first captain in San Diego Padres history.

The first two tables below present Dave Winfield's career as measured by Player won-lost records, in and out of context.

Season	Team	Age	Games	pWins	pLosses	pWORL	pWOPA

Basic Player Won-Lost Records
						Value Decomposition
1973	SDN	21	56	4.3	4.6	-0.2	-0.6
1974	SDN	22	145	18.8	16.3	3.1	1.4
1975	SDN	23	143	20.5	16.7	4.3	2.5
1976	SDN	24	137	22.0	16.6	6.2	4.3
1977	SDN	25	157	23.6	20.8	3.3	1.1
1978	SDN	26	158	25.1	18.2	7.9	5.8
1979	SDN	27	159	26.9	19.8	7.9	5.6
1980	SDN	28	162	21.0	20.2	1.4	-0.6
1981	NYA	29	105	14.6	12.8	2.7	1.3
1982	NYA	30	140	19.9	18.8	2.2	0.3
1983	NYA	31	152	21.4	18.6	3.9	2.0
1984	NYA	32	141	20.9	16.8	5.0	3.2
1985	NYA	33	155	24.1	18.7	6.7	4.6
1986	NYA	34	154	20.4	17.6	3.8	2.0
1987	NYA	35	156	20.7	17.7	4.1	2.2
1988	NYA	36	149	21.8	17.1	5.8	3.9
1989	-	37	-	-	-	-	-
+– 1990		38	132	16.4	16.3	1.1	-0.5
	CAL		112	14.7	14.2	1.3	-0.0
	NYA		20	1.8	2.2	-0.2	-0.4
1991	CAL	39	150	16.8	16.5	1.2	-0.5
1992	TOR	40	156	17.7	12.8	6.2	4.3
1993	MIN	41	143	12.9	14.4	-0.3	-2.0
1994	MIN	42	76	6.1	6.3	0.3	-0.5
1995	CLE	43	45	1.3	2.4	-0.9	-1.2
			------	------	------	------	------
CAREER (reg. season)			2,971	397.3	339.8	75.5	38.7
			------	------	------	------	------
PostSeason (career)			26	2.9	2.3	0.7	0.4
			------	------	------	------	------
COMBINED			2,997	400.2	342.1	76.2	39.1

Season	Team	Age	Games	eWins	eLosses	eWORL	eWOPA

Expected Player Won-Lost Records
						Value Decomposition
1973	SDN	21	56	4.5	4.4	0.3	-0.2
1974	SDN	22	145	18.9	16.1	3.3	1.6
1975	SDN	23	143	20.3	16.9	3.8	2.0
1976	SDN	24	137	21.7	16.9	5.4	3.5
1977	SDN	25	157	24.3	20.0	4.8	2.6
1978	SDN	26	158	24.0	19.4	5.5	3.4
1979	SDN	27	159	26.7	20.0	7.7	5.4
1980	SDN	28	162	22.6	18.7	4.7	2.8
1981	NYA	29	105	14.2	13.1	2.0	0.6
1982	NYA	30	140	20.4	18.3	3.1	1.3
1983	NYA	31	152	21.0	19.0	3.2	1.3
1984	NYA	32	141	20.8	17.0	4.7	2.9
1985	NYA	33	155	22.7	20.1	3.9	1.8
1986	NYA	34	154	19.9	18.0	2.9	1.0
1987	NYA	35	156	19.6	18.8	1.8	0.0
1988	NYA	36	149	21.3	17.6	4.7	2.8
1989	-	37	-	-	-	-	-
+– 1990		38	132	16.3	16.5	0.8	-0.8
	CAL		112	14.6	14.3	1.2	-0.2
	NYA		20	1.7	2.2	-0.4	-0.6
1991	CAL	39	150	17.0	16.3	1.7	-0.0
1992	TOR	40	156	16.9	13.5	4.6	2.7
1993	MIN	41	143	13.4	13.9	0.7	-0.9
1994	MIN	42	76	6.1	6.2	0.4	-0.5
1995	CLE	43	45	1.5	2.2	-0.6	-0.9
			------	------	------	------	------
CAREER (reg. season)			2,971	394.0	343.0	69.6	32.8
			------	------	------	------	------
PostSeason (career)			26	2.6	2.6	0.2	-0.1
			------	------	------	------	------
COMBINED			2,997	396.7	345.6	69.8	32.7

Hall-of-Fame candidates can sometimes be broken down into career candidates, peak candidates, and prime candidates. Dave Winfield is something of a quintessential "career candidate" for the Hall of Fame.

The next table shows the top 10 players in career pWins among players for whom I have calculated Player won-lost records.

		Top 10 Players (sorted by career pWins)
		pWins	pLosses	pWOPA	pWORL
1	Hank Aaron	496.7	369.1	98.5	142.5
2	Barry Bonds	466.8	310.6	136.5	174.4
3	Willie Mays	465.3	329.8	116.5	156.6
4	Pete Rose Sr.	439.3	394.7	23.6	64.5
5	Carl Yastrzemski	430.9	360.2	45.5	85.7
6	Rickey Henderson	428.4	350.3	62.5	100.5
7	Stan Musial	424.1	311.3	88.2	126.2
8	Mel Ott	419.7	295.2	103.6	140.8
9	Babe Ruth	410.9	236.0	161.2	195.2
10	Frank Robinson	398.0	302.5	70.9	106.8

There is sometimes a negative perception of career candidates as mere "compilers". Of course, pWins are a pretty valuable thing to compile.

Still, value is perhaps better measured by comparing Player wins against average or replacement level.

The next table shows the top 20 players in pWins over replacement level (pWORL) from 1961 (the first season of the 162-game schedule) through 1995 (Dave Winfield's final season). Admittedly, this may be somewhat cherry-picked. But being one of the top 20 players over a 35-year stretch is very impressive.

		Top 20 Players, pWORL (1961 - 1995)
		pWins	pLosses	pWOPA	pWORL
1	Joe L. Morgan	371.9	293.9	84.9	117.6
2	Mike Schmidt	338.5	257.6	71.0	99.7
3	Tom Seaver	306.9	258.2	65.1	98.6
4	Rickey Henderson	332.0	257.1	64.4	93.0
5	Reggie Jackson	370.0	295.8	58.4	92.6
6	Hank Aaron	332.1	248.9	63.1	92.5
7	Willie Mays	267.8	189.7	67.5	90.4
8	Jim Palmer	241.5	186.1	61.9	88.7
9	Frank Robinson	296.7	217.8	61.6	88.1
10	Bob Gibson	252.9	207.2	59.7	87.2
11	Steve Carlton	335.6	305.9	49.2	86.9
12	Carl Yastrzemski	430.9	360.2	45.5	85.7
13	Nolan Ryan	354.6	329.6	38.1	81.0
14	Juan Marichal	225.6	184.6	54.6	79.1
15	Lou Whitaker	303.8	262.6	51.2	78.5
16	Fergie Jenkins	285.0	252.3	44.4	77.4
17	Gaylord Perry	315.6	290.2	38.2	76.1
18	Don Sutton	318.6	297.3	38.4	75.6
19	Dave Winfield	397.3	339.8	38.7	75.5
20	Dwight Evans	330.1	271.9	45.6	75.3

There are four basic factors in which players can earn Player won-lost records: batting, baserunning, pitching, and fielding. Setting aside pitching, the next table shows the decomposition of Dave Winfield's career record across these three basic factors: batting, baserunning, and fielding.

eWins	eLosses	eWOPA	eWins	eLosses	eWOPA	eWins	eLosses	eWOPA
Batting			Baserunning			Fielding
266.9	220.9	43.1	22.7	21.2	1.2	103.4	102.0	1.4

Dave Winfield was above-average for his career in all three player factors: batting, baserunning, and fielding.

This puts Dave Winfield in fairly elite company. The next table shows all players for whom I have calculated Player won-lost records who had at least 200 batting wins, 15 baserunning wins, 75 fielding wins, were over positional average in all three factors^*, and also had positive pWOPA for their career. The players are sorted by pWORL.
^*Positional average for batting and baserunning excludes pitcher offense. This is done to fairly compare players in DH and non-DH leagues.

	pWins	pLosses	pWORL	pWOPA
Barry Bonds	466.8	310.6	136.5	174.4
Willie Mays	465.3	329.8	116.5	156.6
Hank Aaron	496.7	369.1	98.5	142.5
Mickey Mantle	354.1	227.5	112.2	141.9
Mel Ott	419.7	295.2	103.6	140.8
Rickey Henderson	428.4	350.3	62.5	100.5
Al Kaline	380.5	299.2	58.6	93.2
Cal Ripken	382.3	351.6	49.2	84.5
Dave Winfield	397.3	339.8	38.7	75.5
Dwight Evans	330.1	271.9	45.6	75.3
Paul Waner	363.4	303.7	36.2	70.9
Roberto Clemente	357.0	295.1	37.8	70.5
Adrian Beltre	358.5	318.3	35.3	68.5
Brooks Robinson	352.3	310.6	32.0	64.9
Carlos Beltran	331.4	290.0	32.4	63.6
Billy Williams	332.4	278.2	31.2	62.1
Bobby Abreu	309.4	264.0	29.6	57.9
Andre Dawson	350.4	309.7	22.8	55.1
Tony Gwynn Sr.	319.4	286.1	12.4	41.5
Vada Pinson	325.7	297.4	9.7	40.7

Article last updated: March 30, 2019

All articles are written so that they pull data directly from the most recent version of the Player won-lost database. Hence, any numbers cited within these articles should automatically incorporate the most recent update to Player won-lost records. In some cases, however, the accompanying text may have been written based on previous versions of Player won-lost records. I apologize if this results in non-sensical text in any cases.

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