Baseball Player Won-Loss Records
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Jim Rice

Hall-of-Famers as Seen Through Player Won-Lost Records: Jim Rice

Jim Rice was elected to the Hall of Fame in his 2nd year of eligibility, 2000, with 79.6% of the vote.

Five highlights of Jim Rice's career: The first two tables below present Jim Rice's career as measured by Player won-lost records, in and out of context.

Basic Player Won-Lost Records
Value Decomposition
Season Team Age Games pWins pLosses pWORL pWOPA
1974BOS21
24
2.11.41.00.7
1975BOS22
144
20.115.45.94.0
1976BOS23
153
17.517.51.1-0.7
1977BOS24
160
18.413.95.93.9
1978BOS25
163
26.516.911.18.8
1979BOS26
158
21.418.44.22.2
1980BOS27
124
17.215.42.71.1
1981BOS28
108
15.514.22.10.6
1982BOS29
145
22.219.83.51.5
1983BOS30
155
26.521.66.34.0
1984BOS31
159
23.622.02.60.5
1985BOS32
140
19.919.71.2-0.7
1986BOS33
157
24.919.36.84.7
1987BOS34
108
13.014.3-0.7-2.0
1988BOS35
135
11.812.30.5-1.0
1989BOS36
56
4.54.70.3-0.3
------ ------ ------ ------ ------
CAREER (reg. season)
2,089
284.8246.954.427.3
------ ------ ------ ------ ------
PostSeason (career)
18
2.22.20.1-0.1
------ ------ ------ ------ ------
COMBINED
2,107
286.9249.154.527.2


Expected Player Won-Lost Records
Value Decomposition
Season Team Age Games eWins eLosses eWORL eWOPA
1974BOS21
24
1.81.70.30.1
1975BOS22
144
18.916.63.51.6
1976BOS23
153
16.918.01.2-0.7
1977BOS24
160
18.014.25.23.3
1978BOS25
163
25.018.48.05.8
1979BOS26
158
22.317.56.24.1
1980BOS27
124
16.615.91.5-0.1
1981BOS28
108
15.314.41.70.2
1982BOS29
145
21.620.42.30.4
1983BOS30
155
26.122.15.43.1
1984BOS31
159
22.822.81.1-1.1
1985BOS32
140
20.319.32.10.1
1986BOS33
157
23.520.74.01.9
1987BOS34
108
13.413.90.3-1.0
1988BOS35
135
11.812.30.6-0.9
1989BOS36
56
4.34.9-0.1-0.7
------ ------ ------ ------ ------
CAREER (reg. season)
2,089
278.6253.143.216.1
------ ------ ------ ------ ------
PostSeason (career)
18
2.22.10.20.0
------ ------ ------ ------ ------
COMBINED
2,107
280.8255.243.516.2


Jim Rice: One of the Best Hitters of His Generation
Jim Rice's Hall-of-Fame case was based primarily on his batting performance through his prime. From 1975 - 1986, Jim Rice had an average Triple Crown line per 162 games of .304/33/118. That's impressive, but Triple Crown stats can be misleading and need to be put into context.

The top 10 players in batting wins over non-pitcher average from 1975 through 1986 are shown next.

Top Players, Batting Wins over Non-Pitcher Average (1975 - 1986)
eWins eLosses eWinPct eWOPA
1Mike Schmidt184.2122.70.60056.9
2Reggie Jackson152.0118.10.56333.8
3Eddie Murray146.8113.60.56433.2
4George Brett149.0117.60.55931.4
5Dave Winfield166.1132.30.55731.3
6George Foster156.0122.10.56129.3
7Jim Rice170.0140.80.54729.2
8Greg Luzinski135.0104.00.56528.6
9Dwight Evans138.5110.90.55527.6
10Fred Lynn134.1106.80.55727.3

Positional Average excludes pitcher offense



Measured by batting wins over non-pitcher average, Jim Rice was one of the top 10 batters over this 12-year period. Two things strike me as noteworthy about this table. First, three players in the above table were the starting outfield for the Boston Red Sox for much of the first half of this time period.

Second, Jim Rice is second in batting wins in the previous table. This segues into the final section of this article.

Jim Rice: One of the Best Players of His Generation
During his prime, Jim Rice had two key things going for him. First, as noted above, he was an excellent hitter. Second, Jim Rice was also an exceptionally durable player. From 1975 - 1986, Jim Rice played in 1,766 games with 7,754 plate appearances, averages of 147 games and 646 PA per season - and that includes 108 games and 495 PA in 1981, which represented appearing in every Red Sox game during that strike-shortened season. Because of his durability, Jim Rice looks very good when measured against replacement level.

The final table of this article, then, shows the top 10 players in major-league baseball from 1975 through 1986 as measured by pWins over replacement level (pWORL).

Top 10 Players, 1975 - 1986, ranked by pWORL
Player pWins pLosses pWOPA pWORL
1Mike Schmidt259.7192.060.1
81.9
2George Brett219.3171.046.6
65.4
3Joe L. Morgan177.3136.144.1
59.4
4Eddie Murray184.2135.540.0
55.7
5Dave Winfield260.4215.532.2
55.2
6Steve Carlton183.8161.434.0
53.9
7Dwight Evans221.7179.334.1
53.5
8Jim Rice253.5214.229.9
53.4
9George Foster236.6191.132.1
52.7
10Reggie Jackson207.6168.531.6
51.3


Article last updated: February 3, 2020



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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