Arky Vaughan

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Arky Vaughan

Hall-of-Famers as Seen Through Player Won-Lost Records: Arky Vaughan

Arky Vaughan was elected to the Hall of Fame by the Veterans' Committee in 1985.

Five highlights of Arky Vaughan's career:

Arky Vaughan was selected to nine All-Star teams. He was the starting shortstop for the National League in four All-Star games and the starting third baseman twice.

Vaughan received MVP votes eight times. His high finish was third, which he achieved twice, in 1935 and 1938.

Vaughan led the National League in on-base percentage, walks, triples, and runs scored three times apiece. He led the league in batting average, slugging percentage, OPS, and stolen bases once each. His league leads in batting average, slugging percentage and OPS came in the same season, 1935, when he also led the National League in walks and on-base percentage.

In 1935, Vaughan batted .385/.491/.607, all of which led the National League. Vaughan's .385 batting average that season is the 5th-highest by a shortstop in major-league history (second-best of the 20th century). His .491 on-base percentage is the highest single-season OBP by a shortstop in major-league history. His .607 slugging percentage is the 6th-highest in major-league history for a shortstop. His 1.098 OPS that season is the highest in major-league history for a shortstop.

Vaughan is one of eight players since 1901 to lead his league in batting average and walks in the same season (which he did in 1935).

The first two tables below present Arky Vaughan'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
1932	PIT	20	129	18.1	17.6	2.9	1.0
1933	PIT	21	152	25.3	19.2	8.9	6.7
1934	PIT	22	149	23.6	20.0	6.3	4.1
1935	PIT	23	137	23.5	15.8	10.1	8.1
1936	PIT	24	156	25.3	20.7	7.6	5.2
1937	PIT	25	126	19.8	14.9	7.0	5.2
1938	PIT	26	148	23.6	18.5	7.6	5.5
1939	PIT	27	152	21.5	20.8	3.7	1.4
1940	PIT	28	156	25.1	20.8	7.4	5.0
1941	PIT	29	106	13.4	12.9	2.2	0.8
1942	BRO	30	128	17.7	13.4	5.6	4.0
1943	BRO	31	149	21.9	18.8	5.4	3.4
1944	-	32	-	-	-	-	-
1945	-	33	-	-	-	-	-
1946	-	34	-	-	-	-	-
1947	BRO	35	64	5.8	3.9	2.3	1.8
1948	BRO	36	65	4.7	4.4	0.7	0.2
			------	------	------	------	------
CAREER (reg. season)			1,817	269.3	221.6	77.9	52.4
			------	------	------	------	------
PostSeason (career)			3	0.1	0.1	0.1	0.1
			------	------	------	------	------
COMBINED			1,820	269.5	221.7	78.0	52.4

Season	Team	Age	Games	eWins	eLosses	eWORL	eWOPA

Expected Player Won-Lost Records
						Value Decomposition
1932	PIT	20	129	18.4	17.3	3.4	1.5
1933	PIT	21	152	24.5	20.0	7.4	5.2
1934	PIT	22	149	24.5	19.1	8.3	6.0
1935	PIT	23	137	23.8	15.5	10.7	8.6
1936	PIT	24	156	26.2	19.7	9.6	7.3
1937	PIT	25	126	18.9	15.8	5.2	3.4
1938	PIT	26	148	23.8	18.3	8.1	5.9
1939	PIT	27	152	22.5	19.9	5.6	3.3
1940	PIT	28	156	25.1	20.9	7.4	5.0
1941	PIT	29	106	14.2	12.1	3.9	2.6
1942	BRO	30	128	16.3	14.8	2.9	1.3
1943	BRO	31	149	21.2	19.4	4.1	2.1
1944	-	32	-	-	-	-	-
1945	-	33	-	-	-	-	-
1946	-	34	-	-	-	-	-
1947	BRO	35	64	5.3	4.4	1.3	0.8
1948	BRO	36	65	5.0	4.1	1.2	0.7
			------	------	------	------	------
CAREER (reg. season)			1,817	269.7	221.2	79.1	53.6
			------	------	------	------	------
PostSeason (career)			3	0.1	0.0	0.1	0.1
			------	------	------	------	------
COMBINED			1,820	269.9	221.3	79.2	53.7

In his New Historical Baseball Abstract, Bill James ranked Arky Vaughan as the second-greatest shortstop in major-league history. James's number one shortstop was Honus Wagner (a fairly conventional choice) whose career almost entirely predates the seasons for which Retrosheet has released play-by-play data. And James published the New Historical Abstract in 2001, so it predates much of the career of Alex Rodriguez (if one considers him a shortstop) and Derek Jeter. So, in effect, Bill James argues (or, at least, he would have argued in 2001) that Arky Vaughan was the best shortstop of the twentieth century for whom I have calculated Player won-lost records.

Bill James named Cal Ripken as his #3 shortstop. Comparing Vaughan to Cal Ripken is an interesting exercise.

Age	Games	pWins	pLoss	WOPA	WORL	Games	pWins	pLoss	WOPA	WORL
	Arky Vaughan						Cal Ripken
20	129	18.1	17.6	1.0	2.9	23	0.6	0.9	-0.2	-0.2
21	152	25.3	19.2	6.7	8.9	160	21.6	18.0	4.3	6.2
22	149	23.6	20.0	4.1	6.3	162	24.8	19.4	6.6	8.7
23	137	23.5	15.8	8.1	10.1	162	25.9	19.4	8.0	10.1
24	156	25.3	20.7	5.2	7.6	161	23.1	20.4	4.1	6.2
25	126	19.8	14.9	5.2	7.0	162	22.0	20.0	3.5	5.5
26	148	23.6	18.5	5.5	7.6	162	19.3	21.4	-0.7	1.2
27	152	21.5	20.8	1.4	3.7	161	19.9	19.7	1.3	3.2
28	156	25.1	20.8	5.0	7.4	162	22.4	19.6	4.2	6.2
29	106	13.4	12.9	0.8	2.2	161	20.4	18.4	3.2	5.1
30	128	17.7	13.4	4.0	5.6	162	23.2	20.2	4.2	6.2
31	149	21.9	18.8	3.4	5.4	162	19.7	18.7	2.2	4.1
32						162	20.4	19.4	2.3	4.2
33						112	14.9	12.8	3.0	4.4
34						144	17.6	18.3	0.6	2.3
35	64	5.8	3.9	1.8	2.3	163	20.6	19.4	2.3	4.3
36	65	4.7	4.4	0.2	0.7	162	19.4	17.1	2.3	4.1
37						161	16.4	17.5	-1.1	0.6
38						86	10.0	9.3	0.6	1.6
39						83	8.7	7.7	1.0	1.9
40						128	11.5	14.0	-2.5	-1.2
------	------	------	------	------	------	------	------	------	------	------
CAREER RECORDS	1,817	269.3	221.6	52.4	77.9	3,001	382.3	351.6	49.2	84.5
CAREER RECORDS (common ages)	1,817	269.3	221.6	52.4	77.9	2,125	282.8	252.7	45.3	70.7

Could you make a case for Vaughan over Ripken? Certainly. Could you make a case for Ripken over Vaughan? Also yes.

Both players had their best season at age 23 (1935 for Vaughan, 1984 for Ripken) with these two seasons being extremely similar in value. Ranking the remaining seasons in order, the next-best season by one of these two was probably Vaughan's 1933 season, followed by Ripken's first MVP season in 1983. Beyond those seasons, Vaughan probably had about four more seasons better than Ripken's third-best season.

One thing that might affect how one rates Vaughan versus Ripken is how one deals with Vaughan's missing age-32, 33, and 34 seasons. At first blush, one might presume that Vaughan missed these three seasons because of World War II. But the last of these seasons is 1946, after the war had ended. And, in fact, Vaughan simply retired after the 1942 season, because of a dispute with his manager, Leo Durocher (source: SABR Bio of Arky Vaughan by Ralph Moses). Personally, I am not inclined to give Vaughan any extra credit for those three seasons. Which leaves him behind Cal Ripken in career pWins over replacement level (pWORL) - and more than 100 pWins behind Ripken.

Vaughan does have a somewhat deeper peak than Ripken - having, for example, 6 of the top 8 pWORL values in the above table - although Vaughan played all but the final two partial seasons of his career in a segregated league. Forced to choose, I think that I would probably rank Ripken just ahead of Vaughan, were I to rank shortstops of the twentieth century. But Vaughan is nevertheless a clearly deserving Hall-of-Famer.

Article last updated: November 5, 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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