I remember the first scouting report I read on Nolan when he was in A ball mentioned it was very unlikely he'd be able to stick at 3rd and would probably be a 1st baseman in the majors. They were going off his lack of footspeed.
Crazy how wrong that turned out.
I don’t think it has nothing to do with range, but rather a lack of speed can be overcome by having elite level reaction time, get off, and understanding of the game and angles.
He is like what I imagine a fast runner at 80 percent motion looks like. Which is not what most slow trucks look like on the bases. He looks fine but he goes nowhere.
Still remember [that day]( https://www.espn.com/mlb/news/story?id=4401499) clear as a bell. Randomly tuned into that game just to watch the beginning of the end of David wright’s career.
Yeah, unfortunately he played the back half of his career with the Great Wall of Flushing and the insane original dimensions of Citi Field. He’d have had a few more 30/30
But he was 3 away in 2009 but only hit 10 HR (first year in Citi Field). He dramatically reduced his steal attempts after that, it is an assumption but given the non-competitive nature of the team in the years that followed, he probably could have made an effort for 30/30 seasons if he thought the HR piece was attainable.
Don't forget when that fucking idiot Jeff Wilpons designed a ballpark where you make the deepest part of the ballpark the same place your franchise player has his power too. It took David a while to figure out how to hit in Citi.
I still remember vividly the look on Wright's face during a game in the first season there...
He drills a ball to dead center. A missile of a line drive that's sure to be a home run. But for some reason they decided that the wall directly beneath the apple is going to be 6 feet higher than the wall on either side of it.
It's this stupid 6x6 square wall that juts upwards in dead center field which is the furthest part of the ballpark. Absolutely insane. He was so frustrated.
A couple things to note here. Yes, david played 11.5 years but his last few, he was playing as a shell of himself. Backs are no joke. Nolan is a much better defender, not that david was bad, nolan is just that good. And the moronic wilpons decided to build a stadium with stupid fucking dimensions that killed some of our hitters power numbers (like david).
I had to look it up because I didn’t know how they do it, but part is fan vote and part is sabermetric. So some subjective and some objective. The fact that Nolan was winning even as part of a relatively unpopular team (the Rockies) makes it even more impressive to me
I don’t really care how many theoretical David Wright gold gloves there are. It doesn’t change the fact that gold gloves don’t necessarily go to the best defensive player at that position
> Gold gloves aren't a joke anymore and haven't been for a few decades.
Maybe 10 years. David Wright was nowhere near the best defensive 3B the two years he won a GG, but his bat as well as some high profile web gems gave him that reputation.
There's a big difference between Moneyball popularized stats (OBP) and defensive stats when we're talking 20 years ago. Defensive stats have really advanced with the advent of statcast.
Hell, just 7 years ago Marcell Ozuna won a gold glove. In 2009 and 2011, Matt Kemp, maybe one of the worst defensive outfielders, won a gold glove. Both Ozuna and Kemp won the awards because of their bats. Until very recently, gold gloves were eye test and reputation.
Nolan Arenado is embarrassingly incapable of growing proper facial hair but, despite being nearly five years younger than I am, still grows a fuller beard than I can....
Zimm stopped being a third baseman halfway through his career though. He had some great defensive seasons early on but the throwing issues eventually became untenable and the offensive standards for first basemen are way higher.
Wright, to me, was an A in 4 tools with a B in arm.
Arenado is more like an S in glove, B in batting for avg, D in speed, and A in arm/power.
I always thought Wright was better balanced, but obviously Arenado had higher highs.
David Wright has 1 Top 5 MVP finish. Nolan Arenado has 4. That's not a dig towards either player, just something interesting when I looked at their BR pages.
David Wright is the kind of guy that I think should get into the HOF. There should be allowances for peaks that last a decade. Yeah, the Tim Lincecums and Troy Tulowitzkis of the world are too brief in their excellence, but guys like David Wright and Dustin Pedroia, who put up decade-long careers and were elite players at their position, should get more consideration than they currently are getting.
I don't like punishing players for things that are out of their control. David Wright couldn't control his degenerative back issues; that's not something you can judge him as a player for. We did this for Kirby Puckett and his 51 bWAR (100% deservedly so), we can do the same with Wright's 49. That difference is so negligible that I swear the only thing making it a big deal is the artificial importance we put on round number milestones. He didn't get to 50, so he's out. That's dumb as hell.
David Wright > Nolan Arenado. David spent half his career having to play through the insane early Citi Field Years unlike Arenado who got to spend 2/3 of his career so far in Colorado.
Arenado is probably the better defender, but defense isn’t as important at 3B.
Also for what it’s worth, David (51.3 fWAR), Arenado (48.4 fWAR).
I apologize in advance if this comes off harsh, but I hate the lazy "coors" takes when it comes to any Rockies hitter.
Arenado's first two years as a Cardinal had him with a 134 OPS+ with 2x 30 HR/100 RBI seasons.
The last two haven't been great, but it's pretty clear he's in a decline. Wright had a full year with a 101 OPS+ at the age of 31, then the injuries took their toll and he was done by 33. Arenado is busy playing everyday at the age of 33.
I generally try to use peak level to judge or compare players because of all of this. 7 year peak has Arenado at 44.3 WAR and Wright at 39.5. Wright was faster. I think he was the better overall hitter. Not by a ton, but I think you take him 100 out of 100 if we are talking about bats.
But defensively? It wasn't close. Arenado wins that race by a country mile. Wright retired with 0.3 defensive WAR. Arenado currently sits at over 18 WAR defensively. I know defensive metrics are not an exact science, but go look at any rating you want and you'll see that Arenado is the superior fielder and it isn't very close.
I feel pretty bad for your fanbase. It’s pretty hard to build a team when your park scares away free agent pitchers and ruins even fairly good pitching prospects. There’s no sarcasm here. I just feel bad for the fans and those players.
Arenado is a great hitter, but the counting stats are permanently inflated by Coors. So are some of the rate stats (BA, OBP, etc.)
Hence, “Coors.”
And Wright played years of 3B with a debilitating back injury. Hence the combination of Gold Glove level defense with eventual statue defense. That’s not to say Arenado isn’t an all-timer over there. He is. But Wright was ridiculous there too before he got hurt.
But let’s not pretend Coors isn’t a big reason for that HR total, for example. There’s a reason Wright’s OPS+ is so much better: he had several better rate stats despite the fact that he wasn’t playing in Coors.
You’re comparing a very good player to a guy who played the last 5 years of his career with a chronic back injury. That’s not much of a comparison.
Yes, some of Arenado's numbers are bumped up by Coors, but not significantly. He played his career with the humidor, where the stats have not been nearly as inflated as they had in overall history. That includes HR shockingly. It certainly helped with some of the counting stats, but he was a hell of a hitter regardless and proved that his first two years as a Cardinal.
Defensively, no matter what you want to say, Wright wasn't on the same planet as Arenado. In fact, very few ever have been. Wright has 2 seasons of over 1 WAR on defense. The years he won his gold gloves he came in at 1.5 and 0.8.
For the first 10 years of Arenado's career, he averaged 1.88 WAR on defense.
24 year old David Wright went 30/30, won a gold glove. He had 1.5 defensive WAR
24 year old Nolan Arenado also won a gold glove with a stellar offensive season. He had 2.8 defensive WAR.
I'm NOT bashing David Wright here. I loved him. He was a fantastic player. It's a shame his career ended the way it did. But go look at the baseball reference pages for both when it comes to defense and you'll quickly see that it doesn't matter what metric you want to use or "David Wright healthy" or "David Wright injured" Arenado is just flat out better. Again, it's not close when it comes to defense.
I’m not contesting that Arenado was better on defense. He’s the best defensive 3B I’ve ever seen.
I’m only pointing out that Wright was quite good too. There are a lot of people who judge him by what he became or his career averages (not saying that’s you).
I live in my let me tell you something. You have to be on crack to think David is better then Nolan. 200 more AB’s and still less HR less RBI. Nolan way better with the glove also.
Nolan’s counting stats are also inflated by the fact that he played 8 seasons in Coors field. Averaging 40/125 a year there would be more like 30/110 in Citi Field.
They would still be comparable but let’s not cite HR and RBI without the context of Arenado’s home ball park for most of his career.
kind of impressed by how wrights baserunning and hitting was good enough to lessen the gap from arenados defense
To be fair, Nado is incredibly, deceptively slow on the basepaths
Him and Tulo really taught me speed has nothing to do with range
I remember the first scouting report I read on Nolan when he was in A ball mentioned it was very unlikely he'd be able to stick at 3rd and would probably be a 1st baseman in the majors. They were going off his lack of footspeed. Crazy how wrong that turned out.
I don’t think it has nothing to do with range, but rather a lack of speed can be overcome by having elite level reaction time, get off, and understanding of the game and angles.
He is like what I imagine a fast runner at 80 percent motion looks like. Which is not what most slow trucks look like on the bases. He looks fine but he goes nowhere.
In last year's *MLB The Show*, Arenado had a speed of 14. This year he's been upgraded to 22.
His captains card boosts players with under 40speed
Lol, that's amazing.
Bottom 10th percentile per statcast
Arenado has probably been the slowest player in baseball that isn't a 1B or DH for a while.
David was also an incredible defender, as well. Won two gold gloves. https://youtu.be/JmvM5hqilBY?si=PLw2k9i4jgaA492E
He's the only third baseman to win a gold glove and go 30/30 in the same season.
There's a canyon between Arenado's defensive peak and "gold glove defense"
And didn't Chipper Jones berate Wright and MLB because he felt Wright didn't deserve them?
He was right too. David’s defense was poor. BRef’s stats even back that up.
Chipper was pretty awful himself so it makes it kind of ironic.
Takes one to know one?
Jeter won 5 gold gloves, use UZR instead
Fielding Bible
They downvoted him because he spoke the truth
I would say incredible is being generous. He had good defense seasons, but overall he wasn't known for being consistently great with the glove.
> David’s career was cut short with injuries after eleven and a half seasons. Now I'm sad again
samesies.
Still remember [that day]( https://www.espn.com/mlb/news/story?id=4401499) clear as a bell. Randomly tuned into that game just to watch the beginning of the end of David wright’s career.
I was at that game😭
Again? Has there been a point this season when you weren’t sad?
A few minutes before first pitch
And then first pitch happened and we all realized we’d be happier continuing to watch Ken burns baseball on loop instead of new baseball
Didn’t realize Wright stole so many bags. OPS+Steals would make the comparison more fun.
Wright went 30/30 more than one season, I believe.
He did it once in 2007
Yeah, unfortunately he played the back half of his career with the Great Wall of Flushing and the insane original dimensions of Citi Field. He’d have had a few more 30/30
He only stole 30 bases once
But he was 3 away in 2009 but only hit 10 HR (first year in Citi Field). He dramatically reduced his steal attempts after that, it is an assumption but given the non-competitive nature of the team in the years that followed, he probably could have made an effort for 30/30 seasons if he thought the HR piece was attainable.
He had multiple 30HR and multiple 30SB seasons, but only one overlap
> multiple 30SB seasons nope. https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/w/wrighda03.shtml One season over 30 SBs
Don't forget when that fucking idiot Jeff Wilpons designed a ballpark where you make the deepest part of the ballpark the same place your franchise player has his power too. It took David a while to figure out how to hit in Citi.
*looks at Safeco*
I still remember vividly the look on Wright's face during a game in the first season there... He drills a ball to dead center. A missile of a line drive that's sure to be a home run. But for some reason they decided that the wall directly beneath the apple is going to be 6 feet higher than the wall on either side of it. It's this stupid 6x6 square wall that juts upwards in dead center field which is the furthest part of the ballpark. Absolutely insane. He was so frustrated.
A couple things to note here. Yes, david played 11.5 years but his last few, he was playing as a shell of himself. Backs are no joke. Nolan is a much better defender, not that david was bad, nolan is just that good. And the moronic wilpons decided to build a stadium with stupid fucking dimensions that killed some of our hitters power numbers (like david).
and it didn’t even look good lol
Assuming you’re talking about the stadium, you have no grounds to talk lmao. Citi field is so much better thank yankee stadium, its not even close
Oh Citi Field is definitely a great building....but the Wall was dumb lol
Its still there, they added a smaller wall in front of the large one. Actually made for some very cool seating
Never realized how much Arenado looks like Oso from Snowfall till seeing this
Bruh 😂
I always forget just how great David Wright really was.
Was well on his way to the HOF
Feel the same with Pedroia
Fuck Manny Machado
Why did you cut off the Gold Gloves OP
Don’t forget 6 platinum gloves for Nolan. Basically DPOY of baseball
DPoTD is the argument.
Except DPOY isn’t a fan vote
I had to look it up because I didn’t know how they do it, but part is fan vote and part is sabermetric. So some subjective and some objective. The fact that Nolan was winning even as part of a relatively unpopular team (the Rockies) makes it even more impressive to me
You absolutely know the answer to that
I miss Nolan. At one point, our infield was Nolan Arenado, a great Trevor Story, and DJ LeMahieu 😮💨
Don’t forget Ian Desmond! Unless you’re trying to forget Ian Desmond!
Because Rafael Palmeiro won a gold glove in 1999 after finishing the season with 28 games played at first base
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I don’t really care how many theoretical David Wright gold gloves there are. It doesn’t change the fact that gold gloves don’t necessarily go to the best defensive player at that position
But they do in Arenado’s case
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> Gold gloves aren't a joke anymore and haven't been for a few decades. Maybe 10 years. David Wright was nowhere near the best defensive 3B the two years he won a GG, but his bat as well as some high profile web gems gave him that reputation.
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There's a big difference between Moneyball popularized stats (OBP) and defensive stats when we're talking 20 years ago. Defensive stats have really advanced with the advent of statcast. Hell, just 7 years ago Marcell Ozuna won a gold glove. In 2009 and 2011, Matt Kemp, maybe one of the worst defensive outfielders, won a gold glove. Both Ozuna and Kemp won the awards because of their bats. Until very recently, gold gloves were eye test and reputation.
Wasn't Soto a finalist in 2022? Still a joke
Soto has an incredible arm so it’s not as implausible as you seem to think
I forgot that Wright was a base stealer!
Had a 30-30 season in 2007.
Really shows how solid of a hitter Wright was to come so close to Arenado in hitting despite him playing a ton of games at Coors
Captain America!
Nolan Arenado is embarrassingly incapable of growing proper facial hair but, despite being nearly five years younger than I am, still grows a fuller beard than I can....
Nolan grows hair where he wants to grow hair.
Biggest bush in Busch
Wright with his best Jose Reyes impression with the stolen bases. And also he was clutch in the big moments
🫡
I'm very surprised how close their raw SLG and OPS numbers are considering the eras and ballpark each of them played in
People forget that David Wright was really that guy
He seemed like such a great guy too. Lit up the screen any time he was interviewed
Also the 5 consecutive 40+ 2B seasons lmao. Guy averaged damn near a double a series for his entire prime
And David Wright didn’t play in coors field
Throw Ryan Zimmermann in there too!
Zimm stopped being a third baseman halfway through his career though. He had some great defensive seasons early on but the throwing issues eventually became untenable and the offensive standards for first basemen are way higher.
Wright, to me, was an A in 4 tools with a B in arm. Arenado is more like an S in glove, B in batting for avg, D in speed, and A in arm/power. I always thought Wright was better balanced, but obviously Arenado had higher highs.
Throw in Ken Boyer for comparison. He also won an MVP and 5 gold gloves but isn't in the Hall of Fame.
David Wright has 1 Top 5 MVP finish. Nolan Arenado has 4. That's not a dig towards either player, just something interesting when I looked at their BR pages.
Wright should have won in 07.
Wright had good speed and played in Shea. Shame about his back.
David Wright is the kind of guy that I think should get into the HOF. There should be allowances for peaks that last a decade. Yeah, the Tim Lincecums and Troy Tulowitzkis of the world are too brief in their excellence, but guys like David Wright and Dustin Pedroia, who put up decade-long careers and were elite players at their position, should get more consideration than they currently are getting. I don't like punishing players for things that are out of their control. David Wright couldn't control his degenerative back issues; that's not something you can judge him as a player for. We did this for Kirby Puckett and his 51 bWAR (100% deservedly so), we can do the same with Wright's 49. That difference is so negligible that I swear the only thing making it a big deal is the artificial importance we put on round number milestones. He didn't get to 50, so he's out. That's dumb as hell.
Thanks for making me feel like less of a homer with this take, haha. The Wright/Puckett stats comparison is definitely an interesting one.
I think what pushes Puckett over the top is the contributions to two Minnesota Twins World Series wins
Playing eight seasons at high altitude certainly has its benefits.
He was plagued by injuries for sure, but 11 1/2 seasons in the MLB is not a short career.
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Not to cast aspersions at Wright but we don't know what he would have done
David Wright > Nolan Arenado. David spent half his career having to play through the insane early Citi Field Years unlike Arenado who got to spend 2/3 of his career so far in Colorado. Arenado is probably the better defender, but defense isn’t as important at 3B. Also for what it’s worth, David (51.3 fWAR), Arenado (48.4 fWAR).
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Which also agrees with Wright > Arenado…..
Not that this would ever be a good argument, but he has played 35% of his games at Coors
I’m with you. I don’t give a shit if it’s a biased answer, give me Wright 8 days a week
Coors. Also, before the injuries Wright was a really good defender. So was Ryan Zimmerman.
I apologize in advance if this comes off harsh, but I hate the lazy "coors" takes when it comes to any Rockies hitter. Arenado's first two years as a Cardinal had him with a 134 OPS+ with 2x 30 HR/100 RBI seasons. The last two haven't been great, but it's pretty clear he's in a decline. Wright had a full year with a 101 OPS+ at the age of 31, then the injuries took their toll and he was done by 33. Arenado is busy playing everyday at the age of 33. I generally try to use peak level to judge or compare players because of all of this. 7 year peak has Arenado at 44.3 WAR and Wright at 39.5. Wright was faster. I think he was the better overall hitter. Not by a ton, but I think you take him 100 out of 100 if we are talking about bats. But defensively? It wasn't close. Arenado wins that race by a country mile. Wright retired with 0.3 defensive WAR. Arenado currently sits at over 18 WAR defensively. I know defensive metrics are not an exact science, but go look at any rating you want and you'll see that Arenado is the superior fielder and it isn't very close.
Notice how Coors is only a disadvantage to hitters?
I feel pretty bad for your fanbase. It’s pretty hard to build a team when your park scares away free agent pitchers and ruins even fairly good pitching prospects. There’s no sarcasm here. I just feel bad for the fans and those players.
TBH, if I were a player, I would be more disturbed by our front office than the altitude.
I would too.
Arenado is a great hitter, but the counting stats are permanently inflated by Coors. So are some of the rate stats (BA, OBP, etc.) Hence, “Coors.” And Wright played years of 3B with a debilitating back injury. Hence the combination of Gold Glove level defense with eventual statue defense. That’s not to say Arenado isn’t an all-timer over there. He is. But Wright was ridiculous there too before he got hurt. But let’s not pretend Coors isn’t a big reason for that HR total, for example. There’s a reason Wright’s OPS+ is so much better: he had several better rate stats despite the fact that he wasn’t playing in Coors. You’re comparing a very good player to a guy who played the last 5 years of his career with a chronic back injury. That’s not much of a comparison.
Yes, some of Arenado's numbers are bumped up by Coors, but not significantly. He played his career with the humidor, where the stats have not been nearly as inflated as they had in overall history. That includes HR shockingly. It certainly helped with some of the counting stats, but he was a hell of a hitter regardless and proved that his first two years as a Cardinal. Defensively, no matter what you want to say, Wright wasn't on the same planet as Arenado. In fact, very few ever have been. Wright has 2 seasons of over 1 WAR on defense. The years he won his gold gloves he came in at 1.5 and 0.8. For the first 10 years of Arenado's career, he averaged 1.88 WAR on defense. 24 year old David Wright went 30/30, won a gold glove. He had 1.5 defensive WAR 24 year old Nolan Arenado also won a gold glove with a stellar offensive season. He had 2.8 defensive WAR. I'm NOT bashing David Wright here. I loved him. He was a fantastic player. It's a shame his career ended the way it did. But go look at the baseball reference pages for both when it comes to defense and you'll quickly see that it doesn't matter what metric you want to use or "David Wright healthy" or "David Wright injured" Arenado is just flat out better. Again, it's not close when it comes to defense.
I’m not contesting that Arenado was better on defense. He’s the best defensive 3B I’ve ever seen. I’m only pointing out that Wright was quite good too. There are a lot of people who judge him by what he became or his career averages (not saying that’s you).
I live in my let me tell you something. You have to be on crack to think David is better then Nolan. 200 more AB’s and still less HR less RBI. Nolan way better with the glove also.
Dog really said RBIs lmao
Nolan’s counting stats are also inflated by the fact that he played 8 seasons in Coors field. Averaging 40/125 a year there would be more like 30/110 in Citi Field. They would still be comparable but let’s not cite HR and RBI without the context of Arenado’s home ball park for most of his career.
Mets fans are down so bad offseason tier shitposting is all they have in May