One of the neat features of the infinitely useful Baseball-Reference.com is the player similarity listings, showing whose stats a given player most closely resembles through both their career and at their current age. This is important because the talk amongst Sox fans these days is that “we” have a great chance at going the distance this year because one man will singlehandedly mean the difference between last year’s abysmal 72 wins and this year’s inevitable World Series triumph. They speak, of course, of the mighty Nick Swisher.
They point to his great attitude in the clubhouse and his commendable acts of charity, which are nice things to have in a ballplayer. They point to how the fans loved him in Oakland, which is also a plus because we all know the South Side has seen more than its share of ornery antisocial types. And of course there’s the inevitable discussion of his grit and grindyness, which are apparently also key requirements in any ballplayer worth trading your two best pitching prospects for.
But when it comes time to talk about Swisher the player, it gets complicated. On the one hand, he’s a career .251 hitter through four seasons. On the other, he’s capable of hitting 35 home runs in Oakland, a number which should only rise playing half the season in the left-handed hitter-friendly Cell. He sports a solid OBP, but he also finished just behind our own Jim Thome for tenth in the American League in strikeouts last year.
So what have we really got in Swisher? According to the folks at B-R, someone in the mold of the following:
1. Phil Plantier (961)
2. Bob Allison (961)
3. Jose Cruz (956)
4. Frank Thomas (951)
5. Austin Kearns (950)
6. Glenn Davis (949)
7. Bob Robertson (945)
8. Jay Gibbons (943)
9. Bo Jackson (942)
10. Pat Burrell (940)
Frank Thomas! Bo Jackson! My heart raced at the idea of having another perpetual highlight reel joining the ranks of the Sox, until two things came to light:
1) Consistency was never Bo’s thing, more like doing normal things in the most superhuman way possible.
2) This is the Frank they’re talking about.
So there you have it, a nice guy whose good deeds aren’t going to compensate for an iffy rotation and a delusional fan base spreading the word on the second coming of the wrong Frank Thomas. God I hate this team.