=O

Hargrove has an 18 point lead in OPS+ as a Ranger, but Harrah has two things on him on top of that: positional value and tenure. He played nearly twice as many games as Hargrove in Texas (okay, some of it in Washington, but I’m being lazy), and that alone I think would be enough to negate the 18 point difference even if they played the same defense at the same position.

In Runs Created, Harrah ranks 8th with 681 while Hargrove ranks 17th with 433. And that, again, doesn’t take in the value of that production from shortstop vs. the value in that production from a first baseman.

Both were below average fielders, with Harrah probably being a little worse, but I don’t think it’s enough to out-do the advantage in games played and positional difference for Toby.

Additionally, when doing a project going back through time and voting for MVPs every season for Baseball Fever, I also had Harrah quite frequently on or near my ballot, so he was, for a while, pretty consistently one of the 10 best position players in the AL or so, and I can think of at least one year where he was near the top of the ballot.

1. Harrah ‘75: 10.6
2. Harrah ‘76: 9.0
3. Hargrove ‘77: 8.5
4. Hargrove ‘76: 7.3
5. Harrah ‘77: 7.1
6. Harrah ‘74: 7.0
7. Hargrove ‘75: 6.4
8. Harrah ‘85: 5.9
9. Hargrove ‘74: 5.5
10. Hargrove ‘78: 5.0
11. Harrah ‘78: 4.7
12. Harrah ‘73: 4.1
13. Harrah ‘72: 3.3

In his five years here, he averaged 122 games per year. That’s missing a quarter of every season he wore a Texas uniform. It wasn’t like he was in a more injury-prone position either — he played 1B and DH while he was here.

To me, putting up an OPS+ of ~120 in the 1B/DH slot isn’t enough production to justify a higher rank.