There is no doubt Larry Walker was a much better baseball player than Derek Jeter when one measures baseball skills.

Larry Walker should have been inducted into the baseball Hall of Fame 10 years ago.

For various reasons, the media falls in love with certain players when it comes to election to various sports halls of fame.

Entrance is very subjective. Each of the individual voters uses his/her own criteria.

In the 2020 baseball election, the golden boy was Derek Jeter. Larry Walker was finally admitted on his 10th and final year of eligibility. If you look at strictly the numbers, Larry Walker was a much, much better baseball player than Jeter in the five skills used to judge players. (Hit, hit for power, run, field and throw).

The numbers I am going to use all come the following website.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/awards/hof_batting.shtml

There are 266 players in the baseball of fame. 80 of those 266 are pitchers. Babe Ruth is listed as both a batter and a pitcher so you can add or delete one number on either category. The offensive numbers of those 80 pitchers are included in the Average Batting Numbers of a Hall of Fame player.

The first column lists the categories used to judge offense.
The second column lists the numbers for the Average Hall of Fame Player.
The third column lists Derek Jeter’s actual offensive numbers.
The fourth column lists Larry Walker's actual offensive numbers.

In the fifth column I projected Larry Walker’s offensive numbers based on the same number of plate appearances as Jeter. Jeter had 12,602 actual plate appearances. Walker had 8,030 actual plate appearances.
Jeter had 1.569 more plate appearances than Walker. I projected Walker's numbers using that multiplication factor of 1.569.


Using Walker’s actual numbers, he only had four less triples in 4,572 less plate appearances.

He had 123 more home runs.

They both had 1,311 runs batted in, but again, Walker had 4,572 less plate appearances.

Walker only had 169 less bases on balls than Jeter.

Walker had more Intentional bases on balls than Jeter by a wide margin.

Walker had more sacrifice flies than Jeter.

Jeter batted second for most of his career. His job was to move the runner on first base into scoring position.

Despite that, he averaged less than 5 sacrifice bunts per year over his career. Baseball's greatest shortstop, Honus Wagner, had 221. Tom Glavine and Rogers Hornsby each had 216. Ozzie Smith had 214. Greg Maddux had 180. John Smoltz had 136. Gaylord Perry and Babe Ruth both had 113. Bob Feller had 100.

If Derek Jeter were truly the team player all these writers who have a man-crush on him, claim him to be, his sacrifice bunts should be significantly higher.

If Derek Jeter were truly the team player all these writers claim him to be, he would have gladly stepped aside for Alex Rodriguez at the shortstop position.

In his book, “The Science of Hitting", Ted Williams defines the three most important rules of hitting.
1. Get a good pitch to hit.
2. Know the game situation.
3. Be quick with bat.

Derek Jeter has the sixth most strikeouts (1,840) of any hall of fame player. He trails only Reggie Jackson, Jim Thome, Willie Stargell, Mike Schmidt and Tony Perez, all of whom usually batted third or fourth in the lineup.

Babe Ruth had 1,330 strikeouts in his career. Cal Ripken had 1,305 strikeouts. George Brett had 908. Lou Gehrig had 790. Wade Boggs had 745. Honus Wagner had 735. Ted Williams had 709. Stan Musial had 696. Ty Cobb had 680. Tony Gwynn had 434. Bob Gibson had 415. Yogi Berra had 414. Joe DiMaggio had 369.

Derek Jeter was a very selfish batter. Derek Jeter never learned where the strike zone was.

Derek Jeter saw most hittable pitches than anybody in baseball history.

For his entire career, Jeter batted in front of the highest priced free agent George Steinbrenner's money could buy. That list includes Jason Giambi, Alfonso Soriano, Hideki Matsui, Tino Martinez (trade), Alex Rodriguez, Gary Sheffield, Mark Teixeira, Curtis Granderson (trade).

Derek Jeter was never the best shortstop in the American League.
In the second half of his career, Derek Jeter wasn’t even the best shortstop on his team.
Derek Jeter had a very limited fielding range for a shortstop.
Derek Jeter had an ordinary throwing arm for a shortstop.

Larry Walker had a better career batting average, a better career on base percentage, a better career slugging percentage, and a better career OPS (on base plus slugging percentage).

Larry Walker was a tremendous defensive outfielder.
Larry Walker had an outstanding throwing arm.
Larry Walker had very good running speed.

In the prime of each player ask yourself this question:

Would the Pittsburgh Pirates have traded Honus Wagner for Derek Jeter?
Would the Seattle Mariners have traded Alex Rodriguez for Derek Jeter?
Would the St. Louis Cardinals have traded Ozzie Smith for Derek Jeter? Whitey Herzog would have had Jeter’s hind end on the bench for being so slow.
Would the Baltimore Orioles have traded Cal Ripken for Derek Jeter?
Would the 1959 Go-Go Chicago White Sox have traded Luis Aparicio for Derek Jeter?

It has often been reported that Derek Jeter bedded just about every pretty female face in New York City. You have to ask yourself, why did these relationships fail? Chances are most of these girls could NOT tell you what state the city of Kalamazoo is in, let alone spell it.

On the other hand, with only a high school education, maybe Derek Jeter was a lousy conversationalist. After posing for all the paparazzi, maybe the only thing Derek Jeter could talk about was Derek Jeter. Imagine a lengthy conversation between the pretty faced bimbo and the high school jock graduate. After about 10 minutes, what are they going to talk about? Maybe that is why he was such a lousy interview. Maybe there just wasn’t any substance to Derek Jeter. Maybe at age 40, that is why Derek Jeter married a girl 16 years younger than he was. Can you imagine those dinner conversations?

ESPN’s 71-year old Tony Kornheiser of Lynbrook, New York, and still a fan of New York teams, suggested that Derek Jeter belongs on the New York Yankee's Mt. Rushmore along with Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Joe DiMaggio.

Tony seems to have forgotten about triple-crown winner Mickey Mantle, three time Most Valuable Player Yogi Berra, pitcher Whitey Ford with his 236-106 record, catcher Bill Dickey who was both an outstanding offensive and defensive player, first baseman Don Mattingly, who averaged 195 hits over 162 games during his 14 year career when the Yankees were going through their down years. Mattingly was also as fine a fielding first baseman as we have seen in a long, long time.

Larry Walker was the 1997 National League Most Valuable Player.

Derek Jeter never won the MVP award.

There is no doubt Larry Walker was a much better baseball player than Derek Jeter when one measures baseball skills.

Larry Walker should have been inducted into the baseball Hall of Fame 10 years ago.

Of course when the baseball Hall of Fame inducted Reggie Jackson with his 2,597 lifetime strikeouts (4 ½ years without even putting the ball in play) and his .262 career batting average, the baseball Hall of Fame became nothing more than a carnival sideshow.

Name Ave. Bat HOFer
Inducted
Yrs 18
From 1871
To 2014
ASG 6
WAR/pos 69.000
G 2160
PA 9102
AB 7998
R 1333
H 2416
2B 417
3B 104
HR 226
RBI 1231
SB 225
CS 57
BB 914
SO 793
IBB 65
GDP 111
SF 33
SH 98
BA 0.302
OBP 0.376
SLG 0.465
OPS 0.841

Name Derek Jeter actual
Inducted 2020
Yrs 20
From 1995
To 2014
ASG 14
WAR/pos 72.400
G 2747
PA 12602
AB 11195
R 1923
H 3465
2B 544
3B 66
HR 260
RBI 1311
SB 358
CS 97
BB 1082
SO 1840
IBB 39
GDP 287
SF 58
SH 97
BA 0.310
OBP 0.377
SLG 0.440
OPS 0.817

Name Larry Walker Actual
Inducted 2020
Yrs 17
From 1989
To 2005
ASG 5
WAR/pos 72.700
G 1988
PA 8030
AB 6907
R 1355
H 2160
2B 471
3B 62
HR 383
RBI 1311
SB 230
CS 76
BB 913
SO 1231
IBB 117
GDP 153
SF 65
SH 7
BA 0.313
OBP 0.400
SLG 0.565
OPS 0.965

Name Larry Walker Projected (x1.569)
Inducted
Yrs
From
To
ASG
WAR/pos
G
PA 12602
AB 10840
R 2126
H 3390
2B 739
3B 97
HR 601
RBI 2057
SB 361
CS 119
BB 1433
SO 1932
IBB 184
GDP 240
SF 102
SH 11
BA
OBP
SLG
OPS