Negro League Overview - Shortstops

This is an ongoing multi-part series on the new ATB Negro Leaguers that will be available in our next draft.  See here for the other parts.

Across the other infield positions we reviewed to date, the Negro Leaguers have projected to provide only middling to weak value come draft day.  However, at shortstop and ultimately in the outfield positions, ATB will benefit from several new elite players.

Willie “El Diablo” Wells was the first true power hitting shortstop in American Baseball history.  Before Alex Rodriguez, Ernie Banks, Rico Petrocelli, and Vern Stephens, shortstops didn’t hit 35, let alone 40 home runs.

Here is a list of the most single season home runs by a shortstop:

57 – 2002, Alex Rodriguez
52 – 2001, Alex Rodriguez
47 – 1958, Ernie Banks
47 – 2003, Alex Rodriguez
45 – 1959, Ernie Banks
44 – 1955, Ernie Banks
43 – 1957, Ernie Banks (played 3B too)
42 – 1999, Alex Rodriguez
42 – 1998, Alex Rodriguez
41 – 1960, Ernie Banks
41 – 2000, Alex Rodriguez
40 – 1969, Rico Petrocelli

Obviously, Rodriguez and Banks corner the market on power hitting shortstops.  However, it is not widely known that Wells featured similar power back in the late 1920’s.  In 1927/1928 he drilled 39 home runs and then upped that to 42 a year later.  In that 1928/1929 season he also hit 41 doubles and scored 157 runs, all while performing as one of the best fielding shortstop in Negro League history.

In the 500-resims, the 1928/1929 Wells batted .258 / .328 / .515 with 37 home runs and 36 doubles.  His .843 OPS is over 30 points better than Honus Wagner.  The 1929/1930 Wells was better still, batting .277 / .351 / .490 with 31 home runs and again 36 doubles.  His OPS was two points worse this year, but the increased batting average and walk rate improved his OBP by 23 points.  Quite simply, Wells is now the best shortstop in the game, easily a first round draft pick, and perhaps an overall Top 10 selection as well.

Wells isn’t the only starting caliber shortstop either.  George Carr, reincarnated Pop Lloyd, and Dobie Moore all project to receive 500 or more at bats next season.  Carr hit 18 home runs and 32 doubles for a .724 OPS, but will be hindered by a lackluster .298 on base percentage.  “Tank” played from 1920 through 1928; his top year was 1925 when he batted .365 / .420 / .631 in 293 at bats.

Elsewhere, Pop Lloyd received a facelift.  ATB has historically used a somewhat fictional stat line for Lloyd, borrowed from another Diamond Mind Baseball league several years ago.  Now that verifiable stats for Lloyd have been compiled, I’ve made the changes and we’ll use this new data going forward.  In our last batch of resims, affectionately known as the “79 resims”, Lloyd batted .292 / .367 / .365.  In these 500 resims Lloyd took a hit, and his new baseline is .296 / .334 / .367.  This is still quite good, and I have him preliminarily ranked as the 11th best offensive shortstop.

Finally, Dobie More is now a viable position player as well.  Featuring more power than Lloyd, Dobie hit 40 doubles and 12 home runs in 1921/1922 en route to a .277 / .289 / .408 line.  I also tested his 1922/1923 season and the results were similar:  .279 / .306 / .386.

Lloyd's best comp is 1923 Joe Sewell while Dobie looks eerily similar to 1982 Robin Yount.