Rules Were Made For Exceptions

Aug 26, 2011

This might be the dumbest thing I've heard in awhile:

The Giants' Wall of Fame will add two new members Saturday when right-hander Jason Schmidt and center fielder Marvin Benard are honored in pregame ceremonies.
The Wall of Fame commemorates the accomplishments of retired players who performed for a minimum of nine seasons as a San Francisco Giant, or five seasons with at least one All-Star selection while representing the club.

Look ... this is crazy talk. I don't want to overstate this - I am a Giants season-ticket holder and I have no idea what the Wall of Fame is, let alone its location. But ... Marvin Benard? Just because some manager got it wrong one year and named him to the All-Star Game does not mean he needs to be honored.

At all.

Forget the fact that he has actually been caught using steroids, unlike another Giants outfielder you may have heard of. Forget the fact that he was by all accounts, a surly bastard who had no sense of humor about the Giants fans teasing him...the fact remains that Marvin Benard is one of the WORST Giants this storied franchise has ever run out on a regular basis.

But, despite that, there is this:

In 2002, the Giants leadoff man [Benard, believe it or not] stole five bases. He hit a homerun every 123 at-bats. He struck out every 4.7 at-bats. And he made $4.2 million in 2002 and 2003.

Look, if I'm being fair - something I don't particularly want to be - Benard wasn't terrible. He just wasn't special, and was wildly overpaid and trotted out there despite being clearly not very good at his job. Here are the players he's most similar to statistically over his career:

Look, I don't know who Beals Becker is either, but I doubt Reed Johnson, Danny Bautista, Terrence Long or Felix Jose are making any Walls of Fame anytime soon. I'm genuinely shocked to see Shane Victorino there, who is actually better than average. (I suspect these don't value stolen bases or defense nearly as much as they should.)

Here's a breakdown of Benard's career, courtesy of Baseball Reference:

Hits/At Bats

For recent years, leaders need 3.1 PA

per team game played">BA <th align="center" class="tooltip hide_non_quals" onclick="" onmouseout="" onmouseover="" style="background-color: #dddddd; border: 1px solid #aaa; padding: 2px;" tip="(H + BB + HBP)/(At Bats + BB + HBP + SF)

For recent years, leaders need 3.1 PA

per team game played">OBP

Year AB R H HR RBI SB CS 1995 34 5 13 1 4 1 0 .382 .400 1996 19 2 7 0 4 1 0 .368 .429 1996 488 89 121 5 27 25 11 .248 .333 1997 114 13 26 1 13 3 1 .228 .315 1998 286 41 92 3 36 11 4 .322 .396 1999 562 100 163 16 64 27 14 .290 .359 2000 560 102 147 12 55 22 7 .263 .342 2001 392 70 104 15 44 10 5 .265 .320 2002 123 16 34 1 13 5 1 .276 .321 2003 71 5 14 0 4 1 0 .197 .237 9 Seasons 2630 441 714 54 260 105 43 .271 .343 162 Game Avg. 478 80 130 10 47 19 8 .271 .343

<th align="center" class="tooltip hide_non_quals" onclick="" onmouseout="" onmouseover="" style="background-color: #dddddd; border: 1px solid #aaa; padding: 2px;" tip="Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Generated 8/26/2011.

Marvin Benard should be able to afford many luxuries in life and obviously, as a former major leaguer, he's a great athlete. But he's not memorable ... and the Giants shouldn't try to force that.

The problem with this Wall of Fame is that there is base criteria - and it's all objective. There's no Sniff Test here, no "wait a minute...that guy?"

The Giants are a storied franchise, and certainly any Wall of Fame will be littered with true champions of the game - Willie Mays, Willie McCovey, Bobby Bonds, Will Clark and so on.

But , because there's no subjective analysis to this, there are others on the Wall of Fame who may be lovely people but were not special talents or even special Giants:

Scotty Garrelts

Kirt Manwaring

Shawn Estes

J.T. Snow

Jeff Brantley

and ... wait for it ... Atlee Hammaker.

The Wall of Fame is dead to me.

Greebs In Regulation

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