Retired Uniforms by Division: American League East

by J-Doug on Apr 15, 2011 3:00 PM EDT in Visuals Above Replacement

In continuing my look at retired uniforms in Major League Baseball, I break the numbers down by division. We all know that the Yankees have retired more uniforms than any other team. Not surprisingly, the combined talent that wore all 15 retired numbers (excluding former manager Casey Stengel) beats all.

While the Yankees and the Red Sox retired uniforms represent the most combined talent, the Orioles have been the most selective: Orioles so honored average 62.4 rWAR vs. 59.6 for the Yankees and 56.9 for the Red Sox.

The second chart depicts the number of retired uniforms worn by players (back row, opaque) as well as others such as managers (front row, translucent).

Having already covered the 0.4 rWAR that Wade Boggs posted for the Tampa Bay (Devil Rays), it's also worth noting that the Toronto Blue Jays tend not to retire numbers.

Finally, both the Orioles and Yankees have retired the numbers of former managers who never played for the team: Earl Weaver and Casey Stengel.

Team	Players	Other	rWAR
BAL	5	1	312.0
BOS	7		398.4
NYY	15	1	894.7
TAM	1		0.4
TOR	0		0.0

Source: rWAR data courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com; Retired numbers courtesy of Wikipedia.

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Wow interesting piece.

Follow me on twitter

"A painting can be beautiful, but I don't want to bang a painting."

by Jeterian 2 on Apr 15, 2011 3:30 PM EDT reply actions

Thanks, Jetes.

Blogger and Editor, Rational Pastime Blog. Twitter: @RationalPastime.

by J-Doug on Apr 15, 2011 5:12 PM EDT up reply actions

Jays, if Level of Excellence = retired numbers

George Bell 18.2 (19.7)

Dave Stieb 53.0 (53.6)

Joe Carter 16.5 (5.7)

Tony Fernandez 39.6 (33.5)

Roberto Alomar 63.5 (20.1)

rWar (number in brackets earned while in the Jays uniform)

by siggian on Apr 15, 2011 4:23 PM EDT reply actions

Joe Carter - Worst retired player ever for playing contributions?

by garik16 on Apr 15, 2011 4:25 PM EDT up reply actions

Though to be fair, his epic fail season was in San Diego

by garik16 on Apr 15, 2011 4:25 PM EDT up reply actions

Even I'd have to retire Joe Carter's number if I were in charge of that.

One clutch home run to win a World Series can make up for a lot of shitty regular season WAR, at least in the minds of the fans.

Blogger and Editor, Rational Pastime Blog. Twitter: @RationalPastime.

by J-Doug on Apr 15, 2011 5:06 PM EDT up reply actions

Thanks, nice work siggian.

Blogger and Editor, Rational Pastime Blog. Twitter: @RationalPastime.

by J-Doug on Apr 15, 2011 5:05 PM EDT up reply actions

Just a though

If you’re looking at standards for uniform retirement, seems like looking at WAR/retired jersey would be more straight forward in telling us the standards by team.

Perhaps total WAR as a proportion of historical team wins would normalize being able to compare everyone else to the Yankees as well.

by BMMillsy on Apr 16, 2011 9:01 AM EDT reply actions

I'm not really trying to say anything about standards at this point

But the numbers are here in each post if anyone wants to do their own calculations. The ranks for the AL East are Baltimore, New York, Boston, Tampa (Toronto excluded).

Blogger and Editor, Rational Pastime Blog. Twitter: @RationalPastime.

by J-Doug on Apr 17, 2011 6:34 PM EDT up reply actions