The Center Attraction

It’s Hall of Fame consideration season.  For the rest of the calendar year, Connections will be looking at some of the names on the 2025 ballot.  

On Tuesday, June 2, 1998, the Brewers hosted the Braves for the second contest in a three-game set.  Thanks to the new alignment within MLB, the series marked the very first time Milwaukee hosted Atlanta, thus bringing the Braves back to the place they called home from 1953 through 1965.  And so, to give the occasion a little extra panache, both clubs were in replica uniforms from that time when Hank Aaron and Eddie Mathews and Warren Spahn were a star trio, a central attraction among the eight clubs in the National League (I think the 1998 clubs were wearing jerseys from the 1957 World Series champion squad – home and away – but the memory is a little fuzzy on this detail).

In the bottom of the second, Marquis Grissom saw a serving from Dennis Martínez that appeared extra tasty and the Brewers’ center fielder put a charge into one – a drive off the bat that looked destined to land in the deep center-right gap and give Grissom extra bases.  

Loping toward the gap with the air of someone for whom chasing down long flies was the most pleasurable and natural way to spend an evening, Andruw Jones had other ideas for the outcome.  Tracking the flight, perfectly calibrating his pace to that of the ball’s arc and descent, Atlanta’s center fielder cut his speed just a tad at the last moment and cradled the fly into the glove at his waist for an artful, delightful basket catch.  The baggy, flannel-looking uniform, the presented ease of the dash into right-center, the decision to casually allow ball to meet glove at the waistline – the entire picture created the realization, “Oh, that’s what it must have been like to watch Willie Mays.”  For someone who revels in the game’s layering, past and present swirling in a special proportion, it was one of the coolest things I’ll ever see on the diamond. 

The catch may have been the ultimate expression of Jones’ toolkit that summer night, but it was also just a single portion of a magical presentation:  he started an 8-3 double play in the third, he homered, he tripled twice, he reached safely in all five plate appearances.  He was everywhere and everything.  He was 21 years and 40 days old, already playing in his 241st career game.  He was on his way to his first Gold Glove.  He was on his way, it appeared so clearly, to a Hall of Fame career.  

That presumed path twisted and halted in unexpected fashions however, ultimately petering out before anticipated.  Jones played his final game before turning 36 years old, starting the clock on his wait until Hall of Fame voters could officially weigh in on his candidacy.  Unlike the explosive and thrilling start to his career, his annual evaluation for immortality was first  unassuming and has since featured a steady rise:  from just 7.3% of the vote in his debut to 61.6% in his most recent finish, one marking his seventh year of eligibility.  Each year has garnered a greater percentage than the previous one, but with only three more chances, Jones still needs a significant bump to have a plaque.  

There are 16 Hall of Famers who manned center field for at least 67% of their games (this list doesn’t include Turkey Stearnes or Cool Papa Bell, who played their entire careers in the Negro Leagues and are in Cooperstown.  It does include Larry Doby, but his NeL stats are not being incorporated in the exercise below).  

Inserting Jones to mix with the 16, his 62.7 bWAR ranks ninth, in between marks from Richie Ashburn and Max Carey.  Jones’ defensive WAR – 24.4 – tops everyone, ahead of Willie Mays’ 18.2  His 434 home runs slots in fourth, behind tallies from Mays, Ken Griffey, Jr. and Mickey Mantle.  For RBI, Jones’ 1,289 comes in eighth, his name behind Duke Snider’s and ahead of Earl Averill’s.  He’s also eighth in total bases, with 3,690 (between Snider and Carey) and seventh in extra-base hits (853), between Joe DiMaggio and Snider.  Finally, Jones’ 111 OPS+ doesn’t treat him so well, matching him with Ashburn for 14th among the pre-existing 16 immortals.  

The selected numbers and ranks seem to fit with a reasonable conception of Jones:  not as a sure-fire, usher him in right away candidate, but a comfortable and reasonable selection to add to those already inducted.  He and his 10 Gold Gloves (tied for third most all-time for all outfielders) would look at home with some of the non-inner circle fellas gracing Cooperstown’s plaque room.  

So why the meandering, lengthy path?  It comes back to that game in June of 1998, I think.  For all of the accomplishments and tallies and moments that could generate awe (like his two-homer performance as a teenager in Game 1 of the 1996 Fall Classic), the prevailing assessment seems more tinged with disappointment than satisfaction.  Barely past the legal drinking age, Jones was an ascending star, seemingly just getting started.  As it turned out, by the time he entered his age-24 season, his best, most productive days as an all-around force (at least by the estimations of bWAR) were already behind him.  How does a voter contend with that arc, that undeniable sense that once upon a time, a HALL OF FAME TALENT authored a hall of fame(?) career?  Does that get held against him, even if the final numbers and summary of performance still meet a certain (and subjective) bar?  

Once upon a time Andruw Jones was a star, a don’t turn away presence that promised electricity in the box and especially in the field, where he was the center attraction:  swallower of real estate and magnet for all manners of fly balls.  The story may have had an unexpected plotline and maybe didn’t run as long as we would have hoped; few careers get that kind of treatment.  But then, few ballplayers ever give us the highs that Andruw Jones could submit, including a “Me and my shadow” moment on a Milwaukee ballfield a quarter-century ago.

Thanks to Baseball Reference and its extraordinary research database, Stathead, for help in assembling this piece.