SABR 41: Stovey #1 overlooked 19th Century Baseball Legend

SABR 41: Harry Stovey Selected As Overlooked 19th Century Baseball Legend

LIVE FROM LONG BEACH — Outfielder and first baseman Harry Stovey has been selected as the Overlooked 19th Century Baseball Legend for 2011 by SABR's Nineteenth Century Research Committee. The announcement was made Friday during the committee's annual business meeting at the SABR 41 national convention.

Stovey was a great all-around player and one of the game’s first power hitters. He finished in the top four in home runs 10 times, leading the league in five of those seasons. In 1883, he set the single-season major league record with 14 homers. When he retired in 1893, he was the all-time leader in home runs with 122 and was third on the list as late as 1920. Stovey’s other offensive numbers include 347 doubles, 174 triples, 908 RBI, more than 500 stolen bases — records are not available for six of his seasons, so he may have stolen more than 800 bases — and 1,492 runs in 1,486 games, including nine seasons of 100 or more runs.

Besides home runs, he led the league in more than 20 other offensive categories, including extra-base hits five times; runs scored and triples four times; slugging percentage and total bases three times; stolen bases twice; and RBI once. Stovey’s first three seasons were with Worcester of the National League. In 1883, he became a member of the Philadelphia Athletics of the American Association, spending seven seasons with the team, which included the pennant that first year, and four seasons of hitting .300 or better. In 1890, he joined the Boston Reds of the Players League and led them to the pennant. He then spent the next three seasons playing for the Boston Beaneaters (1891 and 1892 NL champion), Baltimore Orioles and the Brooklyn Grooms.

From May 26 through June 10, 168 members of the Nineteenth Century Committee submitted their votes for the 2011 Overlooked 19th Century Base Ball Legend — a 19th-century player, manager, executive or other baseball personality not yet inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York. Previous Overlooked Legends were Pete Browning in 2009 and Deacon White in 2010.

Here are the 2011 candidates and their point totals:

•Harry Stovey, 378 points
•Bill Dahlen, 338
•Tony Mullane, 312.5
•Ross Barnes, 300
•Bob Caruthers, 234
•Doc Adams, 199
•Paul Hines, 195
•Jack Glasscock, 189.5
•Dickey Pearce, 165
•George Gore, 114
See Harry Stovey's career statistics at Baseball-Reference.com.

For more information on the Overlooked 19th Century Baseball Legends Project, contact Project Chairman Joe Williams.

— Joe Williams

He should be in, no question.

I really noticed him from playing our fantasy league, he was always on the top of the stats. Why no Love?

Lee

I think his career ended early or he didn't have that many dominant years.

Is it possible for the Veteran's Committee to vote someone like this into the Hall of Fame?

82Redbirds wrote:Is it possible for the Veteran's Committee to vote someone like this into the Hall of Fame?

Yes. See Vic Willis or numerous other examples.

Yes, The veterans Committee has changed quite a bit in the last few years. I believe they either vote every 2 years or every 4 years now.

Lee

The Veteran's Committee has been great at enshrining players who whose careers were contemporary to members of the Committee, less so with Pre-War and Negro League players. There's been some improvement in recent years, but there are still too many deserving guys waiting for their turn. Hopefully that's going to change with the new setup.

The Veteran's Committee, if I remember correctly, voted in a whole slew of Negro League players about 5-10 years ago. Buck O'Neill would talk up their talents. Since he passed away, there has been fewer (if any) elected.

When they revised the VC they did the big NeL push and some 19c house cleaning and then basically said they were done inducting people from that era. SABR is still pushing hard to get a number 19c century players in that were overlooked, like Stovey and Dahlen. Until Wagner came along, Dahlen was probably the best all-around SS to have played the game.

The very first OJ I ever bought was of Stovey because even back in the early 80s he was considered a strong HOF candidate. That's a big reason why the Bid McPhee nod was a such a shock. He wasn't even on anyone's radar while most thought Stovey, Mathews or Dahlen would be next.

Both Stovey and Dahlen seem to be worthy candidates. Mullane was scapegoated in "Baseball's Great Experiment", which was unfortunate. Glad to hear the Veterans Committee has tackled the subject seriously, but a mandate on one every two, three, or four years, seems arbitrary.

There is no mandate to elect anyone. Since the revision they have not elected anyone at least once, if not twice.

His prime years being in the AA, probally works against him for some odd reason. If he would have played his whole career in the NL, he probally would already be in.

JMO

I don't think the new VC would hold that against him. The AA was as good or better than the NL. Now the Union League and Players Leagues, those were pretty weak leagues.

I wasn't saying the AA was a weak league. I was just saying that some AA Players were overlooked in the past.