Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - The Ken Griffey Jr. Project (Part the Second)

Episode Date: May 28, 2020

In his penultimate episode out on the road, D.C. Lundberg continues to project out Ken Griffey Jr.'s year-by-year statistics for seasons in which he missed time to see what his career numbers may have looked like if he didn't miss so much time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Thank you for tuning in to Locked-on Mariners, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day. Here's your host, D.C. Lundberg. Yes, thank you, J.M. Ladies and gentlemen, I am D.C. Lundberg, the Locked-on Network's king of the road. Back with you out on the road to bring you this penultimate episode of the Locked-on Mariner's party in the Panhandle. Today, coming to you on location from Pinehurst, Idaho. Yes, Pinehurst, Idaho. Today, ladies and gentlemen, Locked-on Mariners is, of course,

part of the Locked-on Podcast Network brought to you by Built Bar. Please remember to download rate and subscribe to Locked-on Mariners on Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, or whichever podcasting app that you personally care to use. Ask your smart

device to play Locked-on Mariners or any of the other programs here on the Locked-on podcast network. Follow this program on Twitter at L-O-U-U-Sournerner's and follow me on Twitter at D-C-U-L-N-B-E-R-G for So scoring at home. Yesterday, we began parsing out Ken Griffey Jr.'s year-by-year statistics to see what his

final career total may have looked like if the 1994-95 strike never happened, and also if he didn't miss so much time due to injury. I wanted to see not only if he'd break Hank Aaron's home run record, but how close he would come to 800 home runs. We've already taken care of 1994, 1995, and 1996. And after adding those projections to his career totals, he ate, um, he, and, um, he, he, So far has 683 home runs and also 2,983 hits. So he's definitely going to go over 3,000.

Today we'll look at pretty much his entire tenure in Cincinnati since he missed so many games. The AstroTurf at the Kingdom really took a toll on his legs. But it didn't manifest itself until late in the 2000 season, his first in Cincinnati. We shall start with 2000. He actually had a down year by his. his standards. There was a lot of pressure on him not only as the new kid in town, but he was arguably the best player in the game at the time and already a surefire Hall of Famer. So expectations were much higher than just an average star coming to a new team. For the season, he hit only

271, but was actually hitting around the 240s most of this season. He had gotten the occasional day off as well until missing a week in September, coming back for three pinch hitting appearances, then sitting out the final six games of the year. I will account for the 13 games missed by duplicating the 13 games prior to his pinch hitting appearances. Junior was actually on a season-ending tear, hitting at a 327 clip in those 13 games, which is much more reflective of the Ken Griffey Jr. we saw in Seattle. So accounting for these games, his batting average rises five points to 276.

His season home run total goes from 40 to 44, and he was, winds up driving in 129 runs. This also puts his career home run total at 687 and his career hit total at 2,99. 2001 was a worse season for junior as far as injuries go. He didn't start a game until June 15th, the Reds 65th game of the season. In April, he pinch hit 16 times but failed to get a hit, though he did walk three times. For this, I'm going to third. I'm going to throw out his 16 pinch hitting appearances completely since he would not have done this if healthy. I'll take his first 32 games after coming off the disabled list, double those totals, and use those to mimic the 64 games at the beginning of the season.

But I'm also going to see if taking his first 16 games and quadrupling those numbers are more favorable. And indeed they are. He hit 316 during this stretch versus 283 in the first 32 games following his return. He'll also gain 16 home runs this way, as opposed to 14 home runs the other way. After the numbers have been plugged into the handy dandy spreadsheet I've created to do the calculations for me, he winds up having a very junior-like year. He slashes 303, 372, 569. He hits 38 home runs for the season and drives in 109. This ups his career hit total to 3,071, and a home run total to 703. I'll project out 2002 next and then we'll take a break. He missed multiple

strings of games this year. 41 games in April and May, 25 games in late June and July, and there's also a string of games in September where he was exclusively a late inning pinch hitter. This is going to be complicated. This is like 1995 where he never got on track and he was slumping badly after he came back from his first injury. His batting average went from 2.70,000. to 200 in his first seven games back. I'll deal with the first injury before moving on to the second injury later in the year.

I'll treat the first injury like I treated 1995 since he did slump so badly after coming back. I'm not sure duplicating those numbers would be representative of what he may have done if he never got hurt. He missed 41 games from April 8th to May 23rd. I'll take 41 games during a similar time frame the two years prior and the two following years, like I did for projecting out his 1995 season. I may also take 20 games and double them, depending on which is the more favorable sample. I won't get into too much details since time is going to be short,

but the aggregate I came up with is pretty interesting. The batting average he winds up with is exactly what he ended the 2002 season with, 264. He adds 11 home runs and 28 runs batted in. Now for the second injury, 25 games missed at the end of June and most of July. He actually came out of the shoot pretty well, hitting at a 354 clip in his first 13 games back. So I will take his in-season numbers for this. I'll take his 12 games prior to the injury and the 13 games after the injury to mimic the 25 games lost. There's a string of games in early September in which he was used sparingly as a pinch hitter,

but I'm not going to account for those. But after factoring in the projections to account for the game's missed due to injury, which we just spoke about, Griffey still has something, a down year overall, only hitting 25 home runs. His lowest total since 1992, he slashes 281, 385-509. So his power is in decline, actually, at this point, going from averaging close to 50th season in his final years in Seattle, then going from 44, 38, and 25 in these altered first three years in Cincinnati.

His new career home run total is 720, while he now has 3,140 hits. And remember, gang, these career totals I'm throwing out are for his entire career, not his career up until this point. I'm adding stats to account for games missed year by year. Games played beyond this point are still in those career numbers. Later on, I will figure out when he joined the 3,000 hit club. And I think this is a good time for the Mariners trivia question. Another junior-related one today, obviously.

He was born in the same city as a certain Hall of Famer with whom he also shares a birthday. name the Hall of Famer. Answer, following a word from Built Bar. What can I say about Built Bar that hasn't already been said? Well, there's Plurk, Plac, Plickety Plack, but that doesn't make any sense. I'll just reiterate that they're great-tasting protein bars made with real chocolate that are the closest facsimile to a candy bar as a protein bar can get. They have multiple great flavors with new flavors just unleashed upon the public.

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and his birthplace of Dinora, Pennsylvania, with Hall of Famer Stan Musial. More locked-on mariners from Pinehurst, Idaho, following a brief, say-hey. This podcast is sponsored by the audiobook edition of 24, life stories and lessons from the Say-Hey. kid. In this reflective and inspirational memoir, the legendary Willie Mays shares the inspirations and influences responsible for guiding him on and off the field.

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Locked-on Mariners is set to resume today on location from Pinehurst, Idaho. As our party in the Panhandle begins to wind down. Our final episode from the Panhandle will be tomorrow. Spokane County is finally allowed to begin reopening on June 1st, but I'm kind of afraid it may be too little too late, since Idaho will already be in stage three of reopening. Everyone in Spokane has simply taken the 20-minute drive into Idaho to take advantage, and I sense the economy in Spokane may be in big trouble as a result. Anyways, enough serious talk.

Back to Ken Griffey Jr. Always a good topic for Locked-on Mariners. Trying to see if he had a chance to break Hank Aaron's home run record if he didn't succumb to so many injuries during his career. We left off after projecting out his 2002 season, which brings us, of course, to 2003, in which Junior played only 53 games and hit a MIRES 247.

There are also two periods of injury this year. He played the first five games, then missed the next 33. I'll stay in season for this. I'll take those first five games and triple them, then take the next 18 games to mimic the 33 missed. Again, this is not an exact science. His batting average does go up by 12 points to 259. His on-base percentage goes up by one point,

and he gains 17 points on a slugging percentage. He collects eight more home runs as well. Now for the cluster at the end of the season. His last game was the Reds 94th of the season. I'll take his numbers from game 95 onward in the two seasons preceding this one and the two seasons following this one. Average out those numbers and use those numbers to mimic an injury-free end of the 2003 season. Again, I'm not going to go into detail because of time constraints, but I will note that he missed the end of both 2004 and 2005, so I'm having to fudge once again.

However, the aggregate I come up with to mimic the end of the 2003 season gives him an additional 74 hits 18 more home runs and a slash line during this period of 311, 381, 592. He ended 2005 on a hot streak before getting hurt again and had a very good season overall. Griffey now has a 2003-376-587, much better than the 247-3-370-56 he has in reality. His new season home run total is 39, 26 more than the 13 he had in real life. Those 26 extra home runs added to his previous career mark of 720 gives him 746, and his new career hit total stands at 3245 on to 2004. Aside from the occasional day off here and there, he didn't begin to miss significant time until July 10th.

He missed the 19 games following July 10th, but only played three more games all season. including two pinch hitting appearances. His final game was the Reds 109th of the season, meaning there were 53 games remaining. With the days off he was getting, I'm comfortable saying Junior would have seen action in about 50 of them. So I'll treat this like I treated the games lost at the end of the 1994 season because of the strike, since it's a similar number of games missing.

After that, I will account for the other 19 games lost to injury. At the end of the season, he gains 50 hits and six home runs. but he only slugged 430 during the sample size I'm using to project this. However, his season batting average does go up a few points. As for the other 19 games missed, he only started one more game and pinch hit twice afterwards, so I'm not going to use any games beyond this injury. Instead, the most favorable way to project this out is to take the nine games prior to his injury and double them to make 18, which also gives him a day off during this period,

which probably would have happened. He hit 345 during this period and slugged 517. So his power is clearly declining this season. With everything projected out, he winds up hitting 28 home runs, bringing his career total to 7.54, one behind Hank Aaron, which means he will surpass the hammer since I have more seasons to project out. He also has 146 hits for this season, which gives him a new career total of 3315. His season slash line is now 268, 347, 485.

This was his age 34 season, so it's totally reasonable that his skills would be eroding at this point. He steals only one base, and I'm guessing that was probably part of a botched hit and run. 2005 is next, after which we will call it a day and pick it up on the next show. Anyways, 2005 is nearly a complete season, and it's also a very good season for Junior. He hit 301 and bashed 30 home runs in 128 games. There's only one stretch of games missed due to injury this year, and it's at the end of the season. His final game was the Reds 137th game. Again, he had been getting the occasional day off all season, so of the remaining 25, I'm going to say he plays 24 of them.

After duplicating his final 24 games to account for the 24 games lost at the end of the season, it winds up being his best season in a hell of a long time. And he already had good numbers. His original slash line of 301, 369, 576 goes to 314, 377, 602. He now has 46 home runs for this season and 186 hits, definitely a rejuvenated junior in 2005. And I dare you at home to say rejuvenated junior 10 times fast. Bet you can't do it, although I did get through that with one take, so yay me. In any case, his career hit total as we wind down for the day stands at 3,353, and his career

home run total stands at 765, 10 more than Hank Aaron, and also beyond Barry Bonds' asterisklyden total. And again, I'll go back and figure out when he would have collected his 3,000th hit, 700th home run, and when he would have caught Hank Aaron after I'm finished tomorrow. He also now has over 200 runs scored for his career with 2001 thus far. Please remember to download, rate, and subscribe to Locked-on Mariners on Google Podcast, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, or whichever podcasting app you can think of. Follow the program on Twitter at L.O. underscore Mariners, and follow me on Twitter at D.C. underscore Lundberg.

We will wrap up this project tomorrow, which I thought was going to be a two-day project, and see what kind of numbers Jr. may have wound up with had he not caught the injury bug. Also, we'll wrap up the party in the panhandle. Until then, have a great day. This is Joey Martin, letting you know that we'll be back tomorrow for another edition of Locked-on Mariners, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network. Ask your smart device to play Locked-on Fantasy Baseball upon the conclusion of this program.