Drawing Player Comparisons For Will Rhymes

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Nearly a month ago I wrote a post full of player comparisons for Brennan Boesch. It proved to be an interesting exercise and generated some discussion. I’m back this month with a similar post with Will Rhymes serving as our target subject.

As with my previous post, I will draw comparisons to players at levels I call “Hall of Fame”, “Solid Major Leaguer” and “Role Player”. It is important to remember that my intention is not to put together any sort of career projection, rather to draw comparisons to known player that our subject could become like or has some similar traits to.

Here we go…

Hall of Fame Comparison: Nellie Fox

I have to be honest, it wasn’t easy coming up with a Hall of Fame comparison for Will Rhymes. That isn’t a slam on Will, there just aren’t many second basemen in the hall to being with and at least half of the guys that did make it were proficient base-stealers or have power numbers that exceed what can be expected from Rhymes. Will was able to swipe some bases as a minor leaguer but didn’t have one in his 54 games as a Tiger.

Nellie Fox was a career .288 hitter and hit only 35 home runs in over 9,000 career at bats but he won three Gold Gloves and put up a .984 career fielding percentage as a second baseman, the same as Will Rhymes in 2010.

Nellie Fox may have only been 5′-9″ and 150 lbs and lacked elite statistics but he is in the Hall of Fame.

Solid Major Leaguer Comparison:
David Eckstein

It is easy to write off a guy like David Eckstein. He doesn’t look much like a professional athlete on or off the field but the guy has put together a pretty decent career. Eckstein put up a respectable 2.0 WAR season for the Padres last year after it looked like his career was on a downward trajectory. With his career now closer to the end than the beginning we often forget the kind of impact he had as a younger player.

David Eckstein finished fourth in rookie of the year voting in 2001 then finished 11th in MVP voting during the Angles’ 2002 world championship season. He made All-Star teams as a member of the St. Louis Cardinals in 2005 and 2006. All of this while never hitting more than eight home in a season and typically hitting in the upper .200s.

Eckstein is proof that a solid big league career can be made from hustle and determination. There is still a place for guys like David Eckstein and Will Rhymes in modern baseball

Role Player Comparison: Jamey Carroll

Like Will Rhymes, Jamey Carroll made his major league debut a bit later than is typically the case. Rhymes broke in at the age of 27 while Carroll got his first crack at 28.

Both players check in at 5’7″ with Carroll having a 15 pound advantage over Rhymes, probably attributed to the nine years Jamey has over Will.

Jamey Carroll has found his niche in the big leagues as a dependable guy the manager can turn to in a pinch. It is quite possible that this dependability has been undervalued during his career as he has bounced between four organizations since his debut in 2002.

Carroll’s accomplishments are a function of his grind-it-out attitude rather than his physical gifts, much like we saw this past season from Will Rhymes. The two share similar offensive profiles as slap hitters that won’t find the seat too often. Carroll has averaged one home run for every 210 at-bats for his career while Rhymes has hit just one in his 191 at-bats. Will Rhymes will have a place in this league if he can turn out like Jamey Carroll.

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