Joey Votto's Good Vibes and Wins Above Average

Cincinnati Reds star first baseman Joey Votto made his season debut Monday night against the Colorado Rockies. Votto homered in his second at-bat and thrilled the exuberant crowd at Great American Ballpark when he donned the Viking helmet and cape that marks the Reds’ home run celebration. In the sixth inning, Votto hit a two-run single to put the Reds ahead 5-4. He walked in the eighth inning.

Not bad for a 39-year-old with a surgically-repaired left shoulder that he’s been rehabbing since last August.

The Reds won the game, which pushed their winning streak to nine games. Cincinnati extended that winning streak to ten games with an 8-6 win over the Rockies on Tuesday night. As of Wednesday at 1 pm EDT, the Reds lead the National League Central by 1/2 game over Milwaukee.

It’s a remarkable turnaround for a team that’s had only one winning season since 2013 and that was during the COVID-shortened season in 2020. And it’s young players like Jonathan India, TJ Friedl, and rookies Matt McLain, Spencer Steer and Elly De La Cruz that are fueling the Reds’ resurgence.

But don’t tell Joey Votto that he’s too old to contribute or enjoy what’s going on in Cincinnati this season. Votto is a legendary prankster and funny as hell. This is how he announced that he was heading back to Cincinnati to rejoin the Reds. And this is what he wore to announce that he’d be in the lineup Monday night.

Votto is also the heart and soul of the Cincinnati Reds—the only team he’s played for in his 17-year major league career. Listen to what he said after his epic performance Monday night. An absolute mensch.

Votto’s offensive performance Monday night was so valuable to the Reds’ win that after only one game, he had accumulated 0.2 Wins Above Average for the season. Wins Above Average is a Baseball Reference statistic that measures a player’s contribution to team performance compared to the average Major League Player that season.

WAA differs from Wins Above Replacement (WAR), which measures a player’s contribution to his team’s performance compared to a hypothetical player in Triple-A who might be called up to replace an injured major leaguer. So WAA is more firmly grounded in the performance of actual major leaguers compared to each other.

Other than Votto, there are only four other position players aged 38 or older in MLB this season—Justin Turner, Miguel Cabrera, Yuli Gurriel, and Nelson Cruz. In 303 plate appearances through Tuesday night’s action, Turner had a 0.5 WAA. The other three aside from Votto all have a negative WAA.

Votto went 0-for-4 Tuesday night in the Reds’ win. Heading into Wednesday’s game, Votto’s WAA was down to 0.1.

This got me thinking about how many position players 38 and older have recorded a positive WAA over a full season and what the best WAA is for a position player of that age. The answer to the second question is obvious if you give it more than a second of thought. The answer to the first question surprised me.

Let’s get to the second question first.

Barry Bonds has the highest WAA of any 38-or-older position player in baseball history. In 2004, when Bonds was 39, he recorded 8.8 WAA with a slash line of .362/.609/.812. He hit 45 home runs, 27 doubles and 3 triples. He stole 6 bases.

Bond’s 8.8 WAA in 2004 was the highest for any position player that season, regardless of age. Adrian Beltré, then 25, had the second-best WAA at 7.6.

Here’s the list of the 10 highest WAA in baseball history by a position player aged 38 or older (Baseball Reference statistics now include data from the Negro American League, Negro National League, National Negro League, American Negro League, Negro Southern League, East-West League and Eastern Colored League).

As you can see, Bonds is the only player on the list twice.

I also looked at how many 38-year-old or older position players accumulated more than 1.0 WAA in a season. Answer? 137.

Honus Wagner did it in five consecutive seasons between 1912 and 1916,

Six players did it in four different seasons: Joe Start (between 1881 and 1885), Cap Anson (between 1890 and 1894), John Henry Lloyd (between 1923-1929 in several Negro Leagues); Luke Appling (consecutive seasons from 1946 to 1949), Carlton Fisk (consecutive seasons from 1987 to 1990), and Barry Bonds (between 2003 and 2007).

Will Votto reach 1.0 WAA this season? I’m sure rooting for that.

Either way, there will antics, laughs and fun.