Greatest Bulls Hitters — Corrections and More Thoughts

A few days ago we posted a table to open a discussion regarding the best AAA Durham Bulls. Unfortunately, there were a couple of mistakes in that table and a few players who deserved mention were missed.

After thinking about it a bit, it also seemed to me that sorting by plate appearances was a better measure of opportunities to contribute to Bulls success than games played. If you limit the table to 1000 plate appearances and sort on that metric, here’s what you get.

AAA Durham Bulls Hitters, Sorted by Plate Appearances, >1000 PA

However, Chris D’s work points out there are other ways to look at these guys, and other rank-orderings can tell you something about “greatness” as well. The same 17 players sorted by OPS look like the next table. What jumps out at me in that ordering are the “Bill Evers era” (1998-2005) players: Notably Bob Smith, Scott McClain, Steve Cox, and Ryan Jackson.

AAA Durham Bulls Hitters, >1000 PA, Sorted by OPS

Looking at numbers this way, it becomes harder and harder to pick out just one player, or even a team of top players, although we do have everything except a catcher on this list. What about trying to pick a Durham Bulls AAA All-Star team with say 4 outfielders, 5 infielders, a catcher, a couple of starters and a couple of relievers?