The language of scouts is to talk about something in relation to the Major League average in that area, whether it be speed, fastball velocity, power, hitting ability, etc. When that is expanded beyond a single tool category to the player as a whole, the same language applies. The player projects as starter on an average team, a better than average player on a contending team, and so forth.

I have always seen the flaw in this generalized discussion to be the use of the term “average” applied across all positions, as if the average big league shortstop and the average big league left fielder had similar tool sets. We know that isn’t true, but you rarely hear a scout say “He is going to be an average hitter with plus power for a second baseman”, or “His arm is average for a left fielder.”

I remember an incident from over 20 years ago when I was in the Major League Bureau Scout School. The school was located at Baseball City Complex west of Orlando, home of the Kansas City Royals. One day we went into Orlando to see a scout team featuring two Lake Brantley HS catchers, Jason Varitek and Jerry Thurston. You may not have heard of Thurston, but he was a year younger than Varitek at the time and just as highly regarded. He was a 3^rd round pick of the Padres in 1990.

After the game we went back to Baseball City to break down the players. A couple of the veteran MLSB scouts broke down the 6-4, 200 lb Thurston as having “6” future power (i.e. above average Major League power). I was appalled! I had seen a big, strong kid with some bat speed but a long swing that had been jammed by far less than ML velocity fastballs that day. More importantly, my then statistics packed mind knew that only one catcher in the Major Leagues the previous year had hit enough home runs to qualify as a “6”, according to the numbers we had been presented in the school as “above average”. Catchers just didn’t hit home runs in the late 1980’s.

To make a long story short, being young and strong willed, I basically made a fool of myself arguing with these two respected scouts about how could they say a 17 year old catcher with a long swing was going to hit 25 home runs in the Major Leagues, when in fact only one catcher in the Major Leagues had done so the previous year. They were saying Jerry Thurston was essentially a future All-Star. I am now mature enough (hopefully) to have more rational, reasoned discussions with my peers over differences of opinion. But I was amazed that the scouting evaluations weren’t more position specific.

I only take small solace in adding that Thurston came to the plate 2,227 times in 12 minor league seasons, including five that touched the AAA level, and hit a grand total of 20 home runs, with a single season high of 4.

This weekend I did a very quick and cursory study of what was the “average” base offensive production at various positions during the 2008 season. I used only players who had enough at-bats to qualify for the batting title (expanding that a bit for the catching and DH positions, where games are more spread out among multiple players on one club). I also made note of who the most “average” player was at each position

Here are the results:

Catcher: .279-12-55 (A.J. Pierzynski, CWS, .281-13-60)

First Base: .275-29-96 (Jorge Cantu, FL, .277-29-95)

Second Base: .286-13-70 (Kelly Johnson, ATL, .287-12-69)

Shortstop: .283-11-60 (Yunel Escobar, ATL, .288-10-60)

Third Base: .271-23-84 (Kevin Kouzanoff, SD, .260-23-84)

Leftfield .290-23-77 (Alfonso Soriano, ChiC, .280-29-75)

Centerfield .272-19-70 (Cody Ross, FL, .260-22-73)

Rightfield .296-20-85 (Bob Abreu, NYY, .296-20-100)

DH .272-21-74 (Jason Kubel, MIN, .272-20-78)

First, I expect that if you put together the line up above with a decent (average?) big league pitching staff, you could well win 90+ games, so “average” has to be taken in perspective. That line up lacks a big bopper for the middle of the order but it’s going to be productive through all nine spots and is going to score a bunch of runs. “Average” is pretty good when it plays every day.

There are really no surprises here, though. The least productive positions in terms of power were shortstop, catcher and second base, the three premium defensive positions. The most productive positions were the ones you would expect; first base, right field and left field.

But it is also obvious that if you are a scout talking about a catcher having “average” power you are talking about an entirely different level of production than a first baseman or third baseman having “average” power.