Paul Goldschmidt: Baseball’s Best Player Over the Last Calendar Year
Over the last calendar year, the best player in baseball is NOT Aaron Judge, despite his MLB-leading 50 homers in that time. It’s not Mike Trout, who has been baseball’s best pure hitter (MLB-best 188 wRC+), but who missed the second half of last season with a calf injury. It’s not Juan Soto, despite his baseball-best .451 OBP. It’s not even Jose Ramirez, who has been one of the most underrated superstars of his generation.
The leader over the last calendar year (July 1, 2021—June 30, 2022) is none other than Paul Goldschmidt, with 8.3 WAR, according to FanGraphs. In addition to leading baseball in Wins Above Replacement, Goldschmidt is in the top three among position players in hits, runs, RBI, on-base percentage, slugging percentage, wOBA, and wRC+. At 34 years old, he recently had the best 162-game stretch of hitting in his career (per Baseball-Reference Stathead). His previous best 162-game stretch that did not overlap with the most recent one was back in 2014-2015, when he was 26 and 27 years old, ages considered to be the prime of a hitter’s career.
Goldschmidt was good in his first three seasons with the Cardinals after being acquired in a trade with the Diamondbacks prior to the 2019 season, but he’s taken his game to another level over the last year, during which he’s hit .340/.418/.624 and has a 184 wRC+, which means he’s been 84 percent better than average on offense after accounting for league and ballpark effects. He’s also incredibly reliable, once again likely to play at least 90 percent of his team’s games, which he’s done every season but one since 2012.
As for the rest of the top 10 position players over the last calendar year, with the exception of Mike Trout, the other players mentioned above are also in the conversation. Aaron Judge is 7th in FanGraphs WAR over the last calendar year, Juan Soto is 4th, and Jose Ramirez is 3rd. Because of the time he missed last year with an injured calf, Mike Trout is just 43rd among position players in FanGraphs WAR, but his 8.5 fWAR/150 games is the best in baseball. When he’s healthy and on the field, he still wears the crown.
Here are the top 10 in fWAR over the last calendar year, with category leaders highlighted in gold:
With the best slugging percentage and wOBA during this stretch, Bryce Harper slots in right behind Goldschmidt and ahead of Jose Ramirez. Unfortunately, Harper’s hand injury will keep him out for a while as the Phillies try to stay in the mix for a playoff spot. The National League this year essentially has eight potential playoff teams and seven teams without a chance. The Dodgers, Mets, Braves, Padres, and Brewers all have at least an 83 percent chance to make the playoffs according to the FanGraphs playoff odds, which leaves one spot for either the Giants (51 percent), the Cardinals (55 percent), or Harper’s Phillies (31 percent). Other than those three teams, no other team in the NL has a greater than 6 percent chance to make the playoffs and all but the Marlins (6 percent) are in the 0.0 to 0.2 percent range.
Jose Ramirez is third on this list, but if we use the last two calendar years, he’s the number one player in baseball, followed by Trea Turner, Paul Goldschmidt, and a tie between Manny Machado, Bryce Harper, and Freddie Freeman. Ramirez is also the MLB leader over the last three calendar years, followed again by Trea Turner, then Juan Soto, Paul Goldschmidt, and Bryce Harper. Given their extended excellence, it could be claimed that Jose Ramirez and Trea Turner have been the top two players in baseball.
Speaking of Turner, he is the only middle infielder on this list. He and the guy right behind him, Manny Machado, are not quite up there with the very top-tier hitters in wRC+, but they provide more value in the field than the others.
Aaron Judge, seventh on the list, has 30 homers before the All-Star break, a mark he hit back in 2017 when he finished the year with 52. When you combine what he’s done so far with his rest-of-season projections, he’s looking at another 50-homer season. Should he accomplish the feat, he’ll be just the tenth player in MLB history with two 50-homer seasons. Here are the other nine:
Rafael Devers, eighth on the list, has quietly been one of the top 10 position players in baseball over the last year, essentially tied with Freddie Freeman. Devers has done it with more power, while Freeman tops him in on-base percentage. Rounding out the list is Kyle Tucker, who is likely the least known of this group of 10. He might be wondering just how good he needs to be to get Astros manager Dusty Baker to move him up from sixth in the batting order.
While we’re here, how about we look at the next 10 players on the list, which includes some big surprises.
Dansby Swanson at #11? Tommy Edman at #13? Yep. Both have been above-average hitters and very good fielders. In addition to his glovework, Edman has earned the most baserunning value of any player over the last calendar year. Sandwiched in between Swanson and Edman is bat-heavy Yordan Alvarez, whose 166 wRC+ is fourth in baseball behind Trout, Goldschmidt, and Harper. That’s good company to keep.
Austin Riley’s breakout came during the 2021 season and has extended into 2022 to land him at #14 on this list. His 38 homers over the last 365 days are ninth in baseball. After Riley, Tim Anderson slots in at #15 despite having played only 107 games over the last calendar year. He’s fifth in baseball on the WAR/150 games list, between Jose Ramirez and Trea Turner. He just needs to stay healthy.
Nolan Arenado (#16) and Francisco Lindor (#18) have provided great value on defense, like Swanson and Edman. Arenado has won the Gold Glove Award for third base in every season of his career, while Lindor has two Gold Gloves on his mantel.
In between Arenado and Lindor is Mookie Betts (#17), who is five spots higher on the WAR/150 games list. Betts has been a slightly better hitter in his two-plus years with the Dodgers (139 wRC+) than he was with the Red Sox (135 wRC+), but his WAR/150 G is down from 7.0 with the Red Sox to 6.1 with the Dodgers. That still makes him among the best in the game.
Rounding out the top 20 are Brandon Nimmo and Xander Bogaerts. Nimmo is just ahead of his teammate on the Mets, Pete Alonso (#23). He creates value through on-base percentage and defense, while Pete hits dingers. Bogaerts and his Red Sox teammate, Rafael Devers, just barely edge out Dansby Swanson and Austin Riley of the Braves for the most valuable shortstop/third base combination over the last calendar year.
At the other end of the spectrum, we have the least valuable position players over the last calendar year (minimum 250 plate appearances). At the very bottom is Jackie Bradley, Jr., whose highly-regarded defense isn’t enough to counter a .190/.246/.273 (43 wRC+) batting line. Just above Bradley are Randal Grichuk and Carlos Santana, both well below average hitters over the last 365 days, yet still regularly in their team’s lineup. The rest of the bottom 10 are shown below:
Speaking of Goldschmidt
Switching over to Baseball-Reference WAR (bWAR), Paul Goldschmidt is coming off a 6.1 bWAR season in 2021 and is already at 4.3 bWAR for this year. Even with regression in the second half, he is still likely to be a 6 bWAR player for a second year in a row and should finish the year approaching 58 bWAR for his career. This will put Goldschmidt in the neighborhood of Hall of Fame first basemen Harmon Killebrew (60.3), Joe Torre (57.5), and Bill Terry (56.5).
According to Jay Jaffe’s JAWS metric, Goldschmidt (48.6) is currently behind Bill Terry (49.9) and Harmon Killebrew (49.2) and tied with non-Hall of Famer John Olerud (48.6). He has two years left on his contract with the Cardinals to add to his Hall of Fame resume before becoming a free agent heading into his age-37 season. If he ages well, he could finish his career in the range of Willie McCovey, Mark McGwire, and Todd Helton.
