Dewey was as great a RF as Andrew Jones was a CF but did it longer. Evans manned what arguably remains the most treacherous RF in all of baseball and remained the starting RF through his age 34 season, managing to finish 3rd in Assists among RF’ers and 4th among RF’ers in Total Zone Runs.

Additionally Evans got better as a hitter, even becoming one of the best in baseball at drawing a walk in the second half of his career. He remained a highly productive everyday player through his age 37 season.

In fact it can be argued that starting in 1981 (Age 29) Evans elevated his game to become one of the elite hitters in the game.

From 1981 thru 1991 only one player averaged 25 HR, 150 Hits, 90 Walks, 90 Runs, and 90 RBI . . . Dwight Evans. And that he had that run of production from age 29-39 places him in some very elite company:

                                                                                                
Rk             Player  HR    R  RBI   BB    H From   To   Age    G   PA  2B   BA  OBP  SLG   OPS
1         Barry Bonds 481 1269 1164 1565 1565 1994 2004 29-39 1547 6655 305 .315 .481 .681 1.162
2           Babe Ruth 470 1379 1433 1303 1809 1924 1934 29-39 1528 6696 275 .342 .474 .683 1.157
3     Rafael Palmeiro 419 1029 1249  932 1778 1994 2004 29-39 1675 7289 338 .285 .379 .545  .924
4       Chipper Jones 265  901  926  901 1564 2001 2011 29-39 1452 6094 322 .305 .406 .531  .937
5        Dwight Evans 257  985  941  976 1558 1981 1991 29-39 1542 6680 296 .278 .385 .484  .869
6      Edgar Martinez 246  907  969  952 1593 1992 2002 29-39 1383 6028 390 .322 .433 .553  .986
7    Carl Yastrzemski 242  941  957  989 1646 1969 1979 29-39 1641 6959 275 .280 .382 .458  .839
8         Bob Johnson 233 1025 1098  932 1728 1935 1945 29-39 1580 6814 326 .296 .395 .501  .896

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool UsedGenerated 7/9/2012.

For his career he’s

XBH (Career): 50th
Times on Base (Career): 52nd (Led the AL twice)
Runs Created (Career): 63rd (including 7 Top Ten finishes and twice leading the AL)
Assists (RF, Career): 10th
Putouts (RF, Career): 3rd
Putouts (OF, Career): 52nd
Fielding% (RF, Career): Tied 22nd (again, in one of if not the most difficult RF in MLB)

Add it all up, and there have been few more consistent highly productive players on both sides of the ball in the history of the game. And yet, the voters in their infinite wisdom dropped Dewey from the ballots in 1999.

I have always maintained that the case for Dwight Evans HOF enshrinement was/is stronger than Jim Rice’s.

Is he a big hall candidate? Some might argue that. But I have felt for a long time that defense is grossly undervalued, even ignored, for HOF candidates unless they play up the middle, and particularly in the infield.

Under those circumstances guys who could barely hit the ball out of the IF (cough, Ozzie Smith) are shoe-ins while guys who save Home Runs, turn doubles into singles and shoot down runners at Home are routinely devalued.

454′ blast in Oakland – http://mlb.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?content_id=21808953&c_id=mlb
430′ blast in YSIII – http://mlb.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?content_id=18441499
“423′” shot at Target Field – http://mlb.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?content_id=18164231

He hit ball far!

A Hall of Fame player can hit both lefties and righties

4 players, one is Jones, the other three are HoFers:

L/R Career Splits (RHP, LHP)

A – .254/.330/.483, .262/.360/.505
B – .269/.374/.509, .249/.321/.455
C – .273/.317/.469, .296/.341/.518
D – .293/.340/.495, .313/.382/.521

[players are Jones, Reggie Jackson, Andre Dawson and Jim Rice. I don't really see much of a difference between those three and Jones, and Jones was a far better defender than all of them]

def rWAR/rWAR

Jones: 24.4/60.3
Jackson: -17.2/68.4
Dawson: 0.9/60.6
Rice: -8.8/44.3

And hey, even if he did use steroids, so did Fernando Vina, and I didn’t see him hitting 40 bombs or playing all time great defense.

’04 – .261/.345/.488, 112 OPS+ with 29 HR and 34 2b
’05 – .263/.347/.575, 136 OPS+ with 51 HR and 24 2b
’06 – .262/.363/.531, 126 OPS+ with 41 HR and 29 2b

Collectively he hit .262/.352/.532, a 125 OPS+ with an average of 40 HR and 29 2b in the three years following mandatory drug testing. If that’s dropping like a ball at the end of the table, you must be watching someone else.

Andruw Jones hit 41 home runs and slugged .531 that year.

I think Jones suffered from a far more common problem that plagues major league baseball called “turning 30″. It happens to hundreds of players a year with devastating results. When will MLB finally do something about this problem!

It should also be noted that in his last 3 seasons, Jones has 694 PAs, roughly the same he had in 2001. In that time, he has 43 homers, 103 RBI and a .239/.343/.499 line. Granted, this is helped by platooning, but his offense is still pretty damn good.

…but when you add that offense in with a glove that was easily the best of his era and arguably the greatest of all time…well…I think he has a pretty legitimate HOF case.

Unfortunately, HOF voters still don’t understand the defensive spectrum and that there is a huge difference between CF and the corners. Though he should go, I have no doubt that Jones will be passed and drop off the ballot fairly quickly.

Yeah, I see those in every town. Good point by you.

Sorry, I’m rambling. But Jones’ fascinating career does that too me sometimes.