Fielder is very different from Sexson.
It's not just walks, but that is a very significant difference. 10.3% BB/PA for Sexson's career vs. 13.4 BB% for Fielder. Both started out poor, but Sexson peaked at 13.7% and Fielder has been running 15+% the last three seasons.
10.3% BB rate is very low for a power hitter: Thome 17.0; Ryan Howard 12.3; Branyan 11.9. (Just picking out some guys with similar HR power [5.5% HR/PA or higher].) Sexson's walk rate was lower than any of them.
But strikeouts are the key difference between bashers (Howard, Dunn, Branyan) and hitters with power (Pujols, Manny, Ortiz). Bashers who strike out well over 20% of PAs succeed only when they have both very high HR% and high BB% (like Thome and Dunn).
Compare to hitters with power:
Pujols K/PA 9.5% (Ted Williams-like -- nobody else is remotely close to him right now); Teixeira 17.3%; Manny 18.4%; A-Rod 18.0%; Ortiz 18.4%. But those guys all have HR/PA over 5%, just like the bashers do.
Fielder: 18.5% career K/PA
Sexson 23.4% career K/PA
Sexson was like Branyan, a guy trying for the Thome/Dunn approach, but not having enough power or walks to quite make it. Those guys will be streaky and fade quickly. (Is Ryan Howard already in decline? His whole game was keeping up his unnaturally-high 6.5 HR/PA%. He hasn't done it for two years in a row, and he's been below .900 OPS both years.)
Fielder is much more like Tex, Manny and Papi. Hitters who take it over the wall.
Show me the guys with HR/PA over 5% and K% under 20% and BB% over 15%, and it's gonna be a short list, especially if you exclude guys who were juiced.
Prince Fielder will be on it and Richie Sexson won't.
The guys on it will be worth their $20M+ contracts, I think, almost without exception.
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