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Originally Posted by cincinnati chili
Most of the guys people are calling underrated, are guys I always thought were good.
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I'm looking at it from the perspective of "baseball fan" versus "Reds fan". I knew always that Mario Soto was good. But if you ask 100 baseball fans who were the best three NL Starting Pitchers were through the early 1980's, I doubt you'd hear more than one who'd say "Mario Soto".
Even after being beat to death by a horrible team the guy finished his career with 1730.3 IP while allowing 1395 Hits.
From 1982-1985, Soto threw 1025.3 IP and allowed 786 Hits. That's ridiculous. His BB rate was 3.13 per 9IP. His HR rate was 0.90 per 9 IP. The guy never played with a truly great team. Never played with a truly great defense. Always had to struggle to get through every Inning on his own.
I simply can't think of a Reds player who was more underrated in the context of overall baseball than was Mario Soto. If that guy had been on a good team who knew how to handle him, we might have seen a Hall of Fame career.