You say this when Ozzie had 76.5 career WAR and is widely considered to be the greatest defensive shortstop of all-time, if not the greatest defensive player period.
the biggest thing that annoys me about any Omar vs. Ozzie debate is that people assume their offensive contributions are equal... they really aren't. Going by rBat, Ozzie was worth -117 runs while Omar was worth -244. Ozzie had seven seasons where his bat was worth positive runs while Omar had only two seasons north of 0. Omar had thirteen seasons where his bat was worth -10 runs or less while Ozzie had eight. Neither were good, but I'd say Ozzie was considerably better and Omar had more seasons where he hurt his team offensively. Ozzie at least had two seasons where he was in the top 10 in his league in OBP. Omar had 0.
Then there's the matter of baserunning. Ozzie's baserunning was worth +79 runs. Omar was worth -1. They both stole a lot of bases, but Ozzie stole 176 more bases while getting caught 19 fewer times. Ozzie was successful on 80% of his stolen base attempts while Omar was successful 71% of the time. That's a pretty wide gap. Ozzie was also more successful at taking extra bases (53% vs. 42%).
Once you take those things into account, I really don't think those two are comparable. I think Ozzie was a far superior player. There's a lot more to look at than WAR, but I think WAR is pretty accurate in the large discrepancy between the two even if we assume their defense was equal.
the biggest thing that annoys me about any Omar vs. Ozzie debate is that people assume their offensive contributions are equal... they really aren't. Going by rBat, Ozzie was worth -117 runs while Omar was worth -244. Ozzie had seven seasons where his bat was worth positive runs while Omar had only two seasons north of 0. Omar had thirteen seasons where his bat was worth -10 runs or less while Ozzie had eight. Neither were good, but I'd say Ozzie was considerably better and Omar had more seasons where he hurt his team offensively. Ozzie at least had two seasons where he was in the top 10 in his league in OBP. Omar had 0.
Then there's the matter of baserunning. Ozzie's baserunning was worth +79 runs. Omar was worth -1. They both stole a lot of bases, but Ozzie stole 176 more bases while getting caught 19 fewer times. Ozzie was successful on 80% of his stolen base attempts while Omar was successful 71% of the time. That's a pretty wide gap. Ozzie was also more successful at taking extra bases (53% vs. 42%).
Once you take those things into account, I really don't think those two are comparable. I think Ozzie was a far superior player. There's a lot more to look at than WAR, but I think WAR is pretty accurate in the large discrepancy between the two even if we assume their defense was equal.