The All Outside-the-Hall Team
As I’ve written several times in recent weeks, the past seven years have seen a flurry of candidates elected to the Hall of Fame — a record 22 by the BBWAA over that span, with another five by the various Era Committees. Eleven of those 22 were first-ballot selections by the writers, while another three made it in during their final year. Of the five committee selections, three spent a full 15 years on the writers’ ballot while the other two slipped below the 5% mark and fell off.
The mix of quick selections and long-awaited ones has been dizzying, and it’s significantly altered the landscape when it comes to the best players outside the Hall of Fame — the ones who might be considered in the on-deck circle. As it’s been a long time since I took a spin around the diamond in this context, I thought it would be a good way to close the books on this year’s election cycle. What follows here is a JAWS-driven spin in which I’ve identified both the best eligible candidate and the best who’s awaiting eligibility. That’s not to say that they’re all Hallworthy, or that I’d vote for all of them; in some cases, I’m merely pointing out the dearth of strong candidates. For the “eligible” category, the player must have been retired at least five years, even if he wasn’t on a 2020 ballot, and no, he can’t be under a lifetime ban, nor can he be stuck in that awful limbo between falling off the writers’ ballot with less than 5% of the vote and awaiting his 10-year eligibility window to expire. For the “not yet eligible” category, the player may be active, retired too recently to appear on a ballot, or stuck in that post-5% limbo. As I’ve written relatively recently about many of these players — and less recently at other sites about some of them — I’m going lightning-round style, with pointers to where I’ve expounded at greater length.
| Status | Player | Career | Peak | JAWS | Pos Rk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elig | Thurman Munson | 46.1 | 37.0 | 41.6 | 12 |
| Not Yet Elig | Joe Mauer | 55.0 | 39.0 | 47.0 | 8 |
| HOF Avg | 54.2 | 35.1 | 44.7 |
Eligible: Thurman Munson
With the Modern Baseball Era Committee election of Ted Simmons — the first player to gain entry after going one-and-done on the writers’ ballot — in December, the baton is passed to his long-neglected contemporary, who made his first appearance on a small-committee ballot. Munson’s death in a plane crash at the age of 32 was a tragedy, but before he died, he assembled a Hallworthy resumé, winning MVP and Rookie of the Year honors as well as three Gold Gloves, making seven All-Star teams, serving as the starting catcher for three pennant winners and two champions, and compiling the eighth-best seven-year peak among catchers, nearly two wins above the standard. (MORE)
Not Yet Eligible: Joe Mauer
A number one overall draft pick who made good with his hometown team, Mauer made six All-Star squads, and won three Gold Gloves and three batting titles (the only catcher who can claim that) as well as an MVP award. Though he caught just 921 games (he was forced off the position due to post-concussion problems) and spent the last five seasons of his career as a more or less league average first baseman, his seven-year peak — all from his years as catcher — ranks fifth. I think he’ll be a first-ballot selection in 2024. (MORE)
| Status | Player | Career WAR | Peak WAR | JAWS | Pos Rk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elig | Rafael Palmeiro | 71.9 | 38.9 | 55.4 | 12 |
| Not Yet Elig | Albert Pujols | 100.3 | 61.7 | 81.0 | 2 |
| HOF Avg | 66.9 | 42.7 | 54.8 |
Eligible: Rafael Palmeiro
One of just six players to reach both the 3,000 hit and 500 home run milestones (Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Eddie Murray, Albert Pujols, and Alex Rodriguez are the others), Palmeiro was thrown off the Cooperstown path when he became the first star player suspended for failing a drug test in 2005; he lasted just four years on the writers’ ballot, never topping 12.6%. His 10-year eligibility window expired with the most recent election cycle, meaning that he could appear on the 2022 Today’s Game ballot, though that spot is hardly guaranteed, and getting elected in that context appears unlikely unless or until voters become more forgiving about the PED era. (MORE)
Not Yet Eligible: Albert Pujols
It’s been some type of agony to watch Pujols’ Angels years, but his 11-year run with the Cardinals was so good — three MVP awards, two home run titles, a batting title, three pennants and two championships — that his 86.6 WAR from his St. Louis days alone would rank fifth among all first basemen. As it is, he’s the 31st player to reach 100 WAR, ranks second among all first basemen in JAWS, and has the most hits (3,202) and home runs (656) of any player born outside the US. (MORE)
| Status | Player | Career WAR | Peak WAR | JAWS | Pos Rk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elig | Bobby Grich | 71.1 | 46.4 | 58.7 | 8 |
| Not Yet Elig | Robinson Canó | 69.6 | 50.5 | 60.0 | 7 |
| HOF Avg | 69.4 | 44.4 | 56.9 |
Eligible: Bobby Grich
While Lou Whitaker’s appearance on the 2020 Modern Baseball ballot made waves because it was his first since going one-and-done on the 2001 BBWAA ballot, Grich outranks Whitaker in peak and JAWS and has been waiting since 1994 for his small-committee shot. A six-time All-Star, four-time Gold Glove winner, and a key member of five postseason teams with the Orioles and Angels, he combined elite defense with power and on-base skills, and finished in his league’s top five in WAR five times, but retired at age 37, with “only” 1,833 hits, due to back problems. He’s profiled at length in The Cooperstown Casebook. (MORE)
Not Yet Eligible: Robinson Canó
The 37-year-old Canó has legitimate shots at both 3,000 hits and the home run record for second basemen; with four years to go under contract, he’s at 2,570 hits and 308 homers as a second baseman (not including his 16 at other positions), leaving him 43 short of Jeff Kent’s total at the keystone. Nonetheless, his 2018 PED suspension almost certainly consigns his Hall candidacy to purgatory. (MORE)
| Status | Player | Career WAR | Peak WAR | JAWS | Pos Rk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elig | Bill Dahlen | 75.4 | 40.2 | 57.8 | 10 |
| Not Yet Elig | Alex Rodriguez | 117.8 | 64.3 | 91.0 | 2 |
| HOF Avg | 67.2 | 42.9 | 55.1 |
Eligible: Bill Dahlen
The owner of the highest WAR of any non-Hall of Fame position player who began his career in the 19th century (seventh-highest among all such position players), Dahlen was a hot-headed, hard-drinking two-way shortstop who spent 20 years (1891-1911) with NL clubs in Boston, Brooklyn, Chicago, and New York. Aside from his carousing, his temper, and his fondness for horse-racing, he was known for his fielding prowess, but also briefly held the NL record with a 42-game hitting streak in 1894. Dahlen never led his league in WAR, but eight times he was in the top 10. Last considered on the 2013 Pre-Integration Committee ballot, he fell two votes short of election. He figures to get another shot next winter. (MORE)
Not Yet Eligible: Alex Rodriguez
Classified as a shortstop in JAWS because he accrued the majority of his value there (63.6 WAR through 2003), Rodriguez showed unprecedented power for the position with six straight seasons of at least 40 homers and three league leads. With 613 homers through his age-34 season, he had a plausible shot at overtaking Barry Bonds for the all-time lead, but hip injuries and a year-long PED suspension derailed him, and he collapsed so dramatically that he retired in mid-2016, four homers short of 700. While his public persona has undergone an impressive transformation since the suspension, it’s virtually impossible to envision Rodriguez getting to 75% so long as Bonds and Clemens are on the outside for PED entanglements that predate testing. (MORE)
| Status | Player | Career WAR | Peak WAR | JAWS | Pos Rk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elig | Scott Rolen | 70.2 | 43.7 | 56.9 | 10 |
| Not Yet Elig | Adrián Beltré | 95.6 | 49.3 | 72.5 | 4 |
| HOF Avg | 68.4 | 43.0 | 55.7 |
Eligible: Scott Rolen
An exceptional but under-appreciated two-way player, Rolen combined power and patience at the plate with some of the best glove work the hot corner has ever seen. Even with an injury-shortened career that ended at age 37, he’s third at position both in fielding runs (+175) and in Gold Gloves (eight) and, depending upon your choice of metric, belongs among the top 10 or 20 hitters for the position as well. After debuting at 10.2% in 2017, he’s gained significant ground; given his 35.3% in the most recent cycle, it’s possible to envision him being elected by the writers. My best guess is on the 2025 ballot. (MORE)
Not Yet Eligible: Adrián Beltré
Circa late 2009, Beltré was on his way out of Seattle after a five-year run that was considered a disappointment; to that point, he’d won two Gold Gloves but had never made an All-Star team or come close to living up to his big 2004 walk year with the Dodgers. Little did anyone know he was on the precipice of a nine-year run that turned him into a no-doubt Hall of Famer and one of the game’s most beloved personalities. In Boston and Texas, he made four All-Star teams, won three Gold Gloves, and played a significant part on two pennant winners. With 3,166 hits, 477 homers, the number two ranking in fielding runs at the hot corner, and the number four ranking in JAWS, he’ll be an easy first-ballot selection come 2024. (MORE)
| Status | Player | Career WAR | Peak WAR | JAWS | Pos Rk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elig | Barry Bonds | 162.8 | 72.7 | 117.8 | 1 |
| Not Yet Elig | Ryan Braun | 48.2 | 39.2 | 43.7 | 23 |
| HOF Avg | 65.7 | 41.7 | 53.7 |
Eligible: Barry Bonds
The all-time home run leader, owner of the fourth-highest WAR, and the only seven-time MVP in the game’s history has seen his candidacy stall due to PED allegations that date to the pre-testing era. Though he (and Roger Clemens, who’s in a similar boat) surpassed the 50% threshold in 2017, his fifth year on the ballot, he’s gained just 6.9% in the three years since, and now appears more likely than not to age off the ballot following the 2022 cycle. (MORE)
Not Yet Eligible: Ryan Braun
Though he’s a six-time All-Star with MVP and Rookie of the Year awards on his mantel, Braun is by far the weakest of the not-yet-eligible position players here, even before considering his 65-game suspension for his connection to the Biogenesis clinic in 2013. Of the dozens of players suspended since 2005, he’s the only one who tried to impugn the integrity of testing personnel, throwing in allegations of anti-Semitism to boot. Beset by injuries in recent years — he’s averaged 130 games since the suspension — he recently hinted at retirement following the 2020 season, the final guaranteed year of his contract. That would make him eligible for the 2026 ballot, where he will be roundly ignored.
| Status | Player | Career WAR | Peak WAR | JAWS | Pos Rk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elig | Andruw Jones | 62.8 | 46.5 | 54.7 | 11 |
| Not Yet Elig | Mike Trout | 72.5 | 65.4 | 69.0 | 5 |
| HOF Avg | 71.0 | 44.5 | 57.7 |
Eligible: Andruw Jones
The defensive dynamo of the Braves’ dynasty, Jones won 10 Gold Gloves, racked up the highest total in fielding runs among center fielders (+236), and bashed 434 homer to boot. Despite his traditional and advanced stats, the suddenness of his career collapse at age 31 and disappearance at age 35 have scared voters away; even with a big gain in his third year on the ballot, he’s up to only 19.4% of the vote. I don’t think he’ll get in via the writers, but along with Kenny Lofton, he’ll make for a fine small-committee candidate. And if you’re asking: Lofton, who’s one notch above Jones in the JAWS rankings, will regain eligibility with the 2024 Today’s Game ballot, while Carlos Beltrán, who’s one notch above Lofton, will hit the BBWAA ballot in 2023 but could face resistance due to his involvement in the Astros’ sign-stealing mess. (MORE)
Not Yet Eligible: Mike Trout
Remarkably, the not-yet-eligible player closest to the top of his position’s JAWS rankings besides Pujols is a teammate who’s 11 1/2 years younger. With just eight full seasons (two of them injury-shortened) plus a cup of coffee under his belt, the 28-year-old Trout nonetheless has the third-highest peak score at the position behind only Willie Mays and Ty Cobb. When he plays his first game in 2020, he’ll technically have reached the 10-season minimum for Hall eligibility purposes, though if he sticks around until the end of his $426 million contract, he won’t hit the ballot until 2036. (MORE)
| Status | Player | Career WAR | Peak WAR | JAWS | Pos Rk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elig | Dwight Evans | 67.1 | 37.3 | 52.2 | 15 |
| Not Yet Elig | Ichiro Suzuki | 59.4 | 43.7 | 51.5 | 17 |
| HOF Avg | 71.6 | 42.2 | 56.9 |
Eligible: Dwight Evans
Though he won eight Gold Gloves, Evans was otherwise relatively unheralded during a 20-year career (1972-91) spent almost entirely in Boston, where he was a key cog on four playoff teams and two pennant winners. He combined power (11 seasons of at least 20 homers, and 385 total), patience (six seasons of at least 90 walks, and a career .370 on-base percentage), and excellent range with a cannon-like arm, but made just three All-Star teams, and fell off the writers’ ballot in 1999, after just three years of eligibility. He didn’t get a shot at a small-committee ballot until this past December; he placed third behind Simmons and union leader Marvin Miller, all but ensuring he’ll get another look in 2023. (MORE)
Not Yet Eligible: Ichiro Suzuki
Though he didn’t come over from Japan until age 27, Ichiro made an instant splash stateside, winning a batting title, Rookie of the Year, and MVP awards in 2001 while helping the Mariners to a record 116 regular season wins. He went on to make All-Star teams and win Gold Gloves in each of his first 10 seasons, break the single-season record for hits (262 in 2004, when he added a second batting title), and rack up 3,089 hits. Brief cameos in 2018 and ’19 will delay his eligibility until 2025, but his singular status as an international ambassador of baseball could pave the way for another run at a unanimous vote. (MORE)
| Status | Player | Career WAR | Peak WAR | JAWS | Pos Rk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elig | Roger Clemens | 139.2 | 65.9 | 102.5 | 3 |
| Not Yet Elig | Justin Verlander | 70.9 | 49.4 | 60.2 | 35 |
| HOF Avg | 73.2 | 49.9 | 61.5 |
Eligible: Roger Clemens
Like Bonds, he’s overwhelmingly qualified on the statistical front, with seven Cy Youngs, seven ERA titles, seven league leads in WAR, the number three all-time ranking in strikeouts (4,672), and the number nine ranking in wins (354). And like Bonds, he’s been sidetracked by PED allegations from the pre-testing era. His voting has tracked closely with that of Bonds, and he’s gained just 6.9% over the past three years, putting him in danger of falling off the writers’ ballot before getting elected. (MORE)
Not Yet Eligible: Justin Verlander
Not even a subpar World Series performance prevented Verlander from capping a season that more or less clinched his berth in Cooperstown. He became just the sixth pitcher to toss three no-hitters, the second to record both his 300th strikeout of the season and 3,000th of his career in the same game, led the league in WAR for the fourth time, and took home his long-awaited second Cy Young award. Along the way, he overtook new teammate Zack Greinke for the active lead in JAWS, albeit by just 0.1 point. Signed through next year, he’s clearly got enough in the tank to pitch much longer. (MORE)
| Status | Player | WAR | WPA | WPA/LI | Avg | Pos Rk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elig | Billy Wagner | 27.7 | 29.1 | 17.9 | 24.9 | 6 |
| Not Yet Elig | Joe Nathan | 26.7 | 30.6 | 15.7 | 24.3 | 7 |
| HOF Avg | 39.1 | 30.1 | 20.1 | 29.7 |
Eligible: Billy Wagner
The holder of the all-time records for strikeout rate and opponent batting average, albeit at just an 800-inning threshold, Wagner is short of the admittedly slapdash JAWS standard established by the eight enshrined relievers, but he’s sixth in my preferred measure of reliever Hallworthiness, a hybrid average of WAR, Win Probability Added (WPA), and situational or context-neutral wins (WPA/LI), directly behind five Hall of Famers and well ahead of the other three. After lagging on the ballot with less than 20% in each of his first four years, he vaulted to 31.7% this past cycle, and has a real shot at eventual election. (MORE)
Not Yet Eligible: Joe Nathan
The same 2003 trade that sent Francisco Liriano from the Giants to the Twins as part of a three-player package for A.J. Pierzynski also included Nathan, who to that point was a 29-year-old setup man with one career save. Nathan blossomed in Minnesota and pitched until he was nearly 42, making six All-Star teams, posting six seasons with a sub-2.00 ERA and more than a strikeout per inning, and ranking among the league’s top five in saves seven times. He’s eighth in career saves (377) and seventh in the aforementioned hybrid stat, but he doesn’t have quite the hooks that Wagner does, and could languish when he becomes eligible in 2022. (MORE)
Brooklyn-based Jay Jaffe is a senior writer for FanGraphs, the author of The Cooperstown Casebook (Thomas Dunne Books, 2017) and the creator of the JAWS (Jaffe WAR Score) metric for Hall of Fame analysis. He founded the Futility Infielder website (2001), was a columnist for Baseball Prospectus (2005-2012) and a contributing writer for Sports Illustrated (2012-2018). He has been a recurring guest on MLB Network and a member of the BBWAA since 2011, and a Hall of Fame voter since 2021. Follow him on BlueSky @jayjaffe.bsky.social.
I wonder how Hall voters will treat the pitchers that only indirectly benefited from the banging scheme? Verlander May have lost his clinch status.
I equate this with deflate-gate, where there was plenty of drama, and the occasional hard-liner or anti-Patriots fan likes to trot it out, but it didn’t take very long for people to just stop caring. It’s just not sexy enough to generate much lasting enthusiasm for a protest vote, particularly for players who were only tangentially benefiting – for example, if Fangraphs predicts that the Astros got something like 5 wins over the season from sign stealing, how much can you really say Verlander’s HOF case is built on that?
My thought was really only about the character clause, not artificially diminishing Verlander’s accomplishments. Presumably the only statistical advantage Verlander could gain would be in wins. And if Verlander got one more pitcher win because of the banging scheme, I don’t think that will be a difference maker at all.
Also, the Patriots cheating, much like the Astros, has more of a cumulative effect on perception. But the public doesn’t really care about cheating in football like they do in baseball. Look at steroids.
Also, I don’t think you know any Patriots fans. Weirdly, they seem to have a harder time letting go than the haters, despite winning the super bowl.
“But the public doesn’t really care about cheating in football like they do in baseball. Look at steroids.”
Conversely, look at HOFer Gaylord Perry. Perry made his (supposed) throwing the spitter and otherwise doctoring the ball into a joke that everyone just accepted as a wacky amusement. Corked bats have also been a tradition in baseball. On the extreme side, no one thinks that George Brett should be excluded from the HOF for the Pine Tar Incident, even if he technically broke the rules. Nor would anyone care about non-technologically aided sign stealing. (Throwing a game, OTOH, is clearly malum in se, unlike technologically aided sign stealing and steroids, which are just malum prohibitum.)
What tends to happen in baseball is that something new that violate the rules or find a loophole in them (or even new things that don’t, like bat flipping, but are just new) inspire outrage, but after enough decades people don’t care anymore and they’re “part of the game.” If you were the first person to come up with the Baltimore Chop, people would be outraged (particularly if you watered the infield to take advantage of it), but now it’s part of the rich history of baseball.
JohnThacker,
I have a feeling that video-aided sign stealing isn’t going to follow that particular pattern. I’ll cede the examples given, but this is more in line with throwing games than just trying to get a slight edge.
I don’t know if it’s fair to compare across sports… I don’t know why, but it seems like people care more about baseball transgressions. I mean – Pete Rose gambled on baseball and he’s a pariah; Paul Hornung and Alex Karras did in football and they’re in the Hall of Fame. Baseball doesn’t have a stellar record on race relations… but unlike the NFL, they never codified “you can’t sign black players”. Ray Lewis was fined for obstruction of justice in a murder trial, and he’s a Hall of Famer as well.
OJ killed two people and is a Hall of Famer
Allegedly.
Cave Dameron,
No, he’s definitely in the HOF. No allegedly about it.
the glove didn’t fit
Does the football HoF have an integrity clause?
Wait, what?
I thought OJ was “not guilty” of those killings?
Vegas Baby,
There’s a reason that the justice system doesn’t use the word “innocent” in any situation. He was found not guilty, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t do it, which of course everyone knows he did.
Not guilty, but civilly liable.
“I don’t know why, but it seems like people care more about baseball transgressions”
High-horse is easier to mount, “sanctity of the game” easier to pontificate on when the sport you like isn’t 22 people assaulting each other for 4 quarters.
“Pete Rose gambled on baseball and he’s a pariah; Paul Hornung and Alex Karras did in football and they’re in the Hall of Fame.”
Rose bet on his own games, denied it all til 2004, after which a bunch of his notebooks were found revealing the true scale of his extracurriculars. Karras copped to gambling on NFL games and was suspended/reinstated. Football didn’t have a Black Sox-style scandal, which made gambling on the Game the Unforgivable Sin. Also he was on “Webster.”
” Baseball doesn’t have a stellar record on race relations”
Congratulations “Understatement”! Someone has crafted the perfect example of you.
“but unlike the NFL, they never codified “you can’t sign black players.”
The International League set the post-Cap Anson hissy fit precedent of passing a resolution barring African-American players. after first releasing Fleet Walker and his brother in 1887. It is not a credit to Baseball that ownership signed no Black players for the next 60 years without an official “you can’t sign black players” edict from the League. The practice was already so codified, any resolution would have been “way ahead of ya, barrier’s already up” superfluous.
Who counts a league that’s been defunct for over a century? If it were truly codified, then Branch Rickey would’ve had a much harder time arranging for Jackie Robinson to sign with the Dodgers.
People loose their stuff over any major leaguer suspected of steroids, NFL no one bats an eyelash as it.
A little less than fair to ray lewis, he was a material witness that wouldn’t cooperate for one questioning, then he was charged with murder, falsely, to force him to roll over, he did go as a prosecution witness where he flipped on his buddy’s, who were acquitted, they used self defense as a plea, it worked and they hate ray to this day. He testified against his former friend, so more of a snitch.
It won’t make the slightest difference
Unlike PED’s, the Astros’ cheating was the type of quintessential baseball cheating that Hall voters have had basically no problems with. Gaylord Perry is in the Hall despite openly admitting to doctoring baseballs; the 1894 Orioles have SIX Hall of Famers despite open, rampant, and obvious cheating with various on-field chicanery. It might have cost Carlos Beltran his job, but it will have absolutely no impact on anyone’s Hall of Fame case.
It won’t have any effect on Verlander’s candidacy, but Beltran’s not getting in via the writers.
He blatantly cheated, after the commissioner publicly announced that what he was doing was cheating, and he continued to do so through the playoffs and World Series.
There’s no ambiguity here, either…especially since there’s not a ton of daylight between him and someone like Dwight Evans.
The Athletic had an interesting article yesterday from an Astros fan who amazingly listened to many hours of trash can banging and unfortunately CB came out on top.
True, but that may just be because nobody enforced the character clause at all until the last couple decades. After all, there are amphetamine abusers in the Hall as well. Now that the clause is being enforced, it could very well be extended to other types of cheating by the voters, just as some of them have extended it to Schilling’s off-field character issues despite historically never caring about that, either.
Hell, there are steroid users in the Hall, too. Steroids were a huge part of the game from at least the late 50s. Congress first got involved in 1973, and at least one player from that era has gone on the record claiming that roughly half of the league was using back then.
By the late 80s pretty much everyone knew that steroids were rampant in MLB, but no one gave a shit until SI broke the BALCO story with Game of Shadows.
Tom house saying it doesn’t make it true. Not one person has ever supported that statement. He’s just talking shit
The Astros’ cheating cannot be compared to any of the types of cheating you’ve described, but it still won’t have an impact on anyone’s HOF case. It’s going to be a black mark on the whole 2017 team, but as a team. Your examples are terrible support for the point, however.
Have any position players been harmed because they indirectly benefited from PED use by others on their team? For example, plenty of players probably have more runs or RBIs than they would otherwise because they played in lineups with Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, etc. I’ve never heard of anyone getting penalized for such an indirect benefit though, so I doubt Verlander and similarly positioned pitchers will face any sort of backlash.
I agree with you that it likely won’t affect Verlander’s chances, but I think there’s a difference in the Astro’s cheating being on an organizational level. A guy injecting steroids in his butt wasn’t doing it in the dugout where the whole team and cameras can see him. There was plausible deniability that you didn’t know your teammate who hit 40 homeruns was juicing. You can’t pretend Verlander didn’t know what was going on.
A player could claim they didn’t know McGwire was roiding up. There is somewhat plausible deniability.
On the other hand, strong players and I’d say Latin players with no connection to steroids may be harmed in the voting, like Bagwell or Andruw.
In the PED world you may have suspected but you didn’t likely know. In the case of the Astros everyone on the bench knew. If Beltran and Cora were excommunicated what makes you think springer, Altuve, Verlander won’t have any repercussions. Unlike PEDs I suspect more players will talk over time and the story will get worse not better.
Maybe verlander gets a pass but he looks a lot like bonds now. A guy who had a hall of fame career but then decided to cheat – look how much the last three years have burnished his resume. He’s arguably the biggest beneficiary of the cheating and he knew it was going on.
Yeah, Verlander’s OPS has skyrocketed the last couple years….
I’m afraid to ask about the mental gymnastics that would allow someone to leap from stealing the other’s pitchers signs to some sort of a benefit to Verlander. If you’re using ill-gotten wins as the measure, you are more clueless to the state of baseball today than any fan has a right to be. Verlander’s not striking out 300+ in a season because his lineup knows what the other team is throwing…
Uh what? What stretches are you doing for these mental gymnastics? Verlander has always been good, but in Houston he just got a little better.
Edgertronic cameras and spin rate fella, don’t remember him for his hitting,
Lots of arguements that steroids were a clubhouse issue more than an individual issue, workout buddies and teammates. As opposed to 300 individuals buying pills from 300 different drug dealers,
I think it is safe to say that short of something dramatic (such as a PED bust) happening, Trout clinches an eventual HOF berth when he plays his first game this year.
I think it is already clinched. If Trout were hit by a bus or something, they’re making an exception or whatever and he’s making the hall of fame.
By no means am I an Angels fan or a Trout fanboy, but from a sabermetrics and a “I love baseball” standpoint, I’m really excited to see where Trout’s career takes him. I wonder if he could somehow catch the Babe in WAR when it is all said and done. Whether he’s currently on-pace or not, there’s still so much time and randomness left to really know.
I doubt Trout w ill get anywhere near Babe Ruth in career WAR. Trout’s big, heavy body will wear down much younger than most people think. He already has injury issues and he not even close to 30 yet. All those 2-3 game stints he’s forced to take will eventually become 5-6 games off and DL stints. I think Trout will peter out about 125-130 career WAR.
Except Trout has only played 1/3 as long as the Babe, already has over 1/3 the WAR, and Trout can still be elite in RF or LF when his body wears down by solely focusing on his bat
Ruth didn’t even become a full time hitter until he was 24. Trout was a full time hitter at 20. In any real sense he is not on pace to pass him. Trout was worth 8.3 WAR last year. He would need to be that good with absolutely no drop for 14 more years to pass Ruth. Good luck with that.
Ruth was a full-time pitcher at 20, accruing 20.6 bWAR as a pitcher along with 19.3 as a hitter (Ohtani-ing his 23-24 seasons) through age 24. 39.9 total to Trout’s 47.5. Through Trout’s just-finished age 27 he’s at 72.5 to Ruth’s 70.9. On pace to pass? Way too early. Currently ahead of through age 27? Yes.
” He would need to be that good with absolutely no drop for 13 more years to pass Ruth”
Which would be true if that’s how averages worked. If Trout plays til 40 like Ruth, he’d need to average 8.46 WAR a year to get the 110 bWAR to pass him. average WAR per season =/= Minimum WAR per season. Seasons finished with greater than 8.46 bWAR (which he’s done already…5 times) allow for greater leeway as far as late-career decline.
Catching Ruth is a bananas idea, but not impossible. 8ish WAR certainly isn’t current Trout’s ceiling, which means juuuuust maybe it wouldn’t need to be 39 year old Trout’s floor.
rhdx,
That’s the whole point. Every once in a while someone like that is going to come along. This sort of hero worship that only applies to pre-Modern Game players is part of baseball’s problem. You can respect and appreciate the past without ignoring the natural progression of the game.
…and Babe Ruth was known for his svelte, Ricky Henderson-esque physique and impeccable dietary habits
Exactly.
Thank goodness that Babe Ruth didn’t have a big, heavy body…
Mike Trout currently has 73.4 WAR and is going to play this year at age 28.
If he plays until he’s 40 (13 more seasons, including this one), he’ll need to average 8.3 WAR per season to top Ruth’s career WAR (180.8). That’s… possible, but unlikely, especially considering the fact that Trout now has missed 20+ games for three straight seasons and can be reasonably considered injury-prone.
Reasonable as long as you buy into the nebulous concept of injury-prone and invent a relationship between two freak slide-related injuries despite the body part, nature of the injury, and body hemisphere being different, and occurring a year apart. That’s along with classifying a benign growth in a foot as an “injury” despite being completely unrelated to baseball, exercise, conditioning, body type, general disposition etc. It’s an injury like a weird mole is an injury, just in a less convenient place. The surgery is the injury.
Then put Chino Smith in!!!
Agreed on Braun. Declaring himself vindicated because he got off on an argument about delivery of the samples, without apparently any argument about how non-compliance would’ve affected the sample in the first place, was insulting to the public’s intelligence, and trashing the guy who handled the samples when it turns out he really was taking PEDs was despicable. He’s one of the few players I heartily boo.
Palmeiro got a raw deal – he was basically the first guy who came up in HOF voting associated with PEDs and took the brunt of it. Even McGuire stuck around long enough to age off the ballot, and Sosa, Manny and Sheffield are still there, and now people are talking Pettite’s merits and Ortiz being a first ballot guy. On stats alone none of the above have/had as good a case as Palmeiro did.
Palmeiro also literally wagged his finger at a Congressional panel and said: “I have never used steroids. Period.” And then he got busted for steroids a few years later. Nobody came off looking like a bigger liar and hypocrite than Palmeiro, which could explain why he was treated more harshly.
Also, at his peak, he was never as good/exciting as the other sluggers you mention: He has very little black ink; he never finished in the top-5 MVP voting; he made just four All-Star teams in a 20-year career; and he has lousy postseason numbers, lacking anything close to a signature on-field moment.
PEDs aside, he’d be at the bottom of my list of the players mentioned.
Man, I forgot about his appearance at the Congressional panel. My main memory of that is McGuire’s “not here to talk about the past” hogwash. Palmeiro *did* end up with a higher WAR total than any of those guys, in some cases significantly so. And he’s got the 3k hits magic number. Sure, he doesn’t have any iconic moments, and he will probably be more remembered for his endorsement of PEDS of an…other variety. but I do think he got shafted by timing. He still wouldn’t make it in with today’s environment, but he’d least have been taken seriously.
At least McGwire made sure he didn’t commit perjury and eventually admitted it.
And he was still a MUCH better player than Ortiz.
Sosa even got caught with a corked bat too– but note that no one puts corked bats in the same category as making someone ineligible. I don’t think I even hear people bring it up as a reason not to vote for Sosa, unlike PEDs. (Yeah, a corked bat probably doesn’t work, but it does violate the rules and the data doesn’t really show a tremendous advantage for the Astros at home either.)
Now that you have the broomstick laying on the floor that is Harold Baines to jump over to get into the Hall of Fame,the line of excluded players rivals that of the restroom line during halftime at the Super Bowl venue.
Nah, the Baines broomstick is just freshly landed on same WTF-inducing spot as the broomsticks of guys like George Kell before him.
Not a great argument. Harold Baines was better than, say, Tommy McCarthy, and nobody is out there saying “if you were better than Tommy McCarthy you belong in the Hall of Fame.”
Jim Edmonds? Higher war than Andruw Jones and 20 more than Kirby Puckett
Actually Jones is ahead of Edmonds in JAWS, bWAR, and fWAR. Although Edmonds is well ahead of Puckett in all three.
It’s pretty crazy that Edmonds has nearly the exact same slash line as Griffey as well and provided more defensive value according to fangraphs, just lacks the quanity.
Edmonds also lacks Griffey’s peak; Griffey’s slash line was dragged down by his bad seasons more so than Edmonds’.
I think Edmonds is a HOFer and one of the most underrated players ever. He was a lot closer to Griffey than people give him credit for. But at their respective bests, Griffey was the definitively better player and better hitter.
CF is full of underrated players, mostly those who were very good defensively. Voters don’t value the defense required to play center to the extend WAR does.
True, but I’d say Edmonds was more underrated as a hitter than a fielder. From 2000 to 2004, he was damn near .300/.400/.600 (.298/.410/.593) and put up a 155 wRC+.
But, this happened to be when Bonds, Sosa, Pujols, and Helton where all going off, so he didn’t a dab of black ink.
But, he did win the Gold Glove each year. (Still wasn’t as good as Griffey, though.)
Cano hopes voters use BBREF instead of fangraphs…. he’s still looking up to Utley on this site, where Cano’s WAR is about 12 less.
Even so, its not often that a second basemen hits 300 homers, but I don’t know if they’ll take counting stats v the norm for a position into consideration
I didn’t know how good Bobby Grich was until I read about him as much as possible, and I’m very willing to say that he is one of the best players that got lost in time.
Grich is the type of player who will eventually get into the Hall of Fame on some form of Veterans’ Committee. There are some truly great players in history who just get completely forgotten about because their skills weren’t valued in their era, they played on bad teams, they got injured too quickly, or some combination of factors. Like, for example:
Gavvy Cravath — not too many players with a career 150 WRC+ who nobody ever even mentions. But he wasn’t great at defense and played in an era where power and walk rates weren’t especially valued, and so he didn’t get a starting gig until he was 31.
Max Bishop — what if I told you there was a plus-plus defensive 2B who’s third all time in walk rate, behind only Ted Williams and Barry Bonds? And that his career OBP is higher than Mickey Mantle or Mike Trout? And that he played on two World Series champions, one time scoring 5 runs in a 6 game World Series win? And that you’ve probably never heard of him before?
Tip O’Neill — if the name sounds familiar, you’re probably thinking of the former Speaker of the House, who received his nickname after the used-to-be-famous baseball player. He has the second-highest single season batting average of all time — .435 — and is the only player ever to lead his league in H, 2B, 3B, HR, R, RBI, BA, OBP, and SLG in the same season.
Dolf Luque — had a hard time breaking in to MLB because he was Cuban, but pitched in the Cuban League for 34 SEASONS and did have a stellar 20 year MLB career. His 1923 season for the Reds is one of just 39 total player seasons since 1900 with an ERA less than half the league average. And his full name is one of the best in Baseball history — Adolfo Domingo de Guzman Luque.
Charlie Keller — more famous than the other players on this list, but still, for a guy who played on 3 Yankees World Series championship teams and put up 32.2 fWAR in his first 5 seasons and is 42nd all time in career OPS (just behind Tris Speaker; just ahead of Albert Pujols) he sure doesn’t get talked about much.
Precisely. Its amazing how many people don’t know guys who are HOFers like Al Kaline, or even guys that didn’t get much consideration at all like Devon White or Amos Otis.
Great post
I love talking about overlooked guys. Just for fun, here are some modern (or at least more modern) comps to guys on your list.
Dick Allen: Even a higher wRC+ than Gravvath Cravvath; only elligible non-PED guy in the top-20 not in the Hall of Fame.
Willie Randolph: OBP-and-defense guy, like Max Bishop, only he played two-decades; tallied over 60 WAR, which is around double what I would have guessed just based on remembering him from when he played.
Al Rosen: His 1953 season is the greatest ever by a third baseman by bWAR (10.1).
Sam McDowell: Had two seasons of 57 FIP-; tailored made pitcher for fWAR (averaged over 7.0 in his five best season); alcoholism probably ruined his career.
Lance Berkman: Career 144 wRC+; iconic hit in the 2011 WS; could have been named MVP of that series; less than 2% on his only HOF ballot.
Ah, Berkman, Big Puma.
Berkman could’ve won World Series MVP in most other years, but nobody was going to beat out David Freese for 2011 World Series MVP. Besides having the two biggest hits in that series, Freese had a series OPS of 1.160 that beat out Berkman’s 1.093.
Also Mickey Lolich. 2,800 Ks, 48.0 bWAR, 217 wins and went 3-0 (all 3 were complete games, ERA = 1.67) and won the MVP in the 1968 world series.
Add Lou Whitaker to the list of those overlooked. If you look at the list of players eligible in 2001 and see how Lou stacked up to all of them, including the two selected, it’s beyond belief he didn’t get at least 5% of the vote that year. What an injustice done to Sweet Lou…not to mention his All-Star games, GGs, SSs, Rookie of the Year, 1984 WS, etc.
If you take Grich’s 3rd best season in each offensive category (ignoring seasons with less than 500 plate appearances for ratio stats), here is what you get: a .271 batting average, .376 OBP, .431 slugging, .807 OPS, 19 HRs, 5 triples, 29 doubles, 14 SBs, 82 runs and 65 RBIs. And that is cherry-picking his 3rd best in each category … that’s right, his third-best RBI total was 65, he never scored more than 93 runs, and he never finished better than 8th in MVP voting. His top 3 career similarity scores on Baseball Reference are Toby Harrah, Brandon Phillips and Jay Bell. He got a lot of value from intangibles (walks, HBPs, defense), and he was a very good, hard-nosed baseball player, but just not even close to a Hall of Famer in my eyes.
Compare him to other 2B’s. Against HOF right fielders he doesn’t look impressive (probably), but not many second basemen perform like Grich.
Not that I need anyone to do more work here but I never understand why these exercises (on FG and elsewhere) always do every position player and then only one SP. Pitchers make up a bigger portion of the game than that.
They also left out DH completely, although that’s kind of understandable given the lack of decent choices for those already eligible.
Munson didn’t even play ten full seasons. His unfortunate death eliminated his decline phase, thus giving an unintentional boost to his statistics.
Not being able to add to his counting stats no doubt hurt his candidacy a lot more than dying helped him, especially considering the era when his voting occurred.
So I guess dying young mid-career is not a good strategy for making the Hall of Fame?
At age 32, he had an MVP and ROY, 2 rings, and 1558 hits. Assuming a typical decline as he entered his mid 30s, he most likely would have passed 2000 career hits, with a +280 batting average. As a catcher, I think that put him in.
One could put together a team to rival the all time greats in the Hall from this list. What are the weak spots? Third base? Right field?
I expected the best not yet eligible pitcher to be Kershaw.
Turns out a 36 year old Verlander just overook Kershaw and Greinke last season.
At this pace, Kershaw or Verlander is going to be a legit argument.
great article – would have been great to see maybe more pitchers discussed or removing Bonds/Clemens because its pretty clear people agree they had a hall of fame career but just can’t get over the PEDs (which I think undermines what you were trying in the exercise)
Jay, have you ever run JAWS numbers using WAA instead of WAR ? I assume you’ve been asked this before, and probably have looked at it. Curious as to your main findings and any takeaways from such an inquiry
Bonds 117.8 JAWS………jeeez
I’m curious Jay: who are the best players outside of the HOF who aren’t eligible because they didn’t meet the 10 season minimum?
CHINO SMITH!!!!!
Joe Mauer is not a hall of famer in my book. I am a big HOF guy, but he strikes me as hall of very good. There are several fringe HOF C coming up which should hurt his cause – Posey and Yadi have better cases. Pudge was recently elected, so it is getting kind of catcher heavy recently especially when you consider the glut of elite steroid players waiting around. I don’t see how we don’t lighten up on the steroid guys with juiced balls being an official thing and all the other cheating stuff going on in baseball. Take a chunk of Mauer’s offensive production and credit it to 1B and it gets worse. I think it is worth pointing out that a good chunk of his defensive value comes from an era where catcher defensive metrics were really screwed up toward the positive end. Many of the best defensive seasons of all time come in that window, which tells you that it was likely just way off. You can see it in Maurer’s numbers. I doubt he became way better at the end of his days behind the dish – much more likely bad metrics. Is Pete Rose a catcher? You have to find a way to put him somewhere in this list.
I was going to mention Jeff Kent, but I saw you referenced him as a footnote. He should get real consideration as a fringe candidate. One of the best offensive 2B for sure, not just the guy with the most HR at 2B. Defensive metrics are shaky and if you go back a decade they are probably not far beyond worthless. Why not judge Kent by his offense? He was a great player.
Andruw Jones should be in the same breath as Jim Edmonds. Is it really likely that Jim Edmonds had a few negative years on defense? What are the chances that those Jones defensive values are pulled from thin air? Edmonds offered a lot more with the bat and was an great defender as well. My point is that there are a ton of OF in that 60-70 WAR range that get a big chunk of value from defense. Kenny Lofton and Larry Walker are also in that conversation. If you like MVPs, then how does Juan Gonzalez suit you? Or one of the most feared hitters ion the 90s in Albert Belle? If you really want to celebrate great hitters who could take a walk, then treat yourself to the Big Puma. Lance Berkman was probably a terrible CF but you could have hidden him in LF and probably created some positive value where there is negative and then he jumps in to that conversation. If you are not skeptical of defensive metrics, then go ahead and look at Lance Berkman’s OF career – in LF he was negative and positive from year to year. I am highly skeptical that his LF defense varied that much from year to year. My point is that there are a ton of fringe OF candidates and we use some pretty arbitrary trash to separate them. I would argue that they should be evaluated on their hitting prowess as that was what was valued in the day.
Clemens, Bonds, and eventually Rodriguez should all be hall of famers imo
I know it violates almost every rule, he played six seasons in the negro leagues, but his early death can be kinda attributed to where he had to play, but Chino Smith should be in. Chino smiths numbers and his legend in his all too short life speak for themselves, if his talent was treated accordingly, and a mans talent was more important than his skin color, chino would have never been in the place he was in when he died, and the pre 1950 committee can enshrine Charles ‘chino’ Smith based on his numbers, talent, and legend and overlook the fact his life cut short is the only reason he isn’t commonly associated with the greats of the game.