currently active players with a shot at the hall of fame

Actually it's that 63 WAR would put in the top 20 all time for 1st baseman. It's not the end all of his value, but it's a strong enough indication for me that he would deserve a hall of fame, no matter how he gets there (defense, power, average, a combination of all). GG and MVP are not something a trust enough at the moment.

it just seems like a p low dividing line to me, and i'm just growing more and more suspicious of using WAR as a dividing line anyway

MVP voting trends are meaningful. In a single year there might be Shannon Stewart-style anomalies in the MVP voting, but if someone consistently finished in the top 10 during their prime, it's almost certain they were a great player. (yeah, there are rare exceptions like Ryan Howard)

Kershaw is now ninth on the career list of Cy Young shares at 3.34; another full share (which could theoretically happen next year) would move him into fourth place, behind Clemens, Johnson, and Maddux (and just ahead of Pedro). He should end up there within two or three seasons, but catching Clemens (7.66) and Johnson (6.50) will be tough. He's also up to 92 on James's HOF monitor, just shy of the 100 that would make him a "likely HOFer." (I'm not sure if that was ever adjusted during the PED era--if not, it's predictive value is less than it would have been when it was devised in the mid-'80s; pitchers, I think, are short-changed.)

Trout, meanwhile, at the age of 22, is 67th on the MVP-share list at 2.39; he's already passed Ripken, Koufax, Yaz, Winfield, and many other HOFers. And he's up to 65 on the HOF monitor.

i wanna say kershaw is already a probable but i would've said that about johan (12th in CY shares) before 2009 too

he was older when he started to be good but pitchers can drop off or get injured for life at any moment

Sure--or Gooden after the '88 season, maybe even '90; the red flags were there, but I think the general feeling was that he'd continue to pitch well enough to eventually end up in the HOF. Verlander, Sabathia, you never know.

One other thing about Trout. The HOF Monitor originally had a 70-100 score as the gray area; most people in that range didn't make it, but some did. (As standards go up and inclusion gets tougher, I'm not sure you'll see any players in that range get inducted anytime soon, if ever again.) So, as originally devised, Trout is 5 points shy of the gray area. At age 22.

Chase Utley is above a good bunch of 2B HOF in JAWS: Alomar, Biggio, Doerr, Gordon, Lazzeri. Still slighty under the HOF average.

I think he was on track for a protracted Blyleven/Raines debate before this year, but unless he comes back, I'd say no chance now (i.e., in terms of how the vote will actually go).

he's actively diminishing his case with every game played

he still has those two deserved MVPs he didn't win.

He had the peak part of his resume taken care of by 2009; except for Hornsby, Morgan, and Robinson, I doubt there's a second baseman who can match his 2005-09 run. (I guess the two ancient guys too, Lajoie and Collins.) The problem is, there's not much else. If he were to not play past this year, he'd finish with 1,600 hits, and that's a non-starter.

he still has those two deserved MVPs he didn't win.

let no one say a morbs is not magnanimous

not when ppl suggest Jimmy fucking Rollins is worthier

aw