hall of fame, next vote...

kickers are actually probably a ok comparison for closers

You won't have to even think about the matter for at least 15-20 years, after Kimbrel and Jansen retire. And maybe not even then.

Always fascinated by the number of closers' jerseys I see at ballparks. I suppose people really love them.

They are often characters and pitching when the game ends, people know them. Just look at this list of dudes that would never get HOF mention, they are characters in a big way and good closers.

Al Hrabosky
Rod Beck
Rob Dibble
Fernando Rodney
Dan Quisenberry
Tug McGraw
Eric Gagne
Mike Marshall
Brad Lidge
Bobby Thigpen
Brian Wilson
Eddie Guardaudo
Bob Stanley

https://2.bp.blogspot.com/--je22AQa0A8/WSzZhD3LBxI/AAAAAAAAT0U/t4rWmvjBoEMBVEt0s74jmGfWM49a2wu-ACLcB/s1600/Scan0304.jpg

Great list. Jerk or not, Papelbon's a character. I think Sparky Lyle was, too...wrote a Ball Four imitation, in any event.

Excactly...these dudes are 'unique' and people remember them maybe more than someone business like and great like say Mike Mussina.

Vlad the Obscure:

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/vladimir-guerreros-best-games-were-in-montreal-and-no-one-saw-them/

(Funny seeing Reggie on the least-watched list, but makes sense in the context of his prime being in Oakland.)

McGriff had a great season at age 38, he had two bad years after that and retired. His prime was more than ten years previous, but I wouldn't say he was declining for a decade. The fact is that he was never that great of a hitter, kind of a poor man's Rafael Palmeiro who was good every year, had longevity, but was rarely among the very best hitters in baseball. Bouncing between several teams never helps in HOF selections either.

Delgado *was* an elite hitter though, so yeah, his lack of support is a bit confusing.

It wasn't a straight line, no, but I think you can see its contours. If you divide the full-time part of his career into two blocks, '88-94 and '95-'02, the first block has OPS+ seasons of 144-165; the second block is five seasons of 106-125, with two good seasons (142 and 145) mixed in, but both at the lower end of what he did in the first block. The weird juncture for him was '93-'94; he has two of his greatest seasons with Atlanta, but the offensive boom starts and the game kind of passes him by.

I think Toronto's run of McGriff-Olerud-Delgado (did anyone else have the job temporarily in there?) at first base is one of the greatest for a single team ever. Not DiMaggio-Mantle or Williams-Yaz, but pretty great.

the BBWAA is actively conspiring to keep Curt Schilling out of the Hall of Fame, according to this Devin Nunes memo I just read

— Jeff Sullivan (@based_ball) January 24, 2018

I've got no particular sympathies for Schilling, but it's a bit too late to keep the racists and general dickheads out of the HOF.

I’m down w people choosing to not vote for a dude who wants to see them hang.

Oops! I think I directly linked into my e-mail there...can a moderator please delete that post?

Thanks!

Here's a better link: Lloyd Moseby and Pedro into the Canadian Baseball HOF.

https://www.thestar.com/sports/baseball/2018/02/01/pedro-martinez-and-lloyd-moseby-headed-to-canadian-baseball-hall-of-fame.html

I'm tempted to draw a parallel with Trump in the months leading up the election--seemingly doing everything humanly possible to ensure that he wouldn't be elected--but I'm really starting to think that this story won't have a similar ending.

http://sports.yahoo.com/curt-schilling-peddling-conspiracy-theories-surrounding-parkland-shooting-013811657.html

man. poor david wright.

look at the typeface: https://baseballhall.org/hall-of-famers/rodriguez-ivan

idgi

Oh, nothing to get, there’s just so much text that it’s so tiny and narrow! Compare it to say, babe ruth’s plaque.

New system from James ("I understand that I have overdone this, from a reader’s standpoint..."), with an emphasis on "high-quality seasons." It's behind the firewall, but here's the last paragraph.

So counting Carlos Beltran as an active player (because he was an active player last year), we have ten players who have more than 100 points, thus should be regarded as likely (though not certain) Hall of Famers, based on the high-quality seasons that they have already had: Carlos Beltran, Miguel Cabrera, Robinson Cano, Joe Mauer, Yadier Molina, Buster Posey, Albert Pujols, Ichiro Suzuki, Mike Trout and Joey Votto. That list really should be eleven, because Adrian Beltre ought to be on it as well. It's not an unusual number.

He more or less says Trout is already in.

What about Ohtani?

I suppose that new system is for hitters?

So far, but I'm sure he'll follow up with a piece on pitchers. The system is basically Win Shares + bonus points (for All-Star Games, MVPs, World Series teams, etc.; all the narrative stuff that influences voters)--"Augmented Win Shares"--which is then converted to HOF points. 60+ AWS, which has been done only 20 times--e.g., Mantle in '56--gets 25 points, 18 AWS gets 1 point. If he does pitchers, someone like Kluber would do better under the new system than the old one.

I think the system, just like the last one, is meant to be predictive, not necessarily evaluative--who will go in, not always who deserves to.

One of those 25-point seasons, by the way, is Buster Posey's 2012 (catcher + MVP + World Series win).

sorry to ask but does he discuss Yadi? i always think his case is overstated, not just by cardinal fans but also several other team's broadcasters, so i'm curious what puts him over the top for james

A little bit--a career box (113 HOF points, getting near the upper end of the gray area) and this:

"Our system thinks that Yadi is a very likely Hall of Famer. You may have the same opinion; you may have a different one. He’s got great defense, several .300 seasons, some meaningful power, and some championship teams."

I don't see him as a HOF'er either--maybe I've got the same blind spot towards catchers that voters have historically had (probably the biggest after third basemen).

i may just give too much weight to WAR, which probably doesn't fully account for all the things a catcher can do. but those same limitations would apply to other catchers too. even if yadi stays healthy and puts up 2-3 more decent seasons, he'll still barely crack the top 25 by WAR.

He's about the same place using JAWS. Of the 11 retired (Posey and Mauer are still active) non-HOF'ers ahead of him, Jaffe's book sold me on Ted Simmons, and I wouldn't even have a problem with Munson, who has a bWAR of 5.6 per 650 plate appearances (although he was clearly in decline when the crash happened). Otherwise, don't think I'd add anybody.

Anyway, before long, he's offering me a bet: $25, and I give him 4-1 odds, that Scherzer doesn't make the HOF even with a third Cy Young.
― clemenza, Thursday, 13 July 2017

The cat's in the bag, and the bag's in the river.

I think most all of us thought he was more or less in before the season started, but a fourth Cy Young would clinch it, and he's got a good start on that. Hard to argue that he hasn't passed Kershaw as the best pitcher in the NL.

Two catchers from the hall of very good that have some similarity to Molina would be Bill Freehan and Lance Parrish. Both of their career war numbers are pretty similar.

Freehan's career is similar to Molina with his whole career with the Tigers and the 60s World Series appearances. Only really know him from baseball cards so I cannot speak to how good his defense was, but I would imagine pretty decent. The guy went to 11 All Star games, so the fans knew him and thought of him as a pretty good catcher.

Lance Parrish is another player I remember as a kid. He was pretty good and had a long career. In his peak, he was a good power hitter and big part of the 84 Tiger World Championship club. Never going to come up in a HOF vote, but he was a good pro catcher for over a decade. 300+ home runs is pretty darn good from behind the plate too.

Kluber and Sale essentially equal to Scherzer over the last 2 years, fWARwise.

yeah those are the big 4 for sure right now

I agree (why I specified NL for Scherzer)--I might put Kluber a little ahead as #1. I don't think Sale is quite as consistent as Scherzer and Kluber.

James has been doing this detailed historical ranking for each position based on...I forget; "Value," but I forget how he arrives at that. He's done all the infield positions now, plus catcher. Anyway, he had Freehan and Torre trading for #1 in the mid-late '60s: Torre #1 in '65 and '66, Freehan #1 in '67 and '68. Parrish had a good run from '80-'86 (Carter #1 every year): #4, #3, #2, #3, #2, #3, #3.

don't know why i decided to look at WAR/G, but decided to share anyway:

https://i.imgur.com/I8l2JCM.png

kinda pointless to include the ancient guys like barnes but it's always fun to see an unexpected name at such a position. among current players, trout is where you'd expect to find him, but there's also bryant, mookie betts (!!) and corey seager, and josh donaldson at #30

Donaldson is going to be a fun case.

yeah of course the younger guys are going to be overrepresented when you look at rate stats...trout (and maybe betts...) obv is an all-timer tho

i think Bryant as potential to be all timer on same level as Betts.

I thought Donaldson was building a really interesting case going into this year--maybe the first viable position player who didn't get started till he was 27. (I'd have to check.) He was already close to taking care of the peak-value half of the argument--four-and-a-half seasons that match almost any third baseman this side of Schmidt. But he needed some background, and this year has really set him back. He doesn't have much margin of error.

Donaldson’s not gonna make it, unless he comes back with another few years like the previous few. His peak is amazing but so was Mattingly’s.

JAWS
Third Base (33rd):
37.6 career WAR / 37.9 7yr-peak WAR / 37.7 JAWS

Average HOF 3B (out of 14):
68.4 career WAR / 43.0 7yr-peak WAR / 55.7 JAWS

beltre will only make this worse

ya, i don't think i ever thought of Donaldson as a HOF.

It's true that in a hall of fame without Rolen, Nettles, and Martinez (arguably less a 3B than a DH), Donaldson's case look thin.

I mean the peak is there.

Injuries will most likely keep someone like Donaldson from going long enough to get into the hall. The guy I started thinking about was Troy Glaus, who put up a few really good seasons for the Angels and then the injuries tore him up.

yeah Glaus was better than people remember, those two 40+ HR/100 BB years in his age 23 & 24 seasons were a promise never quite fulfilled.

Matt Williams is another hall of the very good third baseman that had a couple of monster seasons.

All those guys were really good for a couple of years, but I don't think you'll find a four-year peak (plus his injury year last season, which was great) to match Donaldson's. Mattingly's a good comparison, position aside.

Anyway, as I say, almost no margin of error. He'd have to put up another 4-5 solid seasons--All-Star caliber, if not quite MVP-caliber--to have a chance. And this year, plus the injury last year, makes that seem increasingly unlikely.

(If he did pull it off, though, he'd be in a better position than Mattingly. For HOF voters, I'm pretty sure playing well through your 30s is preferable to early peak and then a sudden end, or, even worse, a long, prolonged slide.)

VHS: I don't think Martinez is arguably less a third baseman than a DH. It's pretty inarguable--he had almost three times as many games/PA as a DH.

yeah true, the DH award is named after him on top of that.