Clearly…the interesting thing is that it harkens back to the bad old days of the vets committee…you know, before the HOF got bad. :rolleyes::D

McGriff seems solid and likely to make it eventually - if he does, do we need to re-examine guys like Will Clark, Hernandez, and Olerud? And do Votto and Helton go in too?

I think Vizquel will make it and I don't think he necessarily should. Longevity stats, never a top player, although he did seem to always torture the Red Sox. I guess McGriff is a product of small market teams and always being just a step below the superstars. But are players like Dawson, Perez, Cepeda that much better than McGriff?

I think Keith Hernandez and John Olerud are clear No's, though they were very good players and Olerud in particular is very underrated.

Will Clark is a real candidate. Sabrmetrics has been very kind to him, 56.5 WAR, 137 career OPS+, and he finished above .300. His relative lack of home runs for a 1B in the home run era hurts him. He does not 'feel' like a HOFer, but he's really not a bad pick.

Helton cleared 60 WAR, 133 OPS+ both of which account for the extremely favorable conditions he player in. He too is borderline to me, I suspect he will eventually make it.

Votto I would vote for at this point, 7 OBP crowns, 147 OPS+. A couple more years of good-not-great production would really help his counting stats.

Other 1B:
Mattingly is a real candidate, but just like Murphy. Short peak that was very good but not historically great, and so I think he falls short.

Hodges is a good candidate, his OPS+ is a bit low at 120, he has some counting stats, the connection to a mythologized team, and I think his managing works to his credit too, leading the 1968 Mets is worth a lot, taking a team that shouldn't go that far all the way is a credit to a manager. I am surprised he is not in, but I would probably not vote for him purely on his career as a 1B, he's hall of very good to me.

I think Carlos Delgado should have gotten serious consideration. I think I end up at "No" for him, but he should not have fallen off the ballot immediately his first year and I think merited a serious discussion. 138 OPS+, 473 dingers. His WAR is slaughtered by his defense.

I agree, it looks Vizquel will make it. I don't think he should, even though I loved watching him in the 90's and he was as favored player for his highlight defensive plays. During his prime, he was the fourth or fifth best SS in the American League, and never felt like a Hall of Famer, which both Sabrmetric and traditional stats agree with.

McGriff and Lofton have been really hurt by playing for so many small market teams.

I would put McGriff above Perez and Cepeda, even though coming from Giants country my bias is towards Cepeda. McGriff seems a clear "over the line, bottom third of the Hall but well merited by the selection standards they have consistently applied" to me.

I don't see Helton. I think Walker just made it despite the Coors Field thing but I don't see it happening twice.

I don't see Will Clark, to me quintessential Hall of Very Good.

Hernandez and Olerud, no way, agree with you. I don't even understand the support for Hernandez.

Delgado, yeah, interesting case, so is Beltran. Both feel like Dawson to me.

Votto, meh, not even 2000 hits yet, not feeling the love. He doesn't do very well on Baseball Reference metrics either.

With 70 WAR and 434 career homers, I think Beltran makes it. Not first ballot or anything, but he’ll get in.

He may get punished a bit for the scandal, but yes.

I think Helton will end up in, only because of Larry Walker. I think he will get elected his tenth year or by an era committee at some point.

Beltran never 'felt like' a Hall of Famer to me, but his counting stats accumulated to where I thought his career value was going to put him in. No idea what happens now that his career ends in scandal. Will be interesting to see. I thought Lance Berkman from that Astro's team deserved a serious look as well, not saying he should be a yes but he merited much more than 1.2% of the vote and immediately disappearing from the ballot. Sabrmetrics have been kind to him as well.

Votto is heavily benefited by Sabrmetrics and walking constantly. As more and more of the writers adopt this mindset, I think he will end up making it assuming he doesn't hang on too long and kill his career rate stats. 18th in War, 9th in WAR 7, 15th in JAWS among 1B with everyone higher in the HOF, active or a steroid guy. I'm okay with him getting in, I'd probably vote for him on the strength of his OPS and On Base crowns.

His productive career seems to have ended at age 33. He's already been hanging around doing very little for 4 years IMO. Counting numbers still matter to some extent and at a little over 300 HR and probably a little over 2000 hits when all is said and done, doesn't feel like an obvious HOFer to me.

Even with Coors, Helton did very little after age 30.

Perhaps, but I’m not sure this scandal has that much staying power, as the fired managers (beyond Beltran) both got re-hired a year after being banned.

IMO - Helton and Votto are easy HOFers

McGriff is right on that line of HOF and HOVG

Now if we are throwing out names of personal favorites that need a little more consideration...he's probably a HOVG guy but I loved Michael Young.

On the pitching side, surprised Pettite so far has gained so few votes.

Keith Hernandez is the greatest defensive first baseman in MLB history. Period.

I won't argue with that but it doesn't seem to have persuaded many people as he never got more than about 10 percent of the vote.

Sweet Lou
 

I personally believe that if Lou Whitaker played for the Yankees his whole career, like he did for the Tigers, he would have already been in. His career WAR of 75.1 is higher than Ryne Sandberg and Roberto Alomar who played during the same era. A career batting average of .276 isn't great and another World Series title with that core group of mid 80's Tigers would have benefitted his argument, as well.

Garvey's biggest unsung attribute is that he played every game and didn't take days off against tough pitchers to save his percentages. Guys like Willie Stargell and McCovey in the second half of their careers routinely sat against left handers on their days off and that helped save their percentages.

In Garvey's case, he 'suffered through' the 1 for 4 against the tough RH pitcher instead of taking the day off and passing the 0 for 4 onto the backup that would be playing in his stead.

So in that sense, Garvey did help his team win more than his stats show.

However, your premise on walks is pretty flawed, especially since half of your at bats come with nobody on base and walking in those cases is every bit as good as a single. Walks have about 2/3 the value of a single when you take into account ALL the situations, including men on.

Garvey did however do a good job hitting with men on base, and there is some merit for him getting a hit with men on instead of passing it to a lesser hitter behind him...if indeed there was a lesser hitter behind him.

However, some hitters are soo good that the pitchers simply will not let the hitter get any good pitches to hit, and swinging at those pitches will simply play into the pitchers hand. So they walk a lot more than everyone else. That is a good thing. The bad thing is if the management is dumb enough to not get a good enough hitter or two behind them to take advantage of that rare ability to hit for power AND get on base at an elite level. Garvey was not elite like that.

What is the case then if the hitter behind Garvey is just as good as him, and then he is passing it to the next hitter who now has MORE guys on base to hit? Those walks would take on even MORE value then. SOme years Garvey had some good hitters behind him where giving them more scoring opportunities would have helped win more, not less. Some years he had much lesser hitters behind him, but I don't think he ever had putrid hitters behind him. Certainly not like players who were batting 7th or 8th in the NL where the walks truly do mean less.

Somewhat ironically, Whitaker’s being a Tiger is now probably an asset. “Trammel’s in, Whitaker should be too” will, I think, now end up putting him in.

It's hard enough to hit pitches on the corners. When pitches are outside the strike zone, the pitcher has a HUGE advantage if the batter swings. Walks may be unglamorous, but hitters who lay off pitches out of the strike zone even when a hit would be much better than a walk are a huge asset. This is a key premise of SABRmetrics.

+1

Garvey was nails in the post season too.

Curt Schilling, Keith Hernandez, and Ross Barnes are my top 3.

Which means he was doing something right for a long time...

And FUTURE want to be statisticians, using as yet unheard of stats at that...

Walks, on base, home runs, slugging percentage. the stats being used against Garvey were known in his time.

WAR doesn’t think he was great too, but I’m not using that against him. There are a lot of first basemen with better old stats than Garvey, some of which have already been highlighted.

I’d still love to see a logical argument for Garvey using any math, old or new. Surely there is a decent case to be made since he has quite a bit of support.

He performed well in the post season, he gets points for showing up every day and playing 162 games which I frankly think is underrated and works to his benefit. The problem is why he is better than dozens of other players with similar batting stats? Why should he leapfrog numerous players with better stats, old and new, to merit HOF induction?

It's funny timing on this conversation, and that I didn't edit my post to be less player specific, because I meant my comment to be more of a general comment.

Night before last I had a conversation with a fellow baseball fan and said "I'm a Garvey guy, he's the entire reason I've been a Dodger fan since I was 10 years old, but sadly, I don't see him as a hall of famer, he's right there on the steps, but I can't let him in."

Sorry Steve, I still love you.

Rocky
 

I love this post. Don't knock the Rock! Rocky is still alive and well and I would expect that it galls him to see guys like Baines, Ted Simmons, Tim Raines, Larry Walker have gotten in.

Well if Whitaker is in, Randolph is right there too. It's a slippery slope. And I am not saying Randolph should be in...

There is a balance between greatness and longevity when looking at hall of fame, for sure.

But does being “above average” for a long time make you a hall of famer? In the case of Baines and him mostly being a DH with some time in the OF, the lack of awards and recognition, times leading the league, etc…simply suggest “no”.

What about the Super Chief
 

Allie Pierce Reynolds. The Super Chief.

The ace of the staff for a team that won 5 consecutive World Championships in the golden age of baseball (early 1950's). Won 6 world series. 6X all-star. ERA title. 2x strikeout title. 7-2 record in World Series games with 3 saves as well. 137 complete games, 36 shutouts. 2 no hitters in 1952. 182-107 record plus 48 saves. WAR is lower than most pitchers in HOF, but taht doesn't include post-season where he shined.

Traded for by the Yankees from the Indians for another HOF player (Joe Gordon) because one of the greatest hitters in the history of the game (Joe DiMaggio) wanted him on his team rather than having to face Allie.

A bit shorter career than most HOF pitchers. Career cuth short a bit after struggling through his last two seasons with back and knee pain due to a team bus that crashed into a bridge.

To show how well he was thought of in his time, check out the 1961 Fleer All-time Greats set which includes the Super Chief.

The argument really stems from memory and perception. Those of us who followed the game at the time, for better or worse, thought of Garvey as a superstar, fueled probably by the many 200 hit seasons and All Star selections, the All-American image and charisma (until that imploded), and his apparent clutch hitting ability. He surely was portrayed that way. And people weren't thinking SABRmetrically. I doubt anyone was thinking, man Garvey doesn't walk. Classic example of a player who suffered for the evolving understanding of statistics.

That was the point I was trying to make (generally, not specifically about Garvey).

Thanx for Peter for wording it better than I was able to.

Ah yes, I remember it well.

http://www.bronxbanterblog.com/2012/...e-in-paradise/

Not true. He played 1B in 72, before Garvey was a starter. He played amost exclusively in OF in 73 and 74. Not a valid comparison to Garvey.

He was a 1B for 6 of the 8 years from 72 to 79. How is that not "mostly a 1B"?

If Garvey was so great at driving runs, why did he drive them in at a rate 12% lower (91 per 162 vs 103 per 162) than Trout despite hitting 4th while Trout hits 2nd & 3rd? If Garvey was such a tremendous winner, why didn't he win more than 1 World Series? Why didn't he ever win one during a full season? Why are you blaming Trout for not winning a title in his first 9 seasons when it took Garvey 12 to win one?

As for Trout, maybe his not winning has something to do with playing for teams like the 2019 Angels that just barely missed being the first team to have no one throw 100 innings.

Erm - are you serious?
 

I agree Tommy John should be in the conversation for the nearly 300 wins, but for the surgery????? Did he do the surgery on himself?


And Steve Garvey? Really? Retrosheet.org has him -6.1 in BFW (Batter/Fielder Wins) - admittedly it's a harsher measure than WAR, but even Baines is +13.7 by that same measure. Trout is +54.3 in half a career.

There has been a push to induct Dr. Frank Jobe, who developed and performed that surgery.

But not Canseco's pharmacist.

How is surgically altering a pitching arm praised, while chemically altering muscle tissue is banned? What, really, is the difference when it comes to using modern medicine to gain a competitive advantage?

Has anyone ever questioned Koufax' regime of cortisone (steroid) injections?

It's a slippery slope, isn't it?

I guess people would say John and Koufax underwent procedures to "cure" something wrong whereas Bonds et al were simply seeking to enhance performance but were healthy?

Maybe for Koufax, but when guys can throw harder after having Tommy John surgery, I don't think that point holds.

Bonds could say his substances "cured" his insufficient muscle mass and relative lack of power.

People always defend and distinguish amphetamines, but if they didn't improve performance, why did guys use them?

Sabermetrics are not what has kept Garvey out. When Garvey was up for election, it wasn't the sabermetric stats/voters that kept him out. He was being voted on during a time when the old school measurements were the deciding factor.

272 home runs just wasn't good enough for a corner position player. Several 200 hit seasons was certainly considered, but ending up with less than 3,000 hits and zero batting titles, those 200 hit seasons lost their luster a little, and weren't enough to make up for the non elite power.

He simply did not have the old school type counting stats and/or leaderboard stats to get in.

Garvey's peak wasn't good enough to overcome that. For example, Guys like George Foster and Greg Luzinski have hitting peaks that were as good or better better than Garvey's during that time. Pedro Guerrero has a better hitting peak too, though he was hurt a little more often.

Some people feel they need a cup of coffee to start the day. Chemically or psychologically, maybe it helps them get going.

From 1975-1981 George Foster's averages per 162 games are:

.297 BA
38 HR
126 RBI
99 Runs scored
149 OPS+

Garvey's best 7 year run 1974-1980:
.311 BA
24 HR
106 RBI
88 Runs scored
130 OPS+

Cecil Cooper best 7 year run 1977-1983
.316 BA
26 HR
109 RBI
99 Runs Scored
137 OPS+

Kent Hrbek 1984-1990
.288
30
102
86
134 OPS+

Seems those arguments about Garvey being a run producer belong to someone else. Foster has him beat in old school measurements and sabermetric measurements during their peaks that happened at basically the exact same time. Cooper has him beat too.

Garvey's peak isn't that special and there are guys who are not in the HOF that have just as good or better peaks. Foster and HRbek are also both two time WS champions.


Dwight Evans is really the player from that era that has the best case to be inducted.

And what, after all, is psychology if not chemistry?

Exactly.

If a pill makes you more alert - allowing you to make decisions a split second quicker, how is that not performance enhancing? I would argue that faster reaction time aids a hitter more than additional muscles.

But is chemistry cause or effect?

Dave Parker was solid at the plate and in the field....others would include

Keith Hernandez
Gary Sheffield