A Simpler Way to Consider the Hall of Fame Ballot
Here’s the premise: let’s say the 30 players on this year’s ballot are available in a hypothetical time-machine expansion draft and a group of GMs are instructed to rank them KNOWING they will get the exact careers these players had. The must follow this prompt:
Knowing ahead of time exactly how these players performed in their careers, please rank them in the order you would want them on your team.
For this hypothetical, we’re setting aside the assorted controversies surrounding many of the players on this year’s ballot and just drilling down to the basic question of who would you rather have? For example, if you would rather have, say, Tim Hudson’s career over Billy Wagner’s career, then how could Wagner be Hall-worthy and Hudson be at risk of falling off the ballot entirely?
The following is my personal draft order, which may be wildly different from yours, knowledgeable reader, but I’ll do my best to explain my choices.
NOTE: I’ve split players into tiers where I feel there’s a distinct separation between groups. Within the tiers, the players could move up or down fairly easily but it would be difficult for me to move a player from one tier to another. This is loosely based on both FanGraphs and Baseball-Reference Wins Above Replacement (WAR) and Wins Above Average (WAA), for their overall hitting, pitching, and fielding performance. I’ve also taken into consideration the shape of each player’s career, namely, how many seasons with 2-4 WAR (good player level), 4-6 WAR (All-Star level), and 6+ WAR (MVP-level) did they have? When putting together a team, I would value All-Star or better level seasons quite a bit more than just league average seasons.
The Top Tier—Inner Circle Studs (115+ WAR)
1. Barry Bonds—Bonds is my slam-dunk first pick. You have the 762 career homers, the 2227 runs scored, 1996 RBI, 514 steals, and a .298/.444/.607 triple-slash, all while being good on defense into his early 30s. There’s really no other choice.
2. Roger Clemens—Like Bonds, the numbers are undeniable: 354 wins, 4916 innings, 4672 strikeouts, 3.12 ERA during a high-offense era, seven Cy Young Awards. Easy second choice.
3. Alex Rodriguez—Eighteen average or better seasons, more than 3000 hits and just four homers short of 700. Only Hank Aaron has done both and Hank didn’t play shortstop (not saying A-Rod was better than Hank).
A Tier of His Own (~80 WAR)
4. Curt Schilling—Similar value as Mike Mussina, who was a contemporary and is already in the Hall of Fame.
The Bat and the Glove (~70 WAR)
6. Scott Rolen
Ramirez and Rolen are an unlikely pairing. They were wildly different players, with Ramirez being a hitting savant whose glove was mostly ornamental. He was also a character, with the way he wore his uniform and his hair styles and his sojourn into the Green Monster to relieve himself between pitches. He was also part of one of the funniest plays you’ll ever see when he cut off a throw from the notoriously weak-armed Johnny Damon that traveled maybe 30 feet.
By contrast, Rolen was a good but not elite hitter who played terrific defense, winning eight Gold Gloves in a workmanlike manner. He didn’t have Manny’s personality or Manny’s bat, but his overall production was similar, as they were both roughly 70 WAR players. They both also had double-digit seasons worth more than 4 WAR (All-Star level), including three 6+ WAR seasons (MVP level) for each. Manny gets the slight edge for me because that bat was special. His career 153 wRC+ (53 percent better than average on offense after league and ballpark effects are accounted for) is right there with Frank Robinson and Hank Aaron (not saying Manny Ramirez was better than Hank).
The Power Five (55-65 WAR)
8. Todd Helton
9. David Ortiz
10. Andruw Jones
11. Bobby Abreu
This group of five players is a tier down from the previous group for me, but not that much better than the group that follows. I have Sheffield on the top of this tier because he was an incredible hitter and had the most average-or-better seasons (15 with 2+ WAR). The others had 11 or 12 such seasons. Helton was consistently great for about a 10-year stretch from the late 1990s to mid-2000s. Ortiz is right there with him, but I’d take the guy who can play first base over the longtime DH. Jones is considered one of the greatest defensive centerfielders of all-time and Abreu was perennially underrated.
My Cut-Off Tier (55-60 WAR)
12. Andy Pettitte
13. Mark Buehlre
14. Tim Hudson
15. Sammy Sosa
16. Jeff Kent
Three similar pitchers and two hitters make up this tier, which is a cut-off point for me as far as Hall of Fame worthiness is concerned. I think the 16 players listed above all have some argument to be in the Hall of Fame, while the remaining 14 fall short. The main reason this group is below the previous group is they all had fewer MVP-level seasons (6+ WAR).
Going back to the hypothetical, if I were a GM ranking these players in order of preference, I think I would take any of the three pitchers over the two hitters, but it’s a tough call. Also, Pettitte, Buehrle, and Hudson are difficult to separate. Pettitte had more good seasons (2-4 WAR) than the other two, but fewer really good seasons (4+ WAR). I have him on top of the tier because of his longevity and consistency, then Buehrle and Hudson slot in behind him ahead of Slugging Sammy Sosa and ornery Jeff Kent, but I could easily see an argument for shifting the hitters to the top of this tier.
Gang of Four (45-50 WAR)
17. Mark Teixeira
18. Torii Hunter
19. Jimmy Rollins
20. Omar Vizquel
Putting on my GM hat again, from this group I’d start my team with Teixeira, the best bat of the bunch who also fielded his position well enough to win five Gold Glove Awards. Then it would be Hunter, an above average hitter with a great glove, followed by Rollins over Vizquel at shortstop because Rollins’ bat outweighs Vizquel’s glove for me. They both had 12 average-or-better seasons, but half of those 12 seasons were All-Star or better for Rollins, while Vizquel had just two in that category.
Carl Jake (~40 WAR)
21. Carl Crawford
22. Jake Peavy
My reasoning for having Crawford ahead of Peavy is that he had more average-or-better seasons (nine versus six), but it’s an interesting comparison. They finished their careers with a nearly identical number of wins above replacement per Baseball-Reference (39.1 to 39.2), while Peavy has a 2.2 WAR edge per FanGraphs (41.5 to 43.7). They also both played in the big leagues from 2002-2016, which makes them exact contemporaries. During this time, Crawford earned $179 million in salary to Peavy’s $132 million. Does it matter how much a player earns? Does it validate my choice of Crawford over Peavy? Hard to say, but I think if two players are active at the same time and teams were willing to pay one significantly more than the other then it’s something to consider.
Justin, Prince, the Closers, and the Freak (~25 WAR)
23. Billy Wagner
24. Joe Nathan
25. Prince Fielder
26. Tim Lincecum
27. Justin Morneau
It will undoubtedly be controversial that I have Billy Wagner and Joe Nathan so low on this list, but remember the prompt: knowing ahead of time exactly how these players performed in their careers, please rank them in the order that you would want them on your team. With this in mind, how high can they rank? I don’t see them coming close to the Sheffield/Helton/Ortiz/Jones/Abreu tier or the Pettitte/Buehrle/Hudson/Sosa/Kent tier. What about the Teixeira/Hunter/Rollins/Vizquel tier? I would still take those four hitters over Wagner or Nathan.
How about the tier just above? Would a GM choose one of these two relievers over Crawford or Peavy? I wouldn’t. I would prefer the starting left fielder who had nine above-average seasons, which included six All-Star or better seasons (4+ WAR). I would also prefer the starting pitcher who pitched 1450 more innings than either Wagner or Nathan and had five All-Star or better caliber seasons.
When it comes to relievers in the Hall of Fame, you have to decide whether relievers are their own separate group of players who should only be compared with other relievers or if they’re part of the position group known as pitchers. If they are separated into their own category, I believe Wagner was as good and maybe better than Trevor Hoffman and deserving of the Hall of Fame. Nathan is very close for me also.
Relievers aren’t their own special category for me, though. I believe they should be compared with all pitchers, which means they come up significantly short. When I put on my GM hat for this exercise, I would never take the careers of Wagner or Nathan over Pettitte, Buehrle, or Hudson. The volume of innings provided by the three starters makes them two-to-three times more valuable.
While Wagner and Nathan don’t make it up to the previous tier for me, I would take them over the other three players here even though they never reached the heights of Prince Fielder’s incredible 2009 season (.299/.412/.602, 46 HR, 141 RBI) or Tim Lincecum’s back-to-back NL Cy Young Award seasons (2.55 ERA in 452.3 IP, 526 K, 170 ERA+), or Justin Morneau’s 2006 AL MVP season (.321/.375/.559, 97 R, 34 HR, 130 RBI).
I’ll also point out that Wagner and Nathan made $93 million and $95 million in their respective careers, while Fielder ($216 million in four fewer seasons), Lincecum ($105 million in six fewer seasons), and Morneau ($102 million in two fewer seasons) were all more highly compensated. Since teams compensate the best relievers similarly to mid-rotation starters, I don’t see how they belong in the Hall of Fame. The exception is Mariano Rivera, who rises well above all relievers in the Hall of Fame (Dennis Eckersley not included because he made 361 starts in his career).
And Then There Were Three (15-24 WAR)
29. Ryan Howard
30. A.J. Pierzynski
In this final group, I’d take Papelbon over the two hitters but it’s not a choice I make with conviction. It’s more by default. Papelbon had 10 straight pretty good reliever seasons before his career came to a quick finish. I’m willing to slot him ahead of Ryan Howard, who was a good hitter with a bad glove for about six-and-a-half seasons. This included his impressive 58-HR, 149-RBI NL MVP season in 2006. Unfortunately, the last five seasons of his career were not pretty. He still hit 20-plus homers a few times, but his .226/.292/.427 batting line during this stretch made him a below-average hitter overall. Bringing up the rear is, fittingly, A.J. Pierzynski, who was a bit of a rear end during his playing days.
