Class of?

A question occurred to me the other day that prompted the writing of this article. I'll get to that later and instead just get into it: which player on each NL Central team already has (or is closest to) a Hall of Fame resume?

I'm picking one player for each team and in some cases it's a stretch to say the least. Regardless the premise is that I'm considering only those already Hall of Fame bound, not on the track. To continue the train metaphor I will present the case and whether or not I think they're in for each player I choo choo choose. I really only even looked at players who were at least 33 years old as anyone younger hasn't had enough season for a Hall of Fame career regardless.

(Speaking of which in researching this article I came across Dick Allen's career numbers which I had never looked at before. Holy crap. To admit Jim Rice and keep Allen out is asinine. All those character issues and his outspoken nature didn't endear him to reporters and really that's what the Hall should be about right?)

In the order for current standings (hahahaha this is an evil laugh):

Milwaukee Brewers - Randy Wolf

In other words no we don't have anyone who's already punched a ticket into the Hall of Fame. Really my choices were Wolf, Mark Kotsay or Craig Counssell and c'mon. I can't even be bothered to spell Craig Counsell's name right. Back to Wolferine though, he's had a nice career but nothing spectacular. Career ERA+ of 103, high of 124. Strikes out 7 per 9 but walks 3 per 9 too. He's a decent to good pitcher and I'm happy he's in our rotation but he's not a Hall of Famer. Career WAR of 20.0 in 13 seasons. So yeah we don't have anyone already in the Hall but we have a couple guys who could be on their way so no worries.

St. Louis Cardinals - Lance Berkman

This is what prompted this article: Is Lance Berkman a Hall of Famer? I was inclined to say yes and in looking at the numbers the answer is he's getting there. His resurgence this year has been incredible (although quite frankly I wish he'd stop) and it made me want to take a look at his numbers to see if he's already in. .295/.408/.548, OPS+ 146, 49.2 WAR in 13 seasons. As of right now the fact that he's only played 13 seasons is what will hurt him but frankly after this year it looks like he's got a few good years left in him without significant decline to add to his number totals (sitting at 355 HR). But the question presented is does he get in right now? I'd say he's good enough (3.78 WAR/yr is good) but I'm not convinced the BWAA will vote for him, mostly because that's the Boxing Writers Association of America and I mistyped. So he still has some work to do but he looks like he has a great case once he is finished.

Now it's easy to say "Wait what about Pujols?" Only the season thing kept me from picking him but frankly if he were hit by a bus tomorrow I'd still say he had the numbers to get in. 86.7 WAR in 11 seasons (7.88 WAR/yr) is already better than the average HoF player (70.5 WAR in 19 seasons, 3.71 WAR/yr). (I couldn't find an update to those numbers on BTB but it's from 2009 and three players can't have changed the numbers that much. Also I think that might use FanGraphs' WAR instead of B-R. I think FanGraphs gives more credit to defense. Someone correct me if I'm wrong.)

Pittsburgh Pirates - Derrek Lee

It pains me to do this to Dave but he's really the best choice on a relatively young Pirates squad. That being said no Derrek Lee is not a Hall of Famer. But he is a very good player. .281/.364/.494, OPS+122 at first base is something you'd definitely be happy to have on your team but it's not all time great level. WAR of only 30.7 in 15 seasons (2.04/yr) is lower than the HoF replacement (low) level of 53.3 in 17 (3.13/yr). (Doing all this is just making me more mad that Jim Rice got in.) So while Derrek Lee was a very good player he falls short of the Hall. (FanGraphs gives him more credit for his defense, which I always thought Lee was pretty good at. Still he only has 39.1 WAR by their metric so he's still shy.)

Cincinnati Reds - Scott Rolen

Finally I get to someone who actually has 16 seasons played and can actually measure his current numbers against the Hall. .282/.366/.494 is good not great. Same with an OPS+ of 123. Of course none of that adjusts for position and Scott Rolen was for a period of time the best third baseman in the game. He played great defense on the hot corner and his WAR total of 66.3 (4.14/yr) is enough for me to say that yes Scott Rolen is already a Hall of Famer.

Time for a mea culpa. .277/.362/.464. OPS+ 125. WAR 66.4 in 15 seasons (4.14/yr). Those are Ron Santo's numbers. For a long time I've been saying Santo was borderline and that he doesn't deserve to be in. The only reason is the number of years he played because those are Hall of Fame quality numbers without quesiton. I'm willing to admit I'm wrong and that he belongs in and that if you can generate almost the same number of wins in four fewer seasons than the average Hall of Famer then you shouldn't be penalized for a lack of longevity.

Chicago Cubs - Kerry Wood

Oh what could have been. That statement may hurt Dave more than the Derrek Lee stuff. Only 13 seasons but damn. 10.3 K/9 (balanced against 4.3 BB/9 though) is monsterous. Of course every counting stat will make his career graphs all exponential decays. The injuries all mean he'll never get the innings or strikeout totals that are enough to get elected but damn, look at those first four seasons. Not a Hall of Famer but in some alternate universe he is still a dominant starter for the Yankees. Sorry, in the alternate universe the Yankees are still the Yankees.

Houston Astros - Carlos Lee

I was actually thinking to myself the other day "What ever happened to Carlos Lee?" El Caballo put together a nice career but was always hurt by relatively low OBP totals. .286/.338/.491 is a frustrating line for a sabermetrician to look at. Career OPS+ 114 isn't going to blow anyone away either. 22.2 WAR in 13 seasons. Yeah not a Hall of Famer. Houston doesn't have much going for it. At least they have Hunter Pence and Michael Bourn entering the prime of their careers nevermind.

So what is the end result of all this? Really Rolen's the only one that I would say is already heading for the Hall but plenty of players are building their cases to be on the ballot right now. And really given that the average class size can be assumed to be 2-3 players so it's really not so surprising. Among players playing right now here's who I think are already in the Hall: Rolen, Thome, Halladay, Jones, Jeter, Rodriguez, Rivera, and Helton. There are a few other borderline cases out there (plus Ichiro will be sort of hard to predict how the writers treat him but I think he'll get in) but these guys could all be on a bus together tomorrow that drives off a cliff and I'd still say they did enough to get in and also that was really random that they were all on a bus together.

Vote for me in 2012

You might as well since you're throwing votes away, BBWAA. Let's look at some people who actually received votes during this HoF cycle.

Marquis Grissom
Career WAR of 30.6 in 17 seasons puts him at 1.8 WAR/season. His career Batting RAA and Fielding RAA are both in the negative. He had only 5 seasons where his OPS+ was above 100. 4 votes.

B.J. Surhoff
I take no pleasure in this. B.J. Surhoff was one of my favorite players growing up. Career OPS+ is 98 so we may as well call it 100 and say he was average for his career. Admittedly for a catcher you take that if he can field reasonably well and Surhoff apparently did with five seasons of FRAA of 10 or higher. Still, a career OPS of .745 and 1.8 WAR/season in 19 seasons is not a HoF resume. 2 votes.

The rest of the people who received votes I have little to no problem with as they either had a few really good years (Al Leiter) or long productive careers (John Olerud). I can't bring myself to get worked up about Benito Santiago's one vote. It was probably a guy in San Diego who still owes him dinner or something.

Blyleven in 2011!

Apparently, the Powers That Be wanted to ensure that Bert Blyleven's enshrinement resulted in rhyme time.

Congratulations to Blyleven and Alomar for their well-deserved (if delayed) elections.

A few quick notes:

• Barry Larkin jumped to 62.1%, which makes his enshrinement likely a question of when rather than if
• Tim Raines lost ground, dropping to 30.4% from 37.5% and making my life 7.1% less awesome
• Jeff Bagwell on only 41.7% of ballots; I'm not surprised, just disappointed
• Harold Baines finally fell below 5%; he will be missed
• Dave Parker didn't get the final year bump in votes that most players do, but stayed on the ballot all 15 years
• Kevin Brown got only 2.1% of the vote, something I was afraid of as I looked more and more at this class; Brown might not be a Hall of Famer, but he sure as hell deserved a look before falling off the ballot, as I'm sure he's got a damn good case
• John Franco also deserved to stick around, though I'm very, very skeptical that he has much of a case

All-in-all, it was a tough ballot for newcomers, and I'm pretty disappointed at some of the names that we won't get to consider next year, but to reiterate:

BLYLEVEN IN 2011!

My Hall of Fame Ballot that Still Doesn't Mean Anything

It's Hall of Fame season again, and once again I'm behind the 8-ball with regards to writing much despite the fact that Hall of Fame debates are by nature historical debates, specifically historical baseball debates, and I love baseball, history, and debates (as well as every possible combination of two or more of those terms).

I blame holiday revelry.

Nevertheless, like last year, I have just enough time to do a quick rundown of my imaginary ballot. This year is particularly tough, as there are more than ten candidates who I think would make good additions to the Hall of Fame. I don't think I'd vote for more than ten even if I could (which is to say, even if I could vote, and could then also vote for more than ten players), but there are legitimate cases to be made for fourteen or fifteen of these guys, especially in light of recent inductions.

But before I digress too far from my intended purpose, here's my "ballot" (once again in alphabetical order):

Roberto Alomar.  From last year: "If the various advanced defensive metrics developed by smarter folks than I are to be believed, Roberto Alomar was not the defensive genius I thought he was when I was a wee one. But when you hit .300/.371/.443 over 17 seasons at a skill position, you're one hell of a ballplayer."

I stand by everything I wrote last year, though this past year has seen a lot of advanced defensive metrics called into question, still by smarter folks than I, though it's worth noting that the folks who are smart enough to create advanced defensive metrics have also, historically, been smart enough to warn the likes of me that said metrics are advancements, not end points.  So the fact that Robbie Alomar's defense is difficult to quantify, though perhaps more obvious this year than last, is hardly surprising.

But in light of all this, I think Joe Posnanski sums up Alomar best (as he tends to do):

"If you feel that he was a solid but overrated defender -- which probably sums up the anti-Alomar-defense stance -- then he is one of the 10 best second basemen in baseball history...if you believe Alomar was a GREAT defensive player, as many people do, then he's one of the five best second basemen ever and should be in the discussion with Joe Morgan and Rogers Hornsby."

Alomar should have been a slam-dunk first-ballot Hall of Famer.  He probably would have been had he not spat in John Hirschbeck's face back in '96.  He definitely will be a Hall of Famer this year.

Jeff Bagwell.  I suspect that Jeff Bagwell is going to be this year's Roberto Alomar: a guy with a first ballot résumé who has to wait for some ridiculous reason.  But whereas Alomar paid the proverbial piper for slingin' saliva, Bagwell will wait because he was a power hitting first baseman in an era when power hitting first basemen grew on trees (or, perhaps more aptly, were trees─trees which used smaller trees to hit baseballs really goddamned far......or...something).

But despite the fact that suddenly everyone was launching 30+ homers on a yearly basis back in Bagwell's heyday, Bagwell was so, so much better (and so, so much more consistent) than the average bear.  Even ten short years ago, the numbers would have spoken for themselves: .297/.408/.540.  449 homers.  1500+ runs and RBIs (if you're a ribbie fan).  9 seasons with 30+ home runs.  3 with 40+.  2 30-30 years (that's right; Bagwell could steal a bag well* back in the day, and even once his speed left him he was a smart baserunner).  A lifetime OPS+ of 149.  79.9 WAR.  A Gold Glove and 3 Silver Slugger awards.  A Rookie of the Year award and an MVP award.

*That's out of my system now.  I promise.

And oh, what an MVP campaign it was.  .368/.451/.750 with 39 homers, a 65-65 SO-BB rate, 100+ runs/RBI's, 300 total bases─an extraordinary season in any era.  Except it wasn't a season.  It was 1994.  Bagwell did all that in only 110 games.  Motherfucker formed Voltron all by himself in '94.

I'm not going to belabor the point now, because odds are I'll furiously belabor it once the results are in.  But if Jeff Bagwell is not a Hall of Famer, then I have no idea what the words "Hall of Fame" mean.

Bert Blyleven.  From last year: "One of my favorite arguments against Bert Blyleven (and I wish I could remember who made it) was that no kids in the 80's opened up Bert Blyleven baseball cards and got excited. I was excited when I opened Blylevens in the 80's. That's the fun thing about argumentative absolutes: as soon as one little thing doesn't fit, the argument falls apart. As for an argument that matters with regards to Blyleven, point your browsers Rich Ledererward (the Bert Blyleven series is about halfway down the left navbar) if you've not done so already."

Blyleven in 2011!

Barry Larkin.  From last year: "Larkin did absolutely everything well. He hit for average (.295 lifetime). He hit for power (.444 SLG as a middle infielder). He got on base (.371 OBP). He had speed (379 SB at an 83% success rate). He fielded his position (37 defensive RAR). He's 59th all time in WAR with 68.8. He is, quite simply, a Hall of Famer."

Larkin got pretty solid support last year (51.6% of the ballot), and frankly, I suspect his candidacy is going to look better and better as the PED debate hits fever pitch on the next few HoF ballots. 

Edgar Martinez. From last year: "Yes, I know he played most of his career as a DH (of course, so did Paul Molitor, and so did future Hall of Famer Frank Thomas). But inducting relief pitchers has been all the rage lately (and fairly, I think). Designated hitters are a lot more valuable than relief pitchers. And Edgar Martinez was the greatest DH of all time. It's time we set the bar, no?"

.312/.418/.515.  309 HR.  514 2B.  1283 walks versus 1202 strikeouts.  And the man wasn't a regular in the big leagues until he was my age.  Eat your heart out, Ichiro; Edgar was late to the Seattle party before it was cool.

Mark McGwire. From last year: "I'll also be casting my vote that doesn't mean anything for Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Sammy Sosa, and Rafael Palmeiro, by the by."

I've seen several arguments over the years in which people claim that, regardless of what any given person may think of the PED issue, McGwire didn't have a Hall of Fame career.  Most of these arguments hinge on McGwire's low hits total, and the fact that a third of those hits were home runs (as if being one-dimensionally biased towards the best thing you can do at the plate were a bad thing...).

I think a good question for those people, then, is whether they think Harmon Killebrew is a Hall of Famer.  Because McGwire, as a hitter, was a lot like Killebrew.  Except much better.

Just sayin'.

Of course, we all know why most of the people who haven't voted for McGwire, and why most of those people probably still won't vote for him.  Still, it'll be interesting to see the results of his confession on his candidacy, and I'm hopefully that as the years go by, McGwire's case will look better.

Rafael Palmeiro.  I told you last year that I'd case my vote for Palmeiro, and I stick to that promise.  Palmeiro may be the most debatable of the "enhanced" candidates.  One could argue that he simply "compiled," that his career totals are the result of lots and lots of good-but-not-great seasons, that though he was always good he was never great, and so on.

I don't really care about that argument.

When Palmeiro "limped" to the finish line in '05, he still posted an OPS+ of 108.  That's not exactly stellar, mind you, but it's not like he threw together a few part-time, 85 OPS+ years in order to crack the 500 home run mark.  Palmeiro was a valuable player right up until the end, and an elite (if not inner-circle) player for 10 or 11 years.  Durability and consistency are important in baseball, and I think they should be important to the Baseball Hall of Fame.  

Palmeiro failed a drug test after being a condescending asshole about PEDs during a nationally televised Congressional hearing.  He got entirely too friendly with then-Mrs. Sandberg while a Chicago Cub.  Rafael Palmeiro has, in other words, been a jerk.

Ty Cobb stabbed a dude.

Just sayin'.

Tim Raines. From last year: "A case could be made for Tim Raines as the second greatest leadoff hitter ever. Unfortunately, he played at the same time as the greatest leadoff hitter ever, and he played in Montreal. But there's no reason a .294/.385/.425 hitter with an OPS+ of 123 and 808 of the most efficient stolen bases in baseball history shouldn't have a plaque in Cooperstown."

I strongly suspect that, with Blyleven's induction imminent, SABR-minded members of cyberspace will turn their attention towards the Rock.

Alan Trammell. From last year: "Trammell will probably never make it to Cooperstown (like fellow HoF-worthy Tiger Lou Whitaker) because he spread his value over several skillsets, and not as obviously as Larkin did. Trammell could hit. He could field. He was what so many sportswriters have called a "complete player." But he was outhit by Cal Ripken (an anomaly at SS at the time) and outfielded by Ozzie Smith (who was the best defensive SS of all time), putting him in a Tim Raines-easque purgatory despite his 66.8 WAR (69th all time)."

Hopefully, as Larkin gains momentum, Trammell will, too.  Unfortunately, Alan's on the ballot for the 11th time already, which probably doesn't give him enough time to mount a serious comeback.  Fortunately, the Veteran's committee exists to continue to deny Trammell membership for years to come.

But we still love you on the internets, Mr. Trammell. 

Larry Walker.  Yup.  Coors Field.  90's.  Blergity-blarg-blurg.*  I've read the arguments against Walker for years.

*How's that for an even-handed summary of the opposing arguments?

But the man wasn't a one-dimensional slugger, and he wasn't simply a product of his home ballpark.  Was Walker better at Coors Field than on the road?  Absolutely.  He hit .348/.431/.637 at home vs. .278/.370/.495 away.  But an .865 OPS in away games is nothing to sneeze at (Jim Rice OPSed .854 for his career despite playing in Fenway, a notorious hitter's ballpark that, for some reason, isn't as notorious as it probably should be), and Walker also ran the bases well and was an excellent fielder.  He was, in short, a very complete ballplayer.

OPS+, which adjusts for park factors, still loves Walker, who chalked up seven seasons with an OPS+ north of 150 (though one was a partial season and another was the strike-shortened 1994 campaign).  In three of those seven seasons, his OPS+ exceeded 160.  One on of those three seasons, it exceeded 170 Walker collected 409 TB that year, on top of 78 BBs).  Over the course of his career, Walker's OPS+ sits at an even 140.  His WAR was 67.3.  

I don't expect Walker to do especially well in the voting this year.  But it will get a lot of people talking, which should prove interesting.

There are other interesting candidates.  Fred McGriff will be giving voters headaches for years to come, methinks.  Kevin Brown has a very, very good case (and as the crowd thins a bit, that case will likely emerge), though I'm not sure I buy into it just yet.  Lenny Harris is the most hilariously awesome ballot choice in recent memory (though I want to make it clear right now that I love Lenny Harris).  Murphy, Parker, and Mattingly will once again make everyone wonder "what if?"─while, simultaneously, many others will make very good cases for why what was is good enough.  And of course, through it all, the harrumphing over PED users, alleged PED users, and suspected PED users will continue.

My prediction?  Alomar and Blyleven get the call.  Everyone else waits.

Building up inside of me: Omar Vizquel

In this ongoing series of however many I feel like I tackle an issue that has bothered me in the past but is not necessarily relevant.

This season at some point I saw a game where they put up a 3000 hit tracker for players in the range of making this pointless plateau. Included on the list was Omar Vizquel.

Omar Vizquel currently has 2720 hits currently (I have no memory of what he had at the time I saw the graphic). That puts him 280 hits shy of the 3000 hit mark. That wouldn't seem so unreasonable except for a litany of reasons. Omar Vizquel is 44 years-old. Omar Vizquel's highest hit total in a season ever is 191; it happened in 1999 when he was 32. Omar Vizquel is a lifetime .272 hitter and would need something above 1000 AB to get there. Omar Vizquel is currently a utility player for the White Sox and will probably play in something like 70 games this season if he's lucky.

If Omar Vizquel reaches 3000 hits I will buy an Omar Vizquel jersey and wear it to a church on Easter Sunday. I'll make it a Rangers jersey for funsies.

If you are the type to hold arbitrary benchmarks at numbers divisible by 100 or 1000 for whatever reason at least do it reasonably. There are arguments to be made for Omar Viquel to be elected to the Hall of Fame when the time comes. His hits are not one of them.

My Hall of Fame Ballot that Doesn't Mean Anything

I meant to write this much earlier. Then I went on vacation. And here we are.

So, if I had a vote in this year's election (and a million dollars and a unicorn and a million dollar unicorn insurance policy), here's who I'd put on my ballot (in alphabetical order):

Roberto Alomar. If the various advanced defensive metrics developed by smarter folks than I are to be believed, Roberto Alomar was not the defensive genius I thought he was when I was a wee one. But when you hit .300/.371/.443 over 17 seasons at a skill position, you're one hell of a ballplayer.

Bert Blyleven. One of my favorite arguments against Bert Blyleven (and I wish I could remember who made it) was that no kids in the 80's opened up Bert Blyleven baseball cards and got excited. I was excited when I opened Blylevens in the 80's. That's the fun thing about argumentative absolutes: as soon as one little thing doesn't fit, the argument falls apart. As for an argument that matters with regards to Blyleven, point your browsers Rich Ledererward (the Bert Blyleven series is about halfway down the left navbar) if you've not done so already.

Andre Dawson. For a long time, I didn't think Dawson was a Hall of Famer. I saw that .323 OBP and cringed. But the Hawk also slugged .482 on his career, and took a lot of extra bases (314) at a 74% success rate. In other words, when he got on base, he got on bases. And until his knees went to hell, he was a premier defensive center fielder, as well, which is an added bonus. He's not a slam-dunk, but I think he makes the cut (especially when I look at some of the other folks who already have plaques). He is, however, easily the most arguable of my choices (ignoring PED-related debates, that is).

Barry Larkin. Larkin did absolutely everything well. He hit for average (.295 lifetime). He hit for power (.444 SLG as a middle infielder). He got on base (.371 OBP). He had speed (379 SB at an 83% success rate). He fielded his position (37 defensive RAR). He's 59th all time in WAR with 68.8. He is, quite simply, a Hall of Famer.

Edgar Martinez. Yes, I know he played most of his career as a DH (of course, so did Paul Molitor, and so did future Hall of Famer Frank Thomas). But inducting relief pitchers has been all the rage lately (and fairly, I think). Designated hitters are a lot more valuable than relief pitchers. And Edgar Martinez was the greatest DH of all time. It's time we set the bar, no?

Mark McGwire. I'll also be casting my vote that doesn't mean anything for Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Sammy Sosa, and Rafael Palmeiro, by the by.

Tim Raines. A case could be made for Tim Raines as the second greatest leadoff hitter ever. Unfortunately, he played at the same time as the greatest leadoff hitter ever, and he played in Montreal. But there's no reason a .294/.385/.425 hitter with an OPS+ of 123 and 808 of the most efficient stolen bases in baseball history shouldn't have a plaque in Cooperstown.

Alan Trammell. Trammell will probably never make it to Cooperstown (like fellow HoF-worthy Tiger Lou Whitaker) because he spread his value over several skillsets, and not as obviously as Larkin did. Trammell could hit. He could field. He was what so many sportswriters have called a "complete player." But he was outhit by Cal Ripken (an anomaly at SS at the time) and outfielded by Ozzie Smith (who was the best defensive SS of all time), putting him in a Tim Raines-easque purgatory despite his 66.8 WAR (69th all time).

Todd Helton, the Hall of Fame, and a Rain-Delayed White Sox Game

This past Thursday, I attended my first game at U.S. Cellular Field since September 20, 2006 when the Tigers came to town and beat the Southsiders 6-2 in what was, for all intents and purposes, playoff caliber baseball. The Tigers were in town on Thursday, as well, albeit on a much drearier, rainier day. Caleb and I sat through a three hour rain delay before the game began, during which we had a couple beers, listened to stadium organist Nancy Faust play all manner of amazingly hilarious renditions of popular music from the past forty years (her first selection after we arrived at the ballpark at 12:45 was this), and watched 7+ innings of the Brewers-Rockies series finale on the jumbotron.

* * *

It was while watching the Brewers game that I saw a familiar poll question appear on the bigscreen: is Todd Helton a first-ballot Hall of Famer? Len Kasper and Bob Brenly brought up this very question when the Rockies came to town earlier this year, and then as now I felt as though the commentators were asking the wrong question. The question, I thought, shouldn't be whether or not Todd Helton is a first-ballot Hall of Famer, but whether or not Todd Helton is a Hall of Famer at all. With those questions in mind once more, I decided to do a little digging into Todd Helton's Hall of Fame case.

Any discussion of Todd Helton's Hall of Fame candidacy, of course, has to begin with his 2000-2004 seasons, during which he was an absolute monster. Just to put Helton's performances during that stretch into perspective, I took his five year season lows and put them all together to create his worst composite season during that period:

.329/.429/.577, 1.006 OPS (147 OPS+), 182 H, 39 2B, 2 3B, 30 HR, 319 TB, 98 BB, 104 SO, 0 SB, 5 CS, 107 R, 96 RBI

Obviously, those numbers don't add up due to my ridiculously imprecise "methods," and it's worth noting that a whole lot of those lows are from Helton's 2002 campaign, but I can't imagine a single major league GM who wouldn't love to add that kind of production to his lineup for even one year, let alone five. That's a superstar year, and it is in every way possible the worst year that I could cobble together for Helton during his five year peak.

But the next issue that any Helton-for-the-Hall discussion needs to deal with is his power outage after the '04 season. Since 2004, Todd Helton has never hit more than 20 home runs, and he's done that only once. In fairness to Helton, he still gets on base like a beast (if he maintains his .384 OBP for the rest of the 2009 season, it will be his lowest since 1998, his first full year in the bigs), and there are plenty of Hall of Fame hitters who either lost their power or never had any in the first place. Of course, most former power hitters who went on to the Hall of Fame enjoyed longer peaks than Helton (whose power peak lasted six years, including 1999), and most of the guys who never had any power in the first place were slick glove and/or speed men up the middle of the diamond (with some obvious exceptions like Boggs and Gwynn). Helton is a first baseman, and this year's Hall of Fame voting was not particularly kind to the most recently eligible all-OBP no-SLG first sacker.

Still, there's no denying that Helton was a monster for five or six years, and has been a very valuable ballplayer for another three or four. But how valuable, exactly, and how has his value stacked up against Hall of Fame hitters in general and, in light of the first ballot question, first-ballot hitters in particular?

The first question seems like the logical place to start. Helton's numbers were eye-popping during his peak years, but so were those of a lot of other players in the early aughts (lest we forget). So how good was Helton in context, and how valuable has he remained post-peak? Pretty valuable, as it turns out, as recently as 2007. Here's how Helton's numbers have translated into baseball currency (runs) over the course of his career, including adjustments for position:

Offense includes batting, baserunning, and GIDP values; Defense includes TotalZone and infield double play numbers, and Positional is the RAR system's way to account for different positions on the diamond. Math whizzes who aren't familiar with RAR will notice that the three values I've given first don't add up to the total RAR values. That's because I haven't graphed the replacement level values that go into converting from "raw" runs above average to runs above replacement.

But the graph is still telling: during his peak years, Helton was worth between 60 and 90 RAR for the Colorado Rockies, and much of that was on the strength of his bat (though it's worth noting that Helton's reputation as an excellent glove man at first is warranted; he has been above average on defense throughout most of his career). But are those big seasons enough for Cooperstown to come calling?

My immediate thought was to simply compare Helton's production to that of the already enshrined. Fortunately for me, several folks over at Beyond the Box Score (JBrew and TucsonRoyal in particular) have already done quite a bit of legwork in order to establish baseline Hall of Fame performance levels using Wins Above Replacement (WAR), which frequent readers of NLCS (both of you!) will recognize as one of my favorite statistics. (To put my first graph in context, 10 RAR ~ 1 WAR.)

My next move was to use JBrew's data for average Hall of Famer WAR and compare it to Helton's 12-year career (as of the end of 2008):

As you can see, Helton's best seven seasons compare favorably to those of the average Hall of Famer, but then Helton falls off a comparative cliff.

But the question raised by both the Cubs and Brewers telecasts that prompted me to perform this analysis in the first place was not whether Helton is a Hall of Famer, but whether Helton is a first ballot Hall of Famer. Comparing him to the average resident of Cooperstown doesn't do much to answer that question. So I narrowed the dataset down to include only those players who were inducted into the Hall of Fame in their first year of eligibility (data available here).

As it turns out, all but six first-balloters (Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Ty Cobb, Stan Musial, Ted Williams, and Jackie Robinson) played recently enough that most or all of their careers are included in Sean Smith's historical WAR database. Once I had worked out what the average first ballot inductee's WAR looked like, I graphed Helton again, this time against the very creamiest of the crop:

Helton still stacks up pretty well in his top seven seasons; in fact, there doesn't seem to be much of an upward jump in Cooperstown standards when we limit the HoF WAR sampling to first balloters:

In general, the difference between a first ballot Hall of Famer and the average Hall of Famer (importantly, the "average" HoFer values include first balloters) is about half a win per year. Based on WAR, we can see that during his peak years Helton was playing like a borderline first-ballot Hall of Famer, then like a slightly below average Hall of Famer during his remaining good years, and that he's been well below the average immortal in the remaining five years of his career. And this twelve year WAR graph is something of a best case scenario right now, as most players who end up in Cooperstown these days played for much longer than 12 (soon to be 13) seasons:

That's an awful lot of ground for Helton to make up. In order for him to look like a first ballot Hall of Famer, he'll need another five or six years in the 3-5 WAR range, and Helton is already 35. That doesn't mean he won't be a Hall of Famer if he hangs up his spikes tomorrow; hell, he might already be a first ballot Hall of Famer in the eyes of enough voters for him to find himself at the podium in 2014 accepting his election as the Rockies' first representative in Cooperstown. But by at least one metric (and one that I tend to put a lot of stock in), he sure doesn't look like a first ballot Hall of Famer—and perhaps not even like a Hall of Famer, period.

In light of this, perhaps the question that we should be asking isn't "Is Todd Helton a first-ballot Hall of Famer?" or even "Is Todd Helton a Hall of Famer at all?" but rather "Why are we asking about Todd Helton's Hall of Fame chances right now?" His peak, while impressive, probably won't be enough for enshrinement on its own given the historical context, not to mention park effects, which I haven't even mentioned in my analysis [EDIT: though they are accounted for in WAR] but which will absolutely come into play any time a Rockie finds his way to a Hall of Fame ballot. And who knows? Helton could surprise us all and put up four or five good years before calling it quits. So let's wait and see what the next few seasons have in store for Helton, as well what next year's vote has in store for the first legitimate Hall of Fame candidate to put up most of his numbers in Denver, Larry Walker, before we go trying to figure out if Todd Helton has punched his ticket to Cooperstown.

* * *

I was, of course, unable to argue my point so clearly off the cuff, but Caleb and I talked of Helton and the Hall regardless. Were I to show Past Dave and Past Caleb the first half of this post, they'd both be rather surprised: we gave Helton a rather dismal shot at election at the time. But we were perhaps overly pessimistic, particularly in light of the ray of hope that was 2007.

When the game finally began around 4:00, Caleb and I had already been watching baseball and talking baseball for over three hours, but Chicago-Detroit didn't disappoint. Floyd pitched a gem, Thome and Granderson (the two players who both Caleb and I were most invested in) had big games, and thanks to Granderson's 2-run shot off of Bobby Jenks in the top of the ninth, there was plenty of drama late.

And of course, this was a Sox game, so when Ramon Santiago hit a solo home run in the eighth, the whole stadium gave him the booing of a lifetime (quoth Caleb, "Who bothers to boo Ramon Santiago?").*

*Before any furious Sox fans try to remind me: Yes, I'm well aware that Cubs fans en masse are just as bad.

But the highlight of the day for both of us, by far, occurred in the bottom of the second when highly touted prospect Gordon Beckham strode to the plate and this happened. That's right, the kid's entrance music is "Your Love" by The Outfield. Beckham gave one of Edwin Jackson's offerings a pretty good ride to left center, but it died on the track. He got good wood on another pitch in his second at-bat against Jackson, but to no avail.

Fortunately, he hit a home run with "Your Love" and, in doing so, instantly became both Caleb's and my favorite player on the White Sox (sorry, Jimmy T.). He also softened the blow of having to watch A.J. Pierzynski hit a home run to right. As I said to Caleb, "If every Pierzynski home run is followed by Gordon Beckham walking to the plate to that song, I hope he hits 170."

Going into the top of the ninth, I laid out my plans for the ideal game: the Tigers would score two runs to tie the game and the White Sox would be shut down in the ninth, sending us to extras and setting up Gordon Beckham's first Major League home run, a glorious walk-off in the bottom of the whatever. When Curtis Granderson took Bobby Jenks deep to tie things up, things were looking good for the Perfect Game.

But the ninth inning didn't work out quite as planned. Brian Anderson led off with a single off Joel Zumaya. Zumaya then mishandled Chris Goetz's sacrifice bunt attempt and threw the ball away, putting runners on second and third. Josh Fields walked to load the bases, bringing up Scott Podsednik with a chance to win the game. I told Caleb that if Beckham couldn't win the game, a Podsednik-struck walk-off grand slam would be one hell of a consolation prize. He quickly agreed.

And then things got weird.

Podsednik fouled a ball towards the third base side that Brandon Inge chased like a madman. Inge lunged into the stands in shallow left with a bead on the ball only to have it deflected away by a Sox fan. While Inge, furious, began to argue for fan interference (an argument that Jim Leyland and some of his staff joined), the fan raised the ball triumphantly in his hands and turned to all corners of the stadium to bask in the adulation of the rest of the ballpark. (On our way out of the park, we walked right past this guy while he, gesturing furiously and with the ball still in his hand, screamed "I took it away from you!" at every Tigers fan he passed.)

I have an inordinate amount of respect for Section 510, which joined us in booing this jerkbag until we were blue in the face. This includes several fans who were decked to the nines in Sox apparel, one of whom yelled "Let 'em fuckin' play!" in front of his gradeschool daughter.

What made this scene even more odious is the fact that, during the rain delay, we'd been "treated" to the White Sox World Series film, during which we'd watched Joe Crede make his amazing catch in the '05 series in much the same spot at Minute Maid Park as Podsednik's foul had landed at U.S. Cellular. At the time, Caleb and I had talked about how classy the fans in Houston were for getting out of the way of a ballplayer in general, and an opposing ballplayer in particular, and allowing him the chance to make a play. We had no idea how portentious such a line of discussion would turn out to be.

It's worth noting, by the way, that with all of Inge's momentum taking him away from the plate, not to mention the fact that he fell into the stands to try to make a play, Anderson probably could have tagged up and scored from third even if Inge had caught the ball. But, as history will forever show, Podsednik got another chance, and hit a sharp grounder through on the right side to end the game. It's likely that the Sox would have won regardless, but it was a shame to see a fan intentionally break up a play like that.

Come on, guys. Let 'em fuckin' play.

Lest We Forget Rick

No, I wasn't [only] joking when I wrote my letter of apology to Rick Reuschel last month; I really do have every intention of posting Rick-related analysis on this site whenever I perform it or, better yet, stumble across it. And stumble I did! Cyril Morong of Cybermetrics posted an old article of his in which he makes a case for Big Daddy as a Hall of Famer. I'm not sure I buy Reuschel's Hall credentials (I need to do a bit more digging before I cast my inconsequencial yea or nay), but the article is a great read regardless.

Professor Pedro Bigrocket

The four best pitchers of our generation? Probably. A hyper-literate Dominican pornstar? Definitely.

Big Numbers

Randy Johnson won his 300th game tonight against the Washington Nationals (in his first try at #300, no less). I'd throw together a celebratory graph, but the fine folks at Beyond the Boxscore already have.

One thing's for certain. Nobody, ever, under any circumstances, will ever win 300 games ever again. Ever.

EDIT: How did I overlook the opportunity to post a video of the greatest pitch ever thrown?

Bert vs. Nightcrawlers

The plural "s" is getting really damned technical; Blyleven will eat exactly plural (see: two) live nightcrawlers before Saturday's Twins-Mariners game. Apparently, this stunt has something to do with Parkinson's disease. I've gotta hand it to the folks at the Parkinson Association of Minnesota: calling the fundraiser "Bert vs. Nightcrawlers" was a stroke of genius, although I was picturing a whole bucket of nightcrawlers rather than simply two. In my mind, Blyleven had signed up for the Fear Factor version of my old elementary school walk-a-thons; he would have spent the last several weeks walking from door to door collecting pledges for each nightcrawler that he ate, setting himself up for a glorious return to each doorstep on Sunday with tidings of nightcrawly domination (tidings with precise pricetags, no less). He probably would have won a shitty Walkman knock-off for being the top nightcrawler eater at the game.

Glorious.

Alternatively, I would have been even more excited about "Bert vs. Nightcrawler."

In preparation for Blyleven's impending insecticide, I whipped up a couple historical WAR graphs in an attempt to weigh the relative value of Bert Blyleven vs. two nightcrawlers. Although I have historical WAR data for Blyleven, I had to extrapolate for the nightcrawlers, which proved difficult. First, there are two of them, and second, it is unlikely that either can swing a bat. But then again, neither can most backup catchers, so I fudged the data and assumed that two nightcrawlers, taken together, would perform at replacement level. This is probably a generous assumption, but as you can see, Blyleven still has the obvious edge:

The situation doesn't look any less grim for the nightcrawlers if we switch to a career-path plot:

The data doesn't lie: those nightcrawlers are going to get their shit fucked up.

No word yet on whether Blyleven will be credited with a pair of wins after vanquishing his diminuative opponents this weekend. If Commissioner Bud Selig approves of the move, Blyleven's career record will improve to a still largely misleading 289-250, making him look slightly more appealing to Hall of Fame voters who realize that wins are the only pitching statistic that matter, no matter how convincingly Rich Lederer (among others) may argue to the contrary, and putting Blyleven only 11 nightcrawlers shy of Cooperstown.

A Graphical Tribute to Fergie Jenkins and Greg Maddux

Fergie Jenkins and Greg Maddux had their number 31 retired by the Cubs today. Both were obviously great pitchers, and as is my tendency when I read about various baseball-related honors, I dove into the numbers in an attempt to quantify just how great each of these guys really was. All of my data comes from BaseballProjection.com's wonderful pitcher WAR database.

First off, I borrowed a move from the fine folks at Beyond the Boxscore and graphed each pitcher's WAR in descending order from his best season in a Cubs uniform to his worst (partial seasons are included as full seasons for simplicity's sake):

The results shouldn't surprise anyone. Both Jenkins and Maddux essentially started and finished their careers in Chicago (Jenkins pitched a whopping 14.2 innings for the Phillies before coming to Chicago to begin his career in earnest; Maddux pitched two more respectable years for the Dodgers and Padres before hanging up his spikes three years after his Chicago swan song), but Jenkins developed faster and enjoyed his best seasons in a Cubs uniform, whereas Maddux didn't emerge as an ace until his final season in Chicago, after which he was (in)famously allowed to walk, so his prime years were for the Braves. A graph of each pitcher's Cubs career path puts these developmental discrepancies in rather stark perspective:

Maddux's career was on the upswing when he left for Atlanta, while Jenkins had already peaked before he moved on to Texas. If we expand each pitcher's career path to include every stop in his big league career, the advantage shifts to Maddux:

Jenkins peaked earlier, but Maddux sustained his peak (and his career) longer, though mostly as a Brave. Revisiting each pitcher's descending seasonal WAR while taking into account his entire career gives Maddux the edge over Jenkins:

Of course, it's important to remember that Maddux put up most of these numbers in Atlanta rather than Chicago; seven of his top ten seasons (#1 and #'s 3-8) were as a Brave, while Jenkins put up seven of his top ten seasons (#'s 1-2, 4-7, and 10) as a Cub. Breaking up each player's total WAR as a Cub and overall really hammers home this difference:

Jenkins was worth 81.4 WAR over his career, and 53.5 of those wins were with the Cubs. Maddux's career WAR was 96.7, but only 31.4 of those wins were in Cubbie blue. Maddux was the more valuable pitcher; Jenkins was the more valuable Cubs pitcher.

None of this changes the fact that both Jenkins and Maddux are beloved by Cubs fans (and rightly so!). Congratulations to both players for this well-deserved honor. I look forward to watching the number 31 flapping in the breeze at Wrigley for many years to come.

A Raise of the Glass to The Bird and the Voice of the Phillies

The baseball world lost two icons yesterday: Harry Kalas, the voice of the Philadelphia Phillies, and Mark Fidrych, the eccentric but beloved former Tigers Rookie of the Year.

Kalas had been calling Phillies games since 1971. Those of us who aren't Phillies fans may know him best for his "outta here!" call or his NFL Films voiceover work. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame as a broadcaster in 2002.

Fidrych burst onto the MLB scene in 1976 when he won 19 games and the American League Rookie of the Year Award for the Detroit Tigers. Although he would never recapture the magic of that first season due to a string of injuries that limited his career to five years and a whole lot of "what ifs," Fidrych remains one of the most beloved sports figures for a generation of Tigers fans who watched "The Bird" and his mound antics in that summer of '76. He was inducted into the Shrine of the Eternals in 2002.

I should say that as much as I (obviously) love debating the statistical merits of players, I'm very glad that the Shrine exists to honor "distinctiveness of play (good or bad); the uniqueness of character and personality; and the imprint that the individual[s have] made on the baseball landscape"; to honor, in other words, those characters who make the game of baseball more than simply a game of numbers, but a game that can captivate its fans enough that they are willing (and eager!) to wade through all of those numbers.

Cheers to you both, gentlemen.

The Hall of Pretty Good

Historically, the MLB Hall of Fame has been much better than the other major sports in keeping the elite in, and the mere good out. They still are, that doesn't change with this year's most recent elections, nor did it change in the past couple years when they inducted Goose Gossage and Bruce Sutter, respectively.

That's not to say they weren't good players.

The same goes for one of this year's inductees - who everyone pretty much knew would finally get in this year, his 15th and final year on the ballot - Jim Rice. Now, how his stats actually improved over the past 12 months in order for him to gain induction, I'll never know. But apparently, what was it, 14 additional voters said "Eh, good enough!" The whole thing is asinine. Jim Rice was a fine player, a great hitter for several years there, a threat in the middle of that Boston lineup. But one of the elite to ever play the game? Surely you jest. I mean, where's Joe Carter if you're going to just put in good hitting outfielders? And why has Dale Murphy been plodding around the 10-15% plateau ever since he's been on the ballot? I'm not saying he deserves to be in, but where's the love? Here, check the stats if you don't believe me:

Jim Rice: http://www.baseball-reference.com/r/riceji01.shtml
Dale Murphy: http://www.baseball-reference.com/m/murphda05.shtml

For his career, Rice batted .298 (.352 OBP) with 382 home runs, 1451 RBIs, and 2452 hits. Nothing to sneeze at. He also had 1 MVP and zero Gold Glove Awards.

Murphy batted .265 (.346 OBP) with 398 home runs, 1266 RBIs, and 2111 hits. Rice's numbers do look slighly better here (slightly), but Dale also had 2 MVPs to Rice's one, and topped it off with 5 Gold Gloves. Not to mention he played for the shitty, shitty Braves during the 80s so that has to account for a big chunk of those RBIs.

For my money, there were two guys more deserving of going into the Hall over Rice - and no, one of them isn't Dale Murphy. The first is The Hawk, the bane of my youth during his time with Cubs, Andre Dawson.

Dawson will get in, if history is any judge, but it's a crime he hasn't been inducted sooner. Dawson's numbers look like this: .279 batting average, .323 OBP, 438 home runs, 1591 RBIs, 2774 hits, 1 MVP, a Rookie of the Year Award, and 8 Gold Gloves. And I'm not going back to check the numbers but I know that motherfucker stole more than a few bases as well and he had a GUN in RF.

The other guy who should have gone in long ago is Bert Blyleven. How this guy has floated under the radar this long is just a travesty. His numbers just speak for themselves:

287 Wins
242 Complete Games. 242!
60 Shutouts
3.31 ERA
3701 Ks - which is 5th all time

Poor guy. You'd think if he'd have hung around for a couple more crappy seasons just to get #300 he'd be a shoo-in.

Onto the other half of my rant. Whoever didn't fucking vote for Rickey Henderson needs to be stripped of their voting priveleges. He was on, like, 94.7% of the ballot. Over 5% of the writers said, nope, he just wasn't good enough. Give me a fucking break. And while I'm on the subject, what's the deal with this 15 year bullshit? A player does not get any better after he's retired. Sorry. He just doesn't. Generally they get worse as people eclipse their records (Sorry, Lee Smith). You're either a first ballot Hall of Famer or you're not fucking good enough. End of story. Not to mention the whole self-promoting and begging for votes is just embarassing. Goose was practically crying in interviews the year Sutter got in and he didn't. It's pathetic.

And two people voted for Jay Bell! Jay Fucking Bell! And someone wanted to see a bronze bust of JESSE OROSCO! Someone tell these writers that you don't have to vote for 10 guys. Vote for none if you don't think any are deserving, but don't be ridiculous. I would like to track down the guys who voted for Jay Bell and Jesse Orosco and have them explain to me, in great detail, why in God's name either is deserving of the greatest honor a baseball player can achieve. Then I would like to punch them in the neck.

That's enough for this week. Glad to be on board!

Greg Maddux to Announce Plans to Enter Baseball Hall of Fame Five Years from Monday

It should come as no surprise to anyone who has been following the baseball offseason this year that Greg Maddux plans to announce his retirement on Monday. Maddux played for 23 seasons for the Chicago Cubs, Atlanta Braves, Los Angeles Dodgers, and San Diego Padres. He developed into the best pitcher in the National League while with the Cubs, who then infamously allowed Maddux to walk following his first Cy Young year (1992). He would go on to win three more consecutive Cy Young Awards with the Braves (four straight, all told), where he spent his "glory years" anchoring a Braves rotation of himself, Tom Glavine, John Smoltz, and Steve Avery that propelled Atlanta to something like 37 consecutive division titles, before eventually returning to Chicago in 2004 for a farewell tour. After two-and-a-half more years with the Cubs, Maddux split time with the Dodgers and Padres before deciding it was time to move on.

Although I have no doubt that the pundits will spend the next century or so debating whether it was Greg Maddux or Roger Clemens who was the greatest pitcher of their generation, one thing that isn't debatable is Maddux's Hall of Fame candidacy. Greg Maddux will enter Cooperstown in five years, and when he does, he may well do so with the highest percentage of the vote in the Hall of Fame's history (Tom Seaver's 98.8% is the current record).

Many people will write many tributes to Maddux in the coming days, and so I will not belabor this post. But although my team was shortsighted enough to let a great ballplayer (and character) like Maddux walk away, there will always be a special place in the hearts of many, many Cubs fans (this one included) for the Mad Dog.

Godspeed, Mr. Maddux.