Official Hall of Fame Discussion

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Farmer1906
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In reply to AggieEP • 8:39a, 8/14/26
AG
A and D should probably be in. Blows my mind, looking back, that A never did.

I hope B gets in soon. I think he's borderline, but in.

C should be a lock.

E & F are probably on the outside looking in. Hall of Very Good.
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AggieEP
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In reply to Farmer1906 • 9:04a, 8/14/26
If you look at C and F and look at their age 23-33 seasons, I think you'll be surprised how the numbers look.

C - 47.5 bWAR and a 133 OPS+ during his prime.
F - 53.3 bWAR and 115 OPS+ during his prime.

The major difference in their total resumes are that C has had a lot more opportunities in the post season (although F was also a multi time champion) and also has 650 hits and another 6 WAR by debuting early (didn't go to college like F did) and hanging around now putting up replacement level seasons. F was forced into retirement by DBag Machado and didn't get to add anything to his resume after his age 33 season. Even if we assumed a worse case scenario of decline he probably adds 600- 700 more hits in the final 4+ years on his contract putting him at 2500 and within striking distance of 3000 just like with player C.

I agree that C should be a lock, but F is essentially the same player as C just without the extra replacement level seasons to accumulate stats. It'd be one thing if F had just declined rapidly and retired, but his career was ended by a dirty play which I think should be taken into account.

The below article makes the same case I am that F and C are nearly identical players.

https://www.mlb.com/news/dustin-pedroia-hall-of-fame-case
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W
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9:50a, 8/14/26
AG
a couple of problems with player F

- he played in the 21st century where 140 career home runs is not impressive

- home OPS is 90 points higher than his road OPS

check his career doubles:

home: 238 doubles in 3,013 at-bats
road: 156 doubles in 3,018 at-bats
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W
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9:59a, 8/14/26
AG
don't agree with the player C vs. player F comparison

player C at age 33 bests player F at age 33 (when his career ended) in most categories by significant margins

home runs, stolen bases, doubles, hits, batting average, OPS, etc..,

player C had .900 OPS seasons at ages 32 and 33
-----

player F has career postseason OPS of .687

player C is one of the greatest postseason players of the modern era (.841 OPS)

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AggieEP
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In reply to W • 10:15a, 8/14/26
No doubt that F's ballpark helped with some cheap doubles.

But we have Helton in the HoF with a nearly 200 point difference in home and road OPS (1.048 at home .855 on the road) so a 90 point difference seems tame by comparison.

Using an even more accurate comparison, Carl Yastremzski had a plus 125 point OPS differential at home and a similar big bump in doubles at home. Mookie Betts is a plus 80 at home in large part because of his time at Fenway.

Long way of saying that it's a good point, but where do we draw the line on how big of a split we're willing to accept. For me a 90 point difference is notable, but not disqualifying. A 200 point difference should be disqualifying. I do tend to agree with your point overall though, Lance Berkman had a .946 OPS at home and a .940 OPS on the road. Dude raked no matter where he was and wasn't taking advantage of a quirky ballpark.
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Farmer1906
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10:24a, 8/14/26
AG
I think its safe to use names on the next page.
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AggieEP
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In reply to W • 10:34a, 8/14/26
Player C has more than double the ABs of player F in the playoffs. And there is no doubt that C has almost always delivered in the postseason. It's part of what makes C a lock for the HoF. But I'd like to think that performance always settles in at the average over time though and that F's numbers would look more like C's if you gave him another 200 ABs in the playoffs. (Except for the HRs)

I also think (I'm probably alone on this) that the HoF should look at total baseball accomplishments. And F was a 3 time all American and golden spikes finalist. To me those accomplishments matter and paint an even more complete picture of a great player that was always recognized for his impact on winning.

I get that it's hard to look past the low counting stats, but there are extenuating circumstances in his case with a career ending injury.
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Farmer1906
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In reply to AggieEP • 10:35a, 8/14/26
AG
That is an interesting take. It's the Baseball HOF not the MLB HOF.
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AgRyan04
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In reply to Farmer1906 • 11:34a, 8/14/26
Farmer1906 said:
That is an interesting take. It's the Baseball HOF not the MLB HOF.


Inky for Cooperstown!



I actually don't think little league or high school or college or summer ball or minor leagues should have anything to do with Cooperstown
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AgRyan04
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In reply to BCSWguru • 11:47a, 8/14/26
BCSWguru said:
Sorta related….the legends coming in from the corn field was awesome.


It was pretty cool, but I'll be honest, there were a couple or those guys that took me a few minutes to recognize.....aging is a *****.

LaRussa looked like they dug him back up just for the event.

I also don't think we're going to see Steve Carlton at a lot more events, sadly.


I remember the '99 All-Star game having the All-Century guys out....and the '04 HR Derby with all the living 500 HR hitters.....have there been any other events like this that I'm not remembering?
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AggieEP
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In reply to AgRyan04 • 11:57a, 8/14/26
Part of why I think that college should count at least a little bit is to normalize our comparisons between kids who go straight to the pros and those that go to college first.

I mentioned earlier that Machado had 2675 PAs through his age 23 season. Bryce Harper had 2700. That's an advantage of 3 to 4 years of counting stats over a college kid who likely doesn't debut until 23 or 24. Berkman had 106 PAs through his age 23 season. Pedroia had 679. Wyatt Langford is about the best case scenario for a college kid and he had 1100 through his age 23 season.

Not trying to get Pete Incavigla inducted into the HoF or advocating to add hits/HRs to anyone's pro totals but I do think there is some logic to considering achievements like All American selections and Golden Spikes awards. Take Berkman for example, his age 21 season in college he won the golden spikes award and he was a 2 time all American. But it's like it didn't happen as far as the HoF goes. Bryce Harper at 22 was winning an MVP award. That age 22 season for Harper with 10 WAR is like the biggest thing working in his favor and Berkman's monster age 21 season (41 bombs, 134 RbIs in 63 games) is totally ignored.
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AgRyan04
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In reply to AggieEP • 1:21p, 8/14/26
Its part of their baseball story but they either chose to go to college - or - they weren't good enough to be drafted/signed out of high school. I appreciate it and respect it, especially being the college baseball fan that I am, but I'm just not going to give someone extra credit for it when it comes to a Cooperstown resume.
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W
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2:51p, 8/14/26
AG
slightly off-topic...

but one big difference between Cooperstown and Canton is the longevity requirement

Gale Sayers and Terrell Davis would not be in the MLB HoF

no waivers for short careers despite excellence -- and it's fair to wonder why that is
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AggieEP
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In reply to W • 11:57a, 8/16/26
I think what gets me is that the baseball hall of fame requires 10 years, but realistically because of how we define a hall of fame career in baseball, no one outside of Ohtani or Trout could get in while playing only 10 years. Realistically you have to play at least 15 years in order to accumulate enough WAR or counting stats to be considered. Guys like Pedroia, deGrom, Berkman are looked at as great players who "just needed a couple of more years to get in." To me this is asinine, they hit the 10 year minimum and were great players, what else do we need to see?

This dude did the math on an "average" hall of famer

https://www.replacementlevelpodcast.com/2012/07/22/your-average-hall-of-famer/

And we see that 18 years is the average career length for a hall of famer with a debut age of 21.

Everyone likes to complain about the idea of the "hall of very good" if we open the doors to a wider variety of players, but IMO as it stands now the hall is basically the "hall of very durable." Altuve has been rancid the last 2 years and is likely to remain so until he retires, but the 250 hits and 39 HRs the past two seasons have added to his counting stats in a way that for baseball fans makes his resume more "complete." He'll finish with like 2800+ hits and 300+ hrs and we'll act as if those two numbers set him far apart from Pedroia. But if he had been forced to retire 2 years ago, his path to Cooperstown would have been infinitely more complicated. (I still would vote for him 100%)
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AgRyan04
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In reply to AggieEP • 1:00p, 8/16/26
I agree on that!

I think the counting numbers are awesome, but I don't think they should be the only path
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94chem
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1:20p, 8/16/26
I just saw today that Tommy John passed away. Check out his stats...kind of unbelievable that a guy with 61 WAR, 288 wins, and a career 3.34 ERA isn't in the Hall. 700 starts. And...I wonder if he donated his tendons to people who need Tommy John surgery.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/j/johnto01.shtml
94chem,
That, sir, was the greatest post in the history of TexAgs. I salute you. -- Dough
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AgRyan04
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In reply to 94chem • 1:37p, 8/16/26
Sorry to see that he passed

There are a bunch of pitchers on the list that I would put in before I got to John. He had a good, verrrrry long career but he had an extremely short peak.
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AggieEP
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In reply to 94chem • 1:56p, 8/16/26
The hall has struggled to figure out what to do with the Tommy John's of the world. The counting stats are great but in a 26 year career he was a 4 time all star.

Jim Kaat has almost identical numbers and was only a 3 time all star, but won a ton of gold gloves which probably punched his ticket despite the questionable nature of that award.

Blyleven waited for a while with a similar profile. (2 time all star)


That generation of pitchers pitched a ton of innings and got decisions in like every game even if they weren't effective so it's a bit misleading to see that someone has 280 wins and just assume they were elite. All that doesn't mean that the hall shouldn't have room for guys like that, but they (Kaat, John, Blyleven) were all extreme compilers that would not even be discussed if they only pitched 15 years.

(Note I don't really care about all star appearances but I do think that only being picked a couple of times in a really long career says something about how you stack up against your peers at the same position.)
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AgRyan04
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In reply to AggieEP • 3:02p, 8/16/26
AggieEP said:
The hall has struggled to figure out what to do with the Tommy John's of the world. The counting stats are great but in a 26 year career he was a 4 time all star.

Jim Kaat has almost identical numbers and was only a 3 time all star, but won a ton of gold gloves which probably punched his ticket despite the questionable nature of that award.

Blyleven waited for a while with a similar profile. (2 time all star)


That generation of pitchers pitched a ton of innings and got decisions in like every game even if they weren't effective so it's a bit misleading to see that someone has 280 wins and just assume they were elite. All that doesn't mean that the hall shouldn't have room for guys like that, but they (Kaat, John, Blyleven) were all extreme compilers that would not even be discussed if they only pitched 15 years.

(Note I don't really care about all star appearances but I do think that only being picked a couple of times in a really long career says something about how you stack up against your peers at the same position.)


Kaat did have all the GGs and Blyleven did have 3700 strikeouts....if a guy is going to be a compiler, they need to get to the milestones. If he got to 300 wins he'd be in, but he didn't get to 300.
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94chem
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7:51a, 8/17/26
Meanwhile, Harold Baines...
94chem,
That, sir, was the greatest post in the history of TexAgs. I salute you. -- Dough
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AggieEP
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In reply to 94chem • 8:34a, 8/17/26
Baines is the best example of the huge advantage it is to debut young and stick around a long time. If you scaled his numbers down and only go from his age 23-38 seasons you have almost the exact same WAR (35.3) as he had for his whole career (38.8) but you then subtract 500 hits and 70 HRs from his overall totals leaving him at like 2300 hits and 300 HRs. At those numbers he looks more like Nick Markaikas than a HoFer. But getting to 2866 hits still resonates with a certain crowd who think volume = greatness.

In fact, if we really wanted to be more fair about the hall, what we'd use is the 162 gm average of a guy's line to help us think about their candidacy instead of contextless counting stats. (Probably even more fair to just take the top 7 WAR years for each guy, but since I want to make a point about accumulators I'm using their entire careers)

For Baines that's 2.2 WAR on a .289/.356/.465 slash with 22 HRs/93 RBIs and a OPS+ of 121.

Pedroia is 5.6 WAR on a .299/.365/.439 slash with 15 HRs/78 RBIs and a OPS+ of 113.

Berkman is 4.5 WAR on a .293/.406/.537 slash with 32 HRs/106 RBIs and a OPS+ of 144.

Dave Parker is 2.6 WAR on a .290/.339/.471 slash with 22 HRs/98 RBIs and a OPS+ of 121

Dale Murphy is 3.5 WAR on a .265/.346/.469 slash with 30 HRs/94 RBIs and a OPS+ of 121.

Altuve is 4.2 WAR on a .300/.358/.463 slash with 21 HRs/72 RBIs and a OPS+ of 126.

Biggio is a 3.7 WAR on a .281/.363/.433 slash with 17 HRs/67 RBIs and a OPS+ of 112.

Doing this it's not really that hard to distinguish out the accumulators from the really great players. And with cases like BIggio, you have a guy where he was really really good, but he was also an accumulator who was never quite as good as either Pedroia or Altuve on average. The accumulator stage of his career eventually brought his WAR avg down under 4. (If I filter Biggio using just his age 23-38 seasons his avg WAR is a 4.0)

It also makes it clear that if Parker is in, there is no way that Murphy shouldn't be in. The difference is that Parker was able to hang around and get ABs until he was 40 while Murphy was essentially retired at 35.
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AgRyan04
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In reply to 94chem • 9:58a, 8/17/26
94chem said:
Meanwhile, Harold Baines...


Unquestionably the biggest head scratcher in the entire hall!

At the Field of Dreams when they were announcing the HOFers and their achievements they're like,

"Steve Carlton, winner of four Cy Young Awards with over 300 career wins and 4,000 strikeouts"

"Jim Thome, 5 time all-Star and member of the 600 HR club"

"Harold Baines, one of the most consistent hitters of his era"
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AgRyan04
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In reply to AggieEP • 10:00a, 8/17/26
Excellent point, and a good way of breaking guys numbers down
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94chem
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In reply to AgRyan04 • 10:20a, 8/17/26
AgRyan04 said:
94chem said:
Meanwhile, Harold Baines...


Unquestionably the biggest head scratcher in the entire hall!

At the Field of Dreams when they were announcing the HOFers and their achievements they're like,

"Steve Carlton, winner of four Cy Young Awards with over 300 career wins and 4,000 strikeouts"

"Jim Thome, 5 time all-Star and member of the 600 HR club"

"Harold Baines, one of the most consistent hitters of his era"


...and didn't play in the field
94chem,
That, sir, was the greatest post in the history of TexAgs. I salute you. -- Dough
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94chem
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10:24a, 8/17/26
Edgar Martinez had an OPS+ of 164 for his 7 years stretch, 1995 - 2001, and slashed .329/.446/.574, with an OPS of 1.020. Even in the steroid era, his OPS+ was amazing.
94chem,
That, sir, was the greatest post in the history of TexAgs. I salute you. -- Dough
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jja79
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1:33p, 8/17/26
AG
I have a friend who was a teammate of Baines for one season. He was in disbelief when he was elected. Said he's the nicest guy he met in his 7 years and his mother was a great cook.
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