2023 Hall of Fame: My Ballot

Another year, another cycle of Hall of Fame discourse that will range anywhere from fascinating to toxic. Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens are unfortunately gone from the ballot, but the steroid discourse is far from over with names like Manny Ramirez, Alex Rodriguez, and others still present. For my full thoughts on cheaters and the Hall of Fame, click here, but the quick summary is that I think almost all of them should get in. 

My ballot this year is a bit sparse. Last year, I voted for the full ten players, but this year I'm down to six after David Ortiz earned induction, Bonds, Clemens, and Curt Schilling ran out of eligibility, and Bobby Abreu dropped off my ballot. No newcomers made their way on, but A-Rod is an addition from last year after the one year steroid penalty I applied. Below, let's first walk through the players I would vote for on my hypothetical ballot, then let's walk through the ones that I wouldn't vote for and why that is. As a reminder, players need 75% of the vote to get into the Hall of Fame.

YES VOTES

3B Alex Rodriguez (1994-2016)
Regular Season: 696 HR, .295/.380/.550, 329 SB, 141 wRC+, 113.7 fWAR in 2784 games.
Postseason: 13 HR, .259/.365/.457, 8 SB, 116 wRC+ in 75 games.
Last year, I had Alex Rodriguez wait in "time out" because I didn't want to (hypothetically) make a cheater a first ballot Hall of Famer. Now that we're past that, though, it's time to let A-Rod into the Hall. You can't argue with the results. Nearly 700 home runs, over 300 stolen bases, over 500 doubles, and an on-base percentage approaching .400 while playing stellar defense makes for an inner-circle resume. His 113.7 fWAR ranks thirteenth all time, ahead of names like Mickey Mantle (112.3), Mike Schmidt (106.5), and Rickey Henderson (106.3). But of course, that's not the point. Not only did Alex Rodriguez cheat, he did so at a time when it was clearly against the rules and he served a yearlong suspension in 2014. So he didn't just cheat, he is a cheater. That said, as I mentioned in my thoughts on cheaters and the Hall of Fame, so are dozens of players already enshrined. There is no purity to preserve. Put him in, and do the same with Bonds and Clemens while we're at it.

LHP Billy Wagner (1995-2010)
Regular Season: 2.31 ERA, 2.73 FIP, 1.00 WHIP, 1196/300 K/BB in 903 innings.
Postseason: 10.03 ERA, 5.01 FIP, 1.97 WHIP, 13/2 K/BB in 11.2 innings.
Okay, Billy Wagner has been on the ballot for long enough. He finally crossed the 50% threshold last year in his seventh attempt, and now at number eight I'm starting to lose patience. Left handed relievers are obviously extremely important, given that every team always ensures that they have one in the bullpen, yet there is not a single one in the Hall of Fame. Billy Wagner isn't just the best lefty reliever of all time – it's not even close. There aren't many cumulative stats available for relievers (no, I don't care about saves), but Wagner leads all lefty relievers in strikeouts (1196, ahead of Jesse Orosco's 1169), fWAR (24.0, ahead of Aroldis Chapman's 20.1), RE24 (198.2, ahead of Orosco's 154.5), and WPA (28.4, ahead of Chapman's 19.9), four stats I think are very good measures of long term success. And aside from strikeouts, none of these are even close, with a 19% lead in fWAR, a 28% lead in RE24, and a massive 43% lead in WPA. Take handedness out of the question, and he still stacks up extremely well to the six true relievers in the Hall of Fame right now. Mariano Rivera is head and shoulders above everybody, but looking at the others – Trevor Hoffman, Rollie Fingers, Goose Gossage, Lee Smith, and Bruce Sutter – Wagner has a better ERA, FIP, WHIP, RE24, and strikeout rate than all of them. 903 innings isn't a huge number, but it's big enough and he was so dominant in those 903 innings that the case is clear. The lone blemish on his resume is a rough, small sample postseason line, but that's hardly enough to keep him out. Wagner should have been in the Hall of Fame years ago and I hope 2023 is finally the year.

OF Andruw Jones (1996-2012)
Regular Season: 434 HR, .254/.337/.486, 152 SB, 111 wRC+, 67.0 fWAR in 2196 games.
Postseason: 10 HR, .273/.363/.433, 5 SB, 108 wRC+ in 76 games.
The more time goes by, the more clear-cut Andruw Jones' case looks. We are talking about a player in the conversation for the greatest defensive outfielder of all time, and that alone at least puts him in the conversation. Throw in that he hit 434 home runs, including 25+ in ten straight seasons, and had four different seasons in which he posted an on-base percentage above .360. Yeah, the end of his career was pretty abysmal, as he slashed just .214/.314/.420 and put just just 6.0 fWAR in 589 games from his age-30 season onwards. But what he had done before that was nothing short of tremendous. From 1998-2006, a stretch of nine seasons, he slashed .270/.347/.513 with 319 home runs and 110 stolen bases, which together with his defense was enough to help him rack up the third most fWAR in all of MLB behind only Barry Bonds and Alex Rodriguez. And that's no fluke – that's nearly a decade sitting in the top three in the sport. That's a Hall of Fame-caliber prime by any measure, and even with the drop off at the end, it's hard to argue with a guy who hit 434 home runs on his way to being an 11% better than league average hitter, appeared in over 2000 games, and showed well in the postseason, all while playing some of the best outfield defense ever seen. That's pretty clear to me.

3B Scott Rolen (1996-2012)
Regular Season: 316 HR, .281/.364/.490, 118 SB, 122 wRC+, 69.9 fWAR in 2038 games.
Postseason: 5 HR, .220/.302/.376, 0 SB, 78 wRC+ in 39 games.
Many people have taken up Scott Rolen as their "guy" in this cycle, and more power to them. Personally, I see him more as a guy I'd like to see get in rather than the one I'm going to stump the hardest for (that would be Wagner and Jones), but I'm still on Team Rolen. Back when he was playing, I don't think many people thought they were watching a future Hall of Famer (though his 34 HR, .314/.409/.598, 9.0 fWAR 2004 season was a Hall of Fame-caliber season), but when you zoom the camera out, the profile looks better and better. Already a high level defender, he went eight straight seasons from 1997-2004 with at least a 121 wRC+, meaning at any point in that stretch he was no less than 21% better than league average with the bat. During that time, he had the third most fWAR in baseball behind only Bonds and A-Rod, though unlike Jones he didn't have that huge drop off at the end of his career. So we have a high level defender, a well above average bat, a consistent bat that held his production over a long period of time (enough to rack up 300+ home runs, 500+ doubles, and 100+ stolen bases if you like counting stats), and best of all for some old school voters, a guy who did it clean. Yeah, he never really looked like a Hall of Famer outside that huge 2004 season, but in aggregate, I think he was.

OF Manny Ramirez (1993-2011)
Regular Season: 555 HR, .312/.411/.585, 38 SB, 153 wRC+, 66.3 fWAR in 2302 games.
Postseason: 29 HR, .285/.394/.544, 1 SB, 140 wRC+ in 111 games.
Manny Ramirez presents a very interesting case. Like Alex Rodriguez, he cheated, he got caught, and he cheated at a time when it was clearly against the rules. So now I have to apply that penalty to his numbers, which on their own are pretty comfortably up to Hall of Fame standards. I noted that borderline players who were caught or at least have a consensus around them using PED's would not make my ballot, but because Ramirez is fairly comfortably above that threshold, he then becomes a borderline case after the PED penalty has already been factored in. Still, even with the PED's, it's hard to go ahead a guy that finished well above 500 home runs and nearly reached a .300/.400/.600 career line in over 2300 games. Only five hitters ever can match all three legs of Manny's slash line – Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, and Hank Greenberg. None of those players appeared in a game after 1960, and among that group, only Ruth out-homered Ramirez. He is a top-25 hitter of all time by wRC+, a feat made more impressive by the fact that offense was at an all time high when he played, and he reached a 140 or better wRC+ fifteen times in a sixteen year stretch from 1995-2010. So for a decade and a half, he was no less than an elite hitter at virtually any time. Throw in the fact that he is the all time postseason home run leader at 29, and I feel comfortable getting over the PED penalty and the poor defense.

OF Gary Sheffield (1988-2009)
Regular Season: 509 HR, .292/.393/.514, 253 SB, 141 wRC+, 62.1 fWAR in 2576 games.
Postseason: 6 HR, .248/.401/.398, 1 SB, 120 wRC+ in 44 games.
Gary Sheffield is a very borderline case, and I won't die on this hill. Given that he likely used PED's, he would seem to fit the bill as a player with a borderline case who was disqualified because without those PED's, he probably doesn't put up a HoF resume. But with that said, his PED usage is not as clear-cut as guys like Bonds, Clemens, A-Rod, or Manny Ramirez, and I've mentioned that I tend to look for at least widespread consensus if not full on proof. I would flip my vote to "no" if proof came out, but to this point I don't find "probably" to be a strong enough adverb to apply that penalty. So let's take his case for what he did on the field. Sheffield clubbed over 500 home runs and over a thousand extra base hits in total while holding a slash line that nearly reached the .300/.400/.500 threshold despite a very long, 22 year career. Finishing with a career 141 wRC+, he had three qualified seasons in which he was up over 170 (an elite number) and six in which he was up over 150. And unlike many big power hitters, he rarely struck out, topping out at a measly 83 punch outs in 2004 and 2008. So he has the counting stats and he certainly looked the part of a Hall of Famer for a few different sustained periods in his career, and for me that's just enough even if he wasn't a great defender. The numbers don't look quite as great coming after Manny Ramirez, but it's important to note that Manny was playing with the PED penalty while Sheffield is not.

NO VOTES

OF Bobby Abreu (1996-2014)
Regular Season: 288 HR, .291/.395/.475, 400 SB, 129 wRC+, 59.8 fWAR in 2425 games.
Postseason: 1 HR, .284/.392/.418, 2 SB, 111 wRC+ in 76 games.
Last year, I voted yes on Bobby Abreu, but I mentioned that I was right on the fence and leaned 51-49 towards my yes vote. This year, I'm still extremely on the fence but I'm leaning 51-49 towards a no vote. It's simply the most borderline case I've encountered so far. Bobby Abreu had a great career, clubbing nearly 300 home runs and nearly 600 doubles while getting on base at a nearly .400 clip and stealing 400 bases. From 1998-2006, he posted an OBP above .400 eight times in nine seasons, he hit at least fifteen home runs in thirteen straight seasons from 1998-2010, clubbing at least 30 doubles in eleven of those, and stole at least nineteen bases in fourteen straight seasons from 1998-2011. He was an on-base machine, could hit for some power, and was an extremely smart baserunner that maximized his speed on the base paths. Add in that he played in over 150 games in thirteen straight seasons from 1998-2010, and he was a model of consistency that contributed to the Phillies, Yankees, and Angels offenses in a wide variety of ways. It's a rock-solid offensive profile, if not the most flashy, but his glove doesn't do him any favors. With an average glove, I think I would vote Abreu in. But he was a net-negative in the field, especially in the second half of his career, so the pressure is on the bat. And it was very, very good. But was it truly great? I think it was close, but I do lean towards a small Hall philosophy and ultimately Bobby Abreu falls victim to that this year. Maybe he'll be back on my ballot next year, we'll see.

1B Todd Helton (1997-2013)
Regular Season: 369 HR, .316/.414/.539, 37 SB, 132 wRC+, 54.9 fWAR in 2247 games.
Postseason: 0 HR, .211/.303/.281, 0 SB, 48 wRC+ in 15 games.
Todd Helton is very, very close, but my small Hall mindset is going to keep him out for now. As a first baseman playing his home games at Coors Field, the offensive bar is going to be incredibly high to reach the Hall of Fame, and during his peak from 1999-2005, he did just that by slashing .341/.442/.621 with 241 home runs in 1092 games. Over that seven year stretch, it was good for the fourth most fWAR in baseball behind Bonds, A-Rod, and Andruw Jones. But unfortunately, the decline was pretty steep; from 2006-2013, he slashed .289/.388/.448 with 98 home runs in 968 games. Even for a first baseman at Coors Field, holding an on-base percentage near .400 through your post-prime years is impressive, and it's almost enough to get him into the Hall for me. Jones followed a similar career arc and I see him as a clear-cut Hall of Famer, but it's important to note that Jones' prime lasted nine years while Helton's lasted seven, so it was almost 30% longer. It's also not his fault that he only got to play in fifteen postseason games, but Helton did not take advantage of that small sample opportunity so there's no addition to the resume there. In the end, we have to decide if seven years of elite hitting is enough by itself to warrant a Hall of Fame vote – in my opinion as someone with a small Hall mindset, that's a no.

LHP Andy Pettitte (1995-2013)
Regular Season: 256-153, 3.85 ERA, 3.74 FIP, 1.35 WHIP, 2448/1031 K/BB in 3316 innings.
Postseason: 19-11, 3.81 ERA, 4.09 FIP, 1.30 WHIP, 183/76 K/BB in 276.2 innings.
The phrase "Hall of Very Good" gets thrown around often, and I think Andy Pettitte can be a prime example of what that looks like. The closer you look at his resume, the better it looks, with a very long career that provided a tremendous amount of value to the Yankees and the Astros. He was a true workhorse that topped 200 innings ten different times and 185 innings thirteen different times, and for the most part he kept his ERA in the 3.50 to 4.30 range most years despite pitching in hitter-friendly parks in the Steroid Era. His postseason resume is impressive, too, as his numbers did not dip at all and he earned the 2001 ALCS MVP Award. Fans can underestimate the value of a strong #2 or #3 starter, and Pettitte provided that for nearly two decades, even popping for ace-like seasons in 1997 and 2005. There is a place in the Hall for consistency and longevity, but ultimately I see it as a place for the all time greats, not just those who were able to string together enough cumulative value to make it. For as great as he was, aside from those two great seasons I don't think opposing teams looked at the lineup card in the morning and thought "uh oh, Andy Pettitte is pitching." Obviously nobody looked forward to facing him, and he still provided a very tough matchup, but the point stands. Andy Pettitte was very, very good for a very long time, but I just don't see a Hall of Famer.

2B Jeff Kent (1992-2008)
Regular Season: 377 HR, .290/.356/.500, 94 SB, 123 wRC+, 56.0 fWAR in 2298 games.
Postseason: 9 HR, .276/.340/.500, 1 SB, 119 wRC+ in 49 games.
It's Jeff Kent's last year on the ballot, and he's very close to a Hall of Famer. He brings a great combination of longevity and consistent, high level performance, having posted eight consecutive 20 HR/30 double seasons, ten consecutive seasons with a wRC+ of 120 or higher (and sixteen straight at league average or better), and nine consecutive seasons with at least 3.3 fWAR. In 2000, he popped for a tremendous season, slashing .334/.424/.596 with 33 home runs and 7.4 fWAR. And given that he played in over 100 games in all seventeen seasons of his career, he was able to rack up solid counting stats with nearly 400 home runs, well over 500 doubles, and nearly 2500 hits in all. He wasn't a standout defender, but he was certainly solid over there at second base. Throw in good postseason performance with a .276/.340/.500 line over 49 games, and it's a well rounded profile. Ultimately though, it feels just a little light. For all his consistency and longevity, he only popped for a 140 or better wRC+ twice, only reached 5.0 fWAR twice, only once hit more than 33 home runs in a season, and only once posted an on-base percentage above .385. So similar to Andy Pettitte, he was very good for a very long time, but there's no peak here that really wows you beyond his one great season in 2000 and another very good one in 2002. I feel better comparing Jeff Kent to the great second basemen of the era, like Craig Biggio, Roberto Alomar, and Chase Utley, than I do to the greats of all time.

LHP Mark Buehrle (2000-2015)
Regular Season: 214-160, 3.81 ERA, 4.11 FIP, 1.28 WHIP, 1870/734 K/BB in 3283.1 innings.
Postseason: 2-1, 4.11 ERA, 3.47 FIP, 1.08 WHIP, 16/1 K/BB in 30.2 innings.
Mark Buehrle is closer than you'd think, but ultimately not quite a Hall of Famer. He was a model of consistency, going fifteen straight seasons with at least 198.2 innings pitched while only once allowing his ERA to rise above 4.28 or his FIP above 4.46. He generated a lot of weak contact, took care of some of it himself with a standout glove, and gave the White Sox and later Marlins and Blue Jays a rock near the top of their rotations. However, he also spent much of his career pitching in a weaker AL Central and he was never particularly dominant, save for perhaps his 2005 season (3.12 ERA, 3.42 FIP, 149/40 K/BB) and of course his 2007 no-hitter and 2009 perfect game. It's hard to get into the Hall based on consistent solid performance rather than periods of true standout performance, and if you were going to give Buehrle a shot, you probably would have wanted to see him throw more than sixteen seasons.

SS Omar Vizquel (1989-2012)
Regular Season: 80 HR, .272/.336/.352, 404 SB, 83 wRC+, 42.5 fWAR in 2968 games.
Postseason: 0 HR, .250/.327/.316, 23 SB, 70 wRC+ in 57 games.
I wasn't a big Omar Vizquel fan before the abuse/sexual assault allegations came out against him, and while I tend not to be concerned about a player's off field behavior, the allegations are pretty serious. Still, I don't need those to know that he's not a Hall of Famer. I do think there is a place in the Hall for the game's elite defenders, but Ozzie Smith (90 wRC+) and Andruw Jones (111 wRC+) are not in the same tier as Vizquel (83 wRC+). Jones clubbed 434 home runs and was a well-above league average hitter for most of his career, while Smith was 10% below league average but did pop for seven seasons in which he was above league average. Vizquel, meanwhile, was 17% below league average for his career and only twice in his 24 seasons could be considered above league average by wRC+ (115 in 1999, 102 in 2002). In an era when offense was at an all time high, Vizquel was a black hole in those Mariners, Indians, and Giants offenses that hit for no power and didn't even get on base at a terribly high clip. He finished with a .336 on-base percentage for his career and never reached .400 in any single season. The counting stats are good – nearly 3000 hits, over 450 doubles, and over 400 stolen bases – but they're not enough to make up for the lack of impact at the plate even with the special glove.

OF Carlos Beltran (1998-2017)
Regular Season: 435 HR, .279/.350/.486, 312 SB, 118 wRC+, 67.8 fWAR in 2586 games.
Postseason: 16 HR, .307/.412/.609, 11 SB, 169 wRC+ in 65 games.
Because he cheated pretty egregiously with the Astros in 2017, Carlos Beltran will get his automatic one year "time out" from my ballot. Going forward, I'm open to voting for him – over 400 home runs, over 1000 extra base hits, over 300 stolen bases, seven different seasons more than 5.0 fWAR, and elite postseason performance certainly warrant strong consideration. But I'll leave deeper thought on that for next year.

RHP Francisco Rodriguez (2002-2017)
Regular Season: 2.86 ERA, 3.31 FIP, 1.15 WHIP, 1142/389 K/BB in 976 innings.
Postseason: 2.95 ERA, 3.66 FIP, 1.36 WHIP, 49/18 K/BB in 36.2 innings.
The bar for relievers to get into the Hall of Fame is high, and it should be. The fact that Billy Wagner isn't in proves that, and I'm all in on Wagner's case. Francisco Rodriguez, I believe, is close to having a Hall of Fame case, but it's not quite enough. Among relievers, he's twentieth all time in fWAR, ninth in RE24, and thirteenth in WPA. For a span of fourteen years from 2003-2016, he was more often than not among the best closers in the league, and that's certainly a loud statement. But inconsistent command kept him from truly joining the game's elite closers for the most part, and I don't think he's in the same tier as Trevor Hoffman and Billy Wagner (and of course nobody is in Mariano Rivera's tier). I think he's closer to Joe Nathan, who narrowly missed my ballot last year but failed to receive the necessary 5% to get another shot. I do hope K-Rod gets the 5% so we can give him a few looks, but I'll ultimately be okay if Rivera, Hoffman, and hopefully eventually Wagner are the only relievers from that era to make the Hall.

RHP Jered Weaver (2006-2017)
Regular Season: 150-98, 3.63 ERA, 4.07 FIP, 1.19 WHIP, 1621/551 K/BB in 2067.1 innings.
Postseason: 2-1, 2.60 ERA, 4.76 FIP, 0.98 WHIP, 28/12 K/BB in 27.2 innings.
Jered Weaver almost had it. Over the first nine seasons of his career, and at the time of his 32nd birthday, he was 131-69 with a 3.28 ERA and a 1.15 WHIP, which is probably a Hall of Fame pace. A reasonable decline in his thirties would have given him a case, but unfortunately, his velocity disappeared and he would pitch just three more seasons, going 19-29 with a 5.15 ERA and finding himself out of baseball by his 35th birthday. I don't consider him to be close to the Hall, but I do want to give credit where it's due given how good he was over the first nine seasons of his career.

Hall of Fame 2021: My Ballot

I find the process of determining Hall-worthiness just as difficult as I find it interesting. There are so many complicating factors such as peak performance vs longevity, park effects and performance relative to league average, and of course, performance-enhancing drugs. Not only whether the drugs should disqualify a player, but whether the player took them and for how long. Below are my thoughts on this year's ballot, player by player, starting with those I would vote for. See my thoughts on steroids here.

Yes Votes

RHP Curt Schilling (1988-2007, 70.0% in 2020)
Career: 216-146, 3.46 ERA, 1.14 WHIP, 3116/711 K/BB in 3261 IP
Postseason: 11-2, 2.23 ERA, 0.97 WHIP, 120/25 K/BB in 133.1 IP
Best season (1997): 17-11, 2.97 ERA, 1.05 WHIP, 319/58 K/BB in 254.1 IP
To me, Curt Schilling is one of two the clear-cut Hall of Famers on this ballot, along with Billy Wagner. If I could only vote for one, I would give Schilling a hard look. He may have never won a Cy Young award, but from 1996-2004, he was one of the best pitchers in all of baseball at a time when Pedro Martinez, Greg Maddux, and Randy Johnson were at their peaks. He had eight qualified seasons with a sub-3.30 ERA (most of which were during the Steroid Era), reached 300 strikeouts three times and narrowly missed a fourth, and appeared in twenty different seasons from 1988-2007. In the postseason, he was on another level, earning NLCS MVP honors in 1993 and a World Series MVP in 2001, holding a 2.23 ERA over 133.1 innings against the best lineups in baseball. He was a stud in the regular season, a stud in the postseason, and stuck around for a long time. He's a Hall of Famer, and I really don't care that he's a bit of a whacko off the field. It's the Baseball Hall of Fame, not the Public Image Hall of Fame.

LHP Billy Wagner (1995-2010, 31.7% in 2020)
Career: 47-40, 2.31 ERA, 1.00 WHIP, 422 SV, 1196/300 K/BB in 903 IP
Postseason: 1-1, 10.03 ERA, 1.97 WHIP, 3 SV, 13/2 K/BB in 11.2 IP
Best season (2003): 1-4, 1.78 ERA, 0.87 WHIP, 44 SV, 105/23 K/BB in 86 IP
Many people are hesitant to put relievers in the Hall of Fame, and I completely understand that stance. Right now, the only pure relievers in the Hall from the modern era of relief pitching are Bruce Sutter, Lee Smith, Mariano Rivera, Trevor Hoffman, and maybe Goose Gossage as you count that as the modern era. Rivera is obviously in a class of his own, but if the other four are Hall of Famers, I see absolutely no argument to keep out Billy Wagner, who is far and away the greatest left handed reliever of all time. I mean, the numbers are ridiculous. He threw 903 innings, but even setting the minimum at 700, no pitcher in history can match his 33.2% strikeout rate, nor his .184 opponents' batting average, nor his 82% strand rate. Not even Mariano Rivera. Relievers are also notoriously inconsistent, but only once in Wagner's sixteen year career did he post an ERA above 2.85. When he retired in 2010 at the age of 39, he was still at the top of his game, posting a 1.47 ERA, a 0.87 WHIP, and a 104/22 strikeout to walk ratio over 69.1 innings, indicating that he still had more left in the tank. So Wagner struggled in the postseason over a tiny 11.2 inning postseason sample, but that's not nearly enough to keep him out in my book. And the 31.7% he got in 2020 is absurdly low.

CF Andruw Jones (1996-2012, 19.4% in 2020)
Career: 434 HR, .254/.337/.486, 152 SB, 111 wRC+, 67.0 fWAR in 2196 games
Postseason: 10 HR, .273/.363/.433, 108 wRC+ in 76 games
Best season (2000): 36 HR, .303/.366/.541, 21 SB, 127 wRC+, 7.7 fWAR in 161 games
Andruw Jones, like Billy Wagner, hasn't gotten nearly the love he deserves in the vote, falling shy of 20% last year. Maybe he's not a Hall of Famer (I think he is), but to me it's a pretty plain fact that he deserves at least 40% or so. Some might cringe at the idea of putting a player who hit .254 with a .337 on-base percentage in the Hall of Fame, and if elected, his .254 average would have him second only to Ray Schalk (.253) for the lowest in HoF history. Still, I see him as fully deserving. Jones was arguably the greatest defensive outfielder ever to play the game, and if some believe that Willie Mays or Devon White was better, than we can safely say he's a slam-dunk top five defensive outfielder ever, no debate. As I'll argue below with Omar Vizquel, though, defensive prowess isn't enough alone to get you in. No matter, because from 1998-2007, Jones was also one of the better hitters in the game, with ten straight seasons of more than 25 home runs, ten straight with 154 games played, eight seasons with a wRC+ of 112, and a career high of 51 home runs in 2005. On their own, those numbers don't put him in the Hall, but when we're talking about an all-time great defender, I think absolutely. fWAR gives another compelling argument, as he reached 4.9 in ten straight seasons and topped 7.0 three times, but I understand some don't buy into that statistic and I think the case is pretty compelling even without it. All time great defender, over 400 home runs, nearly 400 doubles, and over 150 stolen bases puts him in for me.

3B Scott Rolen (1996-2012, 35.3% in 2020)
Career: 316 HR, .281/.364/.490, 118 SB, 122 wRC+, 69.9 fWAR in 2038 games
Postseason: 5 HR, .220/.302/.376, 0 SB, 78 wRC+ in 39 games
Best season (2004): 34 HR, .314/.409/.598, 4 SB, 159 wRC+, 9.0 fWAR in 142 games
On the surface, Rolen doesn't look like a Hall of Famer. He was a very good hitter with "just" 316 home runs, an unremarkable .281 batting average, and a sub-.500 slugging percentage, a very good defender who picked up eight Gold Glove awards but wasn't quite Andruw Jones or Omar Vizquel out there, and only topped 150 games in a season five times. That sounds like a slam-dunk "Hall of Very Good" case to me. But the more you think about it, the better the package looks. The era in which he played was chock full of superstars, but across baseball, how many players in the late 90's/00's could match both his bat and his glove? Maybe Alex Rodriguez and Ken Griffey Jr., but Griffey was already slowing down by the time Rolen came around and you'd have to really love A-Rod's glove to call it better than Rolen's. Rolen really was a superb defender that could impact the game from third base throughout his career, making entire infields around him better from the late 90's Phillies to even the early 10's Reds. On top of that, I think his bat was more than just "good." From 1997-2004, he had more than 20 home runs and at least a .357 on-base percentage in all eight seasons, then topped those numbers again in 2006. Rolen had six seasons in his career in which he hit 25 home runs with at least a .370 on-base percentage, and narrowly missed a seventh. In 2004, he had a truly Hall of Fame-worthy season with 34 home runs and a .314/.409/.598 slash line to go with elite defense, which caps it off for me. I won't die on the hill that Rolen is a Hall of Famer, but to me, his combination of a very good glove, a very good bat, and an elite 2004 season are just enough to push him over the edge.

RF Bobby Abreu (1996-2014, 5.5% in 2020)
Career: 288 HR, .291/.395/.475, 400 SB, 129 wRC+, 59.8 fWAR in 2425 games
Postseason: 1 HR, .284/.392/.418, 2 SB, 111 wRC+ in 20 games
Best season (1999): 20 HR, .335/.446/.549, 27 SB, 6.3 fWAR in 152 games
I've had a fairly similar thought process on Bobby Abreu as I had on Scott Rolen. On the surface, he looks like he belongs in the Hall of Very Good. He hit fewer than 300 home runs, slugged well below .500, and didn't have Rolen's elite defense. However, the longer I look at his case, the more I buy in. There's just something to be said for consistency, and if anything, Abreu was consistent. In 13 straight seasons from 1998-2010, Abreu topped 150 games, hit at least 15 home runs, stole at least 19 bases, clubbed at least 29 doubles, and never posted an on-base percentage below .352. Zoom in a little bit closer to his peak, and the numbers get even more impressive. In a seven year stretch from 1999-2005, he hit at least 20 home runs, stole at least 22 bases, clubbed at least 35 doubles, and never had an OBP below .393. There were no true superstar seasons in there, but for a very long period of time without exception, Abreu was a true power, speed, and on-base threat, and as far as we know, he did it cleanly in an era where many players did not. As with Rolen, I won't die on this hill, but I see a very compelling case here, especially with that .395 on-base percentage that topped .420 three times.

RF Gary Sheffield (1988-2009, 30.5% in 2020)
Career: 509 HR, .292/.393/.514, 253 SB, 141 wRC+, 62.1 fWAR in 2576 games
Postseason: 6 HR, .248/.401/.398, 1 SB, 120 wRC+ in 44 games
Best season (1996): 42 HR, .314/.465/.624, 16 SB, 185 wRC+, 6.5 fWAR in 161 games
Gary Sheffield might have the most complicated Hall of Fame case on the ballot, and he was the last player that I was able to come to a decision on. I'm extremely on the fence but decided to put him in. Firstly, I'll address Sheffield's reputation as a locker room cancer – while it obviously doesn't help his case, I'm not going to hold it against him. I'm here to judge how he impacted the game, not whether I'd want to have a beer with him. Next off, there's the question of steroids. He admitted to using "the cream" on his bum knee in the early 2000's, though claims (somewhat unconvincingly) that he didn't know it was a steroid. He was also named in the Mitchell Report, but to my knowledge, there's no concrete proof that he ever did anything beyond using "the cream." I'll come back to the steroids when I'm done with his accomplishments
Steroids aside, I see Sheffield as a Hall of Famer. As with Scott Rolen and Bobby Abreu, I wouldn't die on that hill, but I feel fully comfortable, in fact more comfortable than with those two. Even if he was a poor defender, we have a man who crushed over 500 home runs with an on-base percentage near .400. He had eight seasons with over 30 home runs, had six qualified seasons with at least a 154 wRC+, had an on-base percentage over .400 in eight straight seasons, and was one of the very best hitters in baseball from 1995-2003. To me, that's a very convincing Hall of Fame resume. Now, let's talk steroids. If he was more borderline in his case, the steroids would disqualify him. And if he used steroids more than just "the cream" for a few years, I wouldn't vote for him either. But we don't (or at least I don't) know the answer to that question, and I believe in "innocent until proven guilty." After a lot of careful thought, he gained my vote, but just barely.

LF Barry Bonds (1986-2007, 60.7% in 2020)
Career: 762 HR, .298/.444/.607, 514 SB, 173 wRC+, 164.4 fWAR in 2986 games
Postseason: 9 HR, .245/.433/.503, 9 SB, 141 wRC+ in 48 games
Best season (2001): 73 HR, .328/.515/.863, 13 SB, 235 wRC+, 12.5 fWAR in 153 games
I don't need to sell anybody on Barry Bonds' numbers. Steroids aside, you can count on one hand the players that can even compare to what Bonds did. I also don't need to sell anybody that he would have been a Hall of Famer without steroids. If you think he might not have been, you're grossly underselling his elite batting eye, approach at the plate, hand-eye coordination, and early career speed. So the only question here is whether you think steroids should disqualify one of the greatest players of all time, which I discussed here. In summary, as much as I hate it, cheating has always been a part of baseball and on top of that, it was encouraged during the Steroid Era.
Okay, now that that's done with, let's just marvel at some of Bonds' career stats. He is the all time leader in home runs (762) and walks (2558) and ranks behind only Babe Ruth in fWAR (164.4). He's third all time in runs scored (2227), fifth in wRC+ (173), and sixth in RBI (1996). From 1928-2000, not a single player could tally more than 11.8 fWAR in a season. Over the course of four seasons from 2001-2004, Bonds did it three times. By wRC+, three of the top four seasons in all of history belong to Bonds, including number one (244 in 2002). In that four season stretch from 2001-2004, Bonds clobbered 209 home runs and slashed .349/.559/.809 with a 232 wRC+ and 47.3 fWAR in 573 games. That 47.3 fWAR over four seasons was more than Mark Grace (45.5), Nellie Fox (45.2), Kirby Puckett (44.9), or Dale Murphy (44.3) had in their entire careers. It cannot possibly be overstated how good Barry Bonds was at hitting baseballs.

RHP Roger Clemens (1984-2007, 61.0% in 2020)
Career: 354-184, 3.12 ERA, 1.17 WHIP, 4672/1580 K/BB in 4916.2 IP
Postseason: 12-8, 3.75 ERA, 1.22 WHIP, 173/70 K/BB in 199 IP
Best season (1997): 21-7, 2.05 ERA, 1.03 WHIP, 292/68 K/BB in 264 IP
With Roger Clemens, we have a similar story to Barry Bonds above. He's not a top-five player of all time like his counterpart, but steroids aside, he is far and away qualified. There's no doubt in anybody's mind that he would be a Hall of Famer without steroids. And given that he was up against lineups full of cheating players, it's hard to blame him for cheating, as much as I hate it. Read my full thoughts on steroids here.
Steroids aside, we can appreciate Clemens' numbers. He topped 210 innings fourteen times in his career, had eleven qualified seasons with an ERA below 3.00, and topped 230 strikeouts eight times. In terms of career strikeouts, only Nolan Ryan and Randy Johnson have more, but Clemens had a lower ERA than both of them. He's seventh on the all time list with 707 career starts, too. Maybe not quite in the all time top tier, but he's certainly one of the all time greats.

No Votes

1B Todd Helton (1997-2013, 29.2% in 2020)
Career: 369 HR, .316/.414/.539, 37 SB, 132 wRC+, 54.9 fWAR in 2247 games
Postseason: 0 HR, .211/.303/.281, 0 SB, 48 wRC+ in 15 games
Best season (2000): 42 HR, .372/.463/.698, 5 SB, 162 wRC+, 8.3 fWAR in 160 games
Todd Helton only narrowly misses my ballot. From 1999-2005, he was one of the very best hitters in baseball, slashing .341/.442/.621 with 241 home runs and a 152 wRC+ in 1092 games. That wRC+, which corrects for the "Coors effect," was the sixth best in baseball in that span over no small sample size. Narrow it by one year to 2000-2005, and his 156 wRC+ was fifth best in baseball to start the millennium. That's absolutely a Hall of Fame piece of the resume, but for a first baseman, I'm looking for just a bit more. From 2006 onwards, he hit .289/.388/.448 with 98 home runs and a 112 wRC+ over 968 games, which as a first baseman in Coors Field, meant he only provided 10.6 fWAR from his age-32 season onwards. So we're left with a tale of two careers with Helton, beginning with an exceptional run from 1999-2005 followed by an unremarkable one from 2006-2013. Had he played shortstop or even a strong right field, I think that first half of his career would be enough to push him into the Hall, but the bar is higher for first basemen and Helton falls just short on the longevity aspect.

RHP Tim Hudson (1999-2015, first year on ballot)
Career: 222-133, 3.49 ERA, 1.24 WHIP, 2080/917 K/BB in 3126.2 IP
Postseason: 1-4, 3.69 ERA, 1.28 WHIP, 53/22 K/BB in 75.2 IP
Best season (2003): 16-7, 2.70 ERA, 1.08 WHIP, 162/61 K/BB in 240 IP
Tim Hudson is another one who is very close. Starting straight from his rookie year, he was a true standout in the Oakland rotation from 1999-2003 and popped back for big seasons with the Braves in 2007, 2010, and 2011. Outside of those seasons, he was still a very solid #2/#3-type starter, and in the end you have a really nice profile as a pitcher with ten qualified seasons with an ERA below 3.60. However, save for maybe his best season in 2003, Hudson was never a star. That's not straight up disqualifying, as we saw with Bobby Abreu, but I'm going to need either more consistency or more longevity if I'm going to overlook that. Abreu had the consistency, Scott Rolen had that huge 2004 season, and a guy like Derek Jeter had the longevity that just bumped them into the Hall. Hudson, as a whole, as a resume that's just a little bit light. We knew we were watching a perennial All Star when Hudson was on the mound, don't think anybody thought they were watching a Hall of Famer. In my opinion, we weren't.

LHP Mark Buehrle (2000-2015, first year on ballot)
Career: 214-160, 3.81 ERA, 1.28 WHIP, 1870/734 K/BB in 3283.1 IP
Postseason: 2-1, 4.11 ERA, 1.08 WHIP, 16/1 K/BB in 30.2 IP
Best season (2005): 16-8, 3.12 ERA, 1.18 WHIP, 149/40 K/BB in 236.2 IP
I still don't think Mark Buehrle is a Hall of Famer, but his case actually gets a lot more intriguing the more you look at it. On the surface, he was a pitch-to-contact guy who never had an ERA below 3.12 and finished at 3.81 for his career while spending most of it in the weaker AL Central. He was never a true ace for more than a few months at a time, but the key here is consistency. Buehrle put in fourteen consecutive seasons of at least 200 innings, and narrowly missed a fifteenth with 198.2 in 2015. In those fifteen seasons from 2001-2015, only once did he post an ERA above 4.28, and never did he walk more than 6.2% of his opponents. He was an elite defender, was the best pitcher on the 2005 World Series Champion White Sox team, and threw a perfect game in 2009. There is really something to be said for a decade and a half of exceptional reliability and exceptional consistency, and I really hope he doesn't fall off the ballot in the first year. However, he was never elite for even one season, so he won't get my vote.

LHP Andy Pettitte (1995-2013, 11.3% in 2020)
Career: 256-153, 3.85 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, 2448/1031 K/BB in 3316 IP
Postseason: 19-11, 3.81 ERA, 1.30 WHIP, 183/76 K/BB in 276.2 IP
Best season (2005): 17-9, 2.39 ERA, 1.03 WHIP, 171/41 K/BB in 222.1 IP
Andy Pettitte is yet another pitcher who just misses for me. He put up excellent seasons in 1997 and 2005 and was very good in a few other seasons, and there's something to be said for the longevity it takes to put up ten seasons of 200+ innings and three more of 185+. He was also on the mound for 276.2 innings in the postseason, holding his own with a 3.81 ERA against plenty of very strong lineups. That's all great, but for the majority of his career, Pettitte was much more a steady than imposing force in the Yankees and Astros rotations. In more than half of his qualified seasons, his ERA was above 4.00, and he regularly got hit around with career opponents' batting average of .269 and a 1.35 WHIP. The longevity is great, the important role on some great teams is a plus, and he popped for a couple of great seasons, but Andy Pettitte is a #3 starter at heart. The Hall of Fame is for aces and long-term, consistent #2's.

2B Jeff Kent (1992-2008, 27.5% in 2020)
Career: 377 HR, .290/.356/.500, 94 SB, 123 wRC+, 56.0 fWAR in 2298 games
Postseason: 9 HR, .276/.340/.500, 1 SB, 119 wRC+ in 49 games
Best season (2000): 33 HR, .334/.424/.596, 12 SB, 159 wRC+, 7.4 fWAR in 159 games
Jeff Kent is another one that's really close, one that I gave significant thought to before ultimately deciding "no." He put up nine consecutive seasons of more than 20 home runs and at least 34 doubles from 1997-2005 and topped 30 home runs three times. In 2000 and 2002, he popped for exceptional seasons and won the NL MVP Award in the former while reaching the World Series in the latter. But while he was an extra base hit machine for the better part of a decade, popping for an OBP as high as .424 in 2000, is that enough? I see a nice, sustained peak, but it's the kind that would need a little more longevity sandwiched on either side of it. Outside of that 1997-2005 stretch, he was solid but unspectacular leading up to it and didn't play after 2008. Seventeen years is a nice career, especially since he played over 100 games in each, but I would have liked to have seen just a little bit more given his peak was more "great" than "elite."

SS Omar Vizquel (1989-2012, 52.6% in 2020)
Career: 80 HR, .272/.336/.352, 404 SB, 83 wRC+, 42.5 fWAR in 2968 games
Postseason: 0 HR, .250/.327/.316, 23 SB, 70 wRC+ in 57 games
Best season (1999): 5 HR, .333/.397/.436, 42 SB, 115 wRC+, 6.0 fWAR in 144 games
Omar Vizquel follows similar logic to Andruw Jones as an all-time great defender whose offensive numbers don't quite stack up. However, the difference between Vizquel and Jones is that Jones hit 434 home runs, while Vizquel was a non-factor in the lineup. His combination of exceptional glovework and longevity buys the bat as much slack as possible, but in my opinion, it's not enough. From 1989-2007, he had sixteen full seasons out of nineteen, itself an accomplishment, but his bat was a virtual black hole in the Seattle, Cleveland, and San Francisco lineups around him at a time when offense was at a premium. In those sixteen full seasons, his bat was only league average or better twice, reaching double digits in home runs just once. His best offensive attribute was his speed, and he deployed it well at times with four straight seasons of at least 35 stolen bases from 1996-1999, but he never registered a .400 on-base percentage and only twice even got above .362. I'm sorry, but even if he came within 123 hits of 3000, his bat was mediocre at best.

LF Manny Ramirez (1993-2011, 28.2% in 2020)
Career: 555 HR, .312/.411/.585, 38 SB, 153 wRC+, 66.3 fWAR in 2302 games
Postseason: 29 HR, .285/.394/.544, 1 SB, 140 wRC+ in 111 games
Best season (1999): 44 HR, .333/.442/.663, 2 SB, 172 wRC+, 7.5 fWAR in 147 games
I briefly touched on my thoughts on Manny Ramirez in my steroid primer, but I'll go back over them here. Taken objectively, his numbers make him a pretty clear-cut Hall of Famer, even if his defense was poor. 555 career home runs, twelve 30 homer seasons, ten with an on-base percentage over .400, and plenty of postseason performance add up to a Hall of Fame resume. From 1994-2010, he put up seventeen straight seasons with at least a 120 wRC+, and fifteen of those were 140 or higher. But in 2009, he failed a PED test, and in 2011, he failed another. Both were late in his career, after he had already eclipsed 500 home runs and proven himself a Hall of Famer. If it had been just the 2009 test, perhaps I could give him the benefit of the doubt and buy that he had just made a mistake. But after the 2011 test, his whole career gets called into question. Plenty of his best production came during the Steroid Era – was he cheating then? He doesn't have the Bonds or Clemens-like resume that proves him to be a clear-cut Hall of Famer with or without steroids. He tested positive twice after the rules were clearly laid out, so I'm out.

RF Sammy Sosa (1989-2007, 13.9% in 2020)
Career: 609 HR, .273/.344/.534, 234 SB, 124 wRC+, 60.1 fWAR in 2354 games
Postseason: 2 HR, .245/.403/.415, 1 SB, 110 wRC+ in 15 games
Best season (2001): 64 HR, .328/.437/.737, 0 SB, 186 wRC+, 9.9 fWAR in 160 games
Sosa is another name that falls victim to the steroid problem. The allegations against him aren't as strong as they are against Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Manny Ramirez, but nonetheless they're stronger than those against Gary Sheffield, whom I voted for. Sosa reportedly tested positive in 2003, and of course there was the corked bat incident. If he had built a convincing, Ramirez-like case, I might have put more consideration into it, but unfortunately he's fairly borderline anyways. From 1998-2001, when he was likely juicing, he put together one of the most impressive offensive stretches in baseball history, slashing .310/.396/.662 with 243 home runs, including totals of 66, 63, 50, and 64. However, for the most part, Sosa was a one dimensional player. He hit a lot of home runs, but he only twice topped a .400 on-base percentage, never put up 40 doubles in a season, and provided very little defensive value. That one tool would likely be enough to carry him into the Hall if it had been clean, but his only tool was tainted and he doesn't have enough to make up for it.

Hall of Fame 2020: My Ballot

There are a couple of big storylines here for the 2020 Hall of Fame ballot, so I'll list out my thoughts on those real quick before we get started.

First off, steroids. My take on steroid users in the Hall has evolved over time, but it's also stayed the same in a lot of ways. I don't think cheaters deserve to be in the Hall, and for a while, I strongly opposed the induction of Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens on that basis. I still do – the Hall is 90% about performance, but at least a small part should be about playing the game the right way, and I mean that in the loosest sense of the term, as in at the very least playing by the rules. Bonds and Clemens didn't meet that standard. However, neither did Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, or a lot of other Hall of Famers from that era who used amphetamines. And what about Hall of Famers like Ivan Rodriguez and Mike Piazza, who probably juiced but were never caught? The juicing question is something I'll never come to a satisfactory answer to, at least one up to my own satisfaction, so I landed on a compromise of sorts: I'll vote for Bonds and Clemens, but only in their tenth and final year of eligibility. That seems fair, I guess, right? Kind of? We'll go with that one.

Secondly, the Jeter-only ballots. A few writers have already released their ballots and showed that they voted only for Derek Jeter in the belief that he should be elected alone. Seriously?? Derek Jeter a) is not even close to being a Ruthian, Maysian, Ted Williams-ian inner-circle Hall of Famer, and b) far, far, far from the only deserving player on the ballot. Especially given that Larry Walker is in his last year of eligibility and can't simply "wait until next year" to get elected. Voting for Jeter alone might be the dumbest thing I've ever seen on a Hall of Fame ballot, and the bar was already pretty high on that one.

Now, here's my ballot, in the rough order of who I think is the most deserving. Wagner, Walker, and Schilling are all about equally deserving to me, so their order is more arbitrary. It's a shallower year for the HoF ballot and there are no true Griffey-like or Maddux-like standouts, and I'm a small Hall guy, so I went with six players.

1. Billy Wagner (1995-2010)

Career: 47-40, 2.31 ERA, 1.00 WHIP, 198.17 RE24, 1196/300 K/BB in 903 IP

Best season (1999): 4-1, 1.57 ERA, 0.78 WHIP, 24.79 RE24, 124/23 K/BB in 74.2 IP

Billy Wagner is at least the third greatest closer of all time, and I'd even argue that he's number two behind Mariano Rivera alone. At the very least, I can't possibly wrap my head around any possible justification for electing Trevor Hoffman and leaving Wagner with less than 20% of the votes. Over the course of his 16 year career, he put up 13 seasons of at least 45 innings pitched, a sub-3.00 ERA, a sub-1.20 WHIP, and more than 50 strikeouts in relief. He did all this while pitching through the heart of the steroid era, and yet his career numbers still come up among the best ever. Among relievers with at least 500 innings pitched, he's fourth ERA (2.31), WHIP (1.00), and strikeout percentage (33.2%), despite all of those ahead of him in the latter category having pitched in a very different, much more strikeout-heavy era. He also has the second best relief-RE24 ever, behind only Mariano Rivera, meaning that he's kept more "expected runs" off the board than even Hoffman in more than 180 fewer innings. To say Wagner doesn't belong in the Hall is really to say that relievers in general don't belong in the Hall, because Rivera is the only one ever that we can confidently say was better.

2. Larry Walker (1989-2005)

Career: 383 HR, .313/.400/.565, 230 SB, 140 wRC+, 68.7 fWAR in 1988 games

Best season (1997): 49 HR, .366/.452/.720, 33 SB, 177 wRC+, 9.1 fWAR in 153 games

Walker is in his last season of eligibility, and it really shouldn't have taken this long. He hit nearly 400 home runs, held a .400 on-base percentage through his career, and stole over 200 bases while playing solid outfield defense. Of course some of those numbers are inflated by playing his home games at Coors Field, but really, could we stick some non-Hall of Famer in Coors Field from 1997-1999 and watch slash .369/.451/.689 over three full seasons? I'll answer that for you, no. And if we want to go to stats that alter for home park, Walker's 140 career wRC+ ranks 69th all time among players with at least 5000 plate appearances – that's ahead of mashers like Albert Belle (139), Reggie Jackson (139), and Vladimir Guerrero (136), among many others. Splitting his stats home vs road the traditional way, he did slash .348/.431/.637 with 215 home runs at home but also .278/.370/.495 with 168 home runs on the road – that's still a 336 home run pace with a high on-base percentage on the road, even though Coors Field has been shown to negatively affect hitters' road performance, not just positively impact their home stats. He's a Hall of Famer to me and a pretty clear one.

3. Curt Schilling (1988-2007)
Career: 216-146, 3.46 ERA, 1.14 WHIP, 3116/711 K/BB in 3261 IP
Best season (2002): 23-7, 3.23 ERA, 0.97 WHIP, 316/33 K/BB in 259.1 IP
A lot of people in the media won't vote for Curt Schilling because they don't like him. That's stupid and that's all I'm going to say on the matter. For a ten year period from 1995-2004, right through the heart of the steroid era, Schilling was untouchable for the Phillies, Diamondbacks, and Red Sox, going 148-86 with a 3.25 ERA and a 2241/423 strikeout to walk ratio over 2123.2 innings. In that decade-long span, 92 pitchers threw at least 1000 innings, and Schilling's 3.25 mark over 2000+ innings ranked behind only Pedro Martinez (2.67), Randy Johnson (2.70), Kevin Brown (2.79), Greg Maddux (2.89), and John Smoltz (2.96), the latter of whom spent time time as a closer anyways. Over that span, Schilling also ranked third in strikeouts (behind Johnson and Martinez), reached 300 strikeouts in a season three times, and out-pitched Roger Clemens (3.46 ERA, 2116/768 K/BB). He was also effective for his ten non-prime years, and he finished his career with a 3.46 ERA, a 1.14 WHIP, and 3116 strikeouts in 3261 innings despite pitching straight through the heart of the steroid era. He was even more effective in the postseason, going 11-2 with a 2.23 ERA, a 0.97 WHIP, and a 120/25 strikeout to walk ratio over 133.1 innings, picking up the 1993 NLCS MVP and the 2001 World Series MVP. To me, he's a no brainer.

4. Derek Jeter (1995-2014)
Career: 260 HR, .310/.377/.440, 358 SB, 119 wRC+, 73.0 fWAR in 2747 games
Best season (1999): 24 HR, .349/.438/.552, 19 SB, 156 wRC+, 7.4 fWAR in 158 games
Jeter's Hall of Fame case to me is more about longevity than peak value. Aside from a couple seasons here and there, he was never truly elite, reaching 5.0 fWAR in a season just five times in twenty years, but he was a consistently above average player for a very long time and put up 13 straight seasons with at least 3.4 fWAR from 1997-2009. He also had an extensive postseason career with a .308/.374/.465 line, 20 home runs, and 18 stolen bases (121 wRC+) in 158 games, about in line with his career averages, and he won five World Series as part of some stacked Yankees teams that also included Hall of Famers Mariano Rivera and Mike Mussina. Media coverage aside, while his on-field play looked pretty borderline Hall of Fame level for much of his career, the end result was well over 3000 hits, 500 doubles, 250 home runs, 350 stolen bases, 1000 walks, and 73.0 total fWAR over 20 years. The longevity and consistency he displayed earned him his spot in the Hall.

5. Andruw Jones (1996-2012)
Career: 434 HR, .254/.337/.486, 152 SB, 111 wRC+, 67.0 fWAR in 2196 games
Best season (2000): 36 HR, .303/.366/.541, 21 SB, 127 wRC+, 7.7 fWAR in 161 games
Jones doesn't get nearly the attention he deserves on this ballot, especially with the way voters talk about a similar player, Omar Vizquel. While Vizquel was an all-time glove with a mediocre bat, Jones was an all-time glove with an above average bat. While he wasn't a first tier or even a second tier hitter in his time, he was still a very valuable bat that was at least 12% better than league average eight times in nine years from 1998-2006. He also put up four straight 20-20 seasons, totaled seven 30+ home run seasons, and topped out with a 134 wRC+ in 2005. Of course, those offensive stats only qualify him for the Hall of Very Good, but when your glove is as absolutely elite as his is, I'd call him a Hall of Famer. Fangraphs only began tracking UZR in 2002, which cuts out five full seasons of his career, but his 126.4 UZR still ranks second only to Ichiro since then and his 17.4 UZR per 150 games is first by a long shot over second place Mookie Betts (14.3) and by an even longer shot over third place Jason Heyward (11.9). It's hard to prove, but there's a case to be made that Jones is up there with Willie Mays as one of the top couple of defensive outfielders ever to play the game, and unlike Omar Vizquel, he can actually hit.

6. Scott Rolen (1996-2012)
Career: 316 HR, .281/.364/.490, 118 SB, 122 wRC+, 69.9 fWAR in 2038 games
Best season (2004): 34 HR, .314/.409/.598, 159 wRC+, 9.0 fWAR in 142 games
I'm a small-Hall guy, and Rolen is pretty borderline for me. On this shallow ballot though, I'll include him in my sixth and final slot that I'm using. Rolen wasn't necessarily elite on either side of the ball – he was a very good hitter and a very good defender. Does that equal Hall of Fame? It's really close, especially since his career barely cracked 2000 games. I'll go with yes for now, as he still finished with over 500 doubles, 300 home runs, 100 stolen bases, a high on-base percentage, and great defense. From 1997-2004, an eight year period where he slashed ..287/.379/.524 with 222 home runs and 91 stolen bases, he was third in all of baseball with 48.0 fWAR, trailing only Barry Bonds and Alex Rodriguez and topping guys like Chipper Jones, Jeff Bagwell, Derek Jeter, and Manny Ramirez in their primes. He didn't have the longevity of some of his counterparts, but the more you look at his case, the harder it is to say that Rolen is not a Hall of Famer.

Close Calls

- Bobby Abreu (1996-2014)
Career: 288 HR, .291/.395/.475, 400 SB, 129 wRC+, 59.8 fWAR in 2425 games
Best season (2004): 30 HR, .301/.428/.544, 40 SB, 148 wRC+, 5.7 fWAR in 159 games
Abreu, like Rolen, is so close, but he falls just a bit short for me. He was a great player with a power/speed/on-base combination that few could match and he rarely got hurt, but the whole package is just a bit light for the Hall of Fame. He wasn't an elite power hitter, hitting more than 25 home runs in a season just twice, he wasn't an elite base stealer, cracking 35 stolen bases just twice, and he was just an okay defender in right field. Now on the other hand, he was a great on-base player who finished near .400 for his career. He was never elite, but he had an on-base percentage above .400 eight times in nine years from 1998-2006 and only narrowly missed it with a .393 mark in 2001, he had seven straight 20-20 seasons from 1999-2005 (and two more in 2008 and 2010), and he was a two time 30-30 player. He's a shoo-in for the Hall of Very Good, but unfortunately, he just misses the Hall of Fame for me.

- Todd Helton (1997-2013)
Career: 369 HR, .316/.414/.539, 37 SB, 132 wRC+, 54.9 fWAR in 2247 games
Best season (2000): 42 HR, .372/.463/.698, 5 SB, 162 wRC+, 8.3 fWAR in 160 games
Helton is another close one because he's probably the greatest player in Rockies history (while Larry Walker beat him in production, Helton made up for it in longevity with the team). And through 2005, even though he was a first baseman playing in Coors Field, he hit plenty enough to be on a Hall of Fame track with a .337/.433/.607 line, 271 home runs, and 44.3 fWAR in 1279 games. However, because all of his talent was tied to his bat and because his 148 wRC+ was 14th in baseball from 1998-2005, he probably had to keep hitting after his 32nd birthday in 2005 in order to get himself over the hump. However, from 2006 to the end of his career in 2013, he slashed .289/.388/.448 with 98 home runs and 10.6 fWAR over those final 968 games. Those aren't awful numbers for the end of a career, but for a first baseman who wasn't elite with the glove (though he was solid there for much of his career), I'd like to see a bit longer of a prime than eight years, or at least not see him taper off so quickly.

- Omar Vizquel (1989-2012)
Career: 80 HR, .272/.336/.352, 404 SB, 83 wRC+, 42.5 fWAR in 2968 games
Best season (1999): 5 HR, .333/.397/.436, 42 SB, 115 wRC+, 6.0 fWAR in 144 games
To me, Andruw Jones is a Hall of Famer, but Omar Vizquel is not. Both were elite, perhaps all-time defenders, but Jones could hit (111 wRC+) and Vizquel could not (83 wRC+). His glove was truly elite, and he's up there with Ozzie Smith as one of the greatest defensive shortstops of all time. And while Smith wasn't a great hitter either (90 wRC+), he played at a time where the game was a bit more pitcher-friendly and teams weren't scoring five to six runs a game. Vizquel's complete lack of power and average on-base skills were a black hole in the Mariners, Indians, and Giants lineups he was a part of when every team was launching the ball out of the park. Even in his best offensive season, 1999, he still failed to reach a .400 on-base percentage. I completely respect Vizquel's glove and I searched his offensive stats looking for something I could consider "good enough" to put him in the Hall, but stealing 30 bases a year isn't enough.

- Andy Pettitte (1995-2013)
Career: 256-153, 3.85 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, 2448/1031 K/BB in 3316 IP
Best season (2005): 17-9, 2.39 ERA, 1.03 WHIP, 171/41 K/BB in 222.1 IP
Pettitte is certainly in the 90's/00's Hall of Very Good rotation, as he was as reliable a mid-rotation starter as they came for the Yankees and Astros who also popped for a couple of ace-like seasons in 1997 (18-7, 2.88 ERA, 1.24 WHIP) and 2005 (17-9, 2.39 ERA, 1.03 WHIP). He threw over 3000 innings while keeping his ERA under 4.00 despite pitching through the steroid era, threw at least 175 innings in 15 separate seasons, and had plenty of postseason success (19-11, 3.81 ERA, 1.30 WHIP, 183/76 K/BB in 276.2 IP). However, in an era that also included Pedro Martinez, Randy Johnson, Roger Clemens, Curt Schilling, Mike Mussina, Kevin Brown, Roy Halladay, and Johan Santana, it's hard to justify Pettitte as a Hall of Famer despite being a mid-rotation talent for most of his career.

Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens: See top of article.

Gary Sheffield, Sammy Sosa, Manny Ramirez: These players all have varying levels of allegations of steroid use, and while a lot of it is speculation, they all have fairly borderline cases even without considering the steroid usage. I'm both extremely anti-cheater and anti-speculation at the same time, but with their cases already being borderline, the steroid usage knocks them off my ballot.

Hall of Fame 2018: My Take

The BBWAA just released its Hall of Fame ballot for 2018. I'll list out my hypothetical ballot with my reasoning behind selecting each player, then I'll talk about notable exclusions and why I would not vote for them.

A quick(ish) primer on my views on steroids:

There are three ways to look at steroid users: let them all in (if they have worthy statistics), let in only those who would have made the Hall of Fame without steroids (Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens), or don't let in any. I strongly favor giving those who may or may not have taken steroids the benefit of the doubt, but for those where we know, I fall into the third category. The Hall of Fame honors baseball's greatest players, and while Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens would certainly fit that label even if they stayed clean, the fact is that they knowingly broke the rules to gain an advantage. In 1991, Major League Baseball officially banned steroids, but a group of players, even if it was a large group of players, decided that the rules did not apply to them and that they could use steroids. They therefore were not only spitting on the game, but by playing by a different set of rules, were playing a different variation of the sport than the clean players and should not be enshrined in the Hall of Fame. The argument can be made that baseball was dying after the 1994 strike and that viewership was down, and that ownership pressured stars to use steroids to hit more home runs and save the sport, but I see those players more as martyrs than as victims; they still chose to cheat and corrupt the game. They played by a different set of rules and do not belong in the Hall of Fame.

My Ballot

1. Chipper Jones (468 HR, .303/.401/.529 slash, 150 SB, 141 wRC+, 84.6 fWAR)

This will be one of the two players we can all agree on. Chipper Jones played 20 years for the Atlanta Braves, crushing 468 home runs with an on-base percentage over .400 and good-enough defense at the hot corner. He was the NL MVP in 1999 when he slashed .319/.441/.633 with 45 home runs, good for a 165 wRC+ and 7.3 fWAR, and that year was far from an anomaly. I don't think anybody disagrees, so I'll use my words on the more controversial/borderline players.

2. Jim Thome (612 HR, .276/.402/.554 slash, 19 SB, 145 wRC+, 69.0 fWAR)

Jim Thome is the other uncontroversial player. He blasted 612 home runs over a 22 year career, and if that isn't enough to convince you on his own, he maintained a .402 career on-base percentage to make himself a true all-around threat at the plate. In 2002, he won the Roberto Clemente Award, and he was one of the few power hitters of the era to never be tied to steroids. Great guy, great hitter, Hall of Famer. Easy.

3. Edgar Martinez (309 HR, .312/.418/.515 slash, 49 SB, 147 wRC+, 65.5 fWAR)

If you don't think Edgar Martinez belongs in the Hall of Fame, you are wrong. It's true that he was a DH for most of his career and was a butcher in the field when he was out there, but how many times have you stopped and thought about Babe Ruth's defense? Or Ted Williams? Or Willie Stargell? They were all terrible, and if you're reaction is "well at least they played defense," I'm not exactly sure why going out into the field and hurting their team with their gloves is any better than DH'ing, and I'm sure they would have spent much of their careers at DH had the position been available. Now for Edgar's offense: his 147 career wRC+ places him 33rd all time, ahead of Mike Schmidt (147), Willie McCovey (145), Willie Stargell (145), Harmon Killebrew (142), Chipper Jones (141), Alex Rodriguez (141), Mike Piazza (140), and...you get it. Martinez didn't hit for as much power as some of the other guys, having only hit more than 30 home runs in a season once, but he was an on-base machine. His .418 on-base percentage ranks 21st all time, sandwiched between #20 Frank Thomas and #22 Stan Musial. Combine that with power, and he absolutely deserves a spot in the Hall of Fame.

4. Vladimir Guerrero (449 HR, .318/.379/.553 slash, 181 SB, 136 wRC+, 54.3 fWAR)

Vlad may have only played sixteen seasons, but he was a one-man wrecking crew at the plate nearly the entire time he was in the majors. For eleven years from 1998-2008, when offense in baseball was at its highest, Guerrero never posted a wRC+ below 129, meaning he was at worst 29% better at the plate than league average in any given year. He won the 2004 AL MVP by slashing .337/.391/.598 with 39 home runs, and that was only his fourth best season by fWAR (5.9) and his third best by wRC+ (154). Guerrero comes with significant faults away from his hitting, including his mediocre defense and his relative lack of longevity, but his prime, both in peak and length, matches up with almost any non-legendary hitter in the Hall. The only point of contention I have with his offense is his low walk rate (8.1% career) but his high batting average (.318) ensured that his on-base percentage would still be high enough (.379) and he hit for so much power that overall, I am not worried about the low walk rate. If anything, his tendency to swing at (and hit) everything got into pitchers heads enough that it could be seen as a bonus.

5. Andruw Jones (434 HR, .254/.337/.486 slash, 152 SB, 111 wRC+, 67.1 fWAR)

Starting with Andruw Jones, I am less adamant about these next players, but I still believe they are Hall of Famers and would be included on my ballot accordingly. Jones wasn't a legendary hitter, slashing "just" .254/.337/.486 for his career and finishing with a 111 wRC+, just 11% above league average. He was average when it came to getting on base, had a good amount of pop (he did hit 51 home runs in 2005), and could steal a few bases. Offensively, that's an All Star package, but not a Hall of Fame one. Where Jones stood out was in center field, where he won ten straight Gold Gloves and was regarded as potentially the best ever. It's hard to quantify defense and even harder to compare quantified values with players from other eras, but in a time when hitters were blasting baseballs deep into the outfield, nothing fell around Jones in center field. Combine that with 434 home runs over 17 years, and Jones is a Hall of Famer.

6. Mike Mussina (270-153, 3.68 ERA, 1.19 WHIP, 2813/785 K/BB, 3562.2 IP)

A 3.68 career ERA doesn't necessarily scream "Hall of Famer," but Mike Mussina deserves the call. For eighteen years, he pitched in hitters' parks (first in Baltimore then in New York) in a hitters' era in a strong division. When you look away from the raw 3.68 ERA, his 82 career ERA- (adjusted to league average, park-adjusted, lower is better) is comparable to that of John Smoltz (81), Juan Marichal (81), Bob Feller (82), and Ron Guidry (83). I am not as confident in pitching WAR as I am in hitting WAR, but Mussina's 82.2 fWAR ranks him 17th all time among pitchers, behind #16 Bob Gibson and ahead of #18 Fergie Jenkins. He topped 150 innings for seventeen straight seasons from 1992-2008, making his starts every fifth day as dependably as anyone. Had he pitched his career in another era and another ballpark, his ERA could be half a run lower and he'd be a shoe-in for the Hall of Fame. Combine his longevity with his performance, and Mike Mussina belongs in the Hall of Fame.

7. Curt Schilling (216-146, 3.46 ERA, 1.14 WHIP, 3116/711 K/BB, 3261 IP)

Schilling may not have been as consistent as Mussina, but he had higher peaks and overall, his numbers are about equal. His 79.8 fWAR is just behind Mussina's 82.2, ranking him 20th all time. His 80 ERA- is also just ahead of Mussina over slightly fewer innings. His peaks were incredible, as he put up four seasons of at least 7.2 fWAR, and in 2002, he racked up 9.3 by going 23-7 with a 3.23 ERA, a 0.97 WHIP, and a 316/33 strikeout to walk ratio over 36 games (35 starts) in an extremely hitter-friendly Arizona ballpark in the middle of the Steroid Era. He also reached 300 strikeouts in 1997 and 1998. He had a bitter relationship with the media throughout his career, which has likely suppressed his votes, but I believe he has done enough to warrant a call to the Hall of Fame.

8. Billy Wagner (47-40, 2.31 ERA, 1.00 WHIP, 1196/300 K/BB, 903 IP)

No, the best reliever on the ballot is not Trevor Hoffman, but Billy Wagner; I don't care how many saves Hoffman had. Though Wagner missed portions of some seasons to injury, he finished his career with a 2.31 ERA and a 1.00 WHIP, striking out batters at ridiculous rates while keeping runners off the bases and establishing himself as the greatest closer of all time not named Mariano Rivera. His 24.1 career fWAR is the sixth highest ever for a reliever, and the five above him all threw significantly more innings. RE24 accumulates the change in run expectancy between each event (strikeout, hit, etc.), and it's very useful in measuring the situation to situation effectiveness of a reliever; Wagner's 198.17 is the second most of all time among relievers, behind only Rivera. In win-probability added, which is a pretty decent metric for measuring "clutchness," Wagner is fifth at 28.40, with three of the four ahead of him having thrown significantly more innings again (though Joe Nathan has thrown many fewer, surprisingly). On an out-for-out basis, Wagner is the best closer ever after Rivera.

9. Trevor Hoffman (61-75, 2.87 ERA, 1.06 WHIP, 1133/307 K/BB, 1089.1 IP)

Wagner may be better, but Hoffman is still one of the greatest relievers ever. He made over one thousand appearances over eighteen seasons, making at least 47 appearances in each of those seasons except 2003. His 26.1 fWAR is the third most ever for a reliever, behind only Mariano Rivera (39.2) and Goose Gossage (28.9). He is one of ten relievers to ever pitch over one thousand games, and of those, only Mariano Rivera (2.06) and Kent Tekulve (2.85) have a lower ERA than his 2.87. Wagner was clearly the better pitcher on and inning for inning basis, but Hoffman's longevity and consistency is what makes him one of the greatest of all time.

10. Larry Walker (383 HR, .313/.400/.565 slash, 230 SB, 140 wRC+, 68.7 fWAR)

Larry Walker is a tough call because he spent nine and a half seasons in Colorado, including his prime, in the days before the humidor. However, his numbers were so outrageous during that prime, especially from 1997-2002, that even the humidor-less Coors Field can't explain away those numbers. In 1997, his best season, he cracked 49 home runs and slashed .366/.452/.720 while stealing 33 bases, good for a 177 wRC+ and 9.1 fWAR. Using wRC+, which adjusts for ballpark and league production, we can find a recent similar season with a more neutral context: this past season, Aaron Judge put up a 173 wRC+ by slashing .284/.422/.627 with 52 home runs. His career 140 wRC+ ranks 68th all time and puts him on the same level as David Ortiz and Frank Howard. At the same time, he just breaks even in defensive value, making him one of just 20 players with positive defensive value and a 140 wRC+. Throw in his 230 stolen bases, and that list of twenty drops to eleven for players with at least 200 stolen bases. Context be damned, Walker had a fantastic career.

Steroid Users Left Off (see steroid primer)

Barry Bonds (762 HR, .298/.444/.607 slash, 514 SB, 173 wRC+, 164.4 fWAR)

Roger Clemens (354-184, 3.12 ERA, 1.17 WHIP, 4672/1580 K/BB, 4916.2 IP)

Manny Ramirez (555 HR, .312/.411/.585 slash, 38 SB, 153 wRC+, 66.3 fWAR)

Gary Sheffield (509 HR, .292/.393/.514 slash, 253 SB, 141 wRC+, 62.1 fWAR)*

Sammy Sosa (609 HR, .273/.344/.534 slash, 234 SB, 124 wRC+, 60.1 fWAR)

*Sheffield was named in the Mitchell Report but has significantly less evidence against him as the other names. However, he's a borderline candidate as it is, and the doubt from the steroid allegations is enough to push more deserving players in.

Left Off

Scott Rolen (316 HR, .281/.364/.490 slash, 118 SB, 122 wRC+, 70.1 fWAR)

Rolen is very close to being a Hall of Famer, and if the ballot wasn't limited to ten names, I might add him on. For now, though, Rolen will be left off due to other players being more deserving. Rolen was a very good hitter over his career, slashing .281/.364/.490 over a seventeen year career, but where he really shined was on defense. He picked up eight Gold Gloves between 1998 and 2010, and Fangraphs backs up his defensive prowess through their metrics. The high defensive value combined with his solid offense (a career 122 wRC+ is not too shabby) gives him 70.1 fWAR, more than any other non-steroid using hitter on the ballot aside from Chipper Jones, but I'm not as confident in Fangraphs' defensive metrics and will leave him off, at least for this year, due to uncertainty.

Fred McGriff (493 HR, .284/.377/.509 slash, 72 SB, 134 wRC+, 56.9 fWAR)

McGriff was a great hitter, hitting nearly 500 home runs and going sixteen seasons from 1987-2002 without posting an on-base percentage below .350. However, he provided no value on defense, which we saw with Jim Thome and Edgar Martinez wasn't enough to outright disqualify someone, but the offense just wasn't there for the era to alleviate it. His 134 wRC+ is pretty good, but if someone is going to get into the Hall of Fame, I'd like to see a little bit better if there is no defensive value being added. There were so many great power hitters in the era, even ones that weren't linked to steroids, that not everybody can get in.

Omar Vizquel (80 HR, .272/.336/.352 slash, 404 SB, 83 wRC+, 42.6 fWAR)

Omar Vizquel was a legendary shortstop defensively, and with a career that spanned 24 seasons from 1989-2012, Vizquel has to at least be considered for the Hall of Fame. However, I can't "vote" for him because he was utterly useless on offense. It may seem hypocritical because I included "useless" defenders Jim Thome and Edgar Martinez, but I do value offense more than defense and a career .688 OPS (and .310 wOBA) is an outright liability in a lineup where offense is at an all time high. Only twice, in 1999 and 2002, did Vizquel produce more offense than the average hitter by wRC+, and he finished at 83 for his career. For context, some recent players with similar levels of offense include Mark Kotsay (84), Ben Revere (82), Craig Counsell (82), Gordon Beckham (81), and Jose Iglesias (81). This doesn't take away from the fact that Vizquel was an amazing player, as his defense was truly remarkable, but his ineptitude at the plate is enough to keep him out of the Hall for me.

Johan Santana (139-78, 3.20 ERA, 1.13 WHIP, 1988/567 K/BB, 2025.2 IP)

Johan Santana was great, and at his prime from 2002-2010, he was a Hall of Famer. However, shoulder problems forced him to retire after just twelve seasons, and it's tough to convince a voter that 2025.2 innings is enough to get into the Hall of Fame. In fact, only one starting pitcher in the Hall of Fame threw fewer innings than Santana: Dizzy Dean, who went 150-83 with a 3.02 ERA and a 1.21 WHIP over 1967.1 innings over twelve seasons. Santana does best Dean in both fWAR (45.3 to 40.9) and ERA- (74 to 77), but at this point, there are more deserving players on the ballot and Santana will have to wait. We can look back on his prime and see that from 2002-2010, only Roy Halladay (50.4) and Roy Oswalt (44) accumulated more fWAR than Santana (43.7), while his 2.90 ERA was tops among starting pitchers. Maybe in a few years.

Jeff Kent (377 HR, .290/.356/.500 slash, 94 SB, 123 wRC+, 56.1 fWAR)

Jeff Kent had a long career with respectable consistency, posting at least a 98 wRC+ in each of his seventeen seasons and reaching at least 120 in ten straight seasons from 1998-2007. He also played second base, occupying a key position and providing adequate defense there. He was also (a bit surprisingly) the 2000 NL MVP, slashing .334/.424/.596 with 33 home runs, good for a 159 wRC+ and 7.4 fWAR. It all adds up to a very good package, but unfortunately, I don't see it as quite enough to warrant a trip to the Hall of Fame in an era where so many players put up comparable numbers.

Others of note: Jamie Moyer (48.2 fWAR), Johnny Damon (44.5), Chris Carpenter (39.1), Carlos Zambrano (30.6), Carlos Lee (27.5)