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Pitching: 292 points League leaders: 15 points (wins, ERA, WHIP) Worked fast, didn't fool around: 10 points Postseason bonus: 5 points Best pitcher ever from Mississippi: 5 points Hall of Fame Race to 400 points: 327 * * * Roy Oswalt was on his way to being a Hall of...
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Really not surprising at all to see his #1 comp is Bret Saberhagen. Both were really good pitchers for a relatively short period of time, but just didn’t last long enough. While their stats don’t mirror each other, there are quite a few parallels between them.
I say this almost every time, but why is Greatness with a capital G determined by having enough pretty good seasons after the age of 30, instead of what you are at the height of your powers?
It’s a fair question, but how long do you have to be at the “height” of your powers? Teddy Higuera was worth 9.4, 6.3, and 7.4 WAR from 1986 to 1988. That’s better than the three best seasons of Mike Mussina’s career (8.2, 7.1, 6.6) If Higuera had played one more season, would he be a legitimate HOF candidate? Being better than Mike Mussina at his peak is pretty impressive.
Patrick–that’s a great example! Really made me think about what I mean.
Those are some really good seasons, and I’d probably rate Higuera much higher than most people would (let’s leave aside the complications with B-WAR, which can be a bit “fluky”–see Aaron Nola–and Higuera’s top seasons drop quite a bit on Fangraphs).
What I’m not trying to say is that only the top few seasons matter. What I am trying to say is that if the top few seasons are good enough, that should be enough. Mussina isn’t going to the HoF because he was amazing for a couple years, but because he was consistently excellent for almost two decades. He had 10 seasons of 5+ B-WAR; that’s amazing. Whereas his peak performance was only very good; he needs “help” from a long peak to get in.
But take someone like Saberhagen: his top seasons were 9.7, 8.0, 7.2. That’s a step above Higuera, and he won two Cy Youngs in those three seasons. It should go without saying that Saberhagen needs MUCH LESS from the rest of his career than Mussina does to be at the HoF level. I would definitely vote for Moose, but would also vote for Saberhagen.
To summarize: a long string of excellence should definitely get you in. But a high blazing peak should ALSO do the trick.
Andy,
I too am more impressed with great peak–even if the peak is short–than a higher number of good to very good seasons; or in some cases, a lot of pretty average or below average seasons at the end to compile.
Dave Winfield had 19 seasons of 130+ games played, and only five seasons of 5+ bWAR. Only one season–his 8.3 1979 season–was above 5.4. BR says 5+ WAR is an All-Star year, and 8+ is an MVP year. So in 19 full seasons, he had only five All-Star-worthy years (according to bWAR) and one MVP-worthy year. But he was in fact a 12-time All Star and first ballot Hall of Famer.
Craig Biggio’s final eight years–seven of which were 140+ games–he averaged a mere 1.2 bWAR. This value was apparently mostly defensive, as he was a below average hitter during that eight-year stretch (averaging 94 OPS+ per year). Yet he would almost certainly not be a Hall of Famer without that eight-year stretch, in which he collected 1152 more hits to finish with…3060!
In my view, Biggio’s HOF case would be just as strong had he retired after 1999, coming off a nine-year stretch of 50.4 WAR. But it is all the average years with all the extra hits that put him in the Hall.
I prefer a player like Larry Walker: more dynamic, with better numbers, but he played a thousand fewer games than either Winfield or Biggio. And that, unfortunately, makes all the difference when it comes to Hall of Fame voting.