Mussina does not make my HOF ballot

[DrungoHazewood]

Pedro was a crappy pitcher once he turned 34 and was injury plagued. That is why he had low career innings pitched. I don't know why the 5 man rotation is being brought up.

Do you realize that there are quite a few HOF pitchers who were done by their 30s? Barely even pitched in their 30s. And pretty much none of them had Pedro's peak. There are pitchers like Addie Joss in the Hall who had a career half as long as Pedro, had a peak that is laughable compared to Pedro, and he was dead at 30. There are guys like Old Hoss Radbourne, famous for his durability and peak, whose career is maybe half as valuable as Pedros. And that's before you consider that he faced competition that might be equal to a college conference on an indy league today.

Maddux, Glavine, and Randy Johnson meet a standard of at least 300 wins, 4000 innings pitched and 2 CY Young awards for the 5 man rotation era that Pedro does not meet. Whether that influences enough voters to not put Pedro in on the first ballot is an open question.

Pedro meets the standard of being arguably the best pitcher who ever lived. He did not have a long career, but he had a massive peak in a context very, very heavily tilted towards offense. And unlike many (most?) other HOFers he actually faced modern athletes in an integrated, international league.

[DrungoHazewood]

To me the only reason that HOF voting is problematic is that so many players have been caught enhancing themselves chemically.

I think you should read Bill James' book on the Hall, written maybe 15 years ago. Long before steroids became an issue. He outlines myriad problems that have nothing to do with PEDs.

The HOF voting is problematic because:

1) The BBWAA is not a reasonable sampling of knowledgeable voters.

2) The voting process was designed on the back of a napkin in 1935. So many things wrong with the 10/12 player limits, the yes/no voting structure, the 75% minimum on a 10+ slot ballot, no guarantee of any inductees in a given year, no run-offs, the 15-year limit... it goes on and on.

3) There are countless committees that act as back doors into the Hall, mainly because the BBWAA missed so many candidates and inducted quite a few undeserving candidates starting in the earliest years. Just a list of the sins of the various special committees could fill a book.

4) The expansion time bomb has only started and there is already a huge backlog of well-qualified candidates with a voting process wholly unprepared to deal with this.

5) The lack of standards, with many wishing for a tiny, elite Hall which directly conflicts with the fact that players on par with Brady Anderson were inducted starting 75 years ago.

5b) Partly due to guys like Tommy McCarthy getting in so long ago, we now have guys like Lou Whitaker and Alan Trammell essentially ineligible despite careers three times as valuable as current HOFers like Bill Mazeroski. The only standard for a HOFer is who's gone before them, and there are probably hundreds of non-inducted players who meet the minimum standards set by the worst BBWAA inductees, and thousands who meet the Vet's Committee standards.

6) The PED mess, with a essentially 100% certainty that some current HOFers used PEDs, but writers excluding candidates for which there is no proof they used.

7) The HOF organization that is independent of MLB but totally relies on MLB for its existence, but sets rules by a board of good ol' boys, which leads to peculiar ways of running the Hall.

Other than that I think the voting is fine.

But yea, other than those huge, systemic problems, it's all good.

Last year the voters did not see anyone that hadn't cheated worthy of getting voted in.

Which is the most damning evidence of an absolutely massive problem you could have. Literally there are dozens upon dozens of players from the last 30 or 40 years who are well above the established HOF floor who aren't going in, aren't getting any votes.

That is keeping with a high standard. That is good for the people in the Hall and the fans as well IMO. Apparently most voters agreed.

Maybe it's laudable to attempt to set a new higher standard. But "keeping with" a high standard? As I mentioned before the Hall inducts several players in the Nick Markakis, Brady Anderson, Torii Hunter range of player every decade, and has almost since day one in the 1940s. Recently the BBWAA has inducted Jim Rice and Kirby Puckett, neither of whom was remotely as good as 15 guys on the current ballot.

I just find it impossible to argue that someone who was twice as valuable, in some cases three times as valuable, as current HOFers can't be voted in now because we're holding the Hall to some kind of high standard. How would you defend that to some kid who says "why is Travis Jackson in the Hall and Tim Raines isn't?" When Raines was vastly superior?

[Frobby]

A pitcher that starts 40 games and pitches 300 innings is more value than a pitcher that starts 33 games and pitches 200 innings. It isn't complicated.

I think you really are off base in your methodology. You have to compare pitchers to others in their same era when it comes to things like ERA, IP, Wins, etc. Or, use stats that are designed to take context into account.

It's misleading to say MLB went to the five man rotation in 1975. In 1975 Catfish Hunter threw 328 innings. Steve Carlton threw 304 innings in 1980 and nobody has done it since. In the last ten years, 250 innings has been reached only twice. The game is always evolving and Pedro doesn't get a demerit for pitching fewer innings than past stars.

Where he does get a slight demerit is that he never was a huge workhorse by the standards of his own era. He only finished in the top 5 in his league in IP once. To me, you can use that to argue that he ranks behind a few guys like Clemens or Maddux or Johnson when it comes to arguing about who was the greatest pitcher of his era. But he's way over the line as an HOF candidate. 17th all time in WAR for pitchers.

[25 Nuggets]

Preach on, Drungo!

By the way, all the stuff above is essentially why the "first ballot" argument holds no water in Major League Baseball.

[Frobby]

Ah, the old Pedro vs Koufax debate resurfaces...

About a decade ago, Koufax was an untouchable legend, kind of like how Joe DiMaggio was once referred to as "the greatest living ballplayer" so many times that people believed it. When Pedro was being his dominant self, folks were offended by the notion he had a better peak than Koufax. He was a classic case of "I saw him pitch and he was the greatest thing since sliced bread blah blah blah", whereas people who were born later wonder if he was overrated.

All I can say is, Pedro's peak years were better relative to league average than Koufax. Gordo's bold text says it all. Koufax pitched in an extreme pitcher's environment, surpassed only by the deadball era. Pedro pitched in the most extreme hitting environment in history. In my opinion, they both did what was asked of them to a similar degree of excellence based on league conditions. Pedro pitched longer, but those years aren't what will usher him into Cooperstown.

I don't feel the need to resolve the Koufax vs. Pedro debate. I will say this, every baseball fan should read Jane Leavy's biography of Koufax. The way in which he carried his team when it counted was extremely impressive. In 1965, he started 9 of the team's final 31 games, and made a relief appearance as well. No wonder he had to stop pitching after one more season.

[MurphDogg]

In 1965, he started 9 of the team's final 31 games, and made a relief appearance as well.

No he didn't.

[Frobby]

I don't feel the need to resolve the Koufax vs. Pedro debate. I will say this, every baseball fan should read Jane Leavy's biography of Koufax. The way in which he carried his team when it counted was extremely impressive. In 1965, he started 9 of the team's final 31 games, and made a relief appearance as well. No wonder he had to stop pitching after one more season.

No he didn't.

Yes he did. Nine starts in 31 games (six complete games including three shutouts) and a relief appearance. One of his starts went 10.2 innings. http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/gl.cgi?id=koufasa01&t=p&year=1965

He did have one really bad outing, where he lasted only 2 innings.

[clapdiddy]

I haven't read through this whole thread, but I was surprised to see that Baseball Reference has Mussina ranked as the #14 pitcher All-Time. Wow.

[DrungoHazewood]

Yes he did. Nine starts in 31 games (six complete games including three shutouts) and a relief appearance. One of his starts went 10.2 innings. http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/gl.cgi?id=koufasa01&t=p&year=1965

He did have one really bad outing, where he lasted only 2 innings.

Sorry for going off-topic... but I just clicked on your link above, here at work, and for the first time in over a month Baseball Reference works!!!! It doesn't lock up my machine!!! It's a Christmas miracle!

[DrungoHazewood]

I haven't read through this whole thread, but I was surprised to see that Baseball Reference has Mussina ranked as the #14 pitcher All-Time. Wow.

By their FanElo rating system, which basically just compiles a ton of user head-to-head ratings. It'll ask, for example "Mussina or Steve Carlton" then "Carlton or Jim Palmer" then "Dave Steib or Jack Morris". Then it ranks everyone based on the sum of all the thousands of interrelated head-to-head matchups. I think #14 is high but not entirely unreasonable. He's 24th in rWAR, 19th in fWAR, and 28th in JAWS. And he unquestionably played in a more difficult league than 50 or 60 years ago, and a vastly better league than pre WWII. In JAWS Mussina trails seven or eight 19th century pitchers who faced kinda laughably silly competition compared to today's MLB.

[weams]

Sorry for going off-topic... but I just clicked on your link above, here at work, and for the first time in over a month Baseball Reference works!!!! It doesn't lock up my machine!!! It's a Christmas miracle!

[PaulFolk]

I am trying to make this a simple as a can. Randy Johnson is the class of the players on the ballot. He pitched at a high level longer than any one else on the ballot. His wins and innings pitched emphasize how much he belongs.

So because Johnson is better than anyone else on the ballot, nobody else deserves any votes? That's not "simple"-- that's tortured logic. We're not comparing the people on the ballot to each other, we're comparing them to the players already in the HOF.

I am not saying that Pedro should not make the Hall. But I don't think he pitch enough inning to be a first ballot guy.

What is this "first ballot" stuff? You either believe the guy is worthy of the HOF or you don't. There isn't any distinction made between which ballot they're voted in on. Their plaques don't say "This guy was voted in on the first ballot, so clearly he's the best of the best."

I just find it hard to believe that on such a crowded ballot, you don't consider anybody worthy of the HOF except Randy Johnson.

[Nigel Tufnel]

Mattingly needs to get in this year. Career 300 hitter, franchise player. He needs to be let in. Why is Jermaine Dye even in there...wow.

I think he had way, way too short of a peak to even be a fringe candidate. He was only a great player for three years, and only a good player for another three. If not for the back injury, his career might have gone differently, but those are the breaks. Just ask Charlie Keller.

[Frobby]

What is this "first ballot" stuff? You either believe the guy is worthy of the HOF or you don't. There isn't any distinction made between which ballot they're voted in on. Their plaques don't say "This guy was voted in on the first ballot, so clearly he's the best of the best."

I find this a complex topic. Generally speaking, I agree you either think someone deserves to be in the Hall of Fame or you don't, and you vote accordingly. But (1) I do think there are some borderline cases where you might not vote for a guy initially in a year when there are a lot of better candidates on the ballot, or equal candidates who are nearing the end of their eligibility period, and (2) the fact that there is a backlog of qualified guys and a history of players who did not get in initially but got in later makes the job more difficult. I really don't want to see 12 guys going into the Hall all at the same time, even if they deserve it. I like it when it's 2-3 players a year. It's OK if it's 4-5 guys in a particularly strong class of new candidates, but more than that and the honor becomes a lot less special.

[weams]

Rk Name YoB %vote HOFm HOFs Yrs WAR WAR7 JAWS Jpos G AB R H HR RBI SB BB BA OBP SLG OPS OPS+ W L ERA ERA+ WHIP G GS SV IP H HR BB SO Pos Summary

1 Craig Biggio 3rd 74.8% 169 57 20 65.1 41.6 53.4 57.0 2850 10876 1844 3060 291 1175 414 1160 .281 .363 .433 .796 112 YES

2 Mike Piazza 3rd 62.2% 207 62 16 59.4 43.1 51.2 43.1 1912 6911 1048 2127 427 1335 17 759 .308 .377 .545 .922 143 MAYBE

3 Jeff Bagwell 5th 54.3% 150 59 15 79.6 48.2 63.9 54.2 2150 7797 1517 2314 449 1529 202 1401 .297 .408 .540 .948 149 NO

4 Tim Raines 8th 46.1% 90 47 23 69.1 42.2 55.6 53.3 2502 8872 1571 2605 170 980 808 1330 .294 .385 .425 .810 123 MAYBE

5 Roger Clemens 3rd 35.4% 332 73 24 140.3 66.3 103.3 61.8 709 179 5 31 0 12 0 13 .173 .236 .207 .443 17 354 184 3.12 143 1.173 709 707 0 4916.2 4185 363 1580 4672 *1 NO

6 Barry Bonds 3rd 34.7% 340 76 22 162.4 72.7 117.6 53.3 2986 9847 2227 2935 762 1996 514 2558 .298 .444 .607 1.051 182 NO

7 Lee Smith 13th 29.9% 135 13 18 29.6 21.1 25.4 34.4 1023 64 2 3 1 2 0 3 .047 .090 .094 .183 -50 71 92 3.03 132 1.256 1022 6 478 1289.1 1133 89 486 1251 *1 YES

8 Curt Schilling 3rd 29.2% 171 46 20 79.9 49.0 64.5 61.8 571 773 39 117 0 29 1 25 .151 .178 .171 .348 -9 216 146 3.46 127 1.137 569 436 22 3261.0 2998 347 711 3116 *1 NO

9 Edgar Martinez 6th 25.2% 132 50 18 68.3 43.6 56.0 55.0 2055 7213 1219 2247 309 1261 49 1283 .312 .418 .515 .933 147 MAYBE

10 Alan Trammell 14th 20.8% 118 40 20 70.4 44.6 57.5 54.7 2293 8288 1231 2365 185 1003 236 850 .285 .352 .415 .767 110 NO

11 Mike Mussina 2nd 20.3% 121 54 18 83.0 44.5 63.8 61.8 537 52 3 9 0 5 0 1 .173 .189 .192 .381 1 270 153 3.68 123 1.192 537 536 0 3562.2 3460 376 785 2813 *1 MAYBE

12 Jeff Kent 2nd 15.2% 122 51 17 55.2 35.6 45.4 57.0 2298 8498 1320 2461 377 1518 94 801 .290 .356 .500 .855 123 NO

13 Fred McGriff 6th 11.7% 100 48 19 52.4 35.8 44.1 54.2 2460 8757 1349 2490 493 1550 72 1305 .284 .377 .509 .886 134 NO

14 Mark McGwire 9th 11.0% 170 42 16 62.0 41.8 51.9 54.2 1874 6187 1167 1626 583 1414 12 1317 .263 .394 .588 .982 163 NO

15 Larry Walker 5th 10.2% 148 58 17 72.6 44.6 58.6 58.1 1988 6907 1355 2160 383 1311 230 913 .313 .400 .565 .965 141 NO

16 Don Mattingly 15th 8.2% 134 34 14 42.2 35.6 38.9 54.2 1785 7003 1007 2153 222 1099 14 588 .307 .358 .471 .830 127 NO

17 Sammy Sosa 3rd 7.2% 202 52 18 58.4 43.7 51.0 58.1 2354 8813 1475 2408 609 1667 234 929 .273 .344 .534 .878 128 NO

18 Randy Johnson 1st 331 65 22 102.1 62.0 82.0 61.8 619 625 20 78 1 40 0 19 .125 .153 .152 .305 -22 303 166 3.29 135 1.171 618 603 2 4135.1 3346 411 1497 4875 *1/7 YES

19 Pedro Martinez 1st 206 60 18 84.0 58.2 71.1 61.8 477 434 22 43 0 18 0 15 .099 .134 .122 .256 -32 219 100 2.93 154 1.054 476 409 3 2827.1 2221 239 760 3154 *1 YES

20 John Smoltz 1st 167 44 21 69.5 38.8 54.2 61.8 735 948 77 151 5 61 3 79 .159 .226 .207 .433 16 213 155 3.33 125 1.176 723 481 154 3473.0 3074 288 1010 3084 *1 YES

21 Gary Sheffield 1st 158 61 22 60.2 37.9 49.0 58.1 2576 9217 1636 2689 509 1676 253 1475 .292 .393 .514 .907 140 NO

22 Brian Giles 1st 53 41 15 50.9 37.3 44.1 58.1 1847 6527 1121 1897 287 1078 109 1183 .291 .400 .502 .902 136 NO

23 Nomar Garciaparra 1st 112 41 14 44.2 43.0 43.6 54.7 1434 5586 927 1747 229 936 95 403 .313 .361 .521 .882 124 NO

24 Carlos Delgado 1st 110 44 17 44.3 34.5 39.4 54.2 2035 7283 1241 2038 473 1512 14 1109 .280 .383 .546 .929 138 NO

25 Darin Erstad 1st 35 14 14 32.3 28.7 30.5 57.2 1654 6024 913 1697 124 699 179 475 .282 .336 .407 .743 93 NO

26 Tom Gordon 1st 47 15 21 35.3 23.4 29.3 34.4 893 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000 .000 -100 138 126 3.96 113 1.360 890 203 158 2108.0 1889 176 977 1928 *1/D NO

27 Jason Schmidt 1st 41 18 14 29.6 27.2 28.4 61.8 324 597 29 63 7 21 0 22 .106 .140 .156 .296 -23 130 96 3.96 110 1.321 323 314 0 1996.1 1846 184 792 1758 *1 NO

28 Cliff Floyd 1st 22 22 17 25.9 25.0 25.4 53.3 1621 5319 824 1479 233 865 148 601 .278 .358 .482 .840 119 NO

29 Jermaine Dye 1st 49 25 14 20.3 23.2 21.7 58.1 1763 6487 984 1779 325 1072 46 597 .274 .338 .488 .826 111 NO

30 Rich Aurilia 1st 31 20 15 18.1 16.7 17.4 54.7 1652 5721 745 1576 186 756 23 450 .275 .328 .433 .762 99 NO

31 Troy Percival 1st 96 14 14 17.5 15.1 16.3 34.4 703 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000 .000 -100 35 43 3.17 146 1.108 703 1 358 708.2 479 85 306 781 *1 NO

32 Aaron Boone 1st 4 14 12 13.5 15.2 14.3 55.0 1152 3871 519 1017 126 555 107 303 .263 .326 .425 .751 94 NO *536/4D

33 Tony Clark 1st 24 16 15 12.5 15.8 14.2 54.2 1559 4532 629 1188 251 824 6 527 .262 .339 .485 .824 112 NO *3D/7

34 Eddie Guardado 1st NO