Monday, July 17, 2006

Hall of Fame Debate

Wiggins and I will now answer all of your questions, doubts, and worries about who will and who will not one day be enshrined in baseball's Hall of Fame. We're going to focus on current players and recently retired (but not yet eligible) ballplayers. We'll break them into categories and discuss from there. Once the list is "complete" (whatever that means) we'll really start to get into it.

Locks
Roger Clemens
Greg Maddux

Near Certainties
Mike Piazza
Alex Rodriguez
Derek Jeter

Randy Johnson
Pedro Martinez
Ivan Rodriguez
Tom Glavine - 4 silver sluggers -- that's cool
Robbie Alomar
Craig Biggio
Mariano Rivera

Manny Ramirez

Steroid Talk
Barry Bonds
Mark McGwire
Sammy Sosa
Rafael Palmeiro
Jason Giambi
Gary Sheffield

Questionable/Stretches
Frank Thomas
Jeff Bagwell
John Smoltz
Fred McGriff
Carlos Delgado
Curt Schilling - his middle name is "Montague". I hate him.
Jason Varitek
Bernie Williams - 5x All-Star, 4x Gold Gloves, 4 rings
Trevor Hoffman - 436 saves, 146 ERA+
Ichiro Suzuki
Andruw Jones
Chipper Jones

Jim Thome
Edgar Martinez
Mike Mussina - 224 W, 125 ERA+

Need More Quality Seasons
Vlad Guerrerro
Johan Santana
Albert Pujols
Miguel Cabrera
Dontrelle Willis
Roy Oswalt
Barry Zito

Tim Hudson
Roy Halladay
Scott Kazmir
Rich Harden

Felix Hernandez
Francisco Liriano

Jason Bay
Carlos Beltran

Alfonso Soriano
David Ortiz
David Wright

Managers/Executives
Joe Torre
Bobby Cox
John Scheurholz
Tony LaRussa
Billy Beane

I suppose we could get into the uber-prospects too, but that's a little much. Even the younger pitchers listed there are a big stretch, but some out of that group are inevitably going to turn into immortals.

Some of these guys shouldn't even be listed -- but I was just trying to put together more of a list so that there'd be more to discuss. Feel free to add/subtract.

13 comments:

Mike said...

I would add Ozzie Guillen and Mike Scoscia to the list of Managers if they get to the playoffs a handful of more times and/or win another title or two. They each have decent enough playing records to add on to.

Mike said...

That would be a fun list too -- past can't miss Hall of Famers, tandems, teammmates, etc.

Len Bias...
Trammell and Whitaker...
Gooden and Strawberry...
Todd van Poppel...
Todd Marinovich...

All kinds of story lines.

Mike said...

Yeah, Piazza must be a lock. I think Rivera is too, but it's just so hard for closers to get in.

Anonymous said...

Rivera is a lock now that he has 400 saves, 4 rings and was dominant for over a decade.

I think Chipper Jones is closer than anyone will think. He'll be over 2000 hits and very close to 400 homers in a couple years.

Andruw Jones is 27 years old (or so) and he already has 300+ homers and is the dominant centerfielder of his generation. He's in as well.

Anonymous said...

I found one you may have overlooked.

I don't think he's nearly a certainty, but he might just make a run at 300 wins.

You left out MIke Mussina.

Mike said...

Mussina is a good call. I did overlook him. But he's got borderline stats (I think without looking), been in plenty of big games, and has the backing of the NY media. He seems like a guy who will get extra votes because he's such a decent guy.

I also wonder if he'll come back as an executive or pitching coach. I think he's a smart guy. If I remember correctly he earned an Econ degree from Stanford in three years (while playing ball there).

I'll add him and BR stats for each guy today. Then we can get in to debating.

Mike said...

Blah, blah, blah... make your list.

Mike said...

Oh - possibly important: I didn't look at any stats to make my in/out decisions. I did it all based on gut feel. That's kind of how I think the Hall should be. If you don't know by "looking at him" that he's a HoFer, then he isn't a HoFer.

Mike said...

Sorry - here you go: http://www.baseball-reference.com/b/beanebi01.shtml

Mike said...

Argh - it wasn't a link:

Billy Beane -- not the gay guy - not that there's anything wrong with that.

Mike said...

I'm sure you have the latter link bookmarked.

Mike said...

I think that has happened to a lot of people. I'm fairly certain that the two have been confused by the media. That's funny.

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