So far, we have established 3 of the players that we would vote for in our non-existent Hall of Fame Ballot (Jeff Bagwell, Mark McGwire, and Edgar Martinez).
4. Larry Walker: HOF Score: 44.58 All-Star Seasons: 5. MVP Seasons: 1.
Pros: .313/.400/.565 140 OPS+. 9 Seasons with a batting average of .300 or higher. Including 3 batting titles. He finished in the top 10 for batting average 6 times. He had 8 seasons of OBP of .400 or higher. He led the league twice in OBP and finished top 10, 6 times. He had 12 seasons of a slugging percentage of .500 or higher, including 6 seasons of .600 or higher and 2 seasons of .700 or higher. He had 8 seasons of top 10 finishes in slugging percentage. He had 10 seasons of having an OPS of .900 or higher. He had 6 seasons of having a 1.000 or higher OPS. He finished in the top 10 for OPS 8 times. He had 7 seasons with an OPS+ of 150 or higher. He finished in the top 10 for OPS+ 6 times. His 1997 season is one of the best seasons (non-Bonds division) in recent memory. I can go through the rest of his top 10 finishes, as well, but I'm not going to. He finished top 10 in rWAR 4 times. He wasn't just a great offensive player. He was one of the better defensive outfielders, as well. He was a great baserunner, often veing voted by managers and coaches as the best baserunner in the league.
Cons: Coors Field. Splits:Home: .348/.431/.637 Road: .278/.370/.495. He was Ted Williams, at home, nowhere near as good on the road. Coors Field has always hurt offensive players in the eyes of sportswriters because Coors Field does help batters to a degree. But Walker excelled in the years before he went to Colorado. He also has done well in stats that are adjusted for the league, stadium, and year, such as OPS+ and WAR. The other problem is a relatively short career when looked at games played because of various injuries.
5. Alan Trammell: HOF Score: 43.56. All-Star Seasons: 5. MVP Seasons: 1.
Pros: .285/.352/.415 110 OPS+. By all accounts, Trammell was at least a good defensive shortstop. His offensive lines are a little bit lower compared to those at non-defensive positions such as first base or the corner outfield positions. But we can still look at his offensive numbers. He had 7 seasons with a batting average of .300 or higher. He had five seasons where he finished in the top 10 in batting average. He had one season with an OBP of .400 or higher. He had four seasons where he finished top 10 in OBP in the league. He had one season with a slugging percentage of .500 or higher and one season where he finished in the top 10 in slugging percentage. He had one season with an OPS+ of 150 or higher. He had two seasons where he finished in the top 10 of OPS+. He probably should've won the 1987 MVP, he did have a MVP caliber season, that year. He had five seasons where he finished in the top 10 in rWAR. In a small sample size of the playoffs he had a triple slash of .333/.404/.588.
Cons: Doesn't have the counting stats that voters typically look for. With the onslaught of offensive shortstops, such as Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, Nomar Garciaparra, etc. his offensive stats are not as impressive as those produced in the 1990s.
6. Barry Larkin: HOF Score: 42.81. All-Star Seasons: 8 MVP Seasons: 0.
Pros: Larkin was, like Trammell, at least a good defensive shortstop. Again, he does not need to have as great of offensive stats as others to be worthy of the Hall of Fame. But, again, we'll look. Career Line: .295/.371/.444 116 OPS+. He had 9 seasons of .300 batting average or higher. He finished in the top 10 of batting average 4 times. He had two seasons of OBP of .400 or higher. He had three seasons of top 10 finishes in OBP. He had three seasons of a slugging percentage of .500 or higher. He finished in the top 10 for slugging percentage twice. He had one season of 150 OPS+ or higher. He also had two top 10 finishes in OPS+. He had three seasons of .900 or higher. He had two top 10 finishes in OPS. He had 5 top 10 finishes in rWAR. Despite the small sample size, he had a triple slash of .338/.397/.465 in the playoffs which was 17 games.
Cons: Injuries. He only had four seasons of 150 or more games so, again, his counting stats are lower
than you would expect.
7. Tim Raines: HOF Score: 42.39. All-Star seasons: 6 MVP seasons: 0
Pros: .294/.385/.425 123 OPS+. 808 stolen bases. He had 8 seasons of .300 batting average or higher. He had four top 10 finishes in batting average. He had 6 seasons of .400 OBP or higher and finished in the top 10 for OBP 7 times. He had one season of .500 slugging percentage or higher and one top 10 finish in slugging percentage. He had one season with an OPS of .900 or higher. He had 4 top 10 finishes in OPS. He had one season with an OPS+ of 150 or higher. He had 6 top 10 finishes in OPS+. He is generally regarded as the 2nd best leadoff hitter of all-time. He had 8 top 10 finishes in runs scored. He had 11 seasons where he finished in the top 10 in stolen bases. There's a good chance that collusion and injuries prevented him from getting to 3000 hits. He was one of the greatest base stealers of all-time. If you combine both the number of stolen bases and his low number of being caught, you come to the conclusion that he was great. He also had 7 top 10 finishes in rWAR.
Cons: Injuries and collusion limited the number of games that he played, limiting his counting numbers. The Hall of Fame generally does not appreciate lead-off hitters. There are also some
character issues as some people remember the stories of him not sliding so his cocaine didn't break.
8. Rafael Palmeiro: HOF Score: 41.74. All-Star Seasons: 5. MVP Seasons: 0.
Pros: .288/.371/.515 132 OPS+. He had 6 seasons with a batting average of .300 or higher. He had five seasons where he finished in the top 10 for batting average. He had one season of .400 OBP or higher. He had two top 10 finishes in OBP. He had 12 seasons with a .500 slugging percentage or higher. He had one season with a .600 or higher slugging percentage. He had 7 top 10 finishes in slugging percentage. He had 10 seasons with an OPS of .900 or higher, including one with an OPS of 1.000 or higher. He had 7 top 10 finishes in OPS. He had 3 seasons with an OPS+ of 150 or higher. He had 7 seasons where he finished in the top 10 in OPS+. He had two seasons where he finished in the top 10 in rWAR. He finished his career with both more than 500 home runs and 3000 hits.
Cons: Failed a steroids test. Did Viagara commercials. Won a suspect Gold Glove. Did his finger wag at congress. Some feel that he wasn't really a dominant enough player to make the Hall of Fame.
9. Fred McGriff: HOF Score: 36.46. All-Star Seasons: 4. MVP Seasons: 0.
Pros: .284/.377/.509 134 OPS+. He had four seasons of batting average of .300 or higher. He had one top 10 finish in batting average. He had two seasons of an OBP of .400 or higher. He had four top 10 finishes in OBP. He had 10 seasons with .500 slugging percentage or higher with one season of .600 or higher. He had 7 top 10 finishes in slugging percentage. He had 8 seasons with an OPS of .900 or higher and one season with 1.000 or higher. He had 7 top 10 finishes in OPS and led the league in OPS once. He had five seasons with an OPS+ of 150 or higher. He had 7 top 10 finishes in OPS+ and led the league once in OPS+. He led the league twice in home runs.
Cons: The rest of the 1990s made his homerun totals look really small. The 1994 season prevented him from hitting 500 homeruns. He never hit 40 or more home runs. Wasn't truly dominating.
10. Dale Murphy: HOF score: 35.55 All-Star seasons: 6. MVP Seasons: 0.
Pros: .265/.346/.469. 121 OPS+. He had two seasons with a .300 batting average or higher. He had 2 top 10 finishes in batting average. He had one season with a .400 OBP or higher. He had 5 top 10 finishes in OBP. He had 7 seasons with a .500 slugging percentage or higher. He led the league twice in slugging percentage and had 6 seasons where he finished in the top 10. He had four seasons with an OPS of .900 or higher. He led the league once in OPS. He had 6 top 10 finishes in OPS. He had two seasons with an OPS+ of 150 and 6 top 10 finishes in OPS+. He was an All-Star caliber player for 6 years.
Cons: He had 6 great seasons but that's it. The rest of his career was effectively a zero, he was better than a replacement player just as many times as he was not better than a replacement player after his 6 dominatint seasons. After his age 31 season, he fell off of a cliff.
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