@JoeBanzai said:
Greenberg missed 4 1/2 years because he served in WW11.
I may have missed the last nine world wars, and I am still scratching my head at the notion that Freddie Patek would be a BETTER home run hitter than Frank Howard by virtue of him being smaller(if Patek had hit as many home runs as Howard)....but Killebrew does have a case over Reggie.
Killebrew OPS+ 143
Reggie OPS+ 139
Killewbrew Win Probability Added 59
Reggie Win Probability Added 50
Killebrew didn't have as many old man at bats to bring his percentages down. He also 'lost' some potential service time at the beginning of his career, though we don't know the extant. Nonetheless, we can just call those two factors a wash, and Killebrew has the offensive edge over Reggie.
Where is Reggie gaining the value to overtake the offensive deficit? We already know the in-validity and pitfalls of defensive measurements, and Reggie wasn't exactly anything of note defensively anyway.
Killebrew played 3B and 1B...but is it a managers 'error' by moving him to 1B? Why would that make Killebrew a lesser player because his manager made the mistake of moving a capable third baseman over to first?
@Skin2 said:
I may have missed the last nine world wars, and I am still scratching my head at the notion that Freddie Patek would be a BETTER home run hitter than Frank Howard by virtue of him being smaller(if Patek had hit as many home runs as Howard)....but Killebrew does have a case over Reggie.
>
That was one of my odder analogies, but the point was that Patek is (I looked it up) the greatest home run hitter EVER for a player shorter than 5' 6". Who is to say that he wouldn't remain the greatest HR hitter had he been Frank Howard's height? Yeah, it's ridiculously silly, and was intended to be. The underlying point was that it makes no sense to "adjust" for physical characteristics of the player, only for external circumstances.
And Killebrew does have a case vs. Jackson, I just find Jackson's case more compelling. In part - probably the biggest part - it is because I am comparing players to replacements rather than to averages. This gives Jackson a lot more value for his longer career than a comparison to average would (if they calculated WPR instead of WPA, I suspect Jakson would win). And while I understand your point about Killebrew possibly being able to play third base for much longer than he did, the fact is that he didn't and I tried to limit my analysis as much as possible to facts only. I don't believe that any HOF vote was ever cast due to a belief that a given player could have played a position that he didn't actually play (except, of course, when he didn't get to play at all due to war, etc.).
Consider, too, that in the "meat" of Killebrew's career (1959-1972), he played 2,025 games with an OPS+ of 151. In the meat of Jackson's career (1968-1982), he played 2,136 games with an OPS+ of 151. Considering the slight era difference and the extra 111 games for Reggie, I think you have to say that Reggie wins that head-to-head battle, but even if you want to call it a tie, it means that the difference in their career OPS+ is due entirely to what happened at the beginning and ends of their careers, so Jackson gets penalized for being able to play longer than Killebrew. If you instead, correctly, credit Jackson for those extra games, then he beats Killebrew.
And a piece of trivia, which was found in trying to determine if a "Phelps factor" applied to any player. Killebrew (a righty) faced RHP 73% of the time; this is right around the overall average, so there's no Phelps factor for Killer. Jackson (a lefty) faced LHP 34% of the time, which is way more than the overall average, resulting in a sort of negative Phelps factor. I didn't actually apply that negative factor, but I found it interesting; I think it implies that opposing teams used LHP when facing Reggie's teams much more often than they did against other teams, and that Reggie was probably the primary reason. Had Reggie faced the same average percentages of RHP and LHP that Killebrew did, his career OPS+ would have been the same as Killebrew's. Again, just trivia, not anything that affected the rankings in any way.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
Dallas, that all makes pretty good sense. Glad you incorporated the "Phelps" factor...or the negative Phelps factor in this case.
As for the Patek point, I may have to use that one, lol. I think I may walk around town and say I'm the greatest basketball player ever...if I were only Seven feet eight inches tall!!
From Joe Torre in 1971 to Mark McGwire in 1998, the highest season for Win Probability Added (best single measure of offense) was Will Clark in 1989. That includes every season Barry Bonds played without cheating. The only players (measured by Win Shares, which includes defense) who have better seasons than Will Clark in 1989 since WWII are Ted Williams, Stan Musial, Mickey Mantle and Bonds (pre-cheating). It was, at the time, the greatest season all but the oldest of the sportswriters who voted on the MVP had ever seen, and they gave the MVP to Kevin Mitchell. He played 15 seasons without ever having a bad, or even below average, year; he was a post-season stud; he was a Gold Glove first baseman and, especially at his peak, one of the greatest clutch hitters who ever played the game. I have him sitting right between his contemporaries Tony Gwynn and Frank Thomas. Thomas was a better hitter but literally useless in the field; Clark was a better hitter than Gwynn but Gwynn was a better fielder. There's not a dime's worth of difference between those three in terms of what matters - winning baseball games - but Clark fell off the HOF ballot after a single vote and the other two sailed in on their first ballots.
HOF voters like players who were awesome at one thing much more than they like players who were merely great at everything. Look at the other players at the top of the non-HOF list. Allen, Wynn, Singleton and Bonds were all great at everything (power, average, fielding, baserunning) but weren't awesome at any one thing (HR, BA, etc.). Some similar players get noticed by hitting a milestone like 3,000 hits (Biggio) or being on a dynasty team (Perez), but some really great players never do.
In the case of Clark, he's not in the HOF because he didn't hit with enough power. Fair or not, that's why he's not in. If you're going to play the (by far) easiest defensive position, voters expect you to hit with power. 9 seasons (out of 15) under 20 homers is what did him in. He's also hurt (no pun intended) by the fact he was considered pretty fragile, averaging just 133 games a year in non-strike seasons.
If you watch Eric Hosmer play first base for a full season, you see how valuable a first baseman can be.
And its far from easy. He scoops up more balls in the dirt from Alcides Escobar and Moustakas than I thought
was humanly possible. He rarely fails to scoop a bad throw out of the dirt, and in a years' time there is a lot
of bad throws. What I can't understand is how Hosmer has a negative war on defense. He hasn't won
his gold gloves by chance, he is excellent at playing his position. I think Clark was the same way, but most
people don't give much respect to first baseman because they think its an easy position to play.
@Darin said:
What I can't understand is how Hosmer has a negative war on defense.
Defensive WAR is crap. The "replacement" player isn't a first baseman, it's a "player", so every first baseman starts off with a negative WAR of roughly -1 and then goes up or down from there based on some less crappy, but still highly suspect, fielding measures. Steve Garvey was the best fielding first baseman I ever saw, and his career defensive WAR is -12.3. Eddie Murray was also excellent; his defensive WAR is -12.8.
There is some limited value in comparing defensive WAR among players at the same position, at roughly the same time, but that's about it. By the same token, don't ever compare total WAR from one player to another, compare offensive WAR only; adding in the defensive WAR just corrupts the total. Offensive WAR is a pretty decent stat.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
Just so they're not left out, following is the same list for pitchers. I've weighted peak, etc. exactly the same way as for the non-pitchers and I've again restricted it to 20th century pitchers. There aren't as many pitchers in the HOF and their "scores" were spread out a little more clearly, so the Tiers aren't exactly evenly divided but they make logical groupings (there is always a fairly clear gap between tiers). Enjoy.
W. Johnson 1
Maddux 1
Alexander 1
R. Johnson 1
Grove 1
Mathewson 2
Martinez 2
Seaver 2
Gibson 2
Newhouser 3
Carlton 3
Hubbell 3
Palmer 3
Brown 3
Walsh 3
Perry 3
Marichal 3
Blyleven 3
Glavine 4
Spahn 4
Feller 4
Niekro 4
Coveleski 5
Koufax 5
Vance 5
Roberts 5
Jenkins 5
Ford 5
Bunning 5
Smoltz 6
Lyons 6
Faber 6
Wilhelm 6
Joss 6
Rixey 7
Drysdale 7
Willis 7
Gomez 7
Eckersley 7
Ryan 7
Plank 8
Grimes 8
McGinnity 8
Dean 8
Wynn 8
Lemon 8
Sutton 9
Gossage 9
Hoyt 9
Ruffing 9
Pennock 9
Haines 10
Chesbro 10
Bender 10
Hunter 10
Sutter 10
Marquard 10
Fingers 10
Unlike the hitters, where my personal feelings about who belonged started to peter out after tier 5, with the pitchers I don't have any problem with anybody until Tier 8, and even there I'm OK with most of them. Tier 9 is a bunch of good pitchers and I don't see any of them as HOF material, but I can imagine the argument in their favor. The pitchers in tier 10 have no business in the HOF, in fact they weren't really all that much better than average pitchers. If Sutter gets in for "inventing" a new pitch, OK, as long as it's not for being a great pitcher. What most, but not all, of them have in common was pitching for really good teams and going to the WS several times.
A few pitchers of interest:
Hal Newhouser is at the top of tier 3, and he probably doesn't deserve to be. His peak was during WWII against pretty weak competition (although he was still a very good pitcher after everyone came back). So he ends up at the top of Tier 3 if you ignore that, which I did, or you can adjust him to wherever you think he belongs. The point is that there is no objective way to put him anywhere but tier 3, so that's where I put him. The flip side of his coin is Feller, who probably would have had his peak during WWII but enlisted instead. Feller probably would have been a tier 2 pitcher had there been no war, but what he actually accomplished lands him in tier 4.
There are five pitchers in the HOF who spent a significant part of their career in the bullpen. Two of them - Wilhelm and Eckersley - deserve to be in the HOF. But note that Eckersley was an excellent starting pitcher (masked in large part by pitching in Boston) and it is his starting pitching that provided most of his value.
Nolan Ryan is one slot away from falling to Tier 8. Ryan had a handful of great seasons peppered among his 25+ years, but he had as many bad seasons and mostly he had above average seasons. Clearly he belongs in the HOF given the important records he set, but by pitching prowess alone he's pretty borderline.
I don't think where anyone else falls should be a shock.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
Ryan being that low is definitely a shock, though I really only caught the tail end of his career and the legendary status was already established. R. Johnson being that high all-time is a bit surprising, glad I got to see him live several times his seasons here in AZ.
Glad to see Maddux and Randy Johnson that high, I was never a fan of the teams Randy
played on, but if he was ever on TV I made sure to watch, loved watching him pitch.
Maddux didn't just pitch games, he turned them into works of art.LOL. The Michelangelo of the mound.
Knew Ryan didn't deserve to be very high, a 100mph fastball with little control can only get you so far.
Maybe a little surprised Warren Spahn wasn't higher than a tier 4 on your list.
Seemed very realiable for a long time.
It's interesting to me that two of the top five of all- time were from the modern era and the other three from the olden days. Nothing in between spanning 50 plus years
m
Walker Proof Digital Album Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
@Skin2 said:
Catfish Hunter and Jack Morris. Have fun with those two names!
The two are forever linked as icons of extended mediocrity mistaken for greatness. They did achieve that status very differently, though; Morris was just mediocre year in and year out for a long time while Hunter was very good for a short time, and aspired to be mediocre for the rest of his career. They are both firmly planted in Tier 10 on the HOF scale.
I calculated tiers for every predominantly 20th century pitcher that I could think of that has the distinction of being more HOF-worthy than Rollie Fingers. I've listed all of them above tier 10. In Tier 10 there are so many that it's too much work to try to list them all, and quite a few of them you've probably never heard of anyway, so I just listed a relatively recent sample.
K. Brown 4
Schilling 4
Stieb 5
Mussina 5
Trout 6
Tiant 6
Walters 6
Pierce 7
Newsom 7
Cone 7
Appier 7
Saberhagen 7
Adams 7
Bridges 7
Vaughn 7
W. Wood 7
C. Mays 7
Luque 8
Harder 8
Warneke 8
Reuschel 8
Key 8
Dutch Leonard 8
Hershiser 8
Shocker 8
John 8
Kaat 8
Viola 8
Ferrell 8
Finley 9
Guidry 9
D. Martinez 9
Simmons 9
McDowell 9
S. Rogers 9
Brecheen 9
Quinn 9
V. Blue 9
Maglie 9
Messersmith 9
Tanana 9
Gooden 9
Tudor 9
Candelaria 10
Chance 10
Hough 10
K. Rogers 10
Moyer 10
Morris 10
Lolich 10
Reuss 10
A few pitchers of interest:
The pitchers in tiers 4 and 5 ought to be in the HOF; they were great pitchers and better than most of the pitchers already in the HOF.
Wilbur Wood would be in the HOF had he pitched for better teams. The White Sox had him in the bullpen for years before they finally figured out he was too good for that and he promptly had a peak that fits in nicely in tier 3. Had he been allowed to start, and had the White Sox been a good team, Wood may have won 20 games 8 years in a row.
Tiant would be in the HOF had he pitched for a team better than the Indians early in his career, and in a park other than Fenway later in his career. Even so, I don't really understand why he's not. He was so much better than Hunter, who pitched at the same time, that I don't really see how any HOF voter could possibly not have seen it.
Yes, Charlie Hough is more deserving of the HOF than Jack Morris.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
here's my suggestion: when a player the caliber of _____________________, who anyone with a brain that follows MLB knows beyond a reasonable doubt should be elected isn't a unanimous choice, those voting against that player lose voting rights for a 5-year period.
politics and petty rivalries should have no place in the process.
Why was Catfish Hunter so mediocre in your opinion? I think he was pretty good for quite a long
time. Started pitching for the K.C. A's who were terrible and the early Oakland A's who were terrible.
The A's didn't get good until he was an 8-9 year veteran. Then he won 20 games five years in a row,
including an era title. Didn't you just say Wilbur Wood might have won 20 games eight years in a row
if he was on a better team. Well, Catfish might have done the same.
One year he started 39 games and completed 30 of them. Finished with a 3.26 career era.
Where is the mediocrity?
One point about era. Back when Catfish pitched the starters completed a lot more games than
pitchers of today. So today pitchers basically don't pitch any more when they get tired.
Back then they kept going, so isn't an era of 3.26 in the 70's more impressive than a pitcher today
with the same era?
@Darin said:
Why was Catfish Hunter so mediocre in your opinion? I think he was pretty good for quite a long
time. Started pitching for the K.C. A's who were terrible and the early Oakland A's who were terrible.
The A's didn't get good until he was an 8-9 year veteran. Then he won 20 games five years in a row,
including an era title. Didn't you just say Wilbur Wood might have won 20 games eight years in a row
if he was on a better team. Well, Catfish might have done the same.
One year he started 39 games and completed 30 of them. Finished with a 3.26 career era.
Where is the mediocrity?
One point about era. Back when Catfish pitched the starters completed a lot more games than
pitchers of today. So today pitchers basically don't pitch any more when they get tired.
Back then they kept going, so isn't an era of 3.26 in the 70's more impressive than a pitcher today
with the same era?
Former Major league umpire Ron Luciano wrote a book; "The Umpire Strikes Back" (GREAT read btw). In it he says "Catfish" has the best control of any pitcher he ever saw. Hunter would throw a pitch on the outside edge and if it got called a strike he would move it over a have inch at a time until it got called a ball...............then right back on the edge.
He also said Catfish would tend to get lazy with his pitches and they would get hit a mile. Luciano said it didn't seem to bother Hunter at all.
Not sure if this means anything as far as HOF "worthiness" is concerned, but Luciano saw a lot of good pitchers and he says Mr. Hunter had the best control..............when he was trying.
I am assuming that he gets ripped for pitching in Oakland and Yankee stadium both considered pitcher friendly parks. From 1972-75, his "best" seasons, Hunter's away record was 39-20. He had a lower era at home where he was 51-18, by about one run except for 1975 where they were about the same
See Sandy Koufax, rated by (too) many to be one of the all-time greats, but he was only good for 1/2 of his career and only great at Dodger Stadium, another pitcher friendly park.
He really was only a full time starter (over 30 starts) for 10 years, not exactly Warren Spahn ;-)
Easy or hard park...... did any other pitcher during Hunter's time achieve what he did? Anyone on the same staff? Vida Blue was good but not as good as Catfish. Jim Palmer was much better, but other than that, Mickey Lolich, Nolan Ryan? Only looking at AL, in NL, Seaver and Carlton were MUCH better, but that's about it for the time frame.
He won as much as anyone but lost a lot less. You can only guess what the numbers would have been if he traded places with say, Gaylord Perry. They might be educated guesses, but you just don't (and can't) know for sure.
I am kind of on the fence with Hunter. I can see him being in, or out of HOF. If I had to say, I would say out.
2013,14 and 15 Certificate Award Winner Harmon Killebrew Master Set and Master Topps Set
Hunter's lifetime home ERA was 2.70
Hunter's lifetime road ERA was 3.92
That is a pretty stark contrast.
Sandy Koufax in his peak had an ERA+ of 167, and led the league in innings pitched twice in that five year peak
Catfish Hunter in his peak had an ERA+ of 127 and led the league in innings pitched once in that five year peak.
Another pretty stark contrast.
Luis Tiant pitched 3,486 innings with an ERA + of 114
Hunter pitched 3,449 innings with an ERA+ of 104
That is a more apt comparison, and one where Hunter comes up short
If you focus only on his peak, where I said he was "very good", then he looks like a Hall of Famer. That is, if you delude yourself that those five very good years are representative of his career then you will see a Hall of Fame Career. But Hunter pitched for 6 years and 1,300+ innings before that, and his ERA+ (ERA compared to an average pitcher) was 96; he was not only not good, he was worse than average. And after his five year peak he pitched another 4 years and 665 innings with an ERA+ of 91 - a lot worse than an average pitcher. Sandwiched in between was his five year peak, and it was a very good - not great - peak. Among those with better peaks are Andy Messersmith, John Tudor and Sal Maglie. Among those with MUCH better peaks are Sam McDowell, Dwight Gooden, Ron Guidry and Urban Shocker (Who? Exactly.)
There's a stat on BBref that you've probably never noticed; it's called waaWL%. This stat determines the W/L percentage that an average team would have had with the given pitcher pitching, so .500 would be the stat for an average pitcher. Hunter's stat is .511. The difference between Hunter and an average pitcher is little more than statistical noise. For Hunter's 5-year peak, his stat is .561. That's very good, but as peaks go it's pretty low. Andy Messersmith's career waaWL% is .553, just a hair below Hunter's peak; his 5-year peak is .587. Andy Messersmith was not a great pitcher, but he was clearly better than Jim Hunter. Sam McDowell's career stat is .551; at his peak .612. McDowell was a MUCH better pitcher than Hunter, and we're still in Tier 9. Move up to truly great pitchers like Dave Stieb (.570, .633) and there's just no comparison; Stieb's average is better than Hunter's peak.
What Jim Hunter had was a host of teammates much better than himself, a career that was effectively over as a quality pitcher at 29, a cool nickname and the good fortune to spend his entire career in pitcher's parks. Yeah, he won 20+ games five times. So did Hippo Vaughn (.564, .614) and I haven't seen much of a groundswell of support to get him in the HOF. The bottom line is that if Catfish Hunter is a HOF pitcher, then there are fewer than half as many pitchers in the HOF as there ought to be. But given the pitchers that are there now, Hunter is as out of place as a turd in a punchbowl.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
@JoeBanzai said:
Easy or hard park...... did any other pitcher during Hunter's time achieve what he did? Anyone on the same staff? Vida Blue was good but not as good as Catfish. Jim Palmer was much better, but other than that, Mickey Lolich, Nolan Ryan? Only looking at AL, in NL, Seaver and Carlton were MUCH better, but that's about it for the time frame.
The answer to who achieved as much as Hunter is going to depend on what you mean by "achieve". If you're counting 20 win seasons as an "achievement" then we're just going in circles since it was the A's and Yankees that achieved those. If we isolate what the pitcher achieved independently of his team, and if we define "Hunter's time" as any 10-year period that includes Hunter's prime (1966-1975 through 1971-1980) then the following pitchers achieved more during "Hunter's time": Gibson, Seaver, Perry, Jenkins, Blyleven, Niekro, Palmer, and Carlton. And that sounds about right; if you ignore the horrible years at the beginning and end of his career, Hunter was the 9th best pitcher of his era. Of course, if that was what it took to get in the HOF we'd have about twice as many pitchers in the HOF as we do.
If you are instead defining "Hunter's time" as just his five year peak then only Perry and Seaver and Wilbur Wood achieved more in that span. But if we're going to define HOF worthiness by nothing more than a 5-year stretch (which is absurd) then he still loses to such luminaries as Dolph Luque, Billy Pierce and Harry Brecheen, and he gets beaten badly by Wilbur Wood, Hippo Vaughn and, yes, Urban Shocker.
Hunter is in the HOF because he pitched for great teams. If you imagine him on Cleveland during his prime he would have won 20 games at most twice, would never have led the league in ERA, would never have appeared in the playoffs or WS, and would be remembered today as a good pitcher, almost as good as Andy Messersmith, but definitely not as good as Sam McDowell. Tell me why that's wrong.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
@dallasactuary said:
There are five pitchers in the HOF who spent a significant part of their career in the bullpen. Two of them - Wilhelm and Eckersley - deserve to be in the HOF. But note that Eckersley was an excellent starting pitcher (masked in large part by pitching in Boston) and it is his starting pitching that provided most of his value.
Eckersley was not an excellent starting pitcher. He had some excellent years (1978 & 1979) but his career 3.71 ERA as a starter tells the story. His excellence wasn't masked by being in Boston - it was masked by him being drunk for a long stretch of his career. Let's not forget that the whole reason he was in the pen in the first place is that he was terrible in Chicago as a starter in '86.
If you watch Eric Hosmer play first base for a full season, you see how valuable a first baseman can be.
And its far from easy. He scoops up more balls in the dirt from Alcides Escobar and Moustakas than I thought
was humanly possible. He rarely fails to scoop a bad throw out of the dirt, and in a years' time there is a lot
of bad throws. What I can't understand is how Hosmer has a negative war on defense. He hasn't won
his gold gloves by chance, he is excellent at playing his position. I think Clark was the same way, but most
people don't give much respect to first baseman because they think its an easy position to play.
Note that I didn't say 1B was easy - I said it was the easiest. Let me clarify a little more - it's a very easy position to be mediocre at. You're rarely asked to field difficult grounders and 98% of the throws are easy to catch.
Clark was obviously a lot better than that. But was he John Olerud or Keith Hernandez? No.
@Tabe said:
Eckersley was not an excellent starting pitcher. He had some excellent years (1978 & 1979) but his career 3.71 ERA as a starter tells the story. His excellence wasn't masked by being in Boston - it was masked by him being drunk for a long stretch of his career. Let's not forget that the whole reason he was in the pen in the first place is that he was terrible in Chicago as a starter in '86.
Maybe "excellent" overstates how good he was. But despite his bad final year as a starter with Chicago his career ERA+ as a starter was 111, and he was in the top 10 in ERA+ five times including a 1st and a 2nd. And you overlooked his rookie season when you listed his excellent years. He was a "very good" starter.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
I'm not saying your wrong in stating he was/is over rated by some.
I'll say it again. Hunter would not get my vote for HOF.
He had an excellent won/loss record for 5 years, he pitched better in Oakland by about 1 run per game than on the road. How much better did the opposing pitchers do in Oakland? I assume they pitched better there too.
Like it or not pitchers get too much credit for 20+ win seasons, string 5 together and average 20 for 7 and (yes it's a team game) he deserves credit. Four of those years he was top 4 in Cy Young award voting, winning once.
A crappy pitcher on a great team will not win 20+ games in a season even once!
His career was FAR to short, even with the great 5 year run, to be considered as good as Gibson, Seaver, Carlton, Palmer etc.
Sam McDowell is a great example of a guy who would have won a lot more games if he pitched for better teams in more pitcher friendly parks.
I wouldn't consider Hunter "a turd in a punchbowl". Maybe a fly in the ointment, but never a turd in a punchbowl.
2013,14 and 15 Certificate Award Winner Harmon Killebrew Master Set and Master Topps Set
@Tabe said:
Eckersley was not an excellent starting pitcher. He had some excellent years (1978 & 1979) but his career 3.71 ERA as a starter tells the story. His excellence wasn't masked by being in Boston - it was masked by him being drunk for a long stretch of his career. Let's not forget that the whole reason he was in the pen in the first place is that he was terrible in Chicago as a starter in '86.
Maybe "excellent" overstates how good he was. But despite his bad final year as a starter with Chicago his career ERA+ as a starter was 111, and he was in the top 10 in ERA+ five times including a 1st and a 2nd. And you overlooked his rookie season when you listed his excellent years. He was a "very good" starter.
I did miss his rookie year - misread it as being a very partial season and ignored it.
I think 3.71 ERA, with multiple terrible seasons, puts you in the "pretty good" category. The 111 ERA+ speaks to that. Regardless of the wording, not good enough to be a benefit to his HOF resume, IMHO.
@Tabe said:
I think 3.71 ERA, with multiple terrible seasons, puts you in the "pretty good" category. The 111 ERA+ speaks to that. Regardless of the wording, not good enough to be a benefit to his HOF resume, IMHO.
Eck's 111 is better than several HOFers, including Pennock (106), Wynn (107), Galvin (107), Sutton (108), Grimes (108), Ruffing (109), Haines (109) and of course Marquard (103) and Hunter (104). It's also only 1 point behind Nolan Ryan. Pitching 2,500 innings with an ERA+ of 111 is very good. It's not HOF-worthy all by itself, for sure, but it's very good and it adds something to a HOF case. Hunter did it, and added another 1,000 innings with an ERA+ of 90; Eck added another 800 innings with an ERA+ of 136. Eck's HOF case isn't the strongest out there, but it's stronger, by far, than any of the tier 9 or 10 pitchers. Where he ranks among the tier 7 and 8 pitchers will depend on how you weight peak and career and other subjective factors.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
@Tabe said:
I think 3.71 ERA, with multiple terrible seasons, puts you in the "pretty good" category. The 111 ERA+ speaks to that. Regardless of the wording, not good enough to be a benefit to his HOF resume, IMHO.
Eck's 111 is better than several HOFers, including Pennock (106), Wynn (107), Galvin (107), Sutton (108), Grimes (108), Ruffing (109), Haines (109) and of course Marquard (103) and Hunter (104).
"He's better than the worst possible HOF examples!" is not exactly the first argument I'd go to. Let's put in every middle infielder better than Phil Rizzuto!
@dallasactuary said:
It's also only 1 point behind Nolan Ryan.
Ryan also did it for 2900 more innings while never being terrible like Eck was.
@dallasactuary said:
Eck added another 800 innings with an ERA+ of 136.
Whoop dee doo. 800 innings is nothing. As a closer, an ERA+ of 136 isn't even that good. In the last 10 seasons alone, 151 guys have had an ERA+ with 20+ saves.
There are currently 21 guys with 200+ saves and an ERA+ of 136 or higher for their careers, including luminaries like Rafael Soriano and Robb Nen.
In other words, Eck is two not-impressive careers smashed together with four amazing (+1 good) years in the middle. 280 innings.
Tabe, I'm not really disagreeing with your overall point. My point is simply that when you say that Eckersley's career provides no basis for being in the HOF, you're ignoring a rather large group of people that are in the HOF on a far shakier basis than he is. If Catfish Hunter is a HOFer, then Eckersley is also a HOFer, and on a much more solid basis than Hunter. So when I say that Eckersley deserves to be in the HOF, I'm saying he deserves to be there by the standards that have been used historically. What you're arguing is that he doesn't deserve to be there because the standards used historically are too low and have allowed pitchers, like Hunter, Haines, Marquard, etc., to get in.
In Ryan's case, he's not in for being more valuable than other pitchers over the course of his career, because far more valuable pitchers have been excluded. He's in for breaking important records and for becoming hugely famous for how he played the game. I have no problem with that, in fact I think it would have been ridiculous to exclude him. But Eckersley was every bit as valuable a pitcher as Ryan. I do think Eckersley deserves to be in the HOF in part because his pitching was good enough by historical standards not to make a mockery of the HOF by putting him there, and in part because of the fame he attained - through his own play, not that of his teammates - by the way he played the game (switching to the bullpen, setting records, having HOF level seasons). It surely is not the most solid case for the HOF out there, and it bothers me much more that Catfish Hunter is in the HOF than it would if Eckersley were not.
This is for you @thisistheshow - Jim Rice was actually a pretty good player.
Comments
I may have missed the last nine world wars, and I am still scratching my head at the notion that Freddie Patek would be a BETTER home run hitter than Frank Howard by virtue of him being smaller(if Patek had hit as many home runs as Howard)....but Killebrew does have a case over Reggie.
Killebrew OPS+ 143
Reggie OPS+ 139
Killewbrew Win Probability Added 59
Reggie Win Probability Added 50
Killebrew didn't have as many old man at bats to bring his percentages down. He also 'lost' some potential service time at the beginning of his career, though we don't know the extant. Nonetheless, we can just call those two factors a wash, and Killebrew has the offensive edge over Reggie.
Where is Reggie gaining the value to overtake the offensive deficit? We already know the in-validity and pitfalls of defensive measurements, and Reggie wasn't exactly anything of note defensively anyway.
Killebrew played 3B and 1B...but is it a managers 'error' by moving him to 1B? Why would that make Killebrew a lesser player because his manager made the mistake of moving a capable third baseman over to first?
>
That was one of my odder analogies, but the point was that Patek is (I looked it up) the greatest home run hitter EVER for a player shorter than 5' 6". Who is to say that he wouldn't remain the greatest HR hitter had he been Frank Howard's height? Yeah, it's ridiculously silly, and was intended to be. The underlying point was that it makes no sense to "adjust" for physical characteristics of the player, only for external circumstances.
And Killebrew does have a case vs. Jackson, I just find Jackson's case more compelling. In part - probably the biggest part - it is because I am comparing players to replacements rather than to averages. This gives Jackson a lot more value for his longer career than a comparison to average would (if they calculated WPR instead of WPA, I suspect Jakson would win). And while I understand your point about Killebrew possibly being able to play third base for much longer than he did, the fact is that he didn't and I tried to limit my analysis as much as possible to facts only. I don't believe that any HOF vote was ever cast due to a belief that a given player could have played a position that he didn't actually play (except, of course, when he didn't get to play at all due to war, etc.).
Consider, too, that in the "meat" of Killebrew's career (1959-1972), he played 2,025 games with an OPS+ of 151. In the meat of Jackson's career (1968-1982), he played 2,136 games with an OPS+ of 151. Considering the slight era difference and the extra 111 games for Reggie, I think you have to say that Reggie wins that head-to-head battle, but even if you want to call it a tie, it means that the difference in their career OPS+ is due entirely to what happened at the beginning and ends of their careers, so Jackson gets penalized for being able to play longer than Killebrew. If you instead, correctly, credit Jackson for those extra games, then he beats Killebrew.
And a piece of trivia, which was found in trying to determine if a "Phelps factor" applied to any player. Killebrew (a righty) faced RHP 73% of the time; this is right around the overall average, so there's no Phelps factor for Killer. Jackson (a lefty) faced LHP 34% of the time, which is way more than the overall average, resulting in a sort of negative Phelps factor. I didn't actually apply that negative factor, but I found it interesting; I think it implies that opposing teams used LHP when facing Reggie's teams much more often than they did against other teams, and that Reggie was probably the primary reason. Had Reggie faced the same average percentages of RHP and LHP that Killebrew did, his career OPS+ would have been the same as Killebrew's. Again, just trivia, not anything that affected the rankings in any way.
Dallas, that all makes pretty good sense. Glad you incorporated the "Phelps" factor...or the negative Phelps factor in this case.
As for the Patek point, I may have to use that one, lol. I think I may walk around town and say I'm the greatest basketball player ever...if I were only Seven feet eight inches tall!!
If you watch Eric Hosmer play first base for a full season, you see how valuable a first baseman can be.
And its far from easy. He scoops up more balls in the dirt from Alcides Escobar and Moustakas than I thought
was humanly possible. He rarely fails to scoop a bad throw out of the dirt, and in a years' time there is a lot
of bad throws. What I can't understand is how Hosmer has a negative war on defense. He hasn't won
his gold gloves by chance, he is excellent at playing his position. I think Clark was the same way, but most
people don't give much respect to first baseman because they think its an easy position to play.
Defensive WAR is crap. The "replacement" player isn't a first baseman, it's a "player", so every first baseman starts off with a negative WAR of roughly -1 and then goes up or down from there based on some less crappy, but still highly suspect, fielding measures. Steve Garvey was the best fielding first baseman I ever saw, and his career defensive WAR is -12.3. Eddie Murray was also excellent; his defensive WAR is -12.8.
There is some limited value in comparing defensive WAR among players at the same position, at roughly the same time, but that's about it. By the same token, don't ever compare total WAR from one player to another, compare offensive WAR only; adding in the defensive WAR just corrupts the total. Offensive WAR is a pretty decent stat.
Just so they're not left out, following is the same list for pitchers. I've weighted peak, etc. exactly the same way as for the non-pitchers and I've again restricted it to 20th century pitchers. There aren't as many pitchers in the HOF and their "scores" were spread out a little more clearly, so the Tiers aren't exactly evenly divided but they make logical groupings (there is always a fairly clear gap between tiers). Enjoy.
W. Johnson 1
Maddux 1
Alexander 1
R. Johnson 1
Grove 1
Mathewson 2
Martinez 2
Seaver 2
Gibson 2
Newhouser 3
Carlton 3
Hubbell 3
Palmer 3
Brown 3
Walsh 3
Perry 3
Marichal 3
Blyleven 3
Glavine 4
Spahn 4
Feller 4
Niekro 4
Coveleski 5
Koufax 5
Vance 5
Roberts 5
Jenkins 5
Ford 5
Bunning 5
Smoltz 6
Lyons 6
Faber 6
Wilhelm 6
Joss 6
Rixey 7
Drysdale 7
Willis 7
Gomez 7
Eckersley 7
Ryan 7
Plank 8
Grimes 8
McGinnity 8
Dean 8
Wynn 8
Lemon 8
Sutton 9
Gossage 9
Hoyt 9
Ruffing 9
Pennock 9
Haines 10
Chesbro 10
Bender 10
Hunter 10
Sutter 10
Marquard 10
Fingers 10
Unlike the hitters, where my personal feelings about who belonged started to peter out after tier 5, with the pitchers I don't have any problem with anybody until Tier 8, and even there I'm OK with most of them. Tier 9 is a bunch of good pitchers and I don't see any of them as HOF material, but I can imagine the argument in their favor. The pitchers in tier 10 have no business in the HOF, in fact they weren't really all that much better than average pitchers. If Sutter gets in for "inventing" a new pitch, OK, as long as it's not for being a great pitcher. What most, but not all, of them have in common was pitching for really good teams and going to the WS several times.
A few pitchers of interest:
Hal Newhouser is at the top of tier 3, and he probably doesn't deserve to be. His peak was during WWII against pretty weak competition (although he was still a very good pitcher after everyone came back). So he ends up at the top of Tier 3 if you ignore that, which I did, or you can adjust him to wherever you think he belongs. The point is that there is no objective way to put him anywhere but tier 3, so that's where I put him. The flip side of his coin is Feller, who probably would have had his peak during WWII but enlisted instead. Feller probably would have been a tier 2 pitcher had there been no war, but what he actually accomplished lands him in tier 4.
There are five pitchers in the HOF who spent a significant part of their career in the bullpen. Two of them - Wilhelm and Eckersley - deserve to be in the HOF. But note that Eckersley was an excellent starting pitcher (masked in large part by pitching in Boston) and it is his starting pitching that provided most of his value.
Nolan Ryan is one slot away from falling to Tier 8. Ryan had a handful of great seasons peppered among his 25+ years, but he had as many bad seasons and mostly he had above average seasons. Clearly he belongs in the HOF given the important records he set, but by pitching prowess alone he's pretty borderline.
I don't think where anyone else falls should be a shock.
Ryan being that low is definitely a shock, though I really only caught the tail end of his career and the legendary status was already established. R. Johnson being that high all-time is a bit surprising, glad I got to see him live several times his seasons here in AZ.
Glad to see Maddux and Randy Johnson that high, I was never a fan of the teams Randy
played on, but if he was ever on TV I made sure to watch, loved watching him pitch.
Maddux didn't just pitch games, he turned them into works of art.LOL. The Michelangelo of the mound.
Knew Ryan didn't deserve to be very high, a 100mph fastball with little control can only get you so far.
Maybe a little surprised Warren Spahn wasn't higher than a tier 4 on your list.
Seemed very realiable for a long time.
It's interesting to me that two of the top five of all- time were from the modern era and the other three from the olden days. Nothing in between spanning 50 plus years
m
Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
Catfish Hunter and Jack Morris. Have fun with those two names!
The two are forever linked as icons of extended mediocrity mistaken for greatness. They did achieve that status very differently, though; Morris was just mediocre year in and year out for a long time while Hunter was very good for a short time, and aspired to be mediocre for the rest of his career. They are both firmly planted in Tier 10 on the HOF scale.
I calculated tiers for every predominantly 20th century pitcher that I could think of that has the distinction of being more HOF-worthy than Rollie Fingers. I've listed all of them above tier 10. In Tier 10 there are so many that it's too much work to try to list them all, and quite a few of them you've probably never heard of anyway, so I just listed a relatively recent sample.
K. Brown 4
Schilling 4
Stieb 5
Mussina 5
Trout 6
Tiant 6
Walters 6
Pierce 7
Newsom 7
Cone 7
Appier 7
Saberhagen 7
Adams 7
Bridges 7
Vaughn 7
W. Wood 7
C. Mays 7
Luque 8
Harder 8
Warneke 8
Reuschel 8
Key 8
Dutch Leonard 8
Hershiser 8
Shocker 8
John 8
Kaat 8
Viola 8
Ferrell 8
Finley 9
Guidry 9
D. Martinez 9
Simmons 9
McDowell 9
S. Rogers 9
Brecheen 9
Quinn 9
V. Blue 9
Maglie 9
Messersmith 9
Tanana 9
Gooden 9
Tudor 9
Candelaria 10
Chance 10
Hough 10
K. Rogers 10
Moyer 10
Morris 10
Lolich 10
Reuss 10
A few pitchers of interest:
The pitchers in tiers 4 and 5 ought to be in the HOF; they were great pitchers and better than most of the pitchers already in the HOF.
Wilbur Wood would be in the HOF had he pitched for better teams. The White Sox had him in the bullpen for years before they finally figured out he was too good for that and he promptly had a peak that fits in nicely in tier 3. Had he been allowed to start, and had the White Sox been a good team, Wood may have won 20 games 8 years in a row.
Tiant would be in the HOF had he pitched for a team better than the Indians early in his career, and in a park other than Fenway later in his career. Even so, I don't really understand why he's not. He was so much better than Hunter, who pitched at the same time, that I don't really see how any HOF voter could possibly not have seen it.
Yes, Charlie Hough is more deserving of the HOF than Jack Morris.
Sadly, I don't see Schilling ever getting in and it has nothing to do with his on-field performance.
here's my suggestion: when a player the caliber of _____________________, who anyone with a brain that follows MLB knows beyond a reasonable doubt should be elected isn't a unanimous choice, those voting against that player lose voting rights for a 5-year period.
politics and petty rivalries should have no place in the process.
Why was Catfish Hunter so mediocre in your opinion? I think he was pretty good for quite a long
time. Started pitching for the K.C. A's who were terrible and the early Oakland A's who were terrible.
The A's didn't get good until he was an 8-9 year veteran. Then he won 20 games five years in a row,
including an era title. Didn't you just say Wilbur Wood might have won 20 games eight years in a row
if he was on a better team. Well, Catfish might have done the same.
One year he started 39 games and completed 30 of them. Finished with a 3.26 career era.
Where is the mediocrity?
One point about era. Back when Catfish pitched the starters completed a lot more games than
pitchers of today. So today pitchers basically don't pitch any more when they get tired.
Back then they kept going, so isn't an era of 3.26 in the 70's more impressive than a pitcher today
with the same era?
Former Major league umpire Ron Luciano wrote a book; "The Umpire Strikes Back" (GREAT read btw). In it he says "Catfish" has the best control of any pitcher he ever saw. Hunter would throw a pitch on the outside edge and if it got called a strike he would move it over a have inch at a time until it got called a ball...............then right back on the edge.
He also said Catfish would tend to get lazy with his pitches and they would get hit a mile. Luciano said it didn't seem to bother Hunter at all.
Not sure if this means anything as far as HOF "worthiness" is concerned, but Luciano saw a lot of good pitchers and he says Mr. Hunter had the best control..............when he was trying.
I am assuming that he gets ripped for pitching in Oakland and Yankee stadium both considered pitcher friendly parks. From 1972-75, his "best" seasons, Hunter's away record was 39-20. He had a lower era at home where he was 51-18, by about one run except for 1975 where they were about the same
See Sandy Koufax, rated by (too) many to be one of the all-time greats, but he was only good for 1/2 of his career and only great at Dodger Stadium, another pitcher friendly park.
He really was only a full time starter (over 30 starts) for 10 years, not exactly Warren Spahn ;-)
Easy or hard park...... did any other pitcher during Hunter's time achieve what he did? Anyone on the same staff? Vida Blue was good but not as good as Catfish. Jim Palmer was much better, but other than that, Mickey Lolich, Nolan Ryan? Only looking at AL, in NL, Seaver and Carlton were MUCH better, but that's about it for the time frame.
He won as much as anyone but lost a lot less. You can only guess what the numbers would have been if he traded places with say, Gaylord Perry. They might be educated guesses, but you just don't (and can't) know for sure.
I am kind of on the fence with Hunter. I can see him being in, or out of HOF. If I had to say, I would say out.
Hunter's lifetime home ERA was 2.70
Hunter's lifetime road ERA was 3.92
That is a pretty stark contrast.
Sandy Koufax in his peak had an ERA+ of 167, and led the league in innings pitched twice in that five year peak
Catfish Hunter in his peak had an ERA+ of 127 and led the league in innings pitched once in that five year peak.
Another pretty stark contrast.
Luis Tiant pitched 3,486 innings with an ERA + of 114
Hunter pitched 3,449 innings with an ERA+ of 104
That is a more apt comparison, and one where Hunter comes up short
If you focus only on his peak, where I said he was "very good", then he looks like a Hall of Famer. That is, if you delude yourself that those five very good years are representative of his career then you will see a Hall of Fame Career. But Hunter pitched for 6 years and 1,300+ innings before that, and his ERA+ (ERA compared to an average pitcher) was 96; he was not only not good, he was worse than average. And after his five year peak he pitched another 4 years and 665 innings with an ERA+ of 91 - a lot worse than an average pitcher. Sandwiched in between was his five year peak, and it was a very good - not great - peak. Among those with better peaks are Andy Messersmith, John Tudor and Sal Maglie. Among those with MUCH better peaks are Sam McDowell, Dwight Gooden, Ron Guidry and Urban Shocker (Who? Exactly.)
There's a stat on BBref that you've probably never noticed; it's called waaWL%. This stat determines the W/L percentage that an average team would have had with the given pitcher pitching, so .500 would be the stat for an average pitcher. Hunter's stat is .511. The difference between Hunter and an average pitcher is little more than statistical noise. For Hunter's 5-year peak, his stat is .561. That's very good, but as peaks go it's pretty low. Andy Messersmith's career waaWL% is .553, just a hair below Hunter's peak; his 5-year peak is .587. Andy Messersmith was not a great pitcher, but he was clearly better than Jim Hunter. Sam McDowell's career stat is .551; at his peak .612. McDowell was a MUCH better pitcher than Hunter, and we're still in Tier 9. Move up to truly great pitchers like Dave Stieb (.570, .633) and there's just no comparison; Stieb's average is better than Hunter's peak.
What Jim Hunter had was a host of teammates much better than himself, a career that was effectively over as a quality pitcher at 29, a cool nickname and the good fortune to spend his entire career in pitcher's parks. Yeah, he won 20+ games five times. So did Hippo Vaughn (.564, .614) and I haven't seen much of a groundswell of support to get him in the HOF. The bottom line is that if Catfish Hunter is a HOF pitcher, then there are fewer than half as many pitchers in the HOF as there ought to be. But given the pitchers that are there now, Hunter is as out of place as a turd in a punchbowl.
Tiant was better, so was Messersmith and McDowell.
The answer to who achieved as much as Hunter is going to depend on what you mean by "achieve". If you're counting 20 win seasons as an "achievement" then we're just going in circles since it was the A's and Yankees that achieved those. If we isolate what the pitcher achieved independently of his team, and if we define "Hunter's time" as any 10-year period that includes Hunter's prime (1966-1975 through 1971-1980) then the following pitchers achieved more during "Hunter's time": Gibson, Seaver, Perry, Jenkins, Blyleven, Niekro, Palmer, and Carlton. And that sounds about right; if you ignore the horrible years at the beginning and end of his career, Hunter was the 9th best pitcher of his era. Of course, if that was what it took to get in the HOF we'd have about twice as many pitchers in the HOF as we do.
If you are instead defining "Hunter's time" as just his five year peak then only Perry and Seaver and Wilbur Wood achieved more in that span. But if we're going to define HOF worthiness by nothing more than a 5-year stretch (which is absurd) then he still loses to such luminaries as Dolph Luque, Billy Pierce and Harry Brecheen, and he gets beaten badly by Wilbur Wood, Hippo Vaughn and, yes, Urban Shocker.
Hunter is in the HOF because he pitched for great teams. If you imagine him on Cleveland during his prime he would have won 20 games at most twice, would never have led the league in ERA, would never have appeared in the playoffs or WS, and would be remembered today as a good pitcher, almost as good as Andy Messersmith, but definitely not as good as Sam McDowell. Tell me why that's wrong.
Eckersley was not an excellent starting pitcher. He had some excellent years (1978 & 1979) but his career 3.71 ERA as a starter tells the story. His excellence wasn't masked by being in Boston - it was masked by him being drunk for a long stretch of his career. Let's not forget that the whole reason he was in the pen in the first place is that he was terrible in Chicago as a starter in '86.
Note that I didn't say 1B was easy - I said it was the easiest. Let me clarify a little more - it's a very easy position to be mediocre at. You're rarely asked to field difficult grounders and 98% of the throws are easy to catch.
Clark was obviously a lot better than that. But was he John Olerud or Keith Hernandez? No.
Maybe "excellent" overstates how good he was. But despite his bad final year as a starter with Chicago his career ERA+ as a starter was 111, and he was in the top 10 in ERA+ five times including a 1st and a 2nd. And you overlooked his rookie season when you listed his excellent years. He was a "very good" starter.
I'm not saying your wrong in stating he was/is over rated by some.
I'll say it again. Hunter would not get my vote for HOF.
He had an excellent won/loss record for 5 years, he pitched better in Oakland by about 1 run per game than on the road. How much better did the opposing pitchers do in Oakland? I assume they pitched better there too.
Like it or not pitchers get too much credit for 20+ win seasons, string 5 together and average 20 for 7 and (yes it's a team game) he deserves credit. Four of those years he was top 4 in Cy Young award voting, winning once.
A crappy pitcher on a great team will not win 20+ games in a season even once!
His career was FAR to short, even with the great 5 year run, to be considered as good as Gibson, Seaver, Carlton, Palmer etc.
Sam McDowell is a great example of a guy who would have won a lot more games if he pitched for better teams in more pitcher friendly parks.
I wouldn't consider Hunter "a turd in a punchbowl". Maybe a fly in the ointment, but never a turd in a punchbowl.
Hippo Vaughn was pretty good! Nice find!!!!!
I did miss his rookie year - misread it as being a very partial season and ignored it.
I think 3.71 ERA, with multiple terrible seasons, puts you in the "pretty good" category. The 111 ERA+ speaks to that. Regardless of the wording, not good enough to be a benefit to his HOF resume, IMHO.
Eck's 111 is better than several HOFers, including Pennock (106), Wynn (107), Galvin (107), Sutton (108), Grimes (108), Ruffing (109), Haines (109) and of course Marquard (103) and Hunter (104). It's also only 1 point behind Nolan Ryan. Pitching 2,500 innings with an ERA+ of 111 is very good. It's not HOF-worthy all by itself, for sure, but it's very good and it adds something to a HOF case. Hunter did it, and added another 1,000 innings with an ERA+ of 90; Eck added another 800 innings with an ERA+ of 136. Eck's HOF case isn't the strongest out there, but it's stronger, by far, than any of the tier 9 or 10 pitchers. Where he ranks among the tier 7 and 8 pitchers will depend on how you weight peak and career and other subjective factors.
"He's better than the worst possible HOF examples!" is not exactly the first argument I'd go to. Let's put in every middle infielder better than Phil Rizzuto!
Ryan also did it for 2900 more innings while never being terrible like Eck was.
Whoop dee doo. 800 innings is nothing. As a closer, an ERA+ of 136 isn't even that good. In the last 10 seasons alone, 151 guys have had an ERA+ with 20+ saves.
There are currently 21 guys with 200+ saves and an ERA+ of 136 or higher for their careers, including luminaries like Rafael Soriano and Robb Nen.
In other words, Eck is two not-impressive careers smashed together with four amazing (+1 good) years in the middle. 280 innings.
Tabe, I'm not really disagreeing with your overall point. My point is simply that when you say that Eckersley's career provides no basis for being in the HOF, you're ignoring a rather large group of people that are in the HOF on a far shakier basis than he is. If Catfish Hunter is a HOFer, then Eckersley is also a HOFer, and on a much more solid basis than Hunter. So when I say that Eckersley deserves to be in the HOF, I'm saying he deserves to be there by the standards that have been used historically. What you're arguing is that he doesn't deserve to be there because the standards used historically are too low and have allowed pitchers, like Hunter, Haines, Marquard, etc., to get in.
In Ryan's case, he's not in for being more valuable than other pitchers over the course of his career, because far more valuable pitchers have been excluded. He's in for breaking important records and for becoming hugely famous for how he played the game. I have no problem with that, in fact I think it would have been ridiculous to exclude him. But Eckersley was every bit as valuable a pitcher as Ryan. I do think Eckersley deserves to be in the HOF in part because his pitching was good enough by historical standards not to make a mockery of the HOF by putting him there, and in part because of the fame he attained - through his own play, not that of his teammates - by the way he played the game (switching to the bullpen, setting records, having HOF level seasons). It surely is not the most solid case for the HOF out there, and it bothers me much more that Catfish Hunter is in the HOF than it would if Eckersley were not.