This week, the Baseball Hall of Fame revealed the twelve candidates that will be considered for 2014 induction by the Veterans Committee. This year's panel is considering players from the Expansion Era (1973 to the present), a welcome change from last year, when the Committee inducted three men from the pre-integration era (Hank O'Day, Jacob Ruppert, and Deacon White) who have all been dead since the Franklin Roosevelt administration. Some of the twelve names should provoke some interesting debates; others are a bit more questionable.
1. TOMMY JOHN
Few people seriously consider Tommy John to be a Hall of Famer, even if you give him credit for famously undergoing the surgery that now bears his name. But his presence on this ballot does serve a useful comparative purpose:
Tommy John: 3.34 ERA, 111 ERA+, 288 wins, 62.3 WAR in over 4,700 innings
Jack Morris: 3.90 ERA, 105 ERA+, 254 wins, 43.8 WAR in over 3,800 innings
In the year 2000, these two pitchers both appeared on the official writers' ballot. Morris received 22.2% of the vote and John got 27.1%. Since then, Morris has climbed all the way to 67.1% while John dropped off the ballot having peaked at 31.7%. Their career numbers did not change between 2000 and 2013, but the perception of their respective careers obviously did.
John may not be worthy of a Cooperstown plaque, but based on those quick-and-dirty numbers above, he certainly deserves to be slotted ahead of Morris in the hypothetical queue. It will be fairly ironic if, in a few months, Morris gets inducted by the BBWAA and John gets rejected by the Veterans Committee.
2. STEVE GARVEY
Not even close. His shiny .294 career average is undercut by his .329 OBP and .446 slugging percentage, both unacceptable numbers from a first baseman. His career-high in OPS was .852. He fell short of 40 WAR. His career OPS+ of 117 isn't even as good as borderline Hall of Famers like Tony Perez (122) and Orlando Cepeda (133). He's the Michael Young on this ballot.
Here's the problem: if the Hall of Fame wanted a first baseman from this era on the ballot, why not Keith Hernandez? He offers virtually the same batting average (.296) and slugging percentage (.436) as Garvey, but has a massive edge in OBP (.382, better than Willie McCovey and Harmon Killebrew). With 60 WAR, a 128 OPS+, and a reputation as one of the best defensive first basemen in history, Hernandez would've been a much stronger choice than Garvey.
3. DAVE CONCEPCION
Apparently there's a vast conspiracy to get every member of the Big Red Machine into the Hall. If we're not vigilant, Tony Perez may try to sneak Concepcion in by hiding him under his shirt. This paragraph by MLB.com columnist Terrence Moore provides an example of the bizarre things people are willing to claim about Concepcion in favor of his candidacy:
"Before Concepcion's career, Major League shortstops were mostly one dimensional -- all-field, little-hit, not much of anything else. After Concepcion's career, you had Cal Ripken Jr., Barry Larkin, Alex Rodriguez, Derek Jeter and the rest, because during Concepcion's career, he showed everybody that shortstops could field, hit and run."
If it just so happens that you have been searching for a real-life example of the logical fallacy "post hoc ergo propter hoc," well, check it off your bingo card. Just because Thing X happened after Thing Y does not mean Thing Y caused Thing X. The mere fact that Ripken, Larkin, Rodriguez, and Jeter all came after Concepcion does not mean we can attribute their success to Concepcion. That's ... quite a reach.
Anyway, the claim that Concepcion "showed everybody that shortstops could ... hit" doesn't really stand up to scrutiny. And by "scrutiny" I mean "going to BaseballReference.com and glancing at Concepcion's career OBP (.322), slugging percentage (.357), and OPS (.679)." His OPS+ of 88 tells me that he was actually 12% worse than the average hitter throughout his career. Even his career batting average was just .267. I guess he hit .300 a couple of times? So basically Terrence Moore is claiming that Dave Concepcion hitting .301 in 1978 is what paved the way for Cal Ripken's 431 home runs and Alex Rodriguez's .942 OPS. A real trail-blazer, that Dave Concepcion. Pretty much the slap-hitting version of Rosa Parks.
The verdict here is "no," in case that wasn't abundantly clear already.
4. DAVE PARKER
Similar in some ways to Dale Murphy. Parker enjoyed a short stretch of dominance, but the rest of his career just wasn't good enough. His year-by-year WAR totals bear this out:
Dave Parker's six best seasons: worth a combined 36 WAR
Dave Parker's other fourteen seasons: worth a combined 4 WAR
Parker's peak was outstanding. Yet he was a barely-above-average player for the rest of his career, which leaves his WAR total at just 40 and basically eliminates any chance of induction. Much like with Steve Garvey, the Hall of Fame could have chosen a stronger outfield candidate from this era, like Dwight Evans.
5. DAN QUISENBERRY
Another interesting career, but a reliever who only had ten relevant seasons can't be a serious Hall candidate.
6. TED SIMMONS
The definition of a borderline case. No one's outraged by his exclusion, and no one would be outraged by his induction. The 13 Hall of Fame catchers have an average of about 52 WAR and Simmons has 50. His career numbers compare very favorably to those of Gary Carter and Carlton Fisk, and he played in just as many games as both of them. He also had five excellent offensive seasons in the late 1970s, so it's not like he was all about longevity. Simmons might be the only player on this ballot clearly worth a vote. At the same time, no one's getting bent out of shape if he falls short this year.
7-12. THE NON-PLAYERS
The other six slots on the ballot are reserved for off-the-field contributors: Bobby Cox, Joe Torre, Tony LaRussa, Billy Martin, George Steinbrenner, and Marvin Miller. These are far more difficult to analyze objectively. A quick gut reaction to the names: Cox, Torre, and LaRussa should all be inducted together as the three dominant managers of the last two-plus decades; Miller should posthumously join them for his contributions to the players' union. Billy Martin, however, suffers by comparison to the other managers on the ballot, and Steinbrenner's impact is both tainted and overrated.
A quick note on Torre: the members of the Veterans Committee are allowed to take playing careers into consideration when voting on these off-the-field contributors. That makes Torre's case a no-brainer because his playing career alone might be worthy of induction. With a .297/.365/.452 batting line and a 129 OPS+, he was one of the best offensive catchers in history, comparable to Yogi Berra and Johnny Bench. He also has more WAR (57.4) than any catcher not in the Hall of Fame (not including the still-eligible Mike Piazza and Ivan Rodriguez). The caveat here is that he only spent 903 of his 2,207 career games as a catcher; the rest came as a corner infielder. Perhaps that's why he wasn't inducted as a player. Regardless, Torre is one of the rare few who had two entirely separate careers in baseball that were both excellent enough, independent of each other, to warrant serious Hall of Fame consideration. More than any other figure on this ballot, he deserves recognition from the Veterans Committee for that impressive feat.
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