Ever since Bert Blyleven was inducted to the Hall of Fame, I've been wondering who the best eligible non-Hall of Fame pitcher is. There are many different metrics you can use in an attempt to measure this. I decided to combine a whole bunch of them and see who the consensus pick is.
Click to behold.
How did I do this?
I took seven metrics—a combination of old school (Wins, for crying out loud!), new school (WAR and wWAR), and those in between (HOF Monitor, HOF Standards, Black Ink, and Gray Ink). All stats were pulled from Baseball-Reference.com. For each metric, I pulled the Top 30 players not in the Hall of Fame (but have been retired long enough to be eligible).
I did an oh-so-scientific reverse scaling, giving the #1 guy 30 points and the #30 guy one point. I then added up all the scores to see who the consensus pick was.
And this is what I got.
Observations
- Well then. Jim McCormick pretty much aces every single metric. Is it safe to say he should probably be in the Hall of Fame?
- The top seven pitchers (and eight of the top nine) are from the 19th century. Not sure exactly what to make of that.
- 297-game winner Bobby Mathews ranks fourth despite no love from WAR or wWAR. I'm guessing those other metrics weigh wins pretty heavily. Well, that and there's no pitcher WAR data for the National Association. Will White also gets no WAR/wWAR love but gets by okay.
- The top 20th century pitcher is Tommy John. I happen to agree that he should be in the Hall of Fame. I think people lump him in the same group with Jim Kaat too easily because of their similar win totals. This graph shows how the separate. John was the better pitcher.
- And there's Kevin Brown again. He rates as the #2 modern pitcher despite no love from HOF Monitor, Black Ink, or Wins. He's the #1 modern pitcher (post-1900) by wWAR. And I'm still pretty sure he's the best pitcher not in the Hall. Why not John? I think many of those Ink and HOF metrics are too win-dependent.
- Luis Tiant performs quite well despite only ranking in four of the seven metrics. He does well on wins, but doesn't show up on HOF Monitor, Black Ink, or even Gray Ink.
- Jack Morris does pretty well here. I mean, he wasn't a bad pitcher, but he gets a lot of his rankings from his win total. Of course, he doesn't rank under WAR or wWAR. He also didn't rank in Black Ink. But boy, did he own Gray Ink.
- Al Spalding, of course, is in the Hall of Fame. But he's not in for his pitching. He's in as a pioneer. This list shows that he's deserving of (at least) a bit of consideration for his pitching days.
- Rick Reuschel is #1 on the WAR list. He's #8 on the wWAR list. But he doesn't appear anywhere else and drops to 20th.
- Frank Tanana is just plain weird. He rates pretty well in WAR and wWAR, but the only other appearance he makes is for wins. Kind of an odd combination.
Here's everyone with a score of 10 or more:
Name | Score |
---|---|
Jim McCormick | 199 |
Tony Mullane | 189 |
Tommy Bond | 146 |
Bobby Mathews | 138 |
Charlie Buffinton | 118 |
Bob Caruthers | 111 |
Will White | 97 |
Tommy John | 94 |
Gus Weyhing | 88 |
Kevin Brown | 80 |
Luis Tiant | 79 |
Jack Morris | 76 |
Silver King | 76 |
Eddie Cicotte | 74 |
Jim Kaat | 69 |
David Cone | 65 |
Ed Morris | 61 |
Al Spalding* | 57 |
Frank Tanana | 54 |
Rick Reuschel | 53 |
Jerry Koosman | 52 |
Billy Pierce | 51 |
Carl Mays | 51 |
Larry Corcoran | 41 |
Jim Whitney | 39 |
Bucky Walters | 36 |
Paul Derringer | 36 |
Tommy Bridges | 36 |
Bret Saberhagen | 34 |
Ron Guidry | 34 |
Chuck Finley | 33 |
Jack Quinn | 33 |
Dave Stieb | 32 |
Sam Jones | 31 |
Larry Jackson | 30 |
Bobo Newsom | 29 |
Bill Hutchinson | 28 |
Dwight Gooden | 28 |
Wes Ferrell | 28 |
Dennis Martinez | 27 |
Jack Powell | 26 |
Sam McDowell | 26 |
Urban Shocker | 26 |
Mark Baldwin | 25 |
Kevin Appier | 24 |
Lee Smith | 23 |
Sadie McMahon | 23 |
Sam Leever | 23 |
Ed Reulbach | 21 |
Wilbur Cooper | 21 |
Allie Reynolds | 20 |
Deacon Phillippe | 20 |
George Mullin | 20 |
Guy Hecker | 20 |
Orel Hershiser | 20 |
Charlie Root | 19 |
Hippo Vaughn | 19 |
John Franco | 19 |
Claude Passeau | 18 |
Wilbur Wood | 17 |
Dutch Leonard | 15 |
Jesse Tannehill | 15 |
Larry French | 15 |
George Uhle | 14 |
Lew Burdette | 14 |
Lon Warneke | 14 |
Ray Kremer | 14 |
Vida Blue | 14 |
Hooks Dauss | 13 |
Mel Harder | 13 |
Mark Langston | 12 |
Dave Foutz | 10 |
Mickey Lolich | 10 |