2017 Cleveland Indians Positional Previews: Second Base
January 18, 2017Defensive: WFNY Mock NFL Draft Strategies
January 19, 2017The 2017 Baseball Hall of Fame results were announced on Wednesday, with Tim Raines, Jeff Bagwell and Ivan Rodriguez joining the hallowed ranks of Cooperstown. It was an encouraging sign to see another three recent stars advance into the Hall — even if Cleveland.com’s Bill Livingston abstained from participating in peculiar fashion.
In today’s age, the Hall of Fame process has turned into a year-long escapade. Ryan Thibodaux’s Hall of Fame Tracker has made it into the legitimate mainstream of baseball conversation. So it’s never too early to start thinking about next year’s ballot. And among the upcoming big-named first-year entrants are two Cleveland Indians legends: Jim Thome and Omar Vizquel.
They’ll be up against several returning stars, as Trevor Hoffman (74.0 percent), Vladimir Guerrero (71.7) and Edgar Martinez (58.6) led the pack of the additional six players to receive 50-plus on this year’s ballot. Along with fellow newcomers Chipper Jones, Scott Rolen and Andruw Jones, it’ll be another tight battle in 2018.
As we wrap up the Twitter discussions of this year’s ballot and look forward to next year, it seemed like a worthwhile While We’re Waiting topic to dive into the statistics behind the cases for Thome and Vizquel. Do you seem them landing in the Hall of Fame eventually? How many years might it take? How do they look on the upcoming ballot?
Starting off, how does Jim Thome compare to fellow offense-focused sluggers in recent ballot history?
The stats above are from Baseball-Reference.com’s Hall of Fame ballot guide. As a quick glossary: It shows career Wins Above Replacement; WAR in the player’s best seven seasons; Jay Jaffe’s JAWS score system; and the Jaffe system average for that position among Hall of Famers. Then, several counting stats for career comparison.
Thome’s 612 home runs certainly stand out from the crowd. They still rank No. 7 in MLB history, although Albert Pujols (591) might soon surpass him. Historically, 500 home runs marked a shoo-in for any candidate. But that hasn’t been the case for many players in the recent steroid-suspected era, as Sammy Sosa (609), Mark McGwire (583), Rafael Palmeiro (569) and Gary Sheffield (509) can all attest.
Of course, Thome isn’t suspected of any performance-enhancing abuse, so surpassing the 600-homer mark will appeal very favorably to many voters. And his on-base percentage and slugging percentage compare favorably to recent inductee Frank Thomas. He looks good from the quick peak at WAR7 and JAWS.
One thing voters might get hung up on could be Thome’s last eight years of his career, 2005-12, where he battled injuries and bounced from team to team. He still knocked out 189 home runs in those years, but he wasn’t the same dominant force as he was in those Cleveland years and his first two in Philadelphia. For a first-year ballot entree, it’s been a long time since he was in his peak MLB performance.
Overall, the Peoria native looks pretty good in his complete resume. The main hiccup could be timing. As is well known, a player has to get 75 percent of the vote to gain entry into the Hall of Fame. And even though voters can include up to 10 players and Thome will likely be fine eventually, he might be very close to the margin in year one against Edgar, Chipper, etc. That’s the numbers game that often occurs in balloting, fair or not.
But what about Omar Vizquel, the shortstop who wowed crowds in the early days of Jacobs Field. How does he look against fellow infielders in recent ballot history?
The offense is obviously the issue here. Very few comparable, legitimate candidates have gotten on the ballot in recent years. Would you rather me compare Omar’s resume to the career resumes of Edgar Renteria, Carlos Baerga, Bret Boone or David Eckstein? Or does digging back a bit farther provide a bit more context?
From a WAR perspective, Vizquel’s value exclusively comes from his excellent fielding and position scarcity, as expected. His offense was well below the league average. In actuality, he only contributed 5.0 wins above average in his career, per Baseball-Reference.com. Thome, on the other hand, contributed 37.5 wins above average.
It’s obviously hard to compare a first baseman to a defensive wizard. They contribute to the game in varied ways. Was Vizquel’s defense more of a historical anomaly than Thome’s offense? How could you properly quantify defense to the level necessary to make this decision?
Vizquel played longer, had equivalent or better offensive statistics than Ozzie Smith, but feels like a longer shot for inclusion to the Hall. Ozzie’s defense perhaps stuck out better in the ’80s and/or actually some degree better. But it’s an awful close comparison.
Ultimately, I’m guessing a second-year success for Jim Thome in 2019. And I’m feeling awful pessimistic about Vizquel. It could come down to the wire, in the final years of his 10-year candidacy. If not, I’d imagine he’ll get in eventually in one of the revamped Hall of Fame procedures for looking back on different eras. How do you think things will end up? Feel free to vote on Twitter or share in the comments.
Jim Thome and Omar Vizquel both enter the @baseballhall ballot in 2018. How do you think they'll eventually do in the voting?
— Jacob L. Rosen (@JacobLRosen) January 18, 2017
81 Comments
“Of course, Thome isn’t suspected of any performance-enhancing abuse”
Every star from that era is suspected of PEDs. Sorry.
Omar Vizquel is my favorite Indian ever. I would love for him to be in, and I think he deserves to be in. His perception was seriously by the fact he had to compete with offensive juggernauts at SS like A-Rod, Nomar, Jeter, Tejada, etc. Had Ozzie Smith played in Omar’s era and vice versa, I think Omar would be easily in the HoF while Ozzie would be the one overlooked by the change in the game. I know Ozzie was a flashier player than Omar, and certainly Ozzie’s NLCS walk off HR complete with the iconic “Go Crazy” call helped raise his profile, but having to compete with the offensive production that shortstops in Omar’s era put up would have been a tall task for any defensive-first player.
I would love to see Omar get in and I think he deserves to get, but I don’t think he has any chance whatsoever.
Ozzy was the gold standard, but I think the aura of the Wizard of Oz has grown to mythical proportions as time has passed, and has pushed his anemic offensive capabilities into obscurity.
I think Omar was the better positional player, but hey, chicks dig the long ball.
My mom named her cat after Omar but he isn’t making it into the hall…
There are still a lot of old-time baseball writers who appreciate a player’s overall game and don’t give a fig about BIP, BEP, and BAP (although they do know BOP). So I like Omar’s chances.
But once the nerds finally take over, fuggetaboutit.
It’ll be interesting with Andruw Jones also on the ballot if there isn’t a renewed intensity in the discussions about how much defense means and if the current measurements might be minimizing their true value.
That said, Thome in, Omar out is the likely outcome here.
Edgar, Bonds, Clemens, Vlad, and Mussina all need to get in soon too. The stuffed ballot is problematic and BBWAA should probably allow a one-year cleansing of unlimited votes to clear the decks.
Also, Tim Raines in, Kenny Lofton without even a chance. No one said life was fair.
Bonds and Clemens don’t need to get in at all.
But I agree that Lofton got totally hosed. On second thought, maybe that’s not a good sign for Omar.
HOF is a museum of the greatest players in MLB history so that someone can walk through what each era was like and see the greats.
They absolutely should have a disclaimer about that era but those guys should be in. Pudge is in, Bags is in. Why should Clemens and Bonds be punished for being better players who also used PEDs?
The old school guys are the ones that have historically ignored some of the finer points on players like Omar unless they were extremely popular like Ozzie.
I know you will come up with ample data to back up that claim, so give me a small taste for my own knowledge. What do you base that on?
HOF voting is a farce anyway.
The whole first, second, third, blah, blah, blah, ballot thing is beyond ridiculous.
A player either IS, or IS NOT a HOFer.
Yeah, I was surprised that I-Roid got in, seeing that he showed up for spring training one year looking like his hat size doubled, and then showed up a few years later looking like Pee Wee Herman.
Doesn’t make it right, though.
I agree but not enough of the voters pay attention and need to have people explain to them the details rather than having them dig into it themselves.
BBWAA would be better to have a selection committee handle it but then it wouldn’t get as much press. MSM loves to both pat itself on the back and tear each other down. Lots of free debate talk.
But he was popular with the ladies, amirite?
Felix Fermin has a great cat name, come to think of it.
and, this with the caveat that I’m sure the adv. stat guys will have their own blindspots.
two most recent examples come into play here:
(1) Tim Raines induction – lots of stat-digging to show his true overall value in baserunning, overall hitting, and being so good at many things while not truly elite in many (other than SB)
(2) Andruw Jones talk for next year – already, people are pointing to his defensive statistics which are so, so far out there showing he is truly belonging even without looking at his offensive stats.
ESPN’s Jayson Stark says both Thome & Vizquel belong (his ballot):
http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/18503141
If you’d rather have had Omar as your SS than AROD from 1995-2005, god bless but gimme Arod all day every day. I don’t think PED usage was proper, ethical, fair, whatever, but I think you may need to revisit the SS years of AROD.
Omar comps historically to Lou Whitaker, and Sweet Lou was kicked to the curb without a 2nd thought, Kenny Lofton-John Olerud style. Not good.
The basis of Omar needs to work from, is the idea that SS is the most vital (catchers can quibble but they are more of the battery) defensive position and the value of an all-time great SS is underlooked. That’s how he gets in. Forget hits, games played, stolen basis.
He is considered a top 3 defensive shortstop and that has it’s own merit, and that he was a vital cog on a perennial playoff team. That’s his platform.
Felix is the name of my mom’s other cat….
/yells out back door for Dybzinski and Asdrubal to come in from the dog house.
Sorry, mg, but that doesn’t really back up your claim. But no matter. I don’t care to pursue it. We’ve got better things to hash.
In a similar vein, I think getting to the Super Bowl a couple times and maybe even winning one would have helped Bernie’s chances.
We had to put Ass-cab down. He was always getting out at the worst possible times.
A-Roid’s overwhelming advantage at the plate obviously makes him hard to pass up, but Omar was the superior fielder.
Passing on Omar for the HOF just because he didn’t have A-Roid’s plate prowess, is doing the SS position an injustice.
Six words: Pee Wee Reese and Phil Rizzuto.
Of course, they played during baseball’s Golden Age in New York, which probably had a dozen newspapers at the time all hyping them up. And they went to a lot of World Series. But neither was much of a hitter. I don’t know about their fielding.
It’s not an either/or. And you can’t falsely assume Omar never used HGH or something to that degree. Not sure we can make that leap so easily.
It’s not an either/or. And you can’t falsely assume Omar never used HGH or something to that degree. Not sure we can make that leap so easily.
Here’s all time dWAR
http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/WAR_def_career.shtml
Omar is 10th
I’m also a believer that player’s cases for the Hall change over time. For example, it’s going to look pretty strange once guys like Bonds and Clemens are in the hall, but Sammy Sosa isn’t.
I don’t want to live in a world where the Hall of Fame has Omar and Kenny, but not Roger and Barry. It’s also worth saying again: it wasn’t against the rules. And even if you personally view it as cheating, like you said, why are Clemens and Bonds punished while others aren’t? It’s especially egregious for Clemens, who took on (and beat) the Federal government on claims that he took PEDs. The full force of the US Justice system can’t prove that he “cheated”, yet the high and mighty sports columnist for the Bumblecrust Gazette won’t let him in the hall? Yeah, that makes sense.
On Clemens, it is more a civil vs criminal discussion. 51% chance he took PEDs? Yeah.
But, my noted stance is similar to yours. Let them in, note the era they were in and what was going on and scandals that were prevalent with them.
It’s odd how I can be simultaneously appalled and completely okay that guys like Lofton, Whitaker, and Edmonds were one-and-dones.
Omar Vizquel was the greatest defensive infielder I have ever seen, and yes I’m old enough to remember Ozzie. I don’t care about the relative lack of offensive sparkle, the defense should make him a lock regardless. And yeah, I guess Thome gets in. But I’ve never really thought of the guy as being on THAT level, for whatever reason. The numbers are the numbers, but I don’t readily think of him when I think his era of the game, nor do I think of him at the top of the list of names from those great Tribe teams. Nothing particular against the guy, though of course his leaving town was a bit shady (also understandable), I just don’t think of him among the greats. Didn’t understand the statue, either. Of course I’m still bitter that Kenny Lofton isn’t in, but I freely admit bias there.
Omar and Ozzie were good defensively in different ways
Ozzie could get to balls that Omar never would but Omar could make plays on bounces and anticipate how/where to slot his arm that Ozzie never could
Cal is also a bit under-appreciated as a great defensive SS
Every player since WW2 should be suspected then.
D-stats really need to be compared position-by-position. SS gets way more leverage in dWAR.
7th dWAR among SS & only 13th in RField among SS
They were better than Sammy, but yeah.
Bernie took the final knee of a Superbowl win
(not what you are going for but always loved that he got to do what so few QBs – even SB winning ones – get to do)
“had equivalent or better offensive statistics than Ozzie Smith,”
From b-ref’s WAR calculations. Ozzie Smith was 117 runs below average with the bat for his career 102 runs above average running the bases. Omar was 244 runs below average with the bat and 8 runs above average running the bases. The offensive numbers favor Smith, and they aren’t even close.
True… I could have picked better examples.
Reese was a league average hitter, and Rizzuto missed three prime years, ages 25-27, to serve in WW2, that he almost certainly deserves some bonus points for.
Yeah, not good examples. Both were better offensive players than Omar. Plus, they had the same kind of reputation for dazzling defensive work. So clearly, there’s some room in the hall for those kind of players. Omar just doesn’t meet that standard.
People forget that Ozzie played a minimum of 81 games a year on the rug with its perfect bounces, while Omar had to deal with the vagaries of natural grass. I have never seen anyone that could play defense at SS like Omar and in addition to seeing Ozzie, I also saw Aparicio and Belanger, who are alltime greats. If Omar doesn’t get in then baseball might as well just analyze offensive stats, and ignore defense. Having said this, I agree with the consensus that if he gets in at all it will be after a number of years.
I don’t think anyone denies that Vizquel was a great defensive player. If he doesn’t get in, it’s because they are accounting for the offense along with the defense.
Since this will most likely be the only HOF story here, I’d like a moment of silence for the one-and-done former Cleveland players on this year’s ballot: Casey Blake, Arthur Rhodes, and Orlando Cabrera.
Maybe if John Olerud didn’t embarrass himself by wearing that stupid batting helmet in the field, he’d be in Cooperstown by now?
#hottake
Melt the statue into ploughshares! http://stream1.gifsoup.com/view4/4117580/simpsons-angry-mob-o.gif
Thanks Steve. Read Jayson Starks piece that he just posted at espn.com. Eleven gold gloves and over 2800 hits. I agree that his offense was mediocre, but I think his incredible defensive accomplishments override.
That’s the thing though, his offense wasn’t even mediocre. He was much worse than even Ozzie Smith at the plate.
The average HoFer has 69 WAR, Vizquel is at 45. WAR isn’t the argument ender, but it’s a great place to start. Vizquel is clearly a step behind the HoF standard, and I’m not sure he has the narrative thing working for him as well as Clevelanders think. We loved him, absolutely, but nationally he is a guy that made just three all-star games and received only one MVP vote in his career – for second place. No rings, and his big postseason moment wasn’t a home run like Smith or Mazeroski, but a passed ball.
Corey Blake