2015 Hall of Fame Ballot

Baseball Player Won-Loss Records
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2015 Hall of Fame Ballot

Earlier this week, the Baseball Writers Association of America (BBWAA) released the 2015 ballot for the National Baseball Hall of Fame. This article looks at the candidates on the 2015 Hall-of-Fame ballot. This is the third year for which I have written such an article: see 2013 and 2014. I also wrote an article that looked at what the 2014 election results might have looked like in the absence of the 10-player ballot limit.

Over the next month or so, I will be writing (fairly brief) articles on each of the players on this year's Hall-of-Fame ballot. These articles will be linked at the end of this article as they are posted.

The first table of this article looks at the 34 players on the ballot as measured by Player won-lost records. In a separate article, I looked at players already in the Hall of Fame and Hall of Merit and how their careers look measured by Player won-lost records. In that article, I identified Willie Stargell as perhaps the most typical Hall-of-Famer as measured by Player won-lost records and Reggie Smith as perhaps the most typical player in the Hall of Merit but not the Hall of Fame. I have included Stargell and Smith in the table below to give some sense of how this year's candidates compare to existing Hall-of-Fame (and Hall of Merit) standards.

		2015 Hall of Fame Ballot Player Won-Lost Records, sorted by pWORL
Player	Games	pWins	pLosses	pWOPA	pWORL	eWins	eLosses	eWOPA	eWORL
Barry Bonds	2,985	462.0	314.9	61.0	91.4	462.6	314.3	61.6	92.1
Roger Clemens	709	318.1	228.1	46.3	74.6	315.4	230.7	43.6	71.9
Randy 'Big Unit' Johnson	619	281.2	220.9	34.2	59.9	277.3	224.8	30.3	56.0
John Smoltz	735	239.7	201.1	26.6	48.5	237.2	203.7	24.1	45.9
Pedro J. Martinez	476	193.6	137.4	31.1	48.5	191.9	139.1	29.4	46.8
Mike Mussina	537	224.2	173.1	25.9	47.5	222.6	174.7	24.4	45.9
Alan Trammell	2,292	283.4	256.6	24.0	44.8	280.9	259.1	21.5	42.3
Craig Biggio	2,850	358.5	325.4	17.9	44.7	356.5	327.4	16.0	42.7
Gary Sheffield	2,575	341.8	289.7	17.7	43.6	343.6	288.0	19.4	45.3
Curt Schilling	571	206.9	172.0	22.7	42.0	205.2	173.7	21.0	40.3
Jeff Bagwell	2,150	275.3	202.5	22.7	41.8	274.7	203.1	22.1	41.1
Jeff Kent	2,297	302.5	264.8	19.3	41.5	299.2	268.1	16.1	38.2
Willie Stargell	2,356	292.9	232.1	18.7	39.9	295.4	229.6	21.1	42.4
Edgar Martinez	2,055	212.2	168.6	18.3	39.4	212.9	167.8	19.0	40.1
Mike Piazza	1,911	213.0	174.2	22.7	38.6	214.3	172.8	24.0	40.0
Larry Walker	1,984	266.7	214.5	17.6	36.8	267.7	213.5	18.6	37.8
Mark McGwire	1,874	219.8	158.6	21.7	36.6	220.4	158.0	22.3	37.2
Tim Raines Sr.	2,500	313.5	276.2	10.8	34.1	316.9	272.8	14.2	37.5
Reggie Smith	1,986	262.0	219.6	13.1	32.5	264.5	217.1	15.6	35.0
Fred McGriff	2,458	276.7	230.4	10.3	30.8	276.6	230.5	10.2	30.7
Sammy Sosa	2,353	313.8	281.1	6.4	30.4	321.5	273.3	14.2	38.1
Lee Smith	1,021	111.3	78.2	16.9	28.6	101.2	88.3	6.8	18.6
Carlos Delgado	2,035	228.9	188.5	11.2	28.0	229.5	187.9	11.8	28.6
Tom Gordon	893	141.5	120.7	10.4	25.9	139.9	122.4	8.7	24.3
Nomar Garciaparra	1,434	184.5	166.0	12.1	25.8	183.8	166.6	11.4	25.1
Brian S. Giles	1,845	246.0	224.1	4.7	23.0	252.7	217.4	11.3	29.6
Jason Schmidt	324	130.9	120.1	9.6	22.2	129.1	121.9	7.9	20.4
Troy Percival	702	71.1	44.6	13.3	21.1	62.3	53.3	4.5	12.3
Rich Aurilia	1,652	171.2	163.7	4.8	17.9	168.0	166.8	1.6	14.8
Darin Erstad	1,653	178.0	164.6	3.3	17.0	174.4	168.2	-0.3	13.4
Don Mattingly	1,785	197.7	179.7	1.9	16.6	197.6	179.8	1.9	16.5
Jermaine Dye	1,763	215.4	211.5	-2.8	13.8	218.1	208.8	-0.1	16.5
Cliff Floyd	1,617	180.4	171.3	-1.1	13.3	184.1	167.7	2.5	16.9
Eddie Guardado	908	62.4	52.7	4.8	12.4	59.8	55.3	2.3	9.9
Aaron Boone	1,152	116.9	112.9	1.1	10.1	115.8	114.0	-0.0	9.0
Tony Clark	1,559	121.6	119.3	-3.8	6.3	124.9	116.0	-0.5	9.6

Keep in mind that Willie Stargell is an average Hall-of-Famer. There are 8 players on this year's Hall-of-Fame ballot with more career pWins over replacement level (pWORL) than Stargell and an additional 3 players (Bagwell, Piazza, and McGwire) with more career pWins over positional average (pWOPA) than Stargell. Removing context and shifting to eWins brings at least two more players even with Stargell, Sheffield and Walker.

That's 13 players who are not just qualified for the Hall of Fame, but, essentially would be qualified for a Hall of Fame that was only half as large as the real one.

If we shift our standard down to Reggie Smith and recognize that even he is not the floor but solidly above minimum standards, I count at least 17 players for whom a strong statistical Hall-of-Fame case can be made.

Recent Debuts in Historical Context

The group of players making their debut on the 2015 Hall-of-Fame ballot is the third consecutive class of extremely strong candidates. To give a sense of just how impressive the last three debut classes have been, the top 10 players who first appeared on a Hall-of-Fame ballot in 2013, 2014, or this year, as measured by pWins over replacement level, are compared to the top 10 players for whom I have calculated Player won-lost records (most games since 1916) who debuted in 1983 or earlier. I chose 1983 because that is the season before the debut season of 2013 Hall-of-Fame ballot debut candidate Roger Clemens.

Player	pWins	pLosses	pWOPA	pWORL	Player	pWins	pLosses	pWOPA	pWORL
	2013-15 HOF Debuts					Everybody Else
Barry Bonds	462.0	314.9	61.0	91.4	Willie Mays	460.1	334.7	49.8	82.0
Roger Clemens	318.1	228.1	46.3	74.6	Hank Aaron	491.8	372.1	42.2	77.9
Greg Maddux	328.5	271.3	39.9	68.5	Babe Ruth	306.0	177.8	54.4	74.2
Randy 'Big Unit' Johnson	281.2	220.9	34.2	59.9	Mickey Mantle	351.7	230.4	50.3	73.9
Tom Glavine	279.4	249.5	24.8	50.1	Joe L. Morgan	373.8	292.1	46.4	72.8
John Smoltz	239.7	201.1	26.6	48.5	Ted Williams	368.9	253.1	44.4	69.7
Pedro J. Martinez	193.6	137.4	31.1	48.5	Stan Musial	420.8	311.5	40.1	69.6
Mike Mussina	224.2	173.1	25.9	47.5	Warren Spahn	353.9	293.4	40.8	68.5
Frank E. Thomas	253.7	190.2	23.5	46.6	Mel Ott	375.2	272.5	39.2	66.2
Craig Biggio	358.5	325.4	17.9	44.7	Lefty Grove	254.8	176.5	44.7	63.9

That's a lot of exceptional Hall-of-Fame candidates to sort through. Four players who have debuted on the last three ballots are among the top 10 players in pWORL for whom I have calculated Player won-lost records and a fifth candidate (Pedro Martinez) beats several of the players on the "Everybody Else" table in career pWOPA. Perhaps even more striking are the names missing from the left-hand table. A top 10 list of the last three Hall-of-Fame debut classes doesn't have room for a player with 3,000 career hits (Craig Biggio) and two players with 500 home runs (Sheffield and Sosa). Recent Hall-of-Fame ballots have seen a true embarrassment of riches.

As I've written about before, it's a damn shame that the BBWAA limits the number of players for whom a voter can choose.

Performance-Enhancing Drugs and the Hall of Fame

Unfortunately, lately, it has become impossible to talk about the Hall of Fame without bumping up against the subject of performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs). This is not a topic that I'm particularly keen on discussing here. My interest is in the data and, as far as the data are concerned, a home run is a home run and a Player win is a Player win, regardless of what a player did to hit that home run or earn that Player win. I gave my opinion on PEDs in baseball in my first Hall-of-Fame ballot article about the 2013 Hall of Fame ballot if anybody cares about my opinion.

The Individual Players on the 2015 Hall of Fame Ballot

Over the next several weeks, I will write up an article about each of the 34 players on the 2015 Hall of Fame ballot. For the most part, these will not be advocacy articles: plenty of other people will post plenty of those. But hopefully, they will be interesting articles that may reveal something new and/or interesting, or at least a little fun, about these players, using Player won-lost records. I hope you enjoy them.

Links to these articles will be added to this article as these articles are posted.

2015 Veterans' Committee Hall-of-Fame Ballot
Dick Allen
Ken Boyer
Gil Hodges
Jim Kaat
Minnie Minoso
Tony Oliva
Billy Pierce
Luis Tiant
Maury Wills

2015 BBWAA Hall-of-Fame Ballot
Rich Aurilia
Jeff Bagwell
Craig Biggio
Barry Bonds
Aaron Boone
Tony Clark
Roger Clemens
Carlos Delgado
Jermaine Dye
Darin Erstad
Cliff Floyd
Nomar Garciaparra
Brian Giles
Tom Gordon
Eddie Guardado
Randy Johnson
Jeff Kent
Edgar Martinez
Pedro Martinez
Don Mattingly
Fred McGriff
Mark McGwire
Mike Mussina
Troy Percival
Mike Piazza
Tim Raines
Curt Schilling
Jason Schmidt
Gary Sheffield
Lee Smith
John Smoltz
Sammy Sosa
Alan Trammell
Larry Walker
Predicted Outcome of the 2015 BBWAA Hall-of-Fame Voting
Analysis of My 2015 BBWAA Hall-of-Fame Voting Predictions
Final Analysis of 2015 BBWAA Hall-of-Fame Election Results and a First Look at the 2016 BBWAA Hall-of-Fame Election

All articles are written so that they pull data directly from the most recent version of the Player won-lost database. Hence, any numbers cited within these articles should automatically incorporate the most recent update to Player won-lost records. In some cases, however, the accompanying text may have been written based on previous versions of Player won-lost records. I apologize if this results in non-sensical text in any cases.

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