PITCHING WINS: A TICKET TO THE BASEBALL HALL OF FAME?

Wins and the Hall of Fame: The Qualitative Approach

The following table presents those 49 20th- and 21st-century pitchers with between 200 and 299 wins who are not in the Hall of Fame ranked by the Baseball Reference version of Wins Above Replacement (WAR). (Statistics for still-active pitchers are current through August 4, 2013.)

Non-Hall of Fame Pitchers Ranked by bWAR, in Descending Order
Pitcher	Years	Wins	Losses	Pct.	ERA	ERA+	ERA–	bWAR	fWAR
Martinez, Pedro	1992-2009	219	100	0.687	2.93	154	67	86.0	86.8
Mussina, Mike	1991-2008	270	153	0.638	3.68	123	82	82.7	82.3
Schilling, Curt	1988-2007	216	146	0.597	3.46	127	80	80.7	83.5
Brown, Kevin	1986-2005	211	144	0.594	3.28	127	78	68.5	73.8
Reuschel, Rick	1972-1991	214	191	0.528	3.37	114	88	68.2	69.4
Smoltz, John	1988-2009	213	155	0.579	3.33	125	81	66.5	78.4
Tiant, Luis	1964-1982	229	172	0.571	3.30	114	87	66.1	54.0
Halladay, Roy	1998-	201	104	0.659	3.37	131	76	65.5	67.9
John, Tommy	1963-1989	288	231	0.555	3.34	111	90	62.3	75.2
Quinn, Jack	1909-1933	247	218	0.531	3.29	114	89	59.0	63.7
Pettitte, Andy	1995-	252	150	0.627	3.87	116	86	58.9	66.8
Finley, Chuck	1986-2002	200	173	0.536	3.85	115	86	58.5	56.7
Tanana, Frank	1973-1993	240	236	0.504	3.66	106	94	57.5	55.8
Koosman, Jerry	1967-1985	222	209	0.515	3.36	110	91	57.1	66.0
Cicotte, Eddie	1905-1920	209	148	0.585	2.38	123	82	56.9	49.2
Powell, Jack	1897-1912	245	254	0.491	2.97	106	96	56.0	46.3
Sabathia, CC	2001-	200	112	0.641	3.57	122	82	54.0	60.5
Hudson, Tim	1999-	205	111	0.649	3.44	124	80	55.5	47.8
Wells, David	1987-2007	239	157	0.604	4.13	108	93	53.5	58.0
Pierce, Billy	1945-1964	211	169	0.555	3.27	119	84	53.1	54.7
Newsome, Bobo	1929-1953	211	222	0.487	3.98	107	95	51.7	62.2
Hershiser, Orel	1983-2000	204	150	0.576	3.48	112	89	51.7	45.2
Rogers, Kenny	1989-2008	219	156	0.584	4.27	107	93	51.1	47.2
Moyer, Jamie	1986-2012	269	209	0.563	4.25	103	97	50.2	47.5
Martinez, Dennis	1976-1998	245	193	0.559	3.70	106	95	49.5	45.7
Cooper, Wilbur	1912-1926	216	178	0.548	2.89	116	86	49.0	46.9
Lolich, Mickey	1963-1979	217	191	0.532	3.44	104	98	48.8	61.5
Harder, Mel	1928-1947	223	186	0.545	3.80	113	90	47.9	54.5
Pappas, Milt	1957-1973	209	164	0.560	3.40	110	92	46.8	46.3
Kaat, Jim	1959-1983	283	237	0.544	3.45	108	93	45.3	69.4
Blue, Vida	1969-1986	209	161	0.565	3.27	108	92	45.0	45.3
Uhle, George	1919-1936	200	166	0.546	3.99	106	94	44.4	49.2
Orth, Al	1895-1909	204	189	0.519	3.37	100	101	44.1	43.8
Morris, Jack	1977-1994	254	186	0.577	3.90	105	95	43.8	52.7
Welch, Bob	1978-1994	211	146	0.591	3.47	106	94	43.5	36.1
Mays, Carl	1915-1929	208	126	0.623	2.92	119	83	42.5	39.4
Jones, Sad Sam	1914-1935	229	217	0.513	3.84	104	97	40.4	46.0
Hough, Charlie	1970-1994	216	216	0.500	3.75	106	95	39.6	24.5
Derringer, Paul	1931-1945	223	212	0.513	3.46	108	93	39.0	60.7
Perry, Jim	1959-1975	215	174	0.553	3.45	106	94	38.7	32.2
Root, Charlie	1923-1941	201	160	0.557	3.59	111	90	38.0	36.4
Whitehill, Earl	1923-1939	218	185	0.541	4.36	100	99	36.3	49.2
Dauss, Hooks	1912-1926	223	182	0.551	3.30	102	98	35.2	39.9
Wakefield, Tim	1992-2011	200	180	0.526	4.41	105	95	34.5	38.9
Mullin, George	1902-1915	228	196	0.538	2.82	101	99	34.3	38.0
Fitzsimmons, Freddie	1925-1943	217	146	0.598	3.51	112	90	33.5	32.0
Reuss, Jerry	1969-1990	220	191	0.535	3.64	100	100	33.1	52.0
Niekro, Joe	1967-1988	221	204	0.520	3.59	98	102	28.7	26.9
Burdette, Lew	1950-1967	203	144	0.585	3.66	99	101	25.8	31.1

By using wins above replacement, or the contribution a player makes toward a team win over an average replacement player, to measure a pitcher's effectiveness, the order of these pitchers changes significantly—because a pitcher is credited with a high number of wins does not mean that he is actively contributing to those wins as much as a pitcher who might not register as many wins but is contributing more in comparison.

To be sure, there is some correlation: In this sample, Mike Mussina is third in wins and second in bWAR; Tommy John tops the wins list and is ninth in bWAR (FanGraphs favors John more highly—he would be fifth in an fWAR sort); and Jack Quinn (whose career is quietly intriguing), seventh in wins, is tenth in bWAR. But several pitchers near the bottom of the wins list now shoot to the top of the bWAR list: Pedro Martinez, Curt Schilling, Kevin Brown, Rick Reuschel, John Smoltz, and Roy Halladay, who reached 200 wins this season. Conversely, several pitchers with top-ten win totals in this sample—including Jim Kaat, Jamie Moyer, Jack Morris, and Andy Pettitte—fall out of the top ten when measured by effectiveness.

Pitchers' Profiles: Who Is a Hall of Famer?

I've written previously about the Hall of Fame chances for Pedro Martinez (eligible in 2015), Mike Mussina (eligible in 2014), Curt Schilling (eligible in 2013), and John Smoltz (eligible in 2015): Two years ago, I labeled Martinez's and Smoltz's inductions as "no brainers" while I called Mussina's and Schilling's candidacy "tough sells" only because of the overcrowded ballot—both are Hall of Famers in my view; I also had Schilling picked as the fourth-best prospect on this year's ballot; he received 38.8 percent of the vote, seventh-best in the embarrassing mess that was this year's voting.

Because I have written at length about all four, I will summarize each briefly. Martinez in his prime had a string of seasons to rival Sandy Koufax for sheer dominance—with Pedro's even more impressive because it occurred right in the teeth of the Steroids Era and its inflated offense. (By contrast, Koufax's dominance occurred during a period in the 1960s when conditions favored pitchers.) The wiry right-hander's .687 winning percentage is second only to Whitey Ford's in the post-World War Two era (it is sixth all-time) while his ERA+ of 154 is second only to Mariano Rivera's. Right-handed Smoltz is the only man to combine 200 or more wins with 150 or more saves while, like Martinez, getting to the 3000-strikeout plateau. Schilling too reached 3000 strikeouts with an insanely stingy 711 walks, which yields an eye-popping strikeout-to-walk ratio of 4.38, second all-time. Oh, and the intense right-hander might have a reputation as a big-game pitcher—do I have to mention the bloody sock? Mussina's knock is a high ERA, but he pitched his entire career in the American League East, the toughest division in Major League Baseball, during a high-offense period while posting a losing season only twice; in fact, the righty won at least 11 games for 17 consecutive seasons, an AL record, while his .638 winning percentage is 39th all-time.

Schilling is currently eligible while the other three will soon be, and barring a complete meltdown among the writers in what is already promising to be a very eventful next few years of voting—between the PEDs backlash and the overstuffed ballot, the writers have much to occupy them—both Martinez and Smoltz will be elected fairly quickly, Schilling will have to wait a few ballots, and Mussina will be a struggle much as Bert Blyleven's campaign was.

As for the six remaining pitchers in the top ten list ranked by bWAR, five have already had their chances on the ballot and one is still active. Those five are at the mercy of the Veterans Committee while the active pitcher, Roy Halladay, might be eligible sooner than he might have expected to be.

Kevin Brown was a one-and-done in 2011, his first year on the ballot, probably because a) he is implicated with PEDs, b) he is seen as not having lived up to the huge contract the Los Angeles Dodgers threw at him (although that is debatable), and c) he is not very likeable. All three reasons overlook how good this intense right-hander really was. Including his only 20-game season in 1992 for the Texas Rangers (he went 21–11 with a 3.32 ERA), Brown for the next decade averaged, per season, 14 wins and 9 losses with a 3.00 ERA in 31 games started, with 217 innings pitched, 6 complete games, and 2 shutouts while striking out 172 batters and walking only 54 for an excellent strikeout-to-walk ratio of 3.18. During that ten-year period, he generated a bWAR of 54.7—an all-star average of 5.5 every year—while averaging an ERA+ of 140, and he finished in the top-ten of Cy Young voting in six of those ten years; he was runner-up to John Smoltz in National League Cy Young voting in 1996 although he was superior to Smoltz in bWAR (7.98 to Smoltz's 7.28), ERA (1.89 to 2.94), and ERA+ (215 to 149), leading the NL with those latter two categories.

Brown's appearance in the Mitchell Report on the use of performance-enhancing drugs, and his refusal to talk to the investigators, all but quashed his Hall of Fame chances, and his fate rests with some future Veterans Committee. Brown's career bWAR of 68.5 ranks 31st among pitchers and 108th among all players, while his fWAR of 73.8 ranks 26th among pitchers. Based on numbers alone, Kevin Brown is better qualified for the Hall of Fame than some pitchers already enshrined, but his involvement with PEDs and baseball's current attitude toward their influence will keep him on the outside for some time to come.

Right-hander Rick Reuschel is an anomaly, and critics of sabermetrics can point to him as the result of crunching abstract numbers instead of "looking with your eyes." Reushel's traditional career numbers are solid but not spectacular: a 214–191 record (.528) with a decent 3.37 ERA and a strong though not elite ERA+ of 114 while he got to 2000 strikeouts (2015) and threw 26 career shutouts. But "Big Daddy" posted double-digit wins—and losses—while toiling for some dismal Cubs teams during the 1970s. With the Cubs, he endured 55 of his 81 career tough losses as his run support was just below the league average. Late in his career, he became the veteran presence for the San Francisco Giants in the late 1980s, including a 17–8 (.680), 2.94 ERA, 115 ERA+ 1989 season that saw the Giants go to the World Series, where they were swept by the Oakland Athletics in a Bay Area series notable primarily for its Game Three being interrupted by the .Loma Prieta earthquake

In his first appearance on a Hall of Fame ballot in 1997, Reuschel garnered exactly two votes and was quickly forgotten. His further chances rest with some future Veterans Committee, and while the Hall has several pitchers whose qualifications are conspicuously suspect—Catfish Hunter, Rube Marquard, and Herb Pennock are non-elite pitchers who all benefited from pitching for strong teams—it is difficult to justify the case of Rick Reuschel for the Hall of Fame despite the impressive bWAR he compiled partly while pitching for sub-par teams.

A solid if not sterling starting pitcher for his entire career, particularly for the Boston Red Sox teams of the 1970s, Luis Tiant, pitching for the Cleveland Indians, experienced a curious reversal between his 1968 season and his 1969 season: In 1968, the last year of the 15-inch-high pitching mound and a year that saw St. Louis Cardinals ace Bob Gibson set the live-ball-era record for ERA with 1.12 and Detroit Tigers hurler Denny McLain become the last pitcher to win 30 or more games in a single season (he won 31), "El Tiante" posted an outstanding 21–9 (.700) record with an American League-leading 1.60 ERA (he also led the league, retrospectively, with his 186 ERA+) while also leading the AL in shutouts with 9, with 4 of those consecutive shutouts, for an Indians team that won 86 games. However, in 1969, as the Indians fell to 62 wins, he effectively reversed his record from the previous year: Tiant won just 9 games while leading the AL in losses with 20 as his ERA rose to 3.71 and he led the AL in home runs allowed (37) and walks (129). Injuries might have plagued him during the season—although he pitched in and started more games than in the previous season—but he eventually found his way to Boston and a new lease of life.

During his eight seasons with the Red Sox, Tiant in 274 games (238 of those starts) and 1774.2 innings pitched amassed a 122–81 win-loss record (a .601 winning percentage) while reaching the 20-games-won plateau three times; during that period, his ERA was 3.36 as he notched 113 complete games including 26 shutouts and compiled 1075 strikeouts, a 118 ERA+, and a bWAR of 36.4, all quite impressive for a pitcher between his age-30 and age-37 seasons. With Boston, the right-hander with the distinctive, deceptive delivery did win another ERA crown with his 1.91 ERA in 1972 (his ERA+ of 169 also led the AL). Tiant survived every year of eligibility on the Hall of Fame ballot; his inaugural year of 1988 saw his strongest support with 30.9 percent of the vote, but he never rose above 20 percent again, finishing with 18.0 percent of the vote in his final year of eligibility, 2002. Tiant is strong both qualitatively and quantitatively, but he is not elite in either respect, and without a dominant stretch in his record, he is not a Hall of Fame pitcher.

More instructive of how starting pitchers will come to be evaluated for their Hall of Fame worthiness is the case of Roy Halladay. In an era of high talent compression, in which players in aggregate are very good and it is harder than it had been in previous eras to stand out, "Doc" Halladay has been both dominant and a workhorse. In the ten-year period from 2002 to 2011, the right-hander led the league in innings pitched four times, in games started once, and in complete games seven times as he averaged, per season, 30 games started, 219 innings pitched, 6 complete games, and 2 shutouts as he won 170 games over that ten-year period against only 75 losses for an outstanding .694 winning percentage, winning at least 20 games three times while falling one shy of 20 games won in two other seasons. Qualitatively, Halladay posted an excellent 2.97 ERA over that ten-year period while generating a 148 ERA+ and a bWAR of 62.4, reaching an MVP-level of 8 wins above replacement per season three times and an All-Star-level of 5 WAR eight times.

Halladay has won a Cy Young Award once in each league, in 2003 with the AL Toronto Blue Jays and in 2010 with the Philadelphia Phillies, his first year in the National League. During that ten-year period, he finished in the top ten of Cy Young voting seven times total including two second-place finishes in 2008 and 2011, when it was a virtual toss-up between Halladay and the Los Angeles Dodgers' Clayton Kershaw. In 2010, Halladay threw two no-hitters, one a perfect game during the regular season, the other a no-hitter in which he allowed just one walk during the Phillies' National League Divisional Series against the Cincinnati Reds—the only no-hitter thrown in the postseason other than Don Larsen's perfect game for the New York Yankees in the 1956 World Series.

In a time of such high talent compression, players not only have a harder time distinguishing themselves from the pack, but the window to be able to distinguish oneself is shrinking: Players do not hit their prime until their mid-20s (barring outlier cases such as Bryce Harper and Mike Trout), and once a player leaves his prime in his early- to mid-30s, that high talent compression usually means that players' skills and effectiveness drop off significantly, enough to force many players out of the game. That looks as if it might be the case with Halladay, whose effectiveness fell off a cliff during the 2012 season. Much of that could be attributed to shoulder trouble, which continued to plague him during this season as he underwent surgery; he has not pitched a game since early May, and seeing that this is his age-36 season, Roy Halladay might have already established his Hall of Fame legacy.

Another pitcher whose career was impacted by surgery was southpaw Tommy John—although his surgery in hindsight prolonged his career to the point that he could actually be considered for the Hall of Fame. In 1974, John's career looked to be cut short when, in the midst of an otherwise-excellent season, he permanently injured an elbow ligament in his pitching arm, the ulnar collateral ligament (UCL). Later that year, Dr. Frank Jobe performed a surgery to replace the UCL with an undamaged tendon; at the time of the surgery, the odds of John returning to major-league pitching were very low; John spent the entire 1975 season rehabilitating. However, he did return in 1976 in his age-33 season to post a 10–10 record for the Los Angeles Dodgers, albeit with a decent 3.09 ERA—but the following season, John won 20 games for the first time in his career (20–7 [.741] with a 2.78 ERA). And when John signed as a free agent with the New York Yankees in 1978, he posted two more 20-game seasons on his way to 288 lifetime wins.

Dr. Jobe's surgical procedure soon became a career-saver for several pitchers afflicted with arm trouble, and because Tommy John was the first successful recipient of the surgery, the procedure has come to be known as "Tommy John surgery." This year, Dr. Jobe was named to the Baseball Hall of Fame for his contribution to the sport.

Ah, but does Tommy John himself deserve to be enshrined in the Hall? As we have seen, John has the highest number of wins of all pitchers in the modern era who did not reach the 300-win plateau. His surgery certainly prolonged his career—he pitched for 12 seasons before the surgery and for 14 seasons after the surgery. His final game was on May 25, 1989, three days after his 46th birthday. As the story goes, he decided to retire after Mark McGwire got two hits off him; McGwire's father was John's dentist, and as John put it, "when your dentist's kid starts hitting you, it's time to retire!"

The following table lists John's performance in the 12 years before his 1974 surgery, the first 7 years following his surgery, and the final 7 years of his career. The Totals rows reflect John's first 20 years in the Major Leagues (19 seasons—he did not play in 1975), John's seasons following his surgery, and his entire career.

Tommy John's Pitching Performance by Period
Period	W-L (Pct.)	GS	ERA	ERA+	ERA–	bWAR	fWAR
1963–1974	124–106 (.539)	318	2.97	116	85	31.0	34.2
1976–1982	113–65 (.635)	217	3.15	120	83	24.7	28.6
Totals, 1963–1982	237–171 (.581)	535	3.05	118	84	55.7	66.8
1983–1989	51–60 (.459)	165	4.43	92	112	6.6	12.4
Totals, 1976–1989	164–125 (.567)	382	3.66	107	98	31.3	41.0
Totals, Entire Career	288–231 (.555)	700	3.34	111	90	62.3	75.2

John's surgery undoubtedly prolonged his career, and for the first seven years following his return from surgery, he pitched at the same level that he had done prior to his surgery. The surgery was a success, and the patient thrived.

But although hindsight is a luxury, it also shows that John prolonged his career to the detriment of his overall effectiveness. From 1983 to 1989, his age-40 to age-46 seasons, John was a below-league-average pitcher, scratching to add to his win totals as the quality of his pitching plummeted. Had Tommy John retired following the 1982 season, or even the 1983 season as he realized that, at age 40, he was no longer a top-flight pitcher, reconstructed arm or not, he might have appeared to be a more promising Hall of Fame candidate. Or perhaps not. John's best showing on the Hall of Fame ballot was in 2009, his 15th and final year on the ballot, when he got 31.9 percent of the vote.

John was runner-up for the Cy Young Award twice, in 1977 and 1979, and in 1979 he might have had a better case than the winner, the Baltimore Orioles' Mike Flanagan—although John's Yankees staff mate Ron Guidry probably outclassed them both. John is 8th in games started (700), 20th in innings pitched (4710.1), and 26th in shutouts (46) in addition to being 26th in wins with 288, but his ranking of 48th in bWAR (62.3) among pitchers (he is 158th among all players) reinforce that Tommy John was a compiler and not an elite pitcher, no matter the lease of life he got from the surgery named for him.

Then there's the enigmatic Jack Quinn, who didn't even begin his Major League career until his age-25 season in 1909; played for two seasons in the short-lived Federal League in 1914 and 1915, and when that league folded, toiled in the Pacific Coast League for two seasons before getting a roster spot with the Chicago White Sox in 1918 when the PCL suspended operations for the First World War; and pitched in his final game days after he turned 49 in 1933; Quinn is one of the few players to have played in four decades. Born in modern-day Slovakia and having come to the United States as an infant, Quinn's life was a quiet, almost mysterious one, with a number of his biographical details shrouded for many years.

But his playing record is fairly clear: The right-hander was never a star pitcher but he was a surprisingly solid one, and while he is not a Hall of Fame pitcher, he does match up with a number of pitchers who are already in the Hall of Fame. His 247 career wins, 49th all-time, is higher than several Hall of Fame pitchers including such high-profile names such as Juan Marichal, Whitey Ford, and Catfish Hunter. More importantly, Quinn's career bWAR of 59.0, 61st all-time, bests that of many Hall of Fame pitchers including Red Ruffing, Mordecai Brown, Ford, Waite Hoyt, Sandy Koufax, and Early Wynn, whose 300 wins is an auspicious milestone. Jack Quinn does underscore the need to look at pitchers both qualitatively and quantitatively.

On the qualitative front, of the top ten pitchers ranked by bWAR above, six are Hall of Fame-caliber pitchers: Pedro Martinez, Mike Mussina, Curt Schilling, Kevin Brown, John Smoltz, and Roy Halladay. Halladay is still technically an active pitcher, although whether he returns from shoulder surgery is to be seen. But what about the other active and recently retired pitchers?