BASEBALL'S 2015 GOLDEN ERA COMMITTEE BALLOT: ARE THERE ANY HALL OF FAME PLAYERS LEFT?

The 2015 Golden Era Player Candidates

Make no mistake about the nine player candidates on the 2015 Golden Era ballot: They are "bubble" candidates—players whose records and accomplishments are on that great, fuzzy margin that separates Hall of Fame talent from the rest of the field.

If there are any players here who truly belong in the Hall, it will be a judgment call to elect them now—keeping in mind that with two exceptions, Dick Allen and Billy Pierce, these players were on BBWAA ballots for all fifteen years of eligibility (Allen was on fourteen ballots; Pierce on five), all nine players have been considered by previous Veterans Committees, and all except for Allen, Pierce, and Maury Wills were on the 2012 Golden Era ballot that elected Ron Santo to the Hall.

The players' records don't change but perceptions of them do. In a context-neutral setting, Santo's numbers were not eye-popping, but putting him in the context of the tough-pitching 1960s and his playing for the generally hapless Chicago Cubs, along with advanced qualitative statistics that supported the anecdotal evidence of Santo's excellence, convinced committee voters in 2012. Will any candidates in 2015 experience a similar reversal of fortune?

Perhaps, but even advanced statistics may not help as much as could be expected, at least with respect to Wins Above Replacement player, or WAR, which measures a player's contribution to his team's wins, taking into account his offensive and defensive contributions, above what a replacement player would contribute. WAR is not a be-all and end-all statistic, but it does give an indication of a player's worth, and it is the only statistic that can be used to compare position players with pitchers. There are different versions of WAR; the two versions discussed here are from Baseball Reference (bWAR) and FanGraphs (fWAR). Often, the difference between the two is marginal—but as we will see below, there can be significant differences in a couple of cases.

Here are the six position players on the 2015 Golden Era ballot, ranked by bWAR, with other qualitative statistics, including fWAR, listed alongside it and explained below the table.

Position Players on the 2015 Golden Era Ballot, Ranked by bWAR
Position Player	Slash Line	wOBA	bWAR	fWAR	OPS+	wRC+
Boyer, Ken	.287/.349/.462	.355	62.8	54.8	116	116
Allen, Dick	.292/.378/.534	.400	58.7	61.3	156	155
Miñoso, Minnie	.298/.389/.459	.382	50.1	50.8	130	133
Hodges, Gil	.273/.359/.487	.378	44.9	42.1	120	121
Oliva, Tony	.304/.353/.476	.365	43.0	40.7	131	129
Wills, Maury	.281/.330/.331	.301	39.5	35.7	88	91

Slash Line: Grouping of the player's career batting average, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage.

wOBA: Weighted on-base average as calculated by FanGraphs. Weighs singles, extra-base hits, walks, and hits by pitch; generally, .400 is excellent and .320 is league-average.

bWAR: Career Wins Above Replacement as calculated by Baseball Reference.

fWAR: Career Wins Above Replacement as calculated by FanGraphs.

OPS+: Career on-base percentage plus slugging percentage, league- and park-adjusted, as calculated by Baseball Reference. Positively indexed to 100, with a 100 OPS+ indicating a league-average player, and values above 100 indicating the degrees better a player is than a league-average player.

wRC+: Career weighted Runs Created, league- and park-adjusted, as calculated by FanGraphs. Positively indexed to 100, with a 100 wRC+ indicating a league-average player, and values above 100 indicating the degrees better a player is than a league-average player.

Here are the three pitchers on the 2015 Golden Era ballot, ranked by bWAR, with other qualitative statistics, including fWAR, listed alongside it and explained below the table.

Pitchers on the 2015 Golden Era Ballot, Ranked by bWAR
Pitcher	W-L (S), ERA	bWAR	fWAR	ERA+	ERA–	FIP–
Tiant, Luis	229–172 (15), 3.30	66.7	53.9	114	87	90
Pierce, Billy	211–169 (32), 3.27	53.2	54.7	119	84	90
Kaat, Jim	283–237 (18), 3.45	45.3	69.4	108	93	90

W-L (S), ERA: Grouping of the pitcher's career win-loss record (and career saves, if applicable) and career earned run average (ERA).

bWAR: Career Wins Above Replacement as calculated by Baseball Reference.

fWAR: Career Wins Above Replacement as calculated by FanGraphs.

ERA+: Career ERA, league- and park-adjusted, as calculated by Baseball Reference. Positively indexed to 100, with a 100 ERA+ indicating a league-average pitcher, and values above 100 indicating the degrees better a pitcher is than a league-average pitcher.

ERA–: Career ERA, league- and park-adjusted, as calculated by FanGraphs. Negatively indexed to 100, with a 100 ERA- indicating a league-average pitcher, and values below 100 indicating the degrees better a pitcher is than a league-average pitcher.

FIP–: Fielding-independent pitching, a pitcher's ERA with his fielders' impact factored out, league- and park-adjusted, as calculated by FanGraphs. Negatively indexed to 100, with a 100 FIP– indicating a league-average pitcher, and values below 100 indicating the degrees better a pitcher is than a league-average pitcher.

The table below combines both position players and pitchers into a ranking by bWAR with their fWAR values also listed.

All 2015 Golden Era Candidates, Ranked by bWAR
Rank	Player	bWAR	fWAR
1	Tiant, Luis	66.7	53.9
2	Boyer, Ken	62.8	54.8
3	Allen, Dick	58.7	61.3
4	Pierce, Billy	53.2	54.7
5	Miñoso, Minnie	50.1	50.8
6	Kaat, Jim	45.3	69.4
7	Hodges, Gil	44.9	42.1
8	Oliva, Tony	43.0	40.7
9	Wills, Maury	39.5	35.7

According to bWAR, and using 60.0 WAR as a rough baseline for serious consideration for the Hall of Fame, both Luis Tiant and Ken Boyer appear to be worthy of discussion, with Dick Allen also a possibility. However, fWAR tells a different story.

The table below combines both position players and pitchers into a ranking by fWAR with their bWAR values also listed.

All 2015 Golden Era Candidates, Ranked by fWAR
Rank	Player	fWAR	bWAR
1	Kaat, Jim	69.4	45.3
2	Allen, Dick	61.3	58.7
3	Boyer, Ken	54.8	62.8
4	Pierce, Billy	54.7	53.2
5	Tiant, Luis	53.9	66.7
6	Miñoso, Minnie	50.8	50.1
7	Hodges, Gil	42.1	44.9
8	Oliva, Tony	40.7	43.0
9	Wills, Maury	35.7	39.5

According to fWAR, Jim Kaat now appears to be the front-runner, with Allen the next-best bet, and Boyer and Tiant less serious candidates than they were when ranked by bWAR. This pinpoints the limitations of using WAR as the only, or even primary, metric, as the player's value changes based on which version of WAR is used. But is there a tool that enables a comparison against existing Hall of Famers?

Yes, there is. Sabermetrician Jay Jaffe has developed "JAWS," the Jaffe WAR Score system, to compare a player at a position against all players, in aggregate, who are already in the Hall at that position by using their WAR values. Note that Jaffe's system uses the Baseball Reference version of WAR, and the usual caveats about the limitations of WAR apply.

The JAWS rating itself is an average of a player's career WAR and his seven-year WAR peak. Jaffe also assigns one position to a player who may have played at more than one position, choosing the position at which the player contributed the most value; thus, in the table below, Dick Allen is compared against third basemen although he actually played more games at first base. The purpose of JAWS is to improve, or at least maintain, the current Hall of Fame standards at each position to ensure that only players at least as good as average current Hall of Famers are selected for the Hall.

The table below lists all nine players on the 2015 Golden Era ballot, ranked by bWAR, along with their JAWS statistics, which are explained below the table, as well as the average bWAR and JAWS statistics for all Hall of Fame players at that position. The table also contains the players' ratings for the Hall of Fame Monitor and the Hall of Fame Standards, also explained below the table.

All 2015 Golden Era Candidates, Qualitative Comparisons to Hall of Fame Players (Ranked by bWAR)
Player	Pos.	bWAR	WAR7	JAWS	JAWS Rank	Ave. HoF bWAR	Ave. HoF JAWS	HoF Mon. (≈100)	HoF Std. (≈50)
Tiant, Luis	SP	66.7	44.6	55.6	51	73.4	61.8	97	41
Boyer, Ken	3B	62.8	46.3	54.5	14	67.4	55.0	86	36
Allen, Dick	3B	58.7	45.9	52.3	17	67.4	55.0	99	39
Pierce, Billy	SP	53.2	37.8	45.5	97	73.4	61.8	82	35
Miñoso, Minnie	LF	50.1	39.8	45.0	22	65.1	53.3	87	35
Kaat, Jim	SP	45.3	38.4	44.9	101	73.4	61.8	130	44
Hodges, Gil	1B	44.9	34.2	39.6	34	65.9	54.2	83	32
Oliva, Tony	RF	43.0	38.5	40.8	32	73.2	58.1	114	29
Wills, Maury	SS	39.5	29.5	34.5	46	66.7	54.7	104	29

Pos.: Player's position under evaluation in this table.

bWAR: Career Wins Above Replacement as calculated by Baseball Reference.

WAR7: The sum of a player's best seven seasons as defined by bWAR; they need not be consecutive seasons.

JAWS: Jaffe WAR Score system—an average of a player's career WAR and his seven-year WAR peak.

JAWS Rank: The player's ranking at that position by JAWS rating.

Ave. HoF bWAR: The average bWAR value of all the Hall of Famers at that position.

Ave. HoF JAWS: The average JAWS rating of all the Hall of Famers at that position.

Hall of Fame Monitor: An index of how likely a player is to be inducted to the Hall of Fame based on his entire playing record (offensive, defensive, awards, position played, postseason success), with an index score of 100 being a good possibility and 130 a "virtual cinch." Developed by Baseball Reference from a creation by Bill James.

Hall of Fame Standards: An index of performance standards, indexed to 50 as being the score for an average Hall of Famer. Developed by Baseball Reference from a creation by Bill James.

With a few isolated exceptions, the various elements used to compare the nine Golden Era player candidates show that the candidates do not measure up to Hall of Fame standards. A few are close, and arguments can be made for them that they are worthy candidates compared to some players already enshrined in the Hall, several of those elected by past Veterans Committees—and as we have seen earlier, some of those committees made some dubious selections.

But because this committee is focusing solely on the Golden Era from 1947 to 1972, it may be helpful to concentrate on only those Hall of Fame players as comparisons to the nine candidates. In other words, how do our nine candidates stack up against their contemporaries already enshrined in the Hall of Fame?