Hall-Bound? Former Brewers on the Hall of Fame Ballot, Past and Present

Paul Molitor during the 2004 Hall of Fame Induction ceremony. 

This week, the Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA) will announce the results of the 2016 National Baseball Hall of Fame vote. If my predictions hold true (they almost never do), Ken Griffey, Jr., Mike Piazza, and Jeff Bagwell will earn a spot in Cooperstown, with Tim Raines just missing the cut (I’d vote for all four, plus Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Mike Mussina, Alan Trammell, Curt Schilling, and Edgar Martinez.) Most notable to Brewers fans, however, is the presence of Trevor Hoffman. Although he played just two years in Milwaukee, Hoffman is the first former Brewer to have any real shot at election to the Hall since Paul Molitor got in in 2004. This week, I decided to take a look at how Brewers have fared on the Hall of Fame ballot and take a look at the former Brewers on this year’s ballot. 

First, a few basics. To be eligible for the Hall of Fame ballot, a player must be retired for five years and have totaled at least ten seasons of Major League experience. A player needs to receive 75% of all votes cast to gain entry to the Hall, but can remain on the ballot with at least 5% of the vote. A player can remain on the ballot for up to ten years (previously 15), so long as they maintain 5% support. 

 Dozens of former Brewers have appeared on the ballot, but for the sake of expediency here, I’ll stick to the 29 who actually received votes… the 29 former Brewers who at least one qualified voter felt was worthy of a place in Cooperstown (well, not really, but more on that later)  

Robin Yount was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1999, joining Orlando Cepeda, Nolan Ryan, and George Brett as that year’s inductees. 

Five former Brewers are in the Hall of Fame. Three went in on their first appearance on the ballot. These are the BIG names in franchise history: Robin Yount, Hank Aaron, and Paul Molitor. Aaron, who played his last two years with the Brewers, was actually the first former Brewer to receive Hall of Fame votes, racking up 98% in 1982. Yount went in with 78% on a crowded ballot in 1999, and Molitor was an easy first-ballot choice in 2004 with 85% of the vote. But, of course, players have had (up until the recent rule change) up to 15 chances to hit that magical 75% mark. Hall of Fame voters are a weird and stingy bunch and will often refuse a player first-ballot enshrinement if his career is not quite up to the “all-time legend” standards of players like Yount and Aaron. Two former Brewers have take this route, Rollie Fingers, who got in on his second try, and 300-game winner Don Sutton, who was elected in 1998 on his fifth try. 

Fingers was the first real “closer” voted into the Hall and, despite being the all-time saves leader when he hit the ballot, some voters seemed unsure of how to treat this new entity and made him wait a year before giving him the prize. Sutton was a different case. He had only a short period where he was truly among the best in the game, but had a long career that left him with a number of career total milestones, including 300+ wins and 3,000+ strikeouts. He never really felt like a Hall of Famer during his career, but hung around so long that he built up some very impressive career numbers. How could voters deny a man who won more games than Tom Seaver and struck out more men than Walter Johnson? 

Dave Parker played only one year in Milwaukee, but was the only former Brewer to ever linger on the Hall of Fame ballot without being elected. 

Then there are the players who gain enough support to stay on the ballot, but never manage to progress towards enshrinement. When I was a kid, my dad told me that great players made the Hall of Fame, while good players got left out. And that’s a very fair way to put it. But the guys who managed to linger on the ballot are a little more than good… some like to use the term “Hall of Very Good” as a place for these guys. Surprisingly, only one former Brewer meets this mark. Of the 29 ex-Brewers to get votes for the Hall – minus the five who were elected – only two managed the 5% required to survive to a second ballot. One is still active on the ballot, and we’ll get to him later. The other is one-year Brewers Dave Parker. “The Cobra” is a classic fringe Hall of Fame candidate. You can make some advance stat arguments for putting him in the Hall and he was certainly better than many players already enshrined, but he fell short in too many categories to gain any real momentum. In his second year on the ballot, he hit 25%, but that proved to be his high-water mark. 

The odd thing is, that of all former Brewers who might have reached the level of a “lingerer” candidate like Parker, one of the most qualified actually got zero votes in his only time on the ballot. Cecil Cooper had a better career than nearly every one of the one-and-done Brewers, yet got no support at all. Incidentally, his career lines up very well with Don Mattingly (they are each others’ #1 career comps on baseballreference.com), who spent 15 years on the ballot and had support as high as 29%. Just goes to show you the importance of having a high profile. Even on lousy Yankee teams – he played in just one playoff series – Mattingly had the eye of the baseball world while Cooper toiled in relative obscurity. 

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Ted Simmons had the numbers of a fringe Hall of Fame candidate, but dropped off the ballot after just one year. 

Another potential lingerer was catcher Ted Simmons. “Simba” polled less than 4% in 1994. Simmons had a very good career and compares well to Hall of Famer Gary Carter by many statistical measures. Unfortunately, Simmons played in the shadows of catchers like Carter, Johnny Bench, and Carlton Fisk, and got somewhat lost in the mix during his career. Like Sutton, he never really felt like a Hall of Famer, but has career numbers that do merit discussion. Unlike Sutton, he lacked the big offensive milestones (he fell just shy of 2,500 career hits). 

Of the other former Brewers to get votes, it’s hard to make a real Hall of Fame case – or even a case as a lingerer – for any of them. So what gives? How did 22 former Brewers get Hall of Fame votes without having any real case for enshrinement? Well, like I said, Hall of Fame voters are a weird bunch. Just as some seem intent on not voting for anyone (just see how many voters deny Ken Griffey damn Jr. this week), some will hand out “honorary” votes to guys that have no business in the Hall of Fame without a ticket and map of exhibits. These votes come from people who don’t actually feel that these guys are worthy of the Hall, but want to give them a tip of hat nonetheless. Don Money got a vote in 1989. Jim Sundberg got one in 1995. Dante Bichette got a few in 2008 as did Sal Bando in 1989 and Willie Randolph in 1998.

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Four Hall of Fame votes were cast for Marquis Grissom (R) in 2011. 

Those players all had solid careers and you can understand the urge to honor them with a throw-away vote. But others require some abstract thinking to understand. Some voters seem to like award winners, no matter what the end result of their careers. Mark Davis (who played briefly in Milwaukee in 1997) was an otherwise unremarkable reliever who had two very good seasons with the Padres in the late 1980s. In 1989, he won the Cy Young award. Eric Gagne had a longer stretch of success, and also won a Cy Young award, but pitched less than 650 career innings and admitted to using performance-enhancing drugs. Davis got one vote in 2003 and Gagne got two in 2014. Doug Jones was a solid closer for a few years and looked like Ron Swanson. He got two votes in 2006. Marquis Grissom had a career on base percentage of .318. He got four votes in 2011. Tom Candiotti was a starting pitcher with a losing career record. He got 2 votes in 2005. It took Rick Dempsey 24 years to amass 1,093 career hits – collecting base hits at about 1/4th the rate of Pete Rose. He got a vote in 1998. 

With this background in mind, I think that this year’s ballot will be a pretty interesting one for former Brewers. There will be four former Brewers up for consideration this year, and I think that all four will get votes and three will survive to next year’s ballot. On to our class of 2016:

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Jason Kendall in the 2008 NLDS against the Phillies. 

Jason Kendall, C. With Brewers 2008-2009. 1st year on ballot. 

Kendall strikes me as the perfect honorary vote guy. First, he had a pretty decent career, actually better than I remembered: His career WAR of 41.5 is better than a few other Hall of Fame catchers and just a few ticks behind Jorge Posada. Second, he was known as a tough and gritty player… the undersized white guy “leader” type that sportswriters seem to love. He hit without batting gloves and chewed tobacco and got dirty. He was also the starting catcher on three different playoff teams (A’s, Cubs, Brewers). 

I suspect he’ll get a vote or two.

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Jim Edmonds on Jackie Robinson Day, 2010. 

Jim Edmonds, OF. With Brewers 2010. 1st year on ballot. 

The only thing that will keep Edmonds from lingering on the ballot is just how loaded it is with good candidates. Voters are limited to ten selections, so borderline guys like Edmonds could get left off of ballots of otherwise sympathetic voters. Edmonds was a very good hitter and an electric centerfielder, but injuries left him short of any major career milestones. He does, however, have the benefit of having played his best years with a high-profile team in St. Louis, where he was a key part of several playoff teams and a World Series winner. I think he’ll make the 5% cut-off this year and could hang around for a while, but the backlog of talent caused by steroid suspicious might keep him short of that. 

Photo by R0sss, Flickr CC

Ugh. This freakin’ guy… 

 Gary Sheffield, OF/DH. With Brewers 1988-1991. 2nd year on ballot. 

 Sheffield is the other Brewer to survive to second ballot and, like Parker, has no shot at making the Hall of Fame. He has the career numbers for serious consideration, but he also has the steroid taint. He reminds me a lot of Raphael Palmeiro, a guy whose final numbers seem stand in stark contrast to how he was seen during his career. Sheffield never felt like one of the best players in the league… he never even seemed to be the best player on any team he played on. Sheffield got less than 12% of the vote last year, and I suspect his numbers will take a McGwire/Sosa type dive (both could fall under 5% this year) and will have another year or two before dropping off the ballot.

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Trevor Hoffman on opening day 2010. 

Trevor Hoffman, P. With Brewers 2009-2010. 1st year on ballot. 

 In 1993, Trevor Hoffman was actually traded from Florida to San Diego for Sheffield. Weird, eh? And Hoffman, of course, is the Brewers’ next best hope of getting an alum into the Hall. I think that he has a very good chance, but I also think his window is somewhat narrow. No modern, one-inning closer has yet been elected to the Hall. Guys like Bruce Sutter, Fingers, and Goose Gossage all regularly pitched multiple innings to close out games. Like the voters’ cautious treatment of Fingers, I think they will be wary to give Hoffman the nod, especially with the looming candidacy of Mariano Rivera. Rivera is a no-doubt first-ballot guy when he becomes eligible in 2019. If Hoffman can’t get in by 2019, I think his chances will take a big hit when voters have the chance to directly compare him to Rivera who, by any measure, was the far superior pitcher. I also feel like the value of the save statistic – which is the overwhelming basis of Hoffman’s candidacy – is diminishing. Closers and their fat save totals are not quite as sexy as they once were as baseball people have paid more heed recently towards late-inning relievers. Hoffman is a bit of a trendy candidate (that is, trendy among the dinosaurs who cast Hall of Fame ballots) who could fall out of fashion too soon. It’s not a sure thing, but I think that Hoffman will eventually get voted into the Hall of Fame. 

But Trevor Hoffman is a Padre! He won’t wear a Brewers hat on his plaque! Ok, he’ll be the next former Brewers in the Hall, but he won’t be the next Brewer in the Hall! Who will be the next real Brewer in the Hall of Fame? Sounds like a topic for a future post… 

Thanks to everyone who’s been checking out Brew Crew Confidential these past few weeks. I’m going to take a week off to organize my 1985-1990 Milwaukee Police Department baseball card sets by ugliness of facial hair, but I’ll be back after that with the story of a long-forgotten war of words between the Brewers and a certain Chicago baseball legend.