What players active in 2010 are already worthy of your personal HOF?

not a bad list. but i'd put hoffman in the "on the fence"list. too many blown saves in limited body of post-season or regular-season pressure games.

 

Purely on first glance...

Chase Utley - No
Vladimir Guerrero - Yes
Jim Thome - Yes
Carlos Beltran - No
Todd Helton - Maybe
Chipper Jones - Yes
Andruw Jones - No
Alex Rodriguez - Yes
Albert Pujols - Yes
Bobby Abreu - No
Derek Jeter - Yes
Roy Halladay - Yes
Ivan Rodriguez - Yes
Scott Rolen - No
Manny Ramirez - Yes
Ichiro Suzuki - Yes
Johan Santana - Not yet
Mariano Rivera - Yes

 

he had many defensive gems shown endlessly on "sportscenter." that's about it, which seems enough to the fast-food generation...

 

As one of the "core four" and one of the best postseason pitchers of all time, he'll get more consideration than he should.

That raises a serious question about this generation of Yankees. When you're looking at borderline guys like Pettitte and Posada, is it fair to add their postseason stats to their career totals for purposes of determining their HOF worthiness?
Pettitte, for example, is 38 and nearing the end of his career. But when you look at his postseason numbers, he's pitched roughly a season's worth of games (41 starts, 19-9, 3.87 ERA, 256 IP, 1.320 WHIP).
Now that the first generation of players who have spent their careers in the expanded playoff format are nearing retirement, there's quite a few borderline guys who are in the same boat as Pettitte. Jeter has played 143 playoff games and is well over 3,000 hits already if you add his postseason totals to the regular-season totals. Rivera has been in 74 games, Posada 116, Manny Ramirez and Chipper Jones (not Yankees, but both relevant to this thought) 111 and 92 games, respectively.
By the time their careers are over, there are probably several players from these Phillies teams, as well as guys like A-Rod (59 playoff games and counting), Mark Teixeira and Robinson Cano that will have similar totals. Yogi Berra, who was in the World Series 15 of his 19 seasons with the Yankees, only played 75 playoff games in his career.
Used to be that postseason success was sort of a "tiebreaker" for HOF inclusion. Is it time, in some cases, to start treating the postseason as an extension of the regular season where career stats are concerned? It's definitely something earlier generations didn't have to deal with.

 

Halladay is on the fast track, but I still think he needs a couple of years to beef up the overall numbers a bit. He's still under 2,000 strikeouts and 200 wins. If his career ended tomorrow, he'd draw comparisons to Schilling when the time came -- great pitcher, one of the best of his generation, but upon close analysis people would start nitpicking and he might end up waiting a while.

You're right about Carpenter. Didn't realize he'd been around that long, and the injuries have done him no favors. He's been one of the best of the last five or six years, but he won't come close.

Posada is borderline as a solid offensive catcher and will ride the Yankee coattails a long way. He should get shut out, though, since both Piazza and Ivan Rodriguez were better and came from the same generation.

Edmonds will get consideration, but there's a dozen guys (like Fred McGriff) who were as good or better who should go in before him. Edmonds' tour of the NL Central waiver wire the last couple years hasn't done him any favors, either.

Johan Santana's stock is sinking fast, but two Cy Youngs and a couple of solid seasons with the Mets will help him. Not sure he'll get the call, but he'll be waiting by the phone for a few years on selection day.

 

Solid list, though I'd put Chipper Jones in the "In" list. He's a career .300 hitter who, for most of his career, was a solid 25-30 HR, 100-RBI, .300/.400/.500 type player. As long as he makes it onto the field for a few weeks next year, he's going to finish with 2,500 hits, 1,500 RBI and possibly 450 HR/500 2B. He has an MVP, should have won the ROY, and finished in the MVP top 10 five other times (and should have been a lot closer to the award than 12th in 2009).

And unlike some of those Braves guys that folded in October, Jones had more hits (96) than games (92) in the postseason, and hit .288.

He was never an outstanding defensive third baseman, but there are a lot of Braves fans who will tell you that Atlanta missed his solid defense at third base down the stretch this season, and he more than made up for it at the plate.

 

Does Pettitte really deserve to be called one of the great post-season pitchers of all time with a 3.87 career post-season ERA?

If that gets him consideration, then Curt Schilling's post-season numbers should make him a lock, right? He finished his career 11-2 with a 2.23 ERA in 19 playoff starts.

 

Omar Vizquel

 

Right now: Ichiro Suzuki, Jim Thome, Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, Andy Pettitte, Mariano Rivera, Cliff Lee, Roy Halladay, Albert Pujols, Chipper Jones, Ivan Rodriguez.

Need a few more quality years: Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau, Mark Teixeira, CC Sabathia, David Ortiz, Jason Bay, Johan Santana, Justin Verlander, Tim Lincecum, Felix Hernandez, Carl Crawford, Troy Tulowitski.

Good number, horrible personality: Manny Ramirez

 

The batshit crazy meter is getting quite a workout on this thread.

Cliff Lee already in the HOF? The guy has had three good years and is already 32. Three years ago he spent most of the summer in Buffalo and had a 6-something ERA for the Indians. He'll have to pitch like Cy Young for the rest of his 30s to even enter the discussion.

Chase Utley as a possible HOFer? He's 32 and plays a position where almost nobody ages gracefully. And he just got his 1,000th hit this year. No. Not even close.

Even discussing Morneau, Ortiz, Bay and Santana as possible HOFers--never mind 20-somethings such as Verlander, Lincecum, Tulowitzki and King Felix--is completely and utterly insane. Jason Bay just signed away the rest of his peak years to Shitti Field and hit six homers in almost 400 ABs BEFORE he suffered a concussion this year. At that rate, he'll hit his 500th homer in 2062, at which point he will be 84 years old. And Jamie Moyer will still be pitching, a few months before his 100th birthday.

And I like Ilmago questioning Jim Edmonds' candidacy, a few days after touting Billy fuckin Wagner for the HOF. This is performance art on par with that guy working at McDonalds, right?

 

LISTS!!!!

 

Cliff Lee has work to do yet, but what's so insane in thinking he can make the Hall? If he has five more good years in him, helps the Rangers reach the World Series this year and then goes somewhere else and has team success, he'll be remembered as a late bloomer who got off the scrap heap to become a dominant pitcher of his era. He gets to a World Series as the ace of three different teams (a good possibility if he signs with the Yankees), that gets him another checkmark in the "pro" column, too.

Including guys like Felix Hernandez, Lincecum and Verlander as shoo-ins is obviously folly at this point of their careers. But if they're not on your radar as all-star regulars for the next decade and people whose cases we might be debating in 2020, then you don't know baseball.