Halladay was always a tough out for the Nats; RIP. Photo via wcpo.com
I have the mlb app with notifications turned on, so I got the news as soon as it was confirmed that Roy Halladay was in the plane. It was shocking indeed. Hate to see something like this.
My Halladay memories: The best seats I ever had at a Nats game were for a Nats-Philadelphia game in late 2008 with Halladay starting. I sprung for those diamond seats, 2nd row behind the plate. It was an awesome experience, and you just don’t really get a sense for how hard these guys throw until you’re *that* close. I also remember vividly a game that I’m sure some of you also remember: Halladay going for a complete game against us in 2011 but running into trouble in the 9th only to strike out both Matt Stairs and Ivan Rodriguez looking … and neither guy moved their bat off their shoulder.
I’ve begun thinking about his legacy, as one is apt to do in times like this: Halladay was an incredibly dominant pitcher for a good stretch of his career, but he was essentially washed up at 34 and out of the game at 36, didn’t have the counting numbers some older voters want, and may have some difficulties getting elected.
However, I wonder if his untimely death affects (to the positive) his Hall of Fame candidacy. It sucks that we’re talking about that as a possible posthumous honor, but he definitely had an interesting case. From 2003 to 2011 he was basically in the conversation year after year of being the best pitcher in the game (2 Cy Youngs, 5 other times named in top 5, and 8 all-star appearances). But he only played 15 full seasons, 6 of which were cut short due to injury or youth, and he was done by age 36. 200 wins, but no where near 3000Ks. One seminal post-season moment (his 2010 NLDS no-hitter), but not a ton of post-season experience other wise (just 5 starts for Philly across 2010-11).
65.6 career bWAR, 65.2 career fWAR, which puts him right in the areas where he should be heavily considered (some hall of fame pitchers right in that same range include Don Drysdale, Don Sutton, Bob Feller, Juan Marichal, Dennis Eckersley, etc). He’s 38th all-time in fWAR for Pitchers, 41st for bWAR. And most every pitcher ranked above him on these lists is already in the HoFame (or should be).
The thing is, there’s starters above him on these lists who are struggling to get elected. Consider these names who are ranked above Halladay but who are not yet elected):
– Roger Clemens (for obvious reasons)
– Mike Mussina: longer career, more Wins, more Ks
– Curt Schilling; whatever you think of his post-career politics, he was a dominant pitcher for a long time who probably could have had 3 Cy Young awards
– Kevin Brown: criminally under-appreciated long time dominant starter
Mussina and Schilling are the ones that stick out for me; if those two guys can’t get in, can Halladay?
Most of the old grizzled voters hate having career value conversations couched around WAR (probably because they don’t understand it). But because we’re likely never seeing 300 wins again i wonder if he might be the kind of candidate where they look past his macro numbers and look at the fact that for nearly a decade he was the #1 or #2 guy in the league. And get some sentimental votes at the same time.
For me? I’m a big Hall kind of guy, so I think all these guys above Halladay need to be in the Hall of Fame. I think Halladay does too; he passes the eye test and the smell test, if not the career stat-gathering test.
