Which former Atlanta Braves belong in the Hall of Fame this year?
Three former Atlanta Braves are getting better support, but still not enough.
Hall of Fame voting is a topic that never pleases anyone, since you’ll find nearly as many opinions as you will ballots. That said, three former Atlanta Braves players are seeing better voting results than in year’s past while another one could be “one and done” due to a lack of support.
We have insight into just 60 (roughly 1/6th) of the expected ballots at the time of this writing, but statistically, that enough to establish some solid trends.
At the top of the results, we have this (as of Christmas Day):
- Curt Schilling (73.8%)
- Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens (69.2%)
- Scott Rolen (56.9%)
This is going to be oh-so-close for Schilling, who needs 75% to get into Cooperstown. This is his 9th ride on the ballot, so he does have one more year to go.
No one ever reaching 70% — as he did on the 2020 ballot a year ago — has failed to be elected. While I expect Schilling to gain enshrinement next year, I would personally prefer that he get in this year since that would clear a voting spot for someone else in 2021.
Even at this level of support, though, Schilling has had a poor result on ballots not revealed publicly: losing 7.3% last year from those not choosing to reveal their choices.
I don’t care what you think about the man: his career numbers scream “HOF” in all respects except the traditional Wins and Losses (216-146)… though the 200 win plateau seems to be the new standard as 300 is now a practical impossibility.
Did he win the Cy Young award? No — but he was 2nd on three different occasions (twice to Randy Johnson and once to Johan Santana). He won three World Series rings. He won 20 games three times. He has “league leader black ink” all over his stats on baseball-reference.com.
His career WHIP is 1.137. Teams traded for him so that they could make a playoff run. Those are the kinds of things you need to have on your resume to be a Hall of Famer.
But that’s Schilling… Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens are still both joined at the hip (near the injection site) with virtually every BBWAA voter selecting either both of them or neither of them. They may never get to 75% (next year is also their last chance), but both are up above their 2020 final totals (~61%) so far.
Like Schilling, though, Bonds and Clemens also get hammered from the private ballot count — losing more support there than virtually any others on the ballot.
My views on these players remain the same as always: one should never offer the sport’s highest honor to those breaking the rules — and while steroid evidence is sketchy on many players, there’s no doubt about these. By all accounts, they engaged in steroid use and gained the most for it, so I would deny them a place in Cooperstown.
Atlanta Braves Connections
FanSided’s main MLB site does its own HOF balloting, and site editors are invited to participate.
On this year’s ballot, I voted for Schilling, Rolen, and these former Braves:
Tim Hudson… sorry Huddy. And right now it appears that he may not reach the 5% support point needed to stay on the ballot.
He and Mark Buehrle are doing the best among 1st time eligibles, but Buehrle is slightly about the waterline (7.7%) and Hudson just below (4.6%).
We’ve talked about Andruw Jones a lot on these pages: most recently here. Last year he couldn’t crack 20%. This year — so far — he’s nearly doubled that at 38.5%… but needs another doubling to actually get in the Hall. Still, he’s trending in the right direction with 6 ballot years still to come.
Gary Sheffield is also up this year: trending at 41.5% after a 30.5% finish a year ago. Very good for a very feared hitter, but he only has 3 more chances after this year.
Wag: the Dog
But let’s devote the rest of this to Wags.
It’s good to see Billy Wagner get nice jump up from 31.7% last year to 44.6%. That is expected to tail off before the final numbers are in, but 40% would be a solid platform to work from with 4 more years of ballots to come.
Wags’ case is admittedly a difficult one despite having all the earmarks you’d like to see for a Hall of Fame performer:
- 7-time All Star
- Top 10 Cy Young votes as a reliever twice (4th place in 1999)
- MVP votes twice
- 0.998 career WHIP
- 422 saves
In a market that doesn’t want to give relievers multiyear deals for fear that they will simply blow out after making a splash for 4 or 5 seasons, Wagner saved 30+ games nine times between 1998 and 2010… with 40+ twice. Even during his final year — his 38-year-old season — he posted 37 saves for the Braves with a 1.43 ERA.
He could be the best left-handed relief pitcher in the history of the game, and yet somehow the saves aren’t enough or the career wasn’t long enough (Wagner was a late-bloomer as he didn’t become established as a closer until roughly age 25) or … well, the record for closers getting into the Hall isn’t very long, period.
But look at these numbers:
- 903 career innings
- 1196 strikeouts
- 601 hits
- 300 walks
This is a pitcher who didn’t hurt himself by creating his own messes — and he was just as good when he finished with the Braves (0.865 WHIP) as when he got started way back with Houston.
One more thing: you might expect that a lefty closer would run into some difficulties with right-handed batters. At the very least, you’d expect a team to find as many RH hitters as possible to face Wagner.
You’d be right… but it didn’t matter:
- Batting average against (RHH): .186 (.567 OPS)
- Batting average against (LHH): .189 (.522 OPS)
Wanna know what a .550-ish OPS looks like? Think Ender Inciarte in 2020 (.512 OPS). Billy Wagner turned virtually every hitter into someone with Inciarte’s production. All of them. Over his entire career.
Next. If you could... what would you do?. dark
That’s why I would vote for Billy Wagner if I had a “real” vote: because he was a dominant closer over a lot of seasons… plenty enough to have earned a plaque. So glad that he was on our side for one glorious year.