Yankees on the 2024 BBWAA Hall of Fame Ballot - Thirtysomething
Here we are, the thrilling conclusion of our 2024 Hall of Fame coverage at Jimmy Sez. In our last installment we covered some of the more controversial characters on this year's BBWAA ballot, and this crop of players will be no different. Steroids? Sign-stealing scandals? Obesity? It's all here.
The players below all joined the Yankees at a ripe old age, which allowed me to use another 80's TV show in the title. No one from this group will get elected this year, but the two most controversial candidates will continue to have their cases pondered, whether via the BBWAA or a Veterans Commitee in the future.
For each player, their JAWS (Jaffe Average WAR Score, developed by Jay Jaffe) value is given along with the average Hall of Famer's JAWS at the player's position. JAWS is a Hall of Fame rating system based on WAR that incorporates both career and peak value. If you're interested in learning more about this, click here.
Bartolo Colon - Starting Pitcher, JAWS: 40.9, HoF JAWS: 61.4
If there were a Hall of Fame for greatest baseball moments, Bartolo Colon would be in on the first ballot.
Hitting what is perhaps the most unlikley home run in baseball history will always be Colon's claim to fame, and rightfully so. But let's not overlook his 21-year career as an effective major league pitcher, which was a miracle in itself.
Colon was signed as an amateur free agent out of the Dominican Republic by Cleveland when he was 20 years old, which is ancient when it comes to amateur free agents. At just under six feet tall, and about as wide as he was tall, nobody was going to give him any breaks based on his athletic potential. He would have to earn his way to the majors, which he did in 1997 as a 24-year old rookie.
By his sophomore season, Colon was named an All-Star and he would anchor Cleveleand's rotation for the next four years before they traded him mid-season in 2002. His five and a half years in Cleveland would be his longest stint with any one team for the rest of his career.
Colon would reach the apex of his pitching career in 2005 with the Angels when he won 21 games and was named the AL Cy Young Award winner, edging out Mariano Rivera in the voting for an award that certainly should have gone to Minnesota's Johan Santana. Over the ensuing four seasons he would struggle with injuries and failed to reach 100 innings pitched in any of those campaigns. He would miss the entire 2010 season due to a right arm that was riddled with injuries and at 37 years old, it seemed that his career was finished.
During his time off, Colon underwent a controversial stem cell procedure to repair his arm. Despite being in the worst shape of his career - not that he was ever in shape to begin with - he convinced the Yankees to take a chance on him with a minor league contract for the 2011 season. Against all odds, he made the Opening Day roster as a bullpen arm and joined the Yankees' starting rotation a month into the season. He was a remarkably effective and durable rotation piece for the remainder of the year, pitching more than 160 innings with an ERA of 4.00 (good for an above average 107 ERA+).
If that comeback wasn't improbable enough, Colon decided to take it a step further. He pitched for another seven seasons for any team willing to pay him and enjoyed a fair amount of success along the way. He was also suspended for 50 games as a member of the Oakland A's after testing positive for synthetic testosterone, but that was just a blip on the radar for the hefty righty who was clearly enjoying the ride he was still on.
At age 45 Colon retired from the major leagues in the top 50 all-time with 552 starts and 2,535 strike outs. He also ranks 51st all-time in career wins with 247. Bartolo was never a truly elite pitcher and certainly had his flaws, but it's hard not to be impressed with what he was able to accomplish given the late start to his career and the injuries he struggled with.
So far on the public ballots Colon has received a single vote for the Hall of Fame and probably won't get any more than that. Even if he didn't have a Hall of Fame career, he won't be soon forgotten by those who love baseball thanks to that sweet swing in San Diego back in May of 2016.
Matt Holliday - Left Fielder, JAWS: 39.4, HoF JAWS: 53.4
Matt Holliday was exactly the type of player that you tend to find on winning ball clubs. He could hit for average with good power numbers and a solid on-base percentage, by all accounts he was a positive influence in the clubhouse, and his trademarks were toughness and dependability. It's no wonder then that his teams reached the playoffs nine times in his 15 seasons as a major leaguer.
After a lengthy minor league career, Holliday showed steady improvement in the majors with the Colorado Rockies and was named an All-Star in 2006. A year later the 27-year old reached new heights by leading the majors in total bases (385) and the NL in hits (216), doubles (50), RBI's (137) and batting average (.340). He was the best player on a team that would reach the World Series - although they would get swept by the Red Sox - and was named the NLCS MVP along the way. In a narrow race with Philadelphia's Jimmy Rollins he was the runner-up for the NL MVP. Despite falling just short of the ultimate prize on both a personal and team level, the 2007 season put him on the map as a true major league star.
Although he would never reach those heights again, Holliday would remain a prominent figure in baseball for another decade. After the 2008 season the Rockies decided that they weren't going to pony up the money it would take to keep him in Colorado once he became a free agent in 2009. As a result, he was traded twice in 2009, first to Oakland, then to St. Louis. The Cardinals wised up and signed the slugger to a seven-year, $120 million contract. A contract he would live up to and then some.
Over the first five years of the Cardinals deal, Holliday's average season included a .295/.383/.496 slash line, a 141 OPS+, 37 doubles, 24 homers, 93 RBI's and 92 runs scored. He was also a three-time All-Star in that span while the Cardinals made four playoff appearances, taking home the World Series trophy in 2011. His success in St. Louis didn't just bring him championship glory, but it also proved that he wasn't a product of the extremely hitter-friendly environment of Coors Field. He was a highly skilled hitter, and would have been no matter where he played.
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Holliday's last two seasons with the Cardinals were plagued by injuries and at 36 years old he became a free agent once again. The Yankees pounced with a one-year "prove it" deal to be the their regular DH for 2017. That turned out to be the most fun Yankee team over the last two decades and Holliday was a key part of it, or at least he was for the first half of the season where he posted a healthy .877 OPS with 15 home runs. But that would be the end of the road for him as an effective player. Just before the All-Star break he was diagnosed with an Epstein-Barr virus and when he came back his OPS plummeted to .525 with just four home runs for the remainder of the year.
In 2018 Holliday decided to end his career where it started by signing a minor league contract with the Rockies. He appeared in 25 games with the big league club before calling it a career at the end of the season.
At his best, Holliday was a great player, even if he was mostly below average when it came to baserunning and fielding. The problem with his Hall of Fame case is that he wasn't great enough for long enough. Had he started his big league career when he was younger and remained an effective player for a few more years than he did, he likley would have flirted with the magic numbers of 3,000 hits and 500 home runs. Alas, he falls well short in that regard and the BBWAA voters have clearly decided that he's not a Hall of Famer. Like Bartolo Colon, he's received one vote on public ballots thus far and will probably not get any more. Still, it's a career worth celebrating. There will always be room on a big league roster for a guy like Matt Holliday.
Gary Sheffield - Right Fielder, JAWS: 49.3, HoF JAWS: 56.7
A Gary Sheffield at bat was a sight to behold. Most of the great swings throughout baseball history could be described as beautiful, elegant or graceful, but a Sheffield swing would best be described as an act of violence. Before each pitch he would tilt his bat from an upright position back and forth towards the pitcher, like a pendulum getting increasingly out of control, until he lunged forward and unleashed his fury on the ball. It was unlike any swing in baseball seen before or since. Few could argue with the results.
After a tumultuous early career with the Milwaukee Brewers in which he never saw eye to eye with the organization, Sheffield got his career on track with a trade to the San Diego Padres in 1992. That year as their full-time third baseman he hit 33 home runs with 100 RBI's, led the major leagues with 323 total bases, and won the batting title with a .330 average. However, that didn't stop the Padres from trading him the following year to the Florida Marlins.
And so began the nomadic career of Gary Sheffield, where he consistently battered baseballs at every stop. In 1996 with the Marlins he put up numbers that impress even in the context of the high octane late 1990's. He slashed .314/.465/.624 for a league-leading 189 OPS+ with 42 home runs, 120 RBI's and an absurd 66:142 strikeout-to-walk ratio.
In three full seasons with the Dodgers he hit .312 with an average of 38 home runs, 103 RBI's, 99 walks and just 67 strikeouts per season. After two nearly identical seasons in Atlanta he became a free agent for this first time in his career in 2003.
Desperate for a right-handed masher, Brian Cashman forked over nearly $40 million for the 35-year old Sheffield. During his first two seasons in pinstripes he was worth every penny and was even the runner-up for AL MVP in 2004. Injuries and a hearty disagreement with management in 2006 forced his way to Detroit where his batting skills waned significantly. He finished out his career with the Mets as a 40-year old in 2009.
Gary Sheffield's career numbers with the bat scream Hall of Famer. He is part of the 500 home run club, had a .292 career batting average, and displayed amazing plate discipline - he walked more than he struck out in 16 of his 22 career seasons. His bat may have been a violent weapon, but he wielded it with the cold calculation of a mafia hitman. Advanced metrics back him up too, as his 561 career Batting Runs Above Average rank 28th all-time.
Even with those eye-popping numbers, Sheffield received only between 11% and 14% of the BBWAA vote between 2015 and 2019. This was mainly due to three things holding him back in the eyes of voters: (1) He switched positions mid-career from third base to right field, but by all accounts and measures was a very poor fielder at both positions, (2) Starting with his minor league career he had a sizable chip on his shoulder and would wear out his welcome as quickly and forcefully as his swing, (3) As a friend of Barry Bonds he was linked to steroid use as part of the BALCO scandal and was named in the 2007 Mitchell Report.
Despite the strikes against him, 2020 was a turning point in the voting for Gary Sheffield. He showed up on a little over 30% of the ballots that year and jumped to over 40% of the vote in 2021. He remained around 40% in 2022, but made a quantum leap to 55% of the vote in 2023. In his last year of eligibility, he's showed up on just under 75% of the public ballots thus far (which includes just over 40% of the electorate so far). The bad news for Sheff is that his share of the vote has always been lower among voters that don't share their ballots publicly. Therefore, he has virtually no chance of getting in this year. Still, a future Veterans Committee will likely find room in the Hall of Fame for one of the greatest hitters of all time.
Carlos Beltran - Center Fielder, JAWS: 57.2, HoF JAWS: 58.1
Over the course of 20 years, Carlos Beltran put up some seriously impressive numbers. He scored over 1,500 runs and drove in another 1,500 with his more than 2,700 career hits. He drew over 1,000 walks, stroked over 550 doubles and went yard more than 400 times. If all that wasn't impressive enough, he also stole more than 300 bases. He's the only player in baseball history to surpass each of those thresholds and not be named Barry Bonds. Yet even with steering clear of any steroid whispers, Beltran was never really considered a slam dunk Hall of Fame candidate during his playing days.
Is it because Beltran doesn't hold up according to advanced metrics? Couldn't be. Those indicate that he was as complete a player as there's ever been in baseball. For his career he compiled 262 batting runs above average, 55 baserunning runs above average, and 39 fielding runs above average (for more detail on how those things are calculated, see my WAR primer). Only two players in major league history put up higher totals than Beltran in all three categories: Willie Mays and Rickey Henderson, two inner-circle Hall of Famers. So what was it about Beltran that made his obvious greatness not so obvious to those covering baseball when he played?
I'll start by mentioning Darrell Evans. What the hell does a third baseman from the 70's and 80's have to do with Carlos Beltran? I'm glad you asked. In his Historical Baseball Abstract - essential reading for any baseball fan - Bill James used Evans as a prime example of the ten things that make a baseball player underrated.
James goes into a fair amount of detail, but to summarize, those ten things are: 1) Specialists are overrated, players who do several things well are underrated; 2) Batting average is overrated, extra bases and walks are underrated; 3) Runs batted in are overrated, runs scored are underrated; 4) Players on championship teams get overrated, players on bad teams are underrated; 5) Players in New York/LA can be overrated, players in smaller cities can be underrated; 6) Talkative players tend to be overrated, quiet players tend to be underrated; 7) A player's home field can determine whether they're underrated or overrated; 8) The era in which a player played can determine whether they're underrated or overrated; 9) Undocumented skills (leadership, defense, heads-up play) tend to be forgotten over time; 10) A player who has a good career with one team will be thought of more highly than a player who does the same things, but with many teams.
By my count, eight of these points apply to Carlos Beltran: 1) He had no weaknesses in his game, but also no overwhelming strength; 2) His career batting average of .279 is pretty good, but not earth-shattering, he made up for that in many ways; 4) He didn't win a World Series until his final season in 2017 when he was 40, more on that season in a bit; 6) Media members never went to Beltran for a juicy quote; 7) His prime was spent mostly in Shea Stadium and Citi Field, both pitcher-friendly parks; 8) The steroid era was ending and offense in general was gradually declining as he was becoming a star player; 9) He was a well-respected and smart player who was pegged to be a manager right after his playing career...until bad things happened; 10) He played for seven different teams, and played well at every stop.
Add it all up, and Beltran might be one of the most underrated players in baseball history.
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All under-ration aside, the real story for Beltran when it comes to the Hall of Fame is the Astros' sign-stealing scheme that he played a key role in during the 2017 season. It was reported in 2019 that during that championship season for the Astros, they had designed and successfully implemented a system using on-field cameras to steal catchers' signs and communicate them to the hitter via banging trash cans, or maybe even electronically in some cases. An official investigation was launched by MLB as a result of the report.
In January 2020, MLB announced its findings. Alex Cora, who was the bench coach of the Astros in 2017, was identified as having developed the scheme with a group of players early on in the season. However, only one player was identified by name and it was Carlos Beltran. As a 20-year veteran at that point, he was likely the most reliable player on the team when it came to recognizing a catchers' signs.
The punishment handed down by MLB was severe. A $5 million fine for the Astros, and they also lost the rights to their first and second round picks in the 2020 and 2021 drafts. Manager A.J. Hinch and GM Jeff Luhnow were suspended for the entire 2020 season, only to be fired hours later by Astros owner Jim Crane. Cora, who was managing the Red Sox by this time, would eventually serve a year-long suspension as well as part of another investigation that involved sign-stealing and his 2018 World Series champion Red Sox team.
Beltran received no explicit punishment for his role in the scheme. However, after being hired to be the new Mets manager in November 2019, he and the Mets announced just days after MLB's findings were published that they mutually agreed to part ways. He then made a public apology and expressed deep regret for his role in the scheme.
So what should we make of this unfortunate situation that has come to define Beltran in recent years? Let's start with the fact that in 2020 it was reported that the wheels were in motion for the Astros' scheme in 2016, a year before Beltran re-joined the team for his final season. Initially it seemed that he had co-masterminded it with Cora, but this confirms that he was merely a participant, if that matters to you.
Let's also consider sign-stealing and its role in baseball. Much like chewing tobacco, brushback pitches, and bench-clearing brawls, stealing signs has been an unsavory, but accepted part of baseball since the game was conceived. This article gives a nice rundown of sign-stealing history in the game. Stealing signs has even likely played a key role in some of the most memorable moments in baseball history, including The Shot Heard 'Round the World.
Does that mean that stealing signs is OK and we should just ignore it? Of course not. When a team makes it as obvious as the Astros did, punishments should be doled out to those involved, and then we can all move on with our baseball lives. In losing his managerial job before it started, I'd say Beltran served his punishment. Now we should move on and put him in the museum that celebrates baseball's greatest players, because he was certainly one of them when he played.
The BBWAA has made it clear thus far that they're not quite ready for that yet. In his debut on the ballot last year he garnered 46.5% of the vote. That's better than the Bonds/Clemens/A-Rod contingent fared in their first years on the ballot, and the public balltos shared thus far show that he should improve on that showing in 2024. But if Beltran does get into the Hall of Fame the conventional way, it's still going to be a few years.
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