Here come the Forties. 1940's Hall of Fame Blog

The 1940's was an interesting decade for the Hall of Fame. Most of the candidates were actually elected by the Old Timer's Committee, which was the first iteration of the Veteran's committee. The committee seemed to have issues with separating a playing career from a managing career, and elected some players in as managers that couldn't possibly have been elected solely on their playing stats without the help of their managing career as well.

1949- Kid Nichols, Charlie Gehringer, Mordecai Brown

Kid Nichols- 1800’s player. He only spent 3 or 4 season past the 1900 decade. I am efforting greatly to improve my ability to judge players before 1900 but I am still lacking so I am still not voting yay or nay on this players. I will live it to the old tyme scholars.

Charlie Gehringer- Emphatically Yes- Charlie inevitably makes it into any conversation of the greatest second basemen of all time. He makes it into this discussions because of course, he was damn good. He ended with a solid career hit total of 2839 and over 1400 RBI’s. He was an excellent Gold Glove type defender and his percentage numbers are very, very good. He racked with a .320 .404 .480 line. Without question this man could play and belongs in the Hall of Fame.

Mordecai “Three Finger” Brown- Yes- I will always lament the fact that Mordecai’s rookie season was spent as a Cardinal and that he was traded to the Cubs for a bag of peanuts. He was possibly the greatest fielding pitcher of all time, and definitely the best at fielding the bunt. He spent hours working on this, even when a lot of people at the time neglected fielding practice for pitchers all together. But he knew he was a control pitcher, and that he was not going to strike a ton of guys out. He knew that limiting base runners was key, and that his ability to get them out with the glove would be an advantage. He was a great pitcher, he pedigree is not in question and who am I to kick a man with Three-Fingers out of the Hall of Fame?

1948-Pie Traynor, Herb Pennock

Pie Traynor-Yes- Pie Traynor is incredibly overrated. That being said he is still tough to kick out of the Hall of Fame. He gets some publicity as being the greatest defensive thirdbasemen. He was great defensively, but I think it’s a stretch to say he is the best. Jimmie Dykes, Clete Boyer, Brooks Robinson, and Scott Rolen are all very likely his equal or superior. A good part of his reputation was built on fond remembrances of his playing days by teammates, and that is a bit of a biased source of course. From what we have its hard to extrapolate that he was the greatest of all time, but its pretty clear that he was an excellent defender. He gets credit as a great hitter too, but that’s a bit inflated as well. He was a singles hitter that didn’t walk. Which leads to a career .320 batting average, but a pretty weak .797 OPS. I am including him, but he is definitely a marginal inclusion.

Herb Pennock-No- To be honest when I saw his name on the list I had to think about it a second. I really couldn’t remember much about him at all other than he pitched on some of the great Yankee’s Murderers Row teams. Then I looked up his stats and realized that that’s about his only redeeming quality and claim to fame. His career ERA is a less than impressive 3.60. Very high for a Hall of Fame level pitcher. His win-loss record was 241-162 for a very nice .598 winning percentage. But giving the fact that he played on mostly great teams in his career, that’s about where it should be, actually maybe a little low. He was an above average pitcher that benefited from playing on historically great teams. He has no place in the Hall of Fame.

1947-Carl Hubbell, Lefty Grove, Frankie Frisch, Mickey Cochrane

Carl Hubbell-Yes-Carl threw a screwball and is most often remembered for two things. Throwing at guys and striking out a zillion matters in a row in an all-star game that’s lineup looked like an All-Time greats list. Hubbell was a great pitcher. He lead the league in ERA 3 times and wins 3 times. He sported ERA’s of sub-3 and sub-2 in the early part of the 1930’s when even good pitchers were getting rocked for about five runs a game. His winning percentage was an excellent .622. I have no problems including him.

Lefty Grove-Yes- Lefty may be the greatest pitcher of all time, so obviously I am putting him in the Hall of Fame. 4 time leader in wins, 9 time leader in ERA. He won exactly 300 games with 141 losses for a spectacular .680 winning percentage. In 1931 he went 31-4. Winning 30 games when people didn’t really do that anymore. That season he tossed up a 2.06 ERA in a season when most teams hit over .300 as a team. This may very well be the most impressive season of all time.

Frankie Frisch-Yes- An excellent player and a good manager. He did a variety of things well, and he was an educated man. That’s where he got the nickname “The Fordham Flash.” He was an excellent defender, and excellent hit and run man, a good hitter, had great speed, had a little pop in his bat, and could steal some bases. He hit .316 for his career with a .369 OBP and .432 SLG. He stole 419 bags in his career and garnered 2880 hits. Not the greatest secondbasemen ever by a long stretch, but still one of the best there has ever been.

Mickey Cochrane-Yes- One of my favorite players of all time he was one of the greats. He has a shortened career due to injury, but since he was a catcher it is about the same as all the others. Mickey was a rarity, even back then, he was a catcher with some good speed. He didn’t really steal bases, but he could scoot around the basepaths pretty well. He was an excellent defensive catcher and one of the best throwers of his time but where he truly excelled was as a hitter. His percentage numbers are a very solid .320 .419 .478. It is kind of funny that his numberes are nearly identical to Charlie Gehringer’s career numbers, they teammates in Detroit.

1946- Ed Walsh, Rube Waddell, Joe Tinker, Eddie Plank, Joe McGinnity, Johnny Evers, Jack Chesbro, Frank Chance, Jesse Burkett.

Ed Walsh-Yes- Big Ed was pretty ridiculous. He had an ERA of 1.82 and won 40 games once. Yep that’s 40 games. Also had the misfortune to go 18-20 while leading the league in losses AND ERA. That is one hell of a tough luck season. He lost 20 with an ERA of 1.27. Ridiculous.

Rube Waddell-Yes- Known primarily for being one of the premier strikeout artists of his generation. He led his league in k’s 6 years in a row with some very respectable totals. He was hard to hit, because players just didn’t strike out that much back then. He was a quality pitcher, who didn’t put up many big win totals, but nonetheless was a great pitcher.

Joe Tinker, Johnny Evers, and Frank Chance- Tinkers, Evers, and Chance all went into the Hall of Fame in the same year, all elected by the Veteran's Committee. Part of the reason, I believe, they were all elected is because it is hard to separate them from each other. They are associated together more than any 3 players in history, and Tinkers and Evers is the most famous double play combo by far. So the question is do all three of them belong in the Hall of Fame? I am going to analyze these guys all under the same column, because it just seems appropriate. First up is Joe Tinker. Tinker was the less fiery of the double play combo, and apparently much easier to get along with than Evers, whom wasn't particularly popular amongst anybody who knew him. However, putting him into the Hall of Fame is a stretch at best. He really just didn’t hit very well. His percentage numbers were a paltry .262 .308. .353 for an incredibly anemic .661 OPS. That is pretty terrible, even for the time. He had one very good year, but also a good half of his years were just pretty darn terrible. He was a plus defender, being above the league fielding percentage for his position pretty much every year, and had marginally above average range. By the subjective accounts he was an excellent defender, and there is no real evidence to dispute that that is possible. However, with anemic hitting, and less than 1700 career hits, his defense does not seem anywhere near enough to merit inclusion in the Hall. Joe Tinker DENIED. Next up is Johnny Evers Evers is probably best known for being the one who recovered the ball and got the umps attention to get the force out in the famous Merkle's Boner play versus the New York Giant's. Evers is similar to Joe Tinker, not quite as good a defender, and quite a bit better hitter. The other numbers are similar but Evers could get on Base quite a bit better with a career .356 OBP. He could also steal you a base pretty frequently. The difference between Tinker and Evers though is this. Evers had some pretty damn good years. One was truly great and another was very good, oddly, he won an MVP award in his second best season. The fact he has an MVP award and was generally a much better player than Tinker, I am going to give him the benefit of the doubt. Johnny Evers ACCEPTED Frank Chance Known as the peerless leader because he was the team leader turned manager for the great Cubs teams in the early part of the 20th century. He started out as a catcher, he was pretty terrible at it, and was smart enough to realize he needed to move himself to first base when the team got Johnny Kling. The question is, I believe Chance got in as a player. Which is just preposterous. He played in less than 1300 games, which is just not enough time to be a Hall of Famer as a player. As a player he was a good defensive first basemen and a much better hitter than either of the other two. He his .294 with a .394 OBP. These are damn fine numbers for the time, and in one season he had an amazing .450 OBP. But the career is just not long enough or distinguished enough to merit being in the Hall of Fame. If you give him credit as a manager then perhaps you can include him, he was the manager for some legendary teams as well as playing for them. So my final verdict Chance as a player DENIED Chance as a player manager ACCEPTED. Poor Joe Tinker, I guess that leaves him as the odd man out.

Eddie Plank-Yes- Eddie plank was a hell of a pitcher. When I think of him, the first thing that pops into my mind has absolutely nothing to do with his playing career, its that his card is the second most valuable in the T-206 set, second only to the famous Honus Wagner card. That probably is an injustice to Mr. Plank. He put up a 326-194 record for his career, for a very nice .627 winning percentage. He also had a career ERA of 2.36. With that amount of wins, with such a good winning percentage, it would be hard for anybody to rationalize him not being in the Hall of Fame.

Jack Chesbro-No- I have a hard time including Jack Chesbro because he only played for 9 seasons. Two of those 9 seasons were fantastic, legendary even. But the rest was merely good, not great. He never won an ERA title. Which I think is telling, as he was never truly the best, which I believe you need to prove if you are going to get in with a tiny sample size.

"Ironman" Joe McGinnity-Yes- This guy is known primarily for his ability to pitch a ridiculous number of innings a year. Perhaps if he hadn’t pitched so many innings his career would have lasted longer than ten years. Actually that’s not really fair, because he got a late start to his career. I am inclined to take him where I didn’t take Chesbro because he pitched about twice as many innings in the same span. Ok that is an exaggeration, but he really did start a ton more game than any pitcher during that time. He lead the league in wins 5 times of his ten years in the league. This would not be impressive given the number of innings he pitched except for the fact that he did it with a good winning percentage. At time with a GREAT winning percentage.

Jesse Burkett-Yes- I generally don't judge players before the turn of the century, but with this guy I am making an exception. He like Delahanty, is a sure thing, because this guy could just knock the cover off the ball.

1945-Ed Delahanty, Jimmy Collins, Fred Clarke, Roger Bresnahan.

Ed Delahanty-Yes- Another Pre-1900 type player, but like Jesse Burkett he is a no-doubter. Ed Delahanty is one of the all time greats, and his death is one of the great mysteries of history.

Jimmy Collins-Yes- Jimmy was one of the best third basemen of his time, both offensively and defensively. .294 .343 .409 is a very good line for a player of his time period. Plus he was an excellent defensive third basemen. During this period of baseball third base is probably the premier defensive position on the diamond due to the high number of bunts down the line.

Fred Clarke-Yes- A good hitter, a good defender, and a good manager. His percentage numbers are a very solid .312 .386. .429. He was one of the most well respected players of his generation by his peers.

Roger Bresnahan- Yes- Roger looks like he shouldn't be a Hall of Famer, but he was probably the best catcher of his time. He could hit a bit, and he had a good OBP to boot, but this was at a time when catchers were some of the worst players on the field due to all the injuries.


1942-Rogers Hornsby- Yes- Another no doubt Hall of Famer, his percentage numbers are phenomenal .358 .434 .577. He won six straight batting titles and he hit over .400 3 times. That’s just silly good.