Roy Halladay shows Hall of Fame path isn’t always pure

On Tuesday, the Hall of Fame announced their newest inductees. If you would have guessed in 2000, one name would never have been on the list.

If someone would have made a list of potential future Hall of Fame players active in the game in 2000 or even in 2004, it’s very feasible that Roy Halladay would not have been on it. On Tuesday, he received 85.4% of the vote from voters to receive election into the Hall of Fame.

Background

Long and lanky at the time, Roy Halladay was highly regarded coming out of high school in Colorado, standing 6’6″ and 180ish pounds when scouts got their first looks at him. He’d filled out some already by the time his senior year of high school ended, and he became the Toronto Blue Jays first-round pick in 1995, #17 overall.

Halladay had a big introduction to the minor leagues, jumped all the way to high-A as a 19-year-old, but holding his own at the level and even excelling in his first full minor league season, throwing 164 2/3 innings with a 2.73 ERA. That made prospect rankers take notice, as he was rated as the #23 prospect in the game after that season by Baseball America.

Control issues plagued his 1997 and 1998 seasons, but due to his youth and consistent ability to eat up innings, Halladay continued to be ranked highly, rated #38 after 1998 and up to #12 after 1998. He got two starts at the big league level in 1998 and shined, which gave plenty of positive feeling to his potential.

Halladay spent all of the 1999 season and had some success as a swingman, but he continued to struggle with control. Those issues came to a head in 2000, as Halladay posted a 10.64 ERA in 67 2/3 innings and was sent to the minors.

Among the elite

Halladay refined his command and control and was back in the majors in the second half of 2001. In 2002, he made his first All-Star team, tossing 239 1/3 innings, with a 19-7 record, 2.93 ERA, and 168 strikeouts. He topped that performance in 2003, winning 22 games and the Cy Young Award.

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Over 500 innings between 2002 and 2003 did no favors to his arm, and he pitched less than 275 combined innings in 2004 and 2005. He rebounded in 2006, reaching the point of one of the elite arms in the game by the end of 2008 and holding that title through a trade to Philadelphia.

Halladay’s excellence ramped up a notch in the National League with the Phillies for two seasons until he just quickly lost effectiveness on the mound at 35. After a 6.82 ERA in 2013 at 36, he retired.

Halladay’s 2002-2011 decade of work averaged 17 wins, a 2.97 ERA, 219 innings, 170 strikeouts, a 1.11 WHIP, and a 148 ERA+. From 2000 to present, Halladay ranks 6th in baseball in wins, 1st in complete games (nearly double 2nd place, 65-39), 12th in innings pitched, 13th in OPS+ (minimum 100 starts), and 16th in strikeouts. All of those rankings are with the horrible season he had in 2000 and include not pitching since 2013.

So many believe that a Hall of Fame player is easy to spot from day one he enters the league and stays at that level his whole career. Roy Halladay shows that isn’t the case.