A Case for CC Sabathia to the HOF (5/5)
Sabathia is also one of the premier left-handed starters of all-time. I would argue there are two names who can definitively be claimed as superior to CC: Lefty Grove, Randy Johnson. Other elite names like Carl Hubbell, Eddie Plank, Warren Spahn, Tom Glavine, and Steve Carlton – you can make a compelling case that Sabathia is better than each of these players.
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Sabathia tops Glavine in K/9+, BB/9+, FIP- (one of the most-utilized park-adjusted metrics for comparing pitchers across generations), WHIP+, BAA+, and ERA-. Every major park-adjusted pitching quantifier you can think of, Sabathia’s is superior to Glavine’s. Hubbell comes off too: he allowed the most home runs in all of baseball from 1928-1943, a timeframe that wasn’t known for players’ ability to hit the long ball. Even if you just factor in his HR/9, to eliminate the argument that he also pitched more innings in that stretch than any other pitcher, he still comes out squarely in the bottom-third among MLB starters.
You can make the argument that CC’s Hall of Fame case does not come without cracks. A lack of standalone dominance in any given season, low strikeout rate relative to the era in which he pitched, less-than-elite ERA, among others.
Some will argue that CC became a shoo-in, guaranteed instantly for induction, by achieving his 3000th strikeout earlier this season, despite the fact that three of the eight pitchers just below him on the all-time list were not voted into Cooperstown, even with a strikeout difference of less than 400 between them and the 3000 mark. Sabathia’s next win, for those who still believe in the individual statistic for pitchers, will be his 250th. He would be 48th on the all-time list, with all but nine of the players ahead of him currently having Hall of Fame status.
On these and additional grounds, I believe Sabathia’s case should relatively easily push voters in the direction of affirming his right to join the veritable pantheon of all-time baseball greats. Will the writers agree? We shall CC.