Which active MLB players have the best shot at Cooperstown?

If you want to get in the Baseball Hall of Fame, the math is pretty clear. All time, there are 63 MLB players with lifetime WAR above 80. Of those, five are not in the Hall of Fame. Two of the five, Albert Pujols and Mike Trout, were active in 2022. The others are Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Alex Rodriguez. So we can safely say that if you get to 80 WAR and don’t do steroids, you are a lock.

There are 41 players with career WAR between 70 and 80. Of these, 28 are in the Hall and four (Justin Verlander, Zack Greinke, Clayton Kershaw, and Max Scherzer) are active. Of the other nine, Curt Schilling is likely out because of his politics, Pete Rose is banned, and Rafael Palmeiro was linked to steroids (although Palmeiro and Schilling are both on the ballot for the Hall of Fame’s contemporary baseball era committee). Bill Dahlen and Jim McCormick are from the 1800s so I don’t know why they aren’t in. That leaves Bobby Grich, Lou Whitaker (view his case for the Hall of Fame here), Scott Rolen, and Carlos Beltran. I believe all of them will eventually get in, but we can still surmise that a WAR of 70 gives you a very good chance.

There are 87 players all-time with career WAR between 60 and 70.  Of those, 52 are in the Hall and three (Miguel Cabrera, Robinson Cano, and Joey Votto) are active. That means that a WAR of 60 gives you about a 60% chance of making the Hall.

Below that, you need some luck. Of the 118 retired players with WAR between 50 and 60, 44 are in the Hall. So, when looking at the chances for active players to make the Hall of Fame, we can put a WAR of 60 as the dividing line between those that are likely to get in and those who aren’t.

What can we infer from these numbers for the Hall prospects of current stars? Well, there are currently 58 active players with career WAR above 30.0. Anyone below that either doesn’t have time left to amass enough WAR to build a strong case, or is too young to make projections about the rest of their career. Of those with more than 30 WAR, a rough analysis would be to extend their average yearly WAR thus far until they are 37 years old.

Granted, that’s random on a lot of levels — assuming no WAR after 37, and that they will maintain their current level of play for that long. But the goal is to figure who is on track, and who has work to do, not to make exact predictions.

A look at current MLB players who could make the Baseball Hall of Fame

Projected above 80 — locks for Cooperstown: Mike Trout, Mookie Betts, Manny Machado, Carlos Correa, Nolan Arenado.

Projected between 70 and 80 — excellent chance for Cooperstown: Francisco Lindor, Justin Verlander, Zack Greinke, Aaron Judge, Bryce Harper, Paul Goldschmidt, Jose Ramirez, Max Scherzer.

Projected between 60 and 70 — decent chance for Cooperstown: Alex Bregman, Robinson Cano, Freddie Freeman, Miguel Cabrera, Jose Altuve, Joey Votto, Xander Bogaerts, Evan Longoria, Giancarlo Stanton, Christian Yelich, Chris Sale.

Projected between 50 and 60 — slim chance for Cooperstown: Jacob deGrom, Marcus Semien, Anthony Rizzo, Andrelton Simmons, Gerrit Cole, Andrew McCutchen, Jason Heyward, George Springer, Starling Marte, Madison Bumgarner, Josh Donaldson.

Projected below 50 — no chance at Cooperstown, unless something changes: Anthony Rendon, Kevin Kiermaier, Salvador Perez, Adam Wainwright, Elvis Andrus, David Price, Nelson Cruz, Stephen Strasburg, Yadier Molina, Lorenzo Cain, DJ LeMahieu, Johhny Cueto, Jose Abreu, Michael Brantley, Justin Upton, Corey Kluber, Yu Darvish, Lance Lynn, Brandon Crawford, Carlos Santana, Justin Turner.

Here are a few caveats. WAR seems to underrate catchers, which means Yadier Molina gets hurt by this method. So does J.T. Realmuto, who only has 29.7 WAR for his career but is generally considered the best catcher in the game over the past few years.

Also, the Hall voters will need to decide how to deal with players who came to MLB mid-career from other countries and thus didn’t have time to amass the normal Hall of Fame numbers. Two that stand out in the list under 50 WAR are Yu Darvish and Jose Abreu. Both have been considered elite players for much of their careers, but Darvish was almost 26 when he came to the majors and Abreu was 27. So Darvish is still short of 100 wins and Abreu has just under 1,500 hits, which would leave them short under normal Hall standards.