In a near-repeat of the 26-26 tie vote between Pete Rose and Nolan Ryan in the 1941 round, Jim Palmer barely edged Rose, 27 votes to 25, to become the 35th inductee into the High Heat Stats Circle of Greats. More on Jim and the voting after the jump.
Among the 137 pitchers who had at least 100 starts in the majors in the 1970s, here are the best ERAs of that decade:
1. Jim Palmer 2.58
2. Tom Seaver 2.61
3. Bert Blyleven 2.88
4. Gaylord Perry 2.92
5. Frank Tanana 2.927
To use another traditional stat, here’s a list of the most regular season Wins by a pitcher in the 1970s:
1. Jim Palmer 186
2. Gaylord Perry 184
T3. Tom Seaver, Steve Carlton and Ferguson Jenkins 178
Using more advanced stats, Palmer falls no more than one slot on the list of greatest pitchers of the 1970s:
Best ERA+, 1970-1979 (min, 100 starts)
1. Tom Seaver 138
2. Jim Palmer 137
3. Bert Blyleven 130
4. Dennis Eckersley 128
5. John Candelaria 127
Best OPS+ Against, 1970-1979 (min. 100 starts)
1. Tom Seaver 72
2. Jim Palmer 77
3. Nolan Ryan 78
T4. Bert Blyleven, J.R. Richard, Andy Messersmith and Don Sutton 80
Palmer is, however just 5th among pitchers in pitching Wins Above Replacement (WAR) during the 1970s, according to baseball-reference, and just 9th in WAR according to Fangraphs.
Here’s another example of the same phenomenon. There’s little doubt that the two greatest pitchers to pitch for the St. Louis Browns/Baltimore Orioles franchise have been Jim Palmer and Mike Mussina. Take a look at some career stats for those two pitchers (these are career numbers, so they include Mussina’s years with the Yankees as well as with the Orioles):
J.Palmer 521 Starts, 268 Wins, 152 Losses, .658 Winning Pct., 125 ERA+, 82 OPS+Against
Mussina 536 Starts, 270 Wins, 153 Losses, .658 Winning Pct., 123 ERA+, 81 OPS+Against
These numbers make it look like Palmer was cloned to create Mussina. But b-ref’s formula gives Mussina 82.7 career WAR while Palmer gets only 67.9. Fangraphs is even more extreme, giving Mussina 82.3 career WAR but Palmer just 51.7. Fangraphs ranks Palmer as only 75th in career pitching WAR since 1901, immediately after Jack Morris and Jerry Reuss and just before Camilo Pascual and Steve Rogers, while Mike Mussina, in contrast, is slotted just above Warren Spahn and Phil Niekro.
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Palmer seemed to have a strong lead for almost the entire length of the balloting this round. But Charlie Hustle never stopped running, gaining four votes on Palmer in the final hours of balloting to climb within a single vote of another tie as late as the last few minutes of the round. Ultimately, Rose fell just one Palmer-to-Rose switched vote short of matching the 26-26 tie in the previous round. That’s the same one-switched-vote margin by which Rose fell to Nolan Ryan in the runoff.
With a relatively weak group of newcomers to the eligibility list, several long-term holdovers were able to pile up votes and add to their store of guaranteed ballot eligibility. John Smoltz, Edgar Martinez and Bobby Grich each appeared on more than 25% of the ballots, and thus expanded the number of rounds for which they are assured eligibility to receive Circle of Greats votes. Edgar appeared on a higher percentage of ballots this round than he has in any previous round.
The final spreadsheet showing this round’s tally shows a few adjustments to reflect the effect of the parallel runoff balloting. Votes for “Rose/Ryan” were re-characterized as votes for Pete Rose once Nolan Ryan won the runoff. And votes for Ryan, although they show up in the spreadsheet, were not counted in the denominator used to calculate the percentage of ballots on which each player appeared. So although 61 valid ballots were cast this round, the far bottom right number on the spreadsheet shows only 59, because six votes for Ryan (two full ballots worth) were not included in that calculation.
The full spreadsheet showing this round’s vote tally, after adjustments, is here: COG 1940 Round Part 1 Vote Tally..
The overall vote summary for all Circle of Greats voting rounds is here: COG Vote Summary , with a summary of the raw vote totals on Sheet 1 and a summary of the percentage totals on Sheet 2.
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The Circle of Greats membership thus far (currently being displayed in order of major league regular season games played):
Rickey Henderson, 3,081 games
Cal Ripken, Jr., 3,001 games
Barry Bonds, 2,986 games
Robin Yount, 2,856 games
Reggie Jackson, 2,820 games
George Brett, 2,707 games
Paul Molitor, 2,683 games
Joe Morgan, 2,649 games
Ozzie Smith, 2,573 games
Tim Raines, 2,502 games
Carlton Fisk, 2,499 games
Rod Carew, 2,469 games
Wade Boggs, 2,440 games
Tony Gwynn, 2,440 games
Mike Schmidt, 2,404 games
Frank Thomas, 2,322 games
Gary Carter, 2,295 games
Alan Trammell, 2,293 games
Barry Larkin, 2,180 games
Johnny Bench, 2,158 games
Jeff Bagwell, 2,150 games
Larry Walker, 1,988 games
Mike Piazza, 1,912 games
Nolan Ryan, 807 games
Greg Maddux, 759 games
Steve Carlton, 745 games
Roger Clemens, 709 games
Tom Glavine, 709 games
Bert Blyleven, 699 games
Tom Seaver, 677 games
Fergie Jenkins, 665 games
Randy Johnson, 619 games
Jim Palmer, 576 games
Curt Schilling, 571 games
Mike Mussina, 537 games
