Roy Halladay 1977-2017

52 Replies

Baseball fans everywhere were stunned and saddened by the tragic passing of Roy Halladay, unquestionably one the greatest pitchers of the recent past. Author of a perfect game and post-season no-hitter, Halladay logged over 2500 IP in a sixteen year career with the Blue Jays and Phillies. Eight times an All-Star and twice a Cy Young Award winner, Halladay recorded a 203-105 career record with a 3.38 ERA, striking out more than 2000 while walking less than two batters per 9 innings.

More after the jump on the career of Roy Halladay.

Halladay was drafted by the Blue Jays as the 17th pick of the first round of the 1995 amateur draft, making his professional debut that same year as an 18 year-old in the Gulf Coast rookie league. Halladay turned in a stellar campaign in A+ ball the next year and worked his way through the AA and AAA ranks in 1997 and 1998, before earning a September call-up in the latter season. Halladay served notice of what lay ahead in his career in collecting his first major league win in his second start, a complete game one-hitter against the Tigers, that one hit coming with two out in the 9th.

Halladay made the Blue Jays out of spring training in the 1999 season and collected the only save of his career in his first appearance of the season. He worked his way into the rotation by the middle of April and collected his first shutout in May. Halladay made three more starts in June but was mainly used in middle and long relief through the summer until rejoining the rotation in mid-August, in time to record 5 quality starts over his last 7 outings. In total, an 8-7 record and a respectable 3.92 ERA in 149.1 IP. Not bad for a 22 year-old rookie.

After that promising rookie season, expectations were high for the 2000 campaign. Halladay started with a W in a strong 7-inning performance, but it was all downhill after that. Getting shelled for six straight starts earned Halladay a tune-up in the minors, but he wasn’t any better when he returned near the end of June and was sent down again a month later. After a September call-up, Halladay was hardly used and got pounded again in his one start that month.  For the season, only 67.2 IP and a monstrous 10.64 ERA. His prospects could not have been more different from those of just one season prior.

Halladay started the 2001 campaign in the minors and didn’t make the big club until the beginning of July. The Red Sox pounded him (and the rest of the Toronto staff) in a 16-4 thrashing in Halladay’s first game but, aside from that outing, he posted a 3.57 ERA for the month, and followed that with 3.24 in August and a dominating 1.63 in September that culminated with a two-hit shutout over the Indians. For the year, 105.1 IP and a stellar 3.16 ERA. But, which Halladay would Toronto see next year?

The 2002 season started Halladay on his historic career, posting a 19-7 record with a 2.93 ERA in 239.1 IP that included two runs or less allowed in 21 of 34 starts, with 6+ IP in all but three of his outings. That would be Halladay’s basic season for the next decade. Aside from the 2004 and 2005 seasons in which he lost significant time to injury, Halladay pitched 220+ innings and collected 16 or more wins every year from 2002 to 2011, posting an ERA under 3.50 in all but one of those seasons, including 6 times under 3.00. For that 10 year peak, Halladay was the most dominating pitcher in the game, as shown by his ledger below.

Totals for 2002-2011 and MLB Rank among 33 pitchers with 1500 IP
Player IP WHIP SO9 BB9 SO/W G GS CG SHO W L W/L% BB SO ERA FIP K% BB% ERA+
Roy Halladay 2194.2 1.111 6.97 1.53 4.57 304 303 63 18 170 75 .694 372 1699 2.97 3.12 19.2% 4.2% 148
MLB Rank 2 2 16 1 1 12 8 1 1 1 4 1 2 4 2 1 12 1 2
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 11/7/2017.

To the above can be added firsts in WAR and WAA (both over 20% higher than Johan Santana in second place), another first in lowest percent of “hard” contact, second in percent of pitches thrown for strikes and highest percent of swings at pitches outside the strike zone, and third in pitches per start and quality starts.

Halladay’s two Cy Young awards were separated by 7 years and featured his top two season marks in IP, Wins, CG, BB/9 and SO/BB ratio. Halladay has the distinction of winning the CYA in both leagues, joining Gaylord Perry, Pedro Martinez, Randy Johnson, Max Scherzer and Roger Clemens.

Toronto was basically a .500 club during Halladay’s tenure, with that result largely due to Doc’s efforts. With Halladay starting, the Blue Jays posted a .662 winning percentage, but only .483 without him. For his peak seasons starting in 2002, that gap widened to a .688 mark with Halladay on the hill and .463 otherwise. With those trends seeming likely to continue as the 32 year-old Halladay finished the 2009 season, Toronto gave Doc the opportunity to finish his career on a winning team with a trade to the defending NL champion Phillies.

Halladay didn’t disappoint his new club, turning in his second CYA season with league-leading totals in IP, Wins, CG, SHO, BB/9 and SO/BB. After his almost no-hitter in his second career game, Halladay had added another one-hitter and four two-hitters, but was still searching for his first no-no. The Doc remedied that omission by recording just the 6th NL perfect game of the live ball era with a 1-0 victory over the Marlins at the end of May. That set the stage for Halladay’s first post-season appearance, an almost perfect performance against the Reds, facing one batter over the minimum for his second no-hit game of 2010, and only the second ever recorded in the post-season.

At age 35 in 2012, Halladay started to experience soreness and pain in his arm that reduced his velocity and hurt his control, resulting in a month and a half on the DL and an inflated 4.49 ERA, It got much worse the next year with velocity on his four-seamer in the low 80s, a BB/9 over 5 and an ERA of almost 7. After becoming a free agent following the 2013 season, Halladay signed a one day contract with Toronto so that he could retire as a Blue Jay.

Despite his dominance over his career peak, Halladay’s black and grey ink are “only” at the level of an average HOFer. Regardless, his black ink is still noteworthy, including:

  • 7 times – CG
  • 5 times – SO/BB ratio
  • 4 times – IP, Shutouts
  • 3 times – BF, BB/9
  • 2 times – Wins
  • 1 time – W-L%, GS, ERA+, FIP, WHIP, HR/9

At the top of the list are his CG totals which none of his contemporaries have come close to matching. Over his 10 year peak, Halladay completed better than 20% of his starts, five times higher than the major league average. The change in complete games over the decades is shown in the chart below.

So how do Halladay’s credentials stand up against other HOF pitchers? Having a career of less than 3000 IP, while not a disqualifier for Hall consideration, certainly limits those chances. Almost 40% of retired pitchers with 3000 IP (52 of 132) are in the HOF compared to just 7% of pitchers (8 of 110) with careers of 2500-3000 IP. That said, Halladay stands second in WAR and WAA in that group, trailing (distantly) only Pedro. In wins (which, for this group, seems to have the strongest correlation to HOF selection), Halladay ranks 5th of those 110 pitchers; the three modern era pitchers ranking slightly ahead of him are all in Cooperstown, as are three of the five following Doc.

Top 25 and ties in Wins by Retired Pitchers with Careers of 2500-3000 IP (HOF members highlighted)
Rk Player WAR IP WAA BB9 SO9 WHIP From To GS CG SHO W L W/L% ERA FIP K% BB% ERA+
1 Pedro Martinez 86.0 2827.1 61.4 2.42 10.04 1.054 1992 2009 409 46 17 219 100 .687 2.93 2.91 27.7% 6.7% 154
2 Bob Caruthers 43.8 2828.2 27.8 1.90 2.86 1.158 1884 1892 310 298 24 218 99 .688 2.83 3.27 7.6% 5.0% 122
3 Hal Newhouser 60.4 2993.0 37.5 3.76 5.40 1.311 1939 1955 374 212 33 207 150 .580 3.06 3.19 14.2% 9.9% 130
4 Bob Lemon 37.5 2850.0 15.1 3.95 4.03 1.337 1946 1958 350 188 31 207 128 .618 3.23 3.79 10.6% 10.3% 119
5 Roy Halladay 65.6 2749.1 40.7 1.94 6.93 1.178 1998 2013 390 67 20 203 105 .659 3.38 3.39 18.8% 5.2% 131
6 Jack Stivetts 41.1 2887.2 19.5 3.60 3.81 1.406 1889 1899 333 278 14 203 132 .606 3.74 4.10 9.7% 9.1% 120
7 Jack Chesbro 41.2 2896.2 16.0 2.14 3.93 1.152 1899 1909 332 260 35 198 132 .600 2.68 2.67 10.9% 5.9% 111
8 Dazzy Vance 62.5 2966.2 39.1 2.55 6.20 1.230 1915 1935 349 217 29 197 140 .585 3.24 3.18 16.5% 6.8% 125
9 Jesse Tannehill 41.1 2759.1 17.3 1.56 3.08 1.186 1894 1911 321 264 34 197 117 .627 2.80 2.86 8.4% 4.3% 114
10 Ed Walsh 63.2 2964.1 36.3 1.87 5.27 1.000 1904 1917 315 250 57 195 126 .607 1.82 2.02 15.2% 5.4% 145
11 Bob Shawkey 46.2 2937.0 18.1 3.12 4.17 1.273 1913 1927 333 197 33 195 150 .565 3.09 3.37 11.3% 8.5% 114
12 David Cone 61.7 2898.2 35.6 3.53 8.28 1.256 1986 2003 419 56 22 194 126 .606 3.46 3.57 21.9% 9.3% 121
13 Tommy Bridges 52.5 2826.1 27.0 3.80 5.33 1.368 1930 1946 362 200 33 194 138 .584 3.57 3.88 13.8% 9.8% 126
14 Babe Adams 49.5 2995.1 26.6 1.29 3.11 1.092 1906 1926 354 205 44 194 140 .581 2.76 2.72 8.7% 3.6% 118
15 Dwight Gooden 48.2 2800.2 24.1 3.07 7.37 1.256 1984 2000 410 68 24 194 112 .634 3.51 3.33 19.6% 8.2% 111
16 Sam Leever 41.8 2660.2 20.1 1.99 2.87 1.141 1898 1910 299 241 39 194 100 .660 2.47 2.84 7.9% 5.5% 123
17 Rube Waddell 61.0 2961.1 34.9 2.44 7.04 1.102 1897 1910 340 261 50 193 143 .574 2.16 2.03 19.8% 6.9% 135
18 Tommy Bond 49.7 2779.2 29.7 0.58 2.78 1.092 1876 1884 314 294 35 193 115 .627 2.25 2.38 7.6% 1.6% 113
19 Wes Ferrell 48.8 2623.0 23.8 3.57 3.38 1.481 1927 1941 323 227 17 193 128 .601 4.04 4.23 8.5% 9.0% 116
20 Lon Warneke 41.9 2782.1 19.2 2.39 3.69 1.245 1930 1945 343 192 30 192 121 .613 3.18 3.74 9.8% 6.4% 119
21 Lefty Gomez 43.1 2503.0 19.7 3.94 5.28 1.352 1930 1943 320 173 28 189 102 .649 3.34 3.88 13.7% 10.2% 125
22 Deacon Phillippe 34.4 2607.0 13.4 1.25 3.21 1.105 1899 1911 289 242 27 189 109 .634 2.59 2.60 9.0% 3.5% 120
23 Urban Shocker 54.9 2681.2 29.0 2.20 3.30 1.255 1916 1928 317 200 28 187 117 .615 3.17 3.54 8.8% 5.9% 124
24 Jimmy Key 49.4 2591.2 26.2 2.32 5.34 1.229 1984 1998 389 34 13 186 117 .614 3.51 3.80 14.4% 6.2% 122
25 Bill Donovan 41.9 2964.2 16.2 3.21 4.71 1.245 1898 1918 327 289 35 185 139 .571 2.69 2.77 12.8% 8.7% 106
26 Mike Cuellar 29.3 2808.0 4.1 2.63 5.23 1.197 1959 1977 379 172 36 185 130 .587 3.14 3.29 14.2% 7.1% 109
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 11/8/2017.

 

Here are Halladay’s ranks among that group of 110.

Ranks Among 110 Retired Pitchers with Careers of 2500-3000 IP
METRIC Overall (since 1876) MODERN ERA (SINCE 1901) LIVE BALL ERA (SINCE 1920)
WAR 2 2 2
WAA 2 2 2
Wins 5 4 4
W-L% 4 2 2
ERA+ 4 4 2
SO/9 9 9 8
SO% 8 7 7
BB/9 14 9 4
BB% 13 7 3
SO/BB 4 3 3
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 11/8/2017.

 

Halladay’s Wins and W-L% are especially impressive considering he played most of his career on mediocre teams, and in a hitter-friendly ballpark. Intangibles also bode well for Halladay; there seems little doubt that he was both well-liked and well-respected, on and off the field.

To me, everything points to Doc passing muster come Hall voting time. That could be right around the corner, assuming that Halladay’s 5 year waiting requirement is waived as a deceased player (otherwise, he will become eligible in 2019) . Hall of Stats has Halladay comfortably included with a 139 score, the 25th ranked pitcher by its evaluation method.

52 thoughts on “Roy Halladay 1977-2017”

  1. CursedClevelander

    Obviously, my first thoughts are on how awful this is – doesn’t it feel like baseball has more of these tragic early deaths than other sports? I’m sure part of it is confirmation bias, but you’ve got Halladay, Cory Lidle, Ken Hubbs, Jose Fernandez, Steve Olin and Tim Crews, Lyman Bostock, Thurman Munson, Nick Adenhart, Yordano Ventura…it’s a sad thing to contemplate.

    But to the purely statistical – I think most of us would agree that Halladay is a Hall of Fame caliber pitcher. If he makes it, was his 2000 season the worst ever for a Hall of Famer?

    After a relatively promising rookie year, the wheels came off – in 19 games, 13 starts, Halladay pitched 67.2 innings. He gave up:

    87 runs – 80 of them earned. 42 BBs. 14 HRs. 107 hits. Only 44 K’s. He was 4-7 with a 10.64(!) ERA (ERA+ of 48) and a 2.202 WHIP. BB-Ref has it as -2.8 WAR, an astonishing number for so few innings.

    What’s his competition? There are 3 others at -2.0 WAR or lower:

    Bob Feller in 1952 – 9-13 with a 4.74 ERA in 191.2 IP. Doesn’t seem too awful, but it adds up to -2.9 WAR. The era context hurts him, as he sports a 71 ERA+. He’d recover a bit in 1953 and 1954 but for the most part he was already finished as a useful starter.

    Jack Chesbro in 1909 – His last season, Chesbro split the year with the Yankees and Red Sox. Neither team used him all that much because he was completely out of juice – a 6.14 ERA (and 13 unearned runs) in 55.2 IP for -2.0 WAR. With an ERA+ of 42, he looks even worse than Halladay in league context.

    Jim Bunning in 1971 – Like Chesbro, Bunning just had nothing left. He was 39 and had 3600+ innings on his arm, and it showed – a 5.48 ERA (65 ERA+) in 110 IP. Also a -2.0 WAR on the dot, like Chesbro. WHIP of 1.482 isn’t that bad, though.

    So there have been some bad seasons for Hall of Famers, but they were all guys with lots of mileage towards the end of their careers. I’m not sure there’s ever been a guy to crater like Halladay early on and recover to pitch for a decade at a HoF level,

    Reply ↓
    1. no statistician but

      What I don’t like about Halladay’s death is how it happened. It is not just my imagination, nor is it an anecdotal mirage: flying in small planes is the most dangerous pastime you can get involved in. The number of high profile sports, politics, and entertainment deaths since 1950 in small plane crashes far exceeds those in automobile accidents, gunshot accidents, dangerous sporting (mountain climbing, sky diving, etc) accidents, even motorcycle accidents. True enough, whole teams have gone down in commercial and chartered flights, but there the onus is on someone else, and far fewer high profile figures had died in such accidents than in privately piloted small plane wrecks.

      From the day the music died to the day Roy Halladay died—think about Rocky Marciano, Patsy Cline, Jim Croce, Ken Hubbs, Tony Lema, Audie Murphy, Thurman Munson, Bob Denver, Lance Reventlow, John F. Kennedy, Jr., Wilbur Shaw (well, 1954, but . . .), Payne Stewart, Mike Todd, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Paul Wellstone, etc.

      I had a friend whose hobby was flying those big four foot wingspan model planes. When his kids were finally through college and he finally had a little loose money—age 58 or 59—he decided to move up to the real thing. Took flying lessons, got his pilot’s license, bought the safest small plane available, one with a built in parachute for the plane. It didn’t save him when he went down two or three months later. He had a wife who was in remission for cancer at the time.

      It used to be a cliche that cocaine use was a sign that someone had too much money. Flying a small plane, to my mind, is another sign.

      Another rant away from baseball per se, but ss I said to begin, HOW Halladay’s death happened really upset me.

      Reply ↓
    2. Doug

      I thought of Red Ruffing and Tom Glavine and their struggles early in their careers. But, nothing close to the -2.8 WAR of Halladay’s 2000 campaign. Leaving aside HOFers, the closest comp to Halladay’s season might be one of these:

      Closest parallel I can find for a HOFer early in his career is Eppa Rixey’s -1.4 WAR in only 103 IP (2-11, 67 ERA+) in 1914, his third season. That followed an excellent rookie season and an okay sophomore year. Early Wynn had -1.3 WAR in 1942 (10-16, 72 ERA+), but in almost twice as many innings as Rixey. It was also Wynn’s third season, though he totaled only 60 IP over his first two.

      Rixey, incidentally, was inducted into the Hall posthumously, dying a month after being voted in by the Veterans’ committee in 1963.

      Reply ↓
  2. e pluribus munu

    Thank you, Doug. A very nice review of Halladay’s fine career with some terrific historical context that makes this a useful reference post. Like CC, I think it’s very sad that this tribute was called for; it could have waited another forty years.

    CC, I’ve gone through the HoF pitcher records and I think you’re right to anticipate that Halladay’s 2000 season could set a new level of wonderfully awful if he ultimately gets into the Hall – wonderful because it’s in the context of the dawn of such a fine career. One interesting tidbit about Halladay’s unearned run total in 2000: all his season’s unearned runs came in one inning, his last appearance. Until that point, bad as his ERA was (10.75), it was at least compounded by no unearned runs. Then Halladay came in to start the bottom of the fourth in relief and was responsible for seven unearned runs in 0.2 IP (on the way to a 1-23 Blue Jay defeat). He did, however, improve his ERA to 10.64.

    Reply ↓
  3. Dr. Doom

    Some other Halladay tidbits:

    **Players with 8+ complete games since 2005:
    1. James Shields, 2011 (11)
    2. CC Sabathia, 2008 (10)
    3. Roy Halladay, 2008 (9)
    4. Roy Halladay, 2009 (9)
    5. Roy Halladay, 2010 (9)
    6. Roy Halladay, 2011 (8)

    **Halladay led his league in Strikeout to Walk Ratio for four straight years. Only Curt Schilling has done that since baseball was integrated.

    **Halladay led his league in complete games 5 consecutive seasons (2007-2011). All five of those years, Halladay had 7 or more complete games. In the entire history of MLB, only Robin Roberts (1952-1956) and Warren Spahn (1957-1963) have led their league in complete games for five or more years straight.

    Finally, Bill James invented this silly thing to get wins and losses on a one-dimensional scale. The formula is really simple. It’s:
    W * W% + (W – L)
    While Halladay’s 203 wins rank 109th all-time, by this method, he ranks 35th among all players with 200+ wins. Considering what Doug pointed out about the generally poor quality of the Toronto teams he played on, this is pretty cool.

    Reply ↓
    1. no statistician but

      Dr. Doom:

      Glad to see you back. On the previous thread I emulated you in a way by trying to get an advance vote on the 2017 NL MVP. I invite you to weigh in.

      Reply ↓
  4. Bluejaysstatsgeek

    I haven’t been around here that much lately, but then again, neither has this place been doing that much lately either. Thank you Doug for a really nice summary of Roy’s career.

    Yesterday, The Fan590 replayed Bob McCown’s interview with Roy the day he signed a 1-day contract to be able to retire a BlueJay. the audio is here:

    http://www.sportsnet.ca/590/prime-time-sports/remembering-roy-halladay-1977-2017/

    My favorite Halladay game was the “Return of Burnett and the Evil Empire” game, May 12, 2009. I was in the upper deck, behind home plate with my son and in filed a bunch of my university students filling the two rows in front of us! The place was rocking: The Jays averages just over 23,000 fans per game, but that night, it was close to 44,000, and figure only surpassed on opening and closing days. Here’s the box score:

    https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/TOR/TOR200905120.shtml

    Another game I loved, but did not attend, was between Halladay and one of my other favourite players who later became a Jay, Mark Buehrle, May 31, 2007. Game duration: ONE HOUR AND FIFTY MINUTES! Roy got the win, but allowed 6 baserunners. Mark gave up two solo HRs and no other baserunners.

    https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/TOR/TOR200705310.shtml

    We were so fortunate to have Roy and his family in our lives here in Toronto. There are a lot of people that were able to enjoy a game in “Doc’s Box” at the SkyDome when they were patients at the Hospital for Sick Children thanks to Roy.

    Finally a hat tip to Harvey Dorfman, who Halladay credited with turning around the mental side of his game. Without Harvey’s guidance, it is possible Halladay might not have turned his career around after being sent down to Dunedin.

    Reply ↓
    1. Mike L

      Nice memories, Bluejay. Come back more often. I’d like to see a rebuild of critical mass of postings and readers/commenters.

      Reply ↓
  5. Paul E

    Doug,
    Thanks for all the research. On October 13th, Halladay tweeted, “I have dreamed about owning an A5 since I retired. Real life is better than my dreams”. When he came to Philadelphia, his humility seemed larger than even his talent. He just seemed like a regular guy, quiet at times, always humble.
    As far as pitching style, he reminded me a lot of Greg Maddux – 3 or 4 pitches that he threw with pinpoint control and never down the heart of the plate. Charlie Manuel let him remain in games when he often had large leads and, subsequently, his arm just died when you might have thought he had another 2-3 years left in the tank

    Reply ↓
  6. no statistician but

    On the surface Roy Halladay is a far different sort of pitcher from another who had similar success in terms of W-L %, ERA+, length of career, and reason for retiring.

    But given the differing eras in which they pitched, I wonder how different they really were? Halladay’s productive starting career lasted ten years vs thirteen for his rival X, and that is a difference that explains a few things in the following comparison (although X lost two productive years in the military):

    Halladay finished in the top ten in wins 8 times vs 11 for X
    Halladay finished in the top ten in ERA 7 times (all top five) vs 11 for X (7 top five)
    Halladay finished in the top ten in Wins 8 times vs 11 for X
    Halladay finished in the top ten in W-L % 7 times vs 9 for X
    Paradoxically, Halladay finished in the top ten just 3 times in H/9 vs 7 for X
    but in Walks and Hits/9 he finished in the top ten 6 times vs 8 for X
    Halladay finished in the top ten in Ks 6 times vs 10 for X, but five of those finishes
    produced over 200 Ks, whereas X had only one season over 200 Ks
    Halladay finished in the top ten in ERA+ 7 times vs 10 for X
    Halladay finished in the top ten in FIP 8 times vs 9 for X

    In career adjusted pitching runs Halladay ranks 28th vs 22nd for X
    In career adjusted pitching wins Halladay ranks 26th vs 21st for X
    In career RE24 Halladay ranks 20th vs 10th for X
    In career WPA Halladay ranks 14th vs 16th for X
    In Career WPA/LI Halladay ranks 20th vs 24th for X
    In career REW Halladay ranks 18th vs 9th for X

    So, was the 6’5” 225 lb Roy Halliday really just the 2000 version of the 5’10” 178 lb Whitey Ford? Were their differences more differences in era than in basic pitching style?

    Reply ↓
    1. Mike L

      NSB, you are taking me back to the COG arguments about Ford–and very nice work you have done. I agree, there are real similarities in results.

      Reply ↓
    2. Dr. Doom

      Similar, yes, but without one of the biggest differences. When you’re talking W%, Ford played for teams that won the pennant. Halladay generally played for teams that won about half their games. The other mitigating factor is that finishing in the top 10 for Ford was different in a 8-team league than it was for Halladay in a 14- or 16-team league. I don’t think they’re really that different, and have a LOT of similarities. I’ve actually always thought of them in a group with Pedro, Curt Schilling, and Tim Hudson – right handers with around 200 wins and absurdly good winning percentages. I’m not as good as Bill James was at sorting pitchers into “families,” but I always appreciated that he did that. These guys are one such group for me.

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    3. Hartvig

      One pitcher that I was surprised to see his career totals line up so closely with Halladay on career wins chart above is Dazzy Vance. Not only are things like WAR & WAA pretty close but also stuff like KO% & ERA. The Dazzler walked a few more batters & his W-L% wasn’t nearly as good but overall you’d be hard pressed to say who’s numbers were who’s if someone were to mix them up.
      Which of course is all totally misleading. Vance was THE strike out pitcher between The Big Train & Rapid Robert whereas Halladay only had 3 top 10 finishes in KO% in his career and all towards the bottom. Vance’s career is virtually entirely in his 30’s whereas Halladay was pretty much toast by age 35.
      Those are 2 guys I’d never think put in a group and yet Vance has an 890.3 similarity score to Halladay.
      Regardless of the tragic circumstances of his early death, if I had a say in HOF balloting he would have my vote.

      Reply ↓
  7. MikeD

    His ten-year peak from 2002-2011 places him among the elite of pitchers. He’s an easy first-ballot HOFer. There are other pitchers who accumulated more WAR, but many of them were not greater pitchers. When it comes to the HOF, I’m about the peak and the elite.

    Reply ↓
  8. MikeD

    Doug, isn’t it too late to waive Halladay’s 5 year waiting requirement? Isn’t voting for the 2018 inductions going on right now? If I have my years correctly, he would have been on the ballots mailed out late next year, announced in early 2019. I don’t believe there would be enough time to add him to the ballots due at the end of December this year. As I noted in my other post, I see Halladay as an easy HOF election, yet I suspect there was going to be great debate among some members of the voting community when his name hit the ballot. I fully expect he’d get elected eventually, but it wouldn’t have surprised me if he had to wait a few ballots. His untimely death will likely eliminate that wait. I see a first-ballot induction. Sad that Doc will not be there to enjoy it.

    Reply ↓
    1. Dr. Doom

      Gehrig and Clemente were both elected via special erection following their deaths. I would think that would be the path for Halladay, too.

      Reply ↓
      1. Voomo Zanzibar

        Seriously ya gotta spell check before clicking ‘post’ DD.
        …Though a dollop of humor on this solemn thread is probably a good thing.

        Reply ↓
        1. Dr. Doom

          Bahahahaha! That is why I almost never post on my phone. Dang. Well, glad to provide a chuckle when I can, unintentional though it was.

          Reply ↓
          2. Paul E

            Geeze….first Weinstein, then Spacey, then Louis C.K., …..and now Dr. Doom. Let’s hope there are no aspiring actresses on this site

      1. Doug

        Thanks for clarifying, obs. I didn’t know if there was a rule. Although, as note for Clemente and Gehrig, sometimes the rules are waived.

        Since Doc will be eligible in 2019 regardless, perhaps that’s as it should be, as the emotional response due to his passing will have subsided somewhat by then.

        Reply ↓
  9. Richard Chester

    Here are the 15 highest ratios of a pitcher’s CG/league CG (both leagues combined). Halladay makes the list 4 times.

    Year ….. CG ….. Ratio….. Player
    2017 ….. 5 ….. 0.085 ….. Corey Kluber
    2017 ….. 5 ….. 0.085 ….. Ervin Santana
    2008 ….. 10 ….. 0.074 ….. CC Sabathia
    2016 ….. 6 ….. 0.072 ….. Chris Sale
    2008 ….. 9 ….. 0.066 ….. Roy Halladay
    2011 ….. 11 ….. 0.064 ….. James Shields
    2007 ….. 7 ….. 0.063 ….. Roy Halladay
    2016 ….. 5 ….. 0.060 ….. Johnny Cueto
    2004 ….. 9 ….. 0.060 ….. Livan Hernandez
    2009 ….. 9 ….. 0.059 ….. Roy Halladay
    2010 ….. 9 ….. 0.055 ….. Roy Halladay
    2014 ….. 6 ….. 0.051 ….. Clayton Kershaw
    1999 ….. 12 ….. 0.051 ….. Randy Johnson
    1998 ….. 15 ….. 0.050 ….. Curt Schilling
    1997 ….. 13 ….. 0.049 ….. Pedro Martinez

    Reply ↓
    1. no statistician but

      Some other facts about CGs:

      Last season in which the tenth place finisher in CGs had

      30 or more: 1906
      25 or more: 1921
      20 or more: 1950
      15 or more: 1979
      10 or more: 1988
      5 or more: 2000.

      First season in which the tenth place finisher had one complete game: 2017.

      First season in which the tenth place finisher has no complete games: coming soon.

      Through 1999 the first place finisher had double digit CGs. Since then only twice has this happened and not since 2011.

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      1. Kahuna Tuna

        Through 1999 the first place finisher had double digit CGs. Since then only twice has this happened and not since 2011.

        Change Shields’ nickname to “Complete Game James.”

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  10. Mike L

    If the waiting period is waived for Halladay for the 2018 HOF class, here are the locks or “serious discussion” eligibles (exclusive of PEDS) 1st Time: Chipper, Thome, and Rolen (all with 70+BWAR). Prominent Holdovers: Hoffman and Vlad (each with over 70% voting this year), Mussina (83WAR) and that blowhard (sorry, muscle memory) Schilling (79.9 WAR). That’s a lot of competition.
    He might have more luck in 2019–the only standout is Mariano (Todd Helton and Pettitte are also first-timers)

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    1. Hartvig

      My thinking is that the closer the voting is to the sad event, the more likely it would be that Halladay get in on the first round. My reasoning goes thusly:

      Voters who are big on advanced metrics are probably going to vote for him regardless. Based on the kind of support that Mussina & Schilling (minus a penalty for dislikability) have received that puts him at about 50%.

      For more traditional voters- who I also think are more likely to be swayed by his untimely death- it gets a little more complicated but I think it works in his favor.

      He has 2 Cy Youngs vs none for either Schilling or Mussina. He also has 2 seconds, a third & a fifth. Schilling has 3 seconds & a fifth and Mussina has 1 second and a few 5th or 6ths. He has 3 twenty win seasons as does Schilling vs only 1 for Mussina but Halladay also has 2 19 wins seasons vs 2 for Mussina & none for Schilling. Schilling suffers from having an odd & somewhat inconsistent career (sort of like Luis Tiant’s) which kind of dilutes the impact while Mussina has a reputation- undeserved, in my opinion- as being a consistently very good but never truly great pitcher. And then there’s Halladay’s leading the league in complete games 7 times. Schilling did it 4 times but they were spread out over a 6 years span and both preceded and followed by injury plagued years thus diluting their impact on the perception of his durability). He also has an even better career winning percentage their either Schilling or Mussina despite the fact that both of theirs were outstanding (Mussina was 19th over all in career winning % vs 41st for Moose & 135th for Schilling). He didn’t strike out enough batters for that to work in his favor but the fact that he struck out 200+ in a season 5 times and is in the top 70 for his career means it probably doesn’t work against him either.

      I’d say if you figure the Cy Youngs, 20 win seasons, reputation for durability and winning percentage and you’ve got a candidate that traditional voters are going to like. Add in the tragedy to focus the voters attention and I think he’d be a pretty sure bet on this years ballot (assuming voting isn’t already underway or something). I’m not positive that would carry over to next fall/winter but I’m fairly certain he’ll get in fairly quickly whenever he gets on the ballot>

      Reply ↓
      1. Mike L

        I don’t think we are very much apart on this one. I think he’ll eventually get in, and deservedly so. To your point above, the First Ballot thing has been rendered absurd–it’s clearly no longer an inner-circle indicator. But I also don’t think Halladay is an inner-circle guy, rather the relative shortness of his career places him in a subset of candidates with high peaks who have (and should) have gone in. On the Big Hall-Small Hall debate, I’m a “Medium” Hall, but that’s only in the abstract, because we have the Hall we already have. Schilling and Mussina are interesting problems, especially in dealing with modern metrics. Better than Halladay? Not over a ten year stretch but career value is substantially higher. If I had the vote, I’d put all three in. I was more focussed on the crowded ballot aspect, and there are several newbies as well as some worthy holdovers that I think are deserving and arguably should go in. Most writers will not go to ten.

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  11. no statistician but

    There seems to be some anticipatory handwringing about Halladay’s chances for immediate enshrinement in the HOF. I can’t see it. He’s a first ballot sure thing and would have been one if he were still among us, unless the voters are totally brainless, or don’t bother to examine the most basic statistics, or have profound memory loss.

    CYA: 2 firsts, 2 seconds, one third
    pWAR: 4 firsts, 1 second, 2 thirds
    ERA: top five seven times
    etc.

    In retrospect he looks as good as he did during his career: a dominating pitcher for a ten year stretch with a minor drop due to injury in two of those years. Short career otherwise, but . . ..

    I know—Curt Schilling. Schilling deserves the Hall, too, and his record looks superficially like Halladay’s, but Halliday accomplished as much or more at a higher level in 500 fewer innings. And Schilling’s attitude hasn’t won him friends.

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  12. e pluribus munu

    I’m surprised by talk of Halladay as a sure first-ballot Hall of Famer. I really don’t see it. I thought he was a terrific pitcher and a nice half-throwback to the days when aces went the distance, and I certainly think he deserves to be in the Hall. But “first ballot” usually means someone who should be, by consensus, among the all-time greats, unarguably superior to the normally outstanding records of Hall candidates: I just don’t see Halladay as meeting that standard. For example, a voter choosing Halladay in preference to Mussina, who is now hoping to be a “fifth-ballot” choice, makes no sense to me (not to mention Schilling, who I think is being denied the Hall for completely illegitimate reasons).

    I think MikeD’s comment captures the issue. Mike calls Doc an “easy” first-ballot pick, but he gives a specific reason: “I’m about the peak and the elite.” I don’t think it follows that “elite” has to relate to “peak,” but if you’re a voter who is all about peak performance, then, yes, Halladay would be an easy first-ballot pick. But HoF voters in total have traditionally been about a combination of peak and longevity of contributions, and the truly easy first-ballot picks have been players who combined both, like Seaver, Carlton, and so forth. (Of course there have been exceptions, like Koufax, but as our CoG debates about Koufax have shown, time has called into question the judgment that he should have been an easy first-ballot pick.)

    Because real Hall voting does reflect a balance of views about what constitutes career excellence, I think that in the normal course of things, Doc would not have been particularly close on the first ballot, but would have gradually gained strength and made it in on a subsequent ballot, as I’m sure Moose will do (and if Schilling, whose votes have not followed the predictable pattern, does not, I think it will be more outrageous than anything Schilling himself has said or done — which is saying a lot).

    As for the effect of Halladay’s sudden death, I don’t really see it as a legitimate factor. It is sad that Doc died prematurely from an accident, but his death followed from his choice to pursue a fairly risky activity that he seems to have truly loved beyond others. I admire his pursuit of that dream, in spite of the obvious risks — I wish I were more of a risk-taker in life, and I wish I had experienced the sense of exultation that Doc’s comments about aviation seemed to reflect — but that’s not the sort of admiration that would bear on a Hall vote or, more specifically, on the timing of a Hall vote. When Clemente was voted into the Hall on an expedited basis after a plane crash, the reason was not that he had died: it was that he had risked his life, and ultimately lost it, in order to benefit others. Clemente’s baseball Hall credentials, which were already of “consensus first-ballot” strength, were enhanced by an exemplary action he felt obligated to undertake as a baseball/home-nation celebrity. It’s saying nothing negative about Doc to say that this would not apply in his case, but I think it would say something negative about baseball if it were unable to bear in mind the difference.

    So I think we should keep several issues distinct: our sadness at Halladay’s early and sudden death, recognition that there is an argument for seeing him as a top quality Hall candidate, and an understanding that his qualifications are not likely of the sort that would normally earn a pitcher first-ballot election.

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    1. no statistician but

      EPM: when the peak is ten years long and constitutes dominance, that’s HOF first ballot to me. Mussina deserves better, too, but anyone taking a close look at his year to year performance and his advanced stats compared to Halladay’s would have to conclude that he wasn’t the pitcher over time that Halladay was, or short term that Schilling was. He’s more like Glavine and Maddox, and I think that’s why he’s been downplayed. Maddox was . . . Maddox, and Glavine’s success went on longer with the result that his raw cumulative stats are more impressive. Halladay is a different sort of pitcher.

      As for your remarks on Koufax, I think your memory is faulty: Koufax was so dominant for his last six years that he was a shoo-in, given the further narrative of his arm problems. In an era when there was far more resistance to first ballot acceptance, he got 86.9%, more than Berra the same year, more than Spahn the following year, and almost as much as Mantle two years later (88.2). The COG debate had a different slant and the advantage of hindsight, but also the disadvantage of too many COG voters not ready to understand or accept the nature of particular players’ contexts from historical accounts.

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      1. e pluribus munu

        A very reasonable response, nsb, except for your suggestion that my memory on Koufax is faulty. There is nothing about Koufax and his career I don’t remember, including my own incredulity that anyone could fail to vote for Koufax — I thought 87% was an outrageous insult. From ’62 through ’66, the only times I could not recite Koufax’s current stats by heart was before I’d had a chance to get hold of the morning’s sports section report on last night’s game.

        But perspectives can change. Koufax was, in fact, not dominant for his last six seasons. He was dominant for three of them (after six initial so-so years of promise postponed) and excellent, in varying aspects, in the other three (control was still an issue in ’61; injuries yielded Kershaw-2016-17-like shortfalls in ’62 and ’64). It was the terrific drama of the best of his seasons that carried him into the Hall: surprising us all by topping Mathewson’s strikeout total in ’61; his injury blowing up the most powerful Dodger team ever in ’62; the super WS performances in ’63 and ’65 and tremendous finishes in the tight pennant races of ’65 and ’66, knocking off Waddell’s record in the bargain, the Yom Kippur sacrifice, the spring holdout, and the utter shock of his retirement after a 27-win (10.3 WAR) season that in every respect seemed to be the apex rather than the end of a Hall career. The storyline carried Koufax in with 86.9%. Take a couple of those pennants away from the Dodgers and tack on a few ordinary wind-up seasons at the end of Sandy’s career, and I expect that 86.9% would have been cut by half, despite the fact that his stats through ’66 were unchanged. Looking back now, I think Koufax belongs in the Hall, but that his first-ballot election was dictated by psychology more than stats (which would not be true of Spahn’s 83% the following year).

        As for Halladay, I have no question you are right: when the peak is ten years long and constitutes dominance, that’s HOF first ballot to you — maybe to me too (I’d have to think about it more). But dominance can be of different degrees — Doc wasn’t dominant in the sense that Sandy seemed to be in the mid-’60s; I don’t believe Doc’s decade would be HOF first ballot to 75% of Hall voters under normal circumstances, and so I believe it’s wrong to call Halladay’s first-round election a sure thing. If that calculus is changed because of Doc’s early death, I think it would indicate a defect in the HoF admissions process. Of course, human voters are always defective: they were in Koufax’s case (although half a century ago I never would have allowed as much).

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        1. Mike L

          I see Halladay as a lot like Scherzer. Talent wedded to a seriously tough-minded personality. If HOF first ballot were truly limited to the inner circle/elite, I agree with EPM, and I wouldn’t put him there. I mentioned the log-jam of eligibles this year (if they move him up) because I think it’s going to be an overloaded ballot, and, while I think Halladay will (and should) be in HOF, I wouldn’t leapfrog him over Chipper, Thome, and either Mussina or Schilling. Hoffman is a different argument. Rolen I could go either way on. Edgar, I think belongs.

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    2. Hartvig

      I’ve never really understood the whole “first ballot” thinking anyways.

      Cy Young wasn’t first ballot- largely because the original voting structure and the rules regarding them were poorly so poorly laid out- but neither was Eddie Collins or Rogers Hornsby or Pete Alexander or Joe DiMaggio or Eddie Matthews or Yogi Berra; yet somehow Lou Brock, Tony Gwynn and Nolan Ryan were.

      I’m not saying that Brock or Gwynn or Ryan don’t belong in the Hall of Fame- I think that they all do- but I don’t think that many people would place them among the elite of the elite either.

      It seems to me that someone is either a Hall of Famer or they’re not. If someone makes a compelling argument that changes your mind from one vote to the next that’s one thing. But not voting from someone on the first ballot or the first 5 or 10 or 14 ballots and then doing so in order to establish some kind of HOF pecking order that’s something entirely different and not something I can really understand.

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      1. e pluribus munu

        I think you’ve highlighted the central aspect of the argument in your last sentence, Hartvig. The games some voters play with their HoF ballots aren’t understandable — unless you allow that many voters tend to act like emotionally complex, game-playing human beings, rather than people who feel responsible to pursue their privileged task with detached objectivity.

        When I was first working, I used to find it strange and irritating that colleagues seemed to do various aspects of their jobs in Byzantine ways, and I tended to show my frustration. Later, I calmed down a little as I came to understand that they acted that way because they were people, and later still, looking back on many of my own decisions, I was dismayed to realize that I was one too. Now that I’ve been retired awhile, I can once again pretend to judgmental purity.

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  13. no statistician but

    On the subject of Hall of Fame voting,

    Bobby Doerr has just passed away 145 days short of his 100th birthday. An idiosyncratic Veterans’ Committee choice for the HOF, in my estimation. Good, of course, but not even super good much of the time, never received more than a 25% share in HOF regular voting. Three of his best seasons were during WWII when the competition wasn’t the greatest, and his RBI totals batting in the heart of the Red Sox lineup were genuinely inflated by playing in Fenway and having guys like Williams, Pesky, and Stephens crowding the bases ahead of him.

    There are arguable reasons for including players in the Hall whose careers were shortened or compromised by death, injury, or illness, from Addie Joss onward, or players whose defensive skill shone far above and beyond expectation like Maz, or players who did something remarkable and memorable like Lou Brock, or even players whose names were a watchword in their time—Tinker, Evers, Chance—but looking through the HOF list casually I can only find three other players who seem a match for Doerr: Rizzuto, Schoendienst, and Kell, all his contemporaries, all infielders, and all idiosyncratic Veterans’ Committee choices, good players, of course, Doerr being the best in most respects, but had Rizzuto not lost three years to WWII, maybe not.

    Doerr, Rizzuto, and Schoendienst were popular players on outstanding teams, but with the exception of Rizzuto in 1950, none was ever really the top player on one of those teams, possibly second best occasionally. Kell has the 1949 batting title and another outstanding season the following year, but otherwise his reputation rests on a string of seasons batting over .300. Save for 1950 he was an indifferent fielder playing on indifferent teams.

    In contrast Halladay, though a pitcher, is so far above these four in excellence that it’s idiotic that we’re discussing his worthiness—in my opinion.

    Reply ↓
    1. Richard Chester

      Ted Williams was instrumental in persuading the Veteran’s committee to vote Doerr into the HOF. Doerr’s 125 tOPS+ at home is the highest for all players with at least 3000 PA. So he benefited greatly by playing in Fenway Park as shown in his career splits. His home OPS was .929 versus .716 on the road. At the original cavernous Yankee Stadium his slash was .200/.272/.257/.528 with 3 HR in 499 AB.

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      1. e pluribus munu

        Richard, Let me suggest a little fine tuning of your good observations about Doerr’s homefield record. I don’t think it’s any knock on him that his tOPS+ was so high per se. A player who is far more successful in his home park than in any other can be valuable: in Doerr’s day, he played 250% more games in that park than in any other one. The problem in Doerr’s case, it seems to me, is that just about everyone hit better in Fenway, meaning that a large portion of his Fenway productivity was just due to Fenway, and not to any exceptional “fit” between Doerr and Fenway.

        As for his performance in the Stadium, I think the figure has to be understood in the context of the quality of the pitching staff Doerr faced there. In the even more cavernous (except in dead center) Griffith Stadium, his productivity was far higher.

        And nsb, while it may seem idiotic to argue Halladay’s Hall worthiness when looking at the lesser Hall lights, I don’t think his Hall worthiness has actually been under debate here. The arguments, as I understand them, have been about whether Hall voters would vote him in on the first ballot, and whether he should be viewed as an “inner circle” Hall candidate. Speaking as an idiot — and there are many who will affirm I’m fully credentialed — I think those are debatable questions.

        Reply ↓
        1. Richard Chester

          epm: Those were some good points you made about Doerr. However I did a PI search for opposing RH batters at Yankee Stadium during Doerr’s career. There were 41 players with at least 200 PA versus the Yankees at YS. Doerr had a higher OPS there than only one other player. Highest was Hank Greenberg at 1.092, followed by Joe Cronin with .871 and Harlond Clift with .808.

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          1. e pluribus munu

            No question his Stadium record was terrible, Richard, and thanks to you we now know it was bottom-of-the-barrel poor. But my point is that if the spaciousness of the grounds were the cause, it should have pertained to Griffith Stadium too.

            RHB Doerr hit 3 HR in each park. It was 301′ down the left field line at the Stadium, 402′ at Griffith.

            With some variations, the dimensions in Griffith during Doerr’s career were: 402/ 391/421/378/328; at the Stadium: 301/402/461/367/296. In Griffith, Doerr used the open field to get 34 other XBH; in the Stadium, the number was 14 (in ten more ABs).

          2. no statistician but

            epm:

            Kinda hafta protest a little about the Yankee pitching being Doerr’s problem in the Stadium. Against that same pitching in Fenway he was 157/ 467 for a .336 BA with 84 runs 23 HRs and 104 RBIs in basically 8/10 of a season’s worth of PAs, faring better than his average performance at Fenway against all teams. On the surface the huge difference doesn’t make sense no matter how you try to work it out—just a combination of factors, maybe.

          3. e pluribus munu

            Fair enough, nsb — I thought of checking on his Fenway record against the Yankees, got lazy, and you caught it. I’m content to leave the anomaly Richard’s sharp eye spotted as an enigma, unless you or he comes up with a solution.

          4. Mike L

            Griffith was built in 1911 for $100K. That’s just a tiny fraction of the cost of political contributions to get a stadium project going now.

          5. Paul E

            FWIW, I thought James or somebody indicated Doerr seriously injured his back and that was the end of it at age 33? I have to believe his success at Fenway is no different than some of the many Rockies players in Colorado. Regarding another darling of this community, Sweet Lou Whitaker, here with please find some data from age 20-32 on each:
            PA’s Games WAR oWAR dWAR
            7395 1704 49.0 43.7 13.1 DOERR
            7166 1695 51.5 45.0 12.5 LOU

            Upon retirement, Doerr was 9th all-time in WAR among ML since 1876 with 75% of G played at 2b. Doerr in the Hall of fame isn’t all that egregious to me since an awful lot of folks on this site seem to support a “large Hall”. BTW, Whitaker went on to ‘compile’ another 23 WAR

          6. Doug Post author

            Doerr’s back injury is indeed what ended his career. He couldn’t be induced to resume his career after he recovered, fearing another similar injury might cause permanent damage.

  14. no statistician but

    It seems Jungle Jim Rivera, the flamboyant 1950s ChiSox outfielder, died the same day as Bobby Doerr at age 96+ to Doerr’s 99+. What a contrast! Doerr’s career ended in 1951 when he was 33. Rivera made the Bigs in 1952 when he was 30. Doerr seems to have been a model citizen his whole life, whereas Rivera was court marshaled in the service and spent five years in military custody for attempted rape, although his post-baseball life appears to have been more regular. Doerr was a steady sort of guy on the field; Rivera made or missed spectacular outfield plays and ran wild on the bases, considering the era. Doerr was a Red Sox and Blue Jays coach for many years. Rivera’s main baseball activity in retirement was to model Bill Veeck’s proposed new White Sox uniform in 1976, the one that had the players wearing shorts. I can remember seeing the newspaper photo of Rivera grinning cynically as he faced the cameras.

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        1. Richard Chester

          Looks like Nori Aoki is second at 3044 and counting (unless he announced his retirement and I don’t know it).

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    2. e pluribus munu

      Thanks to nsb for keeping HHS readers like me current on players who have hung up the last pair of spikes, while adding a quick portrait of their essential baseball features.

      Rivera was a little like Jimmy Piersall, Gates Brown, or Ron LaFlore: good players with checkered pasts of various kinds whom it was hard not to root for. I knew about Rivera’s pre-MLB past when I was a kid (though not the specifics of his crime, which at that age and in that age I might not have understood), but only now, reading his SABR bio, did I find out that he continued to be in hot water early in his MLB career (a bit before I became aware of him).

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    3. Doug Post author

      With Doerr’s passing goes the last living link to MLB in the 1930s.

      Fred Caligiuri and Chuck Stevens are now the elder statesmen in that regard, both debuting in the 1941 season and thus the only living pre-wartime major leaguers.

      Reply ↓

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