Mike Mussina: Hall of Famer?

Now that the disasterous and largely unwatchable Beijing Olympics are over, I can once again devote all my sports attention to baseball - which is what I should have done during the olympics.

Anyway Jonah Keri thinks all Mike Mussina needs to become a hall of famer is a 20 win season. The article is actually well written and Keri has written other good articles like this one on KRod and the MVP, but come on. First of all Mussina's career is not over and based on his terrific resurgence in the 2008 season, I doubt it will be after the season. Also, lack of a 20 win season is not going to be what keeps him out of the playoffs - lack of domination will.

In addition to no 20 win seasons, Mike Mussina has zero: Cy Youngs, World Series rings, seasons with an ERA under 3.00, and seasons with a WHIP under 1.00. He has only been a league leader six times in any standard statistical category, and only 3 times in what I consider to be important ones (Innings, Wins, Winning %, WHIP, Ks, K/BB, and ERA).

Keri stresses the importance of comparing Mussina to his peers so we'll do just that. We'll skip Maddux, Clemens, Johnson, and Pedro as they are worlds better and focus on Glavine, Smoltz, Schilling, Rogers, and Wells.

Wells and Rogers have considerably worse numbers despite having individual seasons and playoff successes that would put them in his league. But no one is advocating for either of them to get in, so it was probably not a good comparison.

Smoltz and Schilling, despite not having Moose's career win total have had better careers. They both have better per innings numbers (ERA, ERA+, WHIP, K/9), they both have had incredibly dominant individual seasons that crush anything Mussina has put up, and they have been arguably the two best postseason pitchers of the era, so I really don't think Mussina stacks up to these two who are considered to be fringe Hall of Famers at best by many.

That leaves Glavine who has pitched longer, has a lot more wins, and a lot more postseason success than Mussina, but his per season and per inning numbers are close to Mussina's. Glavine has the edge in ERA, but much of that may be due to playing in the NL for so long as Mussina has the edge in just about every thing else. But Glavine has had the dominating seasons that the Moose hasn't. He has two Cy Youngs to go with 4 more top 3 finishes, 6 seasons with an ERA uner 3.00, 5 20 win seasons, and most importantly: the world series MVP in the 1990s Braves only championship.

Mussina just doesn't stack up to his peers who will be in the Hall. He has been very good for a long time, but he has never been truly dominant, nor does he have the career totals that should put him in. I don't like the hall of arbitrary numbers argument, but I think Mussina needs either a dominating playoff run, or to hold on for 290 or 300 wins in order to cement his candidacy for the hall.