Cincinnati Reds: Evaluating Joey Votto’s Hall of Fame candidacy

Joey Votto looked like a surefire Hall of Famer after his first 10 seasons with the Cincinnati Reds. However, back-to-back down years have his chances of being enshrined in Cooperstown in doubt.

Joey Votto has been a huge part of the Cincinnati Reds. In eight of his twelve seasons with the Reds, Votto has led the team in WAR. Since 2008, Votto has led the National League in 23 offensive categories. Votto also leads all active players in career on-base percentage (.422). But is Joey Votto a Hall of Famer?

In order to make an informed decision, let’s look at the current list of in the Hall of Famers who’ve played first base. We know that baseball has entered an age where analytics have taken the place of traditional statistics. Terms like WAR and OPS have replaced hits and RBIs as numbers that move the needle.

First baseman who are enshrined in Cooperstown include such greats as Jeff Bagwell, Cap Anson, Jimmie Foxx and Frank Thomas. After crunching the numbers of the 21 first basemen currently in the Hall of Fame, the average WAR sits at 66.6 with Lou Gehrig‘s 112.4 topping the list.

Though Votto’s WAR of 59.7 is better than former Reds great Tony Perez, he still falls short in a number of categories. Votto’s career batting average of .307 is just one point better than the .306 average of the 21 first basemen currently in the Hall of Fame. Votto is well off the pace in terms of total hits, runs, RBIs and home runs.

However, when you take a look at some of the new analytics numbers, Votto compares quite well to those in Cooperstown. Votto’s .422 on-base percentage is better than that of recent inductees Jim Thome and Frank Thomas.

Joey Votto’s career slugging percentage of .522 is better than the average of those first basemen in the Hall of Fame. In fact, Eddie Murray and Willie McCovey fall short of Votto in that category. Votto’s OPS+ is also better than the mean of every Hall of Fame first baseman. Votto’s OPS+ of 151 is higher than Jake Beckley, George Sisler, Roger Conner and Harmon Killebrew.

Don’t discount Votto’s fielding either. While the 35-year-old only has one Gold Glove, that’s still more than Killebrew, McCovey, Perez, Thomas and Thome. Votto’s one NL MVP, that should be two, is also more than George Kelley, Bill Terry and Johnny Mize. Votto’s six finishes in the Top 10 of the NL MVP are more than the 5.4 average and are on par with Bagwell, Foxx and Hank Greenberg.

Joey Votto absolutely dominates the current Hall of Fame first basemen when it comes to analytics stats. Is being king in ratio stats enough to get Votto into the Hall of Fame? It’s difficult to say, especially when most voters look directly at the home run, RBI and hit totals to validate candidates.

There are three Hall of Fame statistics on Baseball-Reference.com that give a bench mark on a players Hall of Fame status based off a long list of criteria. Those stats include HOF Monitor, HOF Standards, and the Jaffe WAR Score System (JAWS).

A HOF Monitor score of 100 indicates a good chance a player will be voted in, while a score of 130 or more is essentially a Hall of Fame lock. Votto currently has a score of 88. A HOF Standards score of 50 correlates with an average HOF players, with 100 being the highest score possible. Joey Votto is sitting at 38.

The JAWS score takes a player’s career WAR total averaged with their seven-year WAR peak. An average Hall of Fame has a career WAR of 66.8, a seven-year peak WAR of 42.7, and a JAWS score of 54.8. Votto sits at 59.7 career WAR, 46 seven-year peak WAR, and a 52.9 JAWS respectively.

Take a minute to digest all of that information, I know it’s a lot. If we look at this as a whole we can see that Votto is a fringe Hall of Famer, possibly a coin flip. As the best player for the Cincinnati Reds the past decade and with his influence and dominance in the OBP category, I believe he will get in, but’s it’s going to take little more.

I do believe that Votto needs to get over 2,000 hits, 350 homers and the 1,000 RBI mark to really make a strong case. He won’t be a first ballot Hall of Famer, but I do believe Votto will eventually hear his name called and become the 13th member of Cincinnati Reds to be voted into the Hall of Fame by the Baseball Writers of America.