Quote:
Originally Posted by RJ
Are you a big Edmonds fan? Just curious, cause I never thought of him as HOF worthy. I might be off base though, since I never really saw him play that much other than his amazing defensive highlights on Sportscenter.
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Nobody really considers him in that breath, but then you have to look at what he did from 1995-2006.
During that time he was unquestionably the 2nd best CFer in baseball (behind Griffy).
For his 6 prime seasons in STL, he put up an OPS over .980 while playing the best CF in the game (and this is based on Bill James fielding bible, not just the sportscenter clips). To put that in perspective, Matt Holliday has put up one season of a .980 OPS or better in his entire career...Edmonds
averaged that.
He was the key cog in both Cardinals WS teams. Pujols is the name that everyone remembers, but Edmonds was more important to both those playoff runs. "The Catch" against Ausmus in game 7 of the '04 NLCS, the walkoff shot in game 6 off Miceli. He catch on the knuckling liner off Jose Reyes' bat with the bases loaded and 1 out in game 7 of the '06 NLCS and his double off Nate Robertson in game 3 of the '06 WS (key hit of the whole series). He was an absolute playoff monster and seemingly came up huge every time out.
Dawson was nowhere near the defender that Edmonds has been throughout his career and Dawson was a corner OFer, not a CFer. CF is the 2nd most important position on the diamond and Edmonds stands among the greatest of all time at it. Now consider the fact that Edmonds has a lifetime OPS+ of 133 to Dawson's 119, a fairly significant difference (and it's era adjusted, so the Dawson folks can't even point to the dead era of the 80s).
Now, try to name 10 CFers better than Jim Edmonds in MLB history. You have to reach to get to 10 and you certainly can't get to 15. Mays, Cobb, Griffey, Dimaggio, Mantle and Speaker are clearly ahead of him, then it gets a little murky. Some folks would argue Puckett, but A) he wasn't a pure CFer and B) I really don't think he was better than Edmonds. Maybe Duke Snider. A lot of folks will argue for Fred Lynn but Lynn was a product of Fenway, he wasn't ever much of a player outside of Boston.
So here you have a guy that was consistently one of the most dangerous hitters in the league for over a decade as well as one of the 15 best to play his position in the last 100 years (and one of the most important positions on the diamond at that).
I'm not saying he's a no-doubter, I'm not even necessarily sure I'd vote him in, but I'm certain he's more deserving than a lot of guys already in there; Andre Dawson included.