Craig Biggio Not a Hall of Famer?

Adam Darowski from Beyond the Boxscore (BtB) recently polled the BtB readership regarding a list of players who are not yet on the Hall of Fame ballot but who he thinks are deserving of enshrinement and wanted to know who the readers thought should get in and who will get in. While the results as a whole are interesting, the one thing that really surprised me was that Craig Biggio was considered unworthy of the Hall of Fame by the readers and that they also felt the BBWAA would not vote him in either. Of all the players who first become eligible in 2013, I figured Biggio had the best shot of being honored (which does not mean he is the most deserving, but that is another post entirely).

Biggio seems to fit the “old school” view of a great player. He was a gritty, hustling player (414 career stolen bases at a 77% success rate) who moved around the diamond in the interests of his team. He played for 20 seasons, all with the Astros, and was a seven time All Star and twice finished in the top five for MVP voting. He also got to the magical number of 3,000 hits—there are no players that have been eligible with 3,000 hits not in the Hall of Fame (Biggio and Derek Jeter are not eligible yet, and Pete Rose has been suspended indefinitely).

Biggio also seems to fit the “new school” view of a great player. His 117 wRC+ from weak-hitting positions (catcher, second base, and centerfield) made him extremely valuable. Baseball-Reference gives him 66.2 WAR, while FanGraphs gives him 70.5 WAR. Both metrics put him at the 10^th best 2B WAR in history. Now you could certainly argue that Biggio is not one of the top ten 2B of all-time, but Bill James argued back in 1998 that Biggio was the fifth best 2B of all-time. And even if you want to knock Biggio slightly out of the top ten, isn’t he still a worthwhile Hall of Famer?

But what most shocked me about the results is that Biggio has something going for him that most contemporary hitters do not—no steroid suspicions.  Biggio is listed as 5’11’’ and 185 pounds on Baseball-Reference, and he never hit more than 26 home runs in a season (and that being in Minute Maid Park, which really helps right handed power numbers). He never bulked up and put up crazy power numbers, as evidenced by his respectful but not impressive .433 career slugging percentage.

So why is there no love for Biggio and the Hall of Fame? Honestly, I’m not sure.  But it will be interesting to see how the BBWAA’s actions compare to the estimates of the BtB readers.