Before we get too far into the regular season, I’m going to add one more special edition update to this year’s Future Hall of Fame Series. However, if you missed the first few pieces in this series, you can start catching up on the Hitters here, and the Starting Pitchers here.
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As I’ve said in the past, I don’t think it’s usually worth it to update my Future Hall of Fame predictions for closers every single season, in the way that I do for starters or position players. However, Billy Wagner’s induction this year seemed like a good excuse to revisit the topic; Wagner marks only the ninth closer in Cooperstown, and with such a small sample to build our Hall standards, I figured it was worth checking to see if things had shifted at all.
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It also helps that I think Wagner will probably be the last closer added to the Hall of Fame for at least the foreseeable future. Now that he’s off the ballot, who’s the best reliever who isn’t already elected? Finding “the best X who isn’t already in” is usually a good way to determine a candidate who might start attracting new voters and building momentum for their case.
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In fact, that’s actually what happened with Wagner himself; his first big jump in Hall polling came in 2020, which just so happened to come immediately on the heels of Trevor Hoffman, Mariano Rivera, and Lee Smith all being elected between 2018 and 2019. With all of those three out of the way, Wagner gained a few favorable comps in Cooperstown (mostly Smith and Hoffman), but perhaps more importantly, there was no obvious player that would make anyone say “Why should we put Wagner in the Hall if [this guy] isn’t in?”
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So with Wagner no longer eligible, who takes up the mantle of “Best Closer Who Isn’t in the Hall of Fame”? It’s not totally clear, and any uncertainty in that answer is going to split momentum in a way that wouldn’t happen if there was a single obvious choice. But just about every potential choice has an additional big asterisk standing in their way on top of that.
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