Trevor Hoffman - Possible Saves Leader, but a Hall of Famer?

Trevor Hoffman picked up his 431st career save tonight, (his 38th of 2005), leaving Hoffman a mere 47 saves behind the all-time career leader, Lee Smith.

Trevor is 37 years old this season. However, he has continued to be an effective closer in his 37-year-old season, and while his peripheral stats have slipped across the board from his stellar 2004, he is still holding opposing hitters to a .234 batting average, while posting a 3.14 ERA and striking out just over a batter an inning.

It seems like a lock that Hoffman will return for at least the 2006 season, in order to make a run at Smith's career saves mark. (He'd probably be approaching the career saves record as we speak, if he hadn't missed most of the 2003 season with an injury.)

Obviously, the "closer" position is relatively new, and as such, relief specialists are dramatically underrepresented in the Hall of Fame - especially when one considers the notoriety that the earliest elite closers, such as Goose Gossage and Bruce Sutter, gained in the late 1970s and early 1980s. While Gossage and Sutter will, in all likelihood, gain access to the Hall of Fame in short order, (which will be the subject of an upcoming column), it is unlikely that Hoffman will have to put up with the years of waiting that his predecessors experienced.

There are currently three pitchers who can be considered "closers" in the Hall of Fame - Hoyt Wilhelm, Rollie Fingers, and Dennis Eckersley. Wilhelm was the original relief specialist - a knuckleballer who pitched until he was 49, and who should be the namesake of an award recognizing baseball's top closer. Eckersley, of course, enjoyed considerable success as a starter, notching a 20-win season and 197 total wins, which helped his Hall bid. Moreover, both Eckersley and Fingers put up a massively dominant Cy Young + MVP season, which Hall voters certainly remembered.

Trevor Hoffman will end his career with no Cy Young awards, and no MVP trophies. Moreover, being the career saves leader hasn't helped Lee Smith into the Hall of Fame, and Smith's induction appears less likely by the year. However, we're confident that Hoffman will be inducted within three years of appearing on the ballot, for a number of reasons. First, and most obviously, Hoffman will have tallied his save total in far fewer seasons (probably 11 and change) than Smith (18 seasons). Equally importantly, Trevor Hoffman played the vast majority of his career with one franchise - San Diego - and became the face of that franchise, while Smith, through no fault of his own, played for 8 franchises during his career.

Mark it down - Trevor Hoffman will be elected to the Hall of Fame, along with at least one of his contemporaries, Mariano Rivera. Hall of Fame voters have long resisted the induction of relief specialists, but the tide will start to turn with the next round of balloting, in which Bruce Sutter and Goose Gossage - and maybe only Sutter and Gossage - will be elected.