Bomber Bites With Jumping Joe–Is Alfonso Soriano a Hall of Famer?

Alfonso Soriano retired from Major League baseball earlier this week after sixteen years in the majors.  Soriano was a premier power hitter for much of his career and combined it with terrific speed early in his career.  Soriano finished his career with 412 home runs, seven All-Star appearances, three Silver Sluggers and two top ten MVP finishes.  He had over 2000 hits and over 1100 RBI.  But was he a Hall of Famer?

Soriano had some monster seasons in his career.  His peak years of 2002-2008 were as good as anyone in baseball during that time.  He is one of four people who have had a 40-40 season (Jose Canseco, Barry Bonds and Alex Rodriguez being the other three).  In fact Soriano nearly did it twice, falling one home run short in 2002.  He led the league in hits and steals in 2002 as well.  He belted at least 30 bombs seven times. 

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However, he also had two big flaws in his game, defense and strikeouts.  Since his official rookie year in 2001, Soriano struck out at least 110 times every year, save for this past season when he was released in July and 2008 when injuries limited him to 109 games.  His defense at second was terrible when he broke into the majors and led all major league second basemen in errors for five straight seasons at one point.  He was eventually shifted to left field and made up for his suspect range and defensive instincts with a terrific arm.  Soriano threw out 22 baserunners with the Nationals in 2006 and 19 with the Cubs the next season.

Mandatory Credit: Chad R. MacDonald.

His poor defense, especially according to the defensive metrics used today, dragged down his WAR over the course of his career like a lead balloon.  Despite all of his offensive talent, he only managed to compile 27.2 WAR over the course of his career, with nearly the entire amount coming during his seven year peak (26.8), which will certainly hurt his Hall of Fame chances.

If Soriano was able to improve his defense at second base enough to be even an average or slightly below average defender and he was able to stay there for his entire career, we might be talking about a certain Hall of Famer.  Once he moved to left field Soriano got lost in the shuffle.  A big part of what made Soriano special back then, and what makes guys like Robinson Cano and Dustin Pedroia special today, is the fact that elite power hitting second baseman have been a rarity throughout baseball history.  Meanwhile, power hitting left fielders litter the landscape.

Soriano also put up a large part of his numbers during the steroid era, and yet was never linked to PEDs in any way.  Yet his name was not part of the Mitchell Report or had a positive test.  By all accounts, Soriano played the game clean at a time when many of his teammates and opponents did not.  A large block of baseball writers who vote for the Hall of Fame have made it clear they will not vote for anyone suspected of PED use.  Rafael Palmeiro, Bonds, Roger Clemens, Jeff Bagwell, Mike Piazza, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and others have been denied entry to Cooperstown.

Since these writers do not recognize these players as gaining entry into the baseball Hall of Fame, does that mean that the numbers that they produced while playing are not to be counted?  Does Soriano all of a sudden vault from 50th in home runs to thirty-something?  And if so, does that make him a Hall of Famer over Bonds, McGwire, Sosa et al?

Personally, I don’t think the ban on players suspected of doing steroids is fair.  I see a difference between guys who were caught doing steroids (Palmeiro, Manny Ramirez, Alex Rodriguez, David Ortiz) and those who we merely suspect might have done steroids (Piazza, Bagwell).  But in my mind the biggest drawback to Soriano’s HOF chances is the fact he changed positions.

I place a great deal of emphasis on the eye test when it comes to Hall of Famers.  It is just simply not a matter of arithmetic in my opinion.  If a player has 2,999 hits instead of 3,000 all of a sudden he is not a Hall of Famer?  Or if his WAR, a number few baseball fans know how to calculate themselves, reaches a certain number he is a first ballot Hall of Famer, if not, he should be ineligible?  No, I want to see if he was thought of a Hall of Famer when he played and have numbers to back it up.

Soriano met the eye test early in his career with the Yankees when he was crushing the baseball for those Yankee teams, including a go ahead home run in Game 7 of the 2001 World Series. But once he moved to left with the Nationals during the 2006 season, he morphed from an elite offensive second baseman to a relatively average outfielder.

Therefore, Soriano will probably ride the Hall of Fame ballot for a long time but never get a plaque in Cooperstown.