Lee Smith

Lee Smith is one of the first players I can remember watching.  During summer vacations with just about all day to do what I wanted I usually spent a lot of the afternoon watching Cubs games on WGN.  They were the only team I could see other than the Saturday game of the week on NBC.

Little did I know then, that he was in the process of defining a new role in major league baseball that would continue to this day nearly thirty years later.  He wasn’t the first – Rollie Fingers, Rich Gossage and Bruce Sutter morphed into closer roles during their careers, but Smith and those who came after him turned it into a one-inning specialist role that would become a staple on every roster.

Next year will be his eleventh on the Hall of Fame ballot and a player must be selected on 75% of the ballots cast by HoF voters to get in.  He appeared on about 50% of the ballots last year.  I wavered in my opinion about whether he should be enshrined in Cooperstown or not.

Why he should be in:  Smith led his league in saves three times and tied for the lead once more on his way to compiling a then-record 478 career saves  and a 3.03 career ERA before retiring in 199 after the 1997 season.  During his first 8 years he often pitched more than one inning per outing as the closer role was not as specialized early in his career.  He’s one of the guys that turned it into what it is today –  for better or worse.  Smith was a seven-time All-Star and his most impressive credential, in my opinion, is finishing in the top-five three times for Cy Young Award consideration, including a second place finish in 1991 when he went 6-3 with 47 saves and a 2.34 ERA for the Cardinals.  He fit the role of an intimidating closer.  Big, hard-throwing, scowling and able to get the strikeout.  He’s 15th on the all-time list for strikeouts per nine-innings.

It’s tough to compare Smith to relief pitchers who are in the Hall, because the roles just weren’t the same.  Since Dennis Eckersley was a starter for much of his career, I won’t even attempt to compare him to Smith.  The Hall of Fame relievers that started their careers earlier than Smith, like Rollie Fingers, Rich Gossage and Bruce Sutter were called upon to pitch earlier in games so they have a few more wins and Smith has a lot more saves.  Players that came along after Smith were put into a closer role that rarely required pitching more than an inning.  This is one reason it’s tricky to compare statistics of players from different eras.  Since Smith straddles the pre-closer and closer eras it’s even murkier. 

A more important barometer for Hall of Fame consideration is to look at how a player stacked up against his contemporaries.  That is best seen in All-Star selections, awards and leading the league in important statistics.  For the sake of comparison, when it comes to All-Star appearances, top-five finishes for the Cy Young Award and leading their leagues in saves, Smith is very close to Gossage, who is in the Hall of Fame.  As I mentioned earlier, seven All-Star selections and three top-five finishes in Cy Young voting tell you that he was considered one of the best at his position for several years.

What’s keeping him out:  First, let’s look at the Gossage, Fingers and Sutter comparisons.  The fact that they were called upon for more than just an inning lends some credence to the argument that they were more valuable to their teams.  Back then, the most clutch relief pitcher was more of a “fireman” coming in to save the game when the other team has a rally going, threatening to tie or take the lead.  It didn’t matter what inning it was and that’s why the term “save” was established.  During Smith’s career it developed into the one inning role we know it as today.  As long as you can get three outs without blowing a three run lead, you get credited for “saving” the game.  A pitcher could theoretically have an 18.00 ERA and be perfect.  So, in the comparison to those pioneer closers who are Hall of Famers, Smith comes up short, because while his role was similar early in his career it was much different in the latter half.

The losses are the biggest argument against Smith.  He went 71-92 and had two seasons with ten losses during his career.  He’s 4th on the all-time blown save list.  Yes, two of the pitchers with more blown saves are in the Hall of Fame, but they blew a lot of those saves trying to finish out two or three innings rather than just one.  I suspect that if a closer lost ten games in today’s game he would wind up in middle relief. 

Sure, he recorded 478 saves, but it took 18 seasons to do it.  Bruce Sutter didn’t save nearly as many games (300), but only pitched 12 seasons.  Sutter averaged the same number of saves per season; was an All-Star six times; won a Cy Young Award and led the league in saves five times.  Ironically, Smith became the Cubs closer after Sutter left the north side for the rival, St. Louis Cardinals and then later Smith too would leave the Cubs for the red birds.

There’s no reason to think that if Gossage, Sutter, Fingers or Dan Quisenberry had begun their careers at the same time as Smith and pitched as long, they would not have had more saves.

While Gossage, Fingers and – to a lesser degree, Sutter –  cemented their clutch performer credentials saving games in the post-season Lee Smith has no such experience to put him over the top.  In fact, his four post-season appearances are a mark against him.  He lost two of those games and had an ERA over 8.00.

So, is he Cooperstown Bound?  Before I started writing this post I would have said, “yes,” and I’ve argued that he should be in for years, but not anymore.  Compared to the Hall of Fame relief pitchers that preceded him and the future Hall of Fame closers that will come after him, I don’t think Lee Smith was as dominant as he needs to be.  A Hall of Fame closer is the kind of pitcher that is so formidable that he changes the way the opponent manages the game: turning it into an eight inning game where the other team pulls out all the stops and goes for broke if they have a chance to tie the game before the closer gets in.  I just don’t think Smith was that guy.  I don’t think fans of opposing teams lost hope and headed for the exits when he came in to protect a lead.  He piled up saves, but his record has already been broken by two players and one of them, Mariano Rivera has added another 130 saves to that record.

Lee Smith was a great relief pitcher, and a good, consistent closer, but I have come to agree with the 50% of Hall of Fame voters who have left him off their ballots for over a decade now.  He was not outstanding enough to earn a spot in the Hall of Fame.  He may have followed Bruce Sutter from the Cubs to the Cardinals, but he should not be following him to Cooperstown.

It will be interesting to see if he finally makes it next year.  A player must appear on 75% of the ballots cast to get in.  Of eligible players, only Jack Morris and Jeff Bagwell appeared on more ballots last year.  Unfortunately for Smith, there are a wave of first-year eligible players that may jump the line in front of him.  Were it not for the question of performance enhancing drugs, a few of them would be first ballot Hall of Famers.

Stats below are from www.baseball-reference.com. It’s a great resource for researching baseball history.  They have created some interesting metrics that they use to gauge a player’s worthiness of the Hall of Fame such as the “Hall of Fame monitor” and “Hall of Fame standards.”  For the record, Smith makes it based on the former, but not the latter.