Hall of Fame countdown: Mike Mussina trending toward induction
Paste BN Sports is counting down the top 24 candidates on the 2018 Baseball Hall of Fame ballot in advance of the Jan. 24 election results. The countdown is based on balloting by our power rankings panel, which includes five Hall voters.
No. 6: Mike Mussina
Pedro Martinez had his day in Cooperstown. So did Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, John Smoltz and Randy Johnson.
The path may be clearing for Mussina to soon join them.
All pitched through a suffocating offensive era and flourished. While Mussina lacks the slam-dunk Hall of Fame credentials of his enshrined contemporaries, his support is on the upswing and his resume seems to take on more shine as workhorse starters become more of an endangered species.
HALL COUNTDOWN:
The case for: You like wins? Mussina compiled 270 of them over his career, shy of that magic 300 number but good for 33rd all-time. He'd won at least 18 games five times but never 20 until his last season, when, at 39, he went 20-7 with a respectable 3.37 ERA in 2008. He never led the AL in ERA but produced 11 top 10 finishes, and six times finished in the top five of Cy Young Award voting.
While not known as a strikeout artist in the mold of Martinez or Johnson, Mussina punched out at least 200 in four seasons, and his 3.58 strikeout-walk ratio easily exceeds the average Hall of Famer's mark of 2.04. While consistency was his hallmark, some of his better years are more impressive viewed through a modern lens. Mussina went 17-11 with a 3.15 ERA in 2001, his first season with the New York Yankees. That seemingly ordinary season gains a little more credence when you consider he tied for the AL lead in ERA-plus (143) and led the circuit in Fielding Indepedent Pitching (2.92).
An excellent athlete and cerebral mound presence, Mussina won seven Gold Glove Awards and made five All-Star rosters, all with the Baltimore Orioles from 1992-99.
The case against: There is that 3.68 ERA, well above the 2.99 mark for an average Hall of Famer and weaker than Martinez (2.93), Maddux (3.16), Johnson (3.29), Smoltz (3.33) and Glavine (3.54), who pitched through a similarly power-charged era. While durability was his hallmark, Mussina was not indomitable, as he gave up at least 200 hits in seven seasons. In his final seven seasons, he was only a bit better than a league-average pitcher, racking up 106 wins but accompanied by a 4.00 ERA and 111 ERA-plus.
X factors: He's one of the greatest pitchers in modern Orioles history, and jumped to the New York Yankees as the Bombers were in the midst of four World Series titles in five years. Yet, he never won a ring himself. Mussina pitched capably for the Yankees in the 2001 playoffs as they won three of his four starts before losing Game 7 of the World Series.
And he certainly did his part to lift Baltimore to the Fall Classic. In the 1997 ALDS, he twice beat a Seattle Mariners club featuring Ken Griffey Jr., Alex Rodriguez and Edgar Martinez, allowing just 10 baserunners over 14 innings, striking out 16. In the '97 ALCS, he was even more dominant, striking out 25 Cleveland Indians and giving up four hits in 15 innings. But he received a pair of no-decisions for his handiwork; the Orioles lost both games in extra innings and the ALCS in six games, and did not reach the playoffs again until 2012.
Mussina also pitched his entire career in the AL East, going up against those vaunted Yankee squads early in his career, and even more loaded Red Sox squads in the 2000s.
Consensus: Mussina is absolutely heading in the right direction - after a ballot debut at 20.3% in 2014, he zoomed to 52% last year and is at 73% in early ballot totals this year. He shared that first ballot with Maddux and Glavine, but now Curt Schilling is the only viable starting pitcher candidate. In coming years, Roy Halladay and Andy Pettitte will join the chase, but it seems highly likely Mussina will vault that 75% mark before any other starter.
Gallery: 2018 Hall of Fame ballot