As Trevor Hoffman approaches 500 career saves, calls for his enshrinement in Cooperstown are growing. Hoffman passed Lee Smith as the all-time saves leader, and even though he is 39 given his performance this season—2.57 ERA and 16 saves, which projects to 46 for the year—, he has a decent shot at 600.

Yes, Hoffman is no longer the strikeout king he once was (his strikeouts per nine innings, 6.86, is the lowest of his career and he hasn't broken ten since 2003), but he has found ways to be effective. His longevity and consistency, the argument goes, demand that he go into the Hall.

That said, given the Hall's stringent standards for relievers and the breadth of talent among his contemporaries, Hoffman does not merit a Hall plaque.

That is not to say that I personally would not put him in the Hall. Given that relievers are woefully underrepresented, there are good half-dozen to a dozen that should get in, but Hoffman should get in line behind at least two contemporaries.

Some time back, I took a look at the history of relief pitching, in which I developed a method to measure the performance of all relievers throughout time. First, I assigned them usage roles based on relief archetypes, then derived the pitching runs saved, and then converted that to pitching wins (or RWin here for Relief Wins). The results, I found, were much more revealing and—dare I say?—accurate than any of the official stats, including saves, at describing a reliever's performance. I also added in starting pitchers based on the same methodology and found that there was a strong case for a good dozen or so relievers to go into the Hall given the comparable starters who have been plaques. (The link has more on the method if you're interested.)

When I ran the study originally, three relievers came out as head and shoulders above the rest of the field. They were Hall-of-Famer Hoyt Wilhelm, Mariano Rivera, and Rich Gossage, in that order.

I reran the stats to see if anything has change substantially given the relief performances in the intervening years. The results are that the Big Three are still the Big Three but the order has changed (Hall of Famers in boldface, RA=Relief Appearances, stats through 2006):

Goose was very close to getting into the Hall this year, falling just 21 votes short (or 71.2% of the writers' vote) and may get in soon as the writers turn more and more away from steroid-era candidates. However, Gossage is arguably the most conspicuously overlooked player currently not in the Hall.

Can you think of another player who is the second-best eligible at his position and yet is not in the Hall? Even the extremely underrepresented third base position is nowhere as badly off. Ron Santo, the best third base candidate currently eligible, has a very strong argument for the Hall and is getting rooked by the current, dysfunctional veterans committee system, and yet he is probably barely in the top ten third basemen all time (He ranked eighth in Win Shares the last time I checked. Darrell Evans ranked higher but he is currently ineligible given the current system).

Rivera will probably go in as the addle-minded writers cite his postseason accomplishments all the while overlooking his peerless regular-season performance.

That leaves a group of about a half-dozen relievers that are very close performance-wise (27 to 32 RWins) with maybe only one or two who have any sort of a shot at the Hall. Hoffman and Wagner still are pitching so they might have time to separate from this pack. However, the two test balloons, the two pitchers who have become eligible for Hall voting, Quisenberry and Henke, fell off the BBWAA ballot after one year. Even Lee Smith, who held the saves record for 13 seasons, four of which he was on the writers Hal ballot, has yet to garner 50% of the vote, let alone the 75% needed for induction.

I guess I shouldn't complain: at least one worthy reliever is being getting a Hall of Fame rep. It's going to be fun to watch how Rivera, Wagner, and Hoffman are evaluated once they retire. They have been contemporaries and may retire around the same time. I would love to see how the writers punch their chads with these three guys on the ballot.

By the way, I reran the numbers for best reliever years and Papelbon's 2006 season comes in at #13, the best reliever season in ten years, better than Gagne in 2003, Rivera in 2005, and Ryan's 2006:

Name	Yr	RWin	Pitch WS
Jim Kern	1979	9.28	24.9
Rich Gossage	1977	7.66	26.0
Doug Corbett	1980	7.45	24.0
Mark Eichhorn	1986	7.33	21.0
John Hiller	1973	7.28	30.5
Willie Hernandez	1984	7.08	24.0
Rich Gossage	1975	7.00	22.8
Dan Quisenberry	1983	6.91	27.8
Bruce Sutter	1977	6.83	26.8
Tim Burke	1987	6.62	19.7
Sparky Lyle	1977	6.21	20.2
Roberto Hernandez	1996	6.01	17.1
Jonathan Papelbon	2006	5.96	17.9
Aurelio Lopez	1979	5.92	19.1
Eric Gagne	2003	5.91	25.0
Bruce Sutter	1984	5.76	23.0
Dennis Eckersley	1990	5.72	19.3
Dick Radatz	1964	5.71	24.5
Dick Radatz	1963	5.70	23.8
Mike Marshall	1979	5.66	22.7
Robb Nen	1998	5.63	19.1
Dick Radatz	1962	5.63	20.8
Mariano Rivera	2005	5.63	17.3
Ellis Kinder	1953	5.61	22.7
B.J. Ryan	2006	5.59	16.8
Ted Abernathy	1967	5.57	24.1
Rich Gossage	1978	5.57	20.1
John Wetteland	1993	5.54	21.4
Derek Lowe	1999	5.50	18.7
Jose Mesa	1995	5.46	16.9