Outside of the slow-moving offseason, a big topic across baseball is the impending announcement of the 2024 National Baseball Hall of Fame class. Ballots keep coming in and an announcement of inductees will formally be made on Tuesday, January 23. It makes you think, what current Met has the best shot of joining Cooperstown one day? A name that immediately comes to mind is shortstop Francisco Lindor.
Lindor is only 30 years old and has already amassed a terrific resume, and with continued success, may just be able to get into Cooperstown one day. As pointed out recently on X, Lindor has accumulated the third-most fWAR of any shortstop through age-29 since the Integration Era. His 47.7 fWAR trails only Álex Rodriguez and Cal Ripken Jr. The total is also higher than the fWARs of Hall of Famers Ernie Banks, Robin Yount, and Derek Jeter when they were 29 years old.
Interestingly enough, using the “JAWS” metric, a statistic created to measure a player’s Hall of Fame “worthiness,” Lindor already matches up favorable to several current Cooperstown members. You can read more about the metric here.
Francisco Lindor. Photo by Roberto Carlo
As of now, Lindor ranks 31st on the JAWS list, ahead of the following Hall of Fame shortstops: Travis Jackson, Phil Rizzuto, Rabbit Maranville, and John Ward. Meanwhile, Lindor’s 40.5 JAWS rating is just 14.9 off the average of the 23 Hall of Fame shortstops. As for the more traditional WAR, Lindor’s 42.7 bWAR is already higher than three shortstops in the Hall of Fame and 25.0 off from the average bWAR of the 23 shortstops in Cooperstown.
As of now, no, Lindor is not Hall of Fame worthy. However, luckily for him, he is still under contract in New York until the end of the 2031 season and he has posted a bWAR of 5.5 and 6.0 bWAR, respectively, the last two seasons. Simply using bWAR as a measure, Lindor would have to average roughly 3.13 wins above replacement per season over the remainder of his contract to hit the current bWAR average of Hall of Fame shortstops. Given he posted a 3.0 figure in what was regarded as a down year his first season in New York, hitting and surpassing, with ease, the average shortstop Hall of Fame bWAR number is quite likely.
As for traditional statistics, the 2,000 hit mark, 300 home run mark, and 1,000 RBI mark are all attainable. If Lindor averages 150 hits per season, he’d hit the 2,000 hit mark in 4.5 seasons. Meanwhile, he will need to average 20 home runs a year for the next 4.25 seasons and 80 RBIs over the next four years to hit the 300 home run and 1,000 RBI marks, respectively.
Aging and regression is an unfortunate part to every athlete’s career. Luckily for Lindor, it appears he still has several strong years ahead of him and just turned 30. In 2023, his 6.0 bWAR number was the second-best of his career. He looks to be just hitting his stride with the Mets, and with a few more seasons of that level, may just be on his way to Cooperstown when it is said and done.
