In an article a couple of weeks ago, I ranked the best hitters outside the Hall of Fame, and concluded that Dick Allen deserves the top spot. Of course, hitting by itself doesn’t determine Hall-worthiness; defense–the difficulty of the position and the quality of play–and baserunning are parts of the picture as well. So who are the best all-around position players not in the Hall?
It was an innocent enough question. When I did my column comparing Ozzie Smith and Omar Vizquel as regards their Hall of Fame resumes (or lack thereof), out of the blue the query came: is Larry Walker a Hall of Famer?
Were the stats of 1990s stars inflated by expansion?