The Inaugural St. Louis Cardinals Hall-of-Fame Class & Wins Above Replacement

Over the weekend, the St. Louis Cardinals announced the inaugural class of inductees for the rebooted Cardinals Hall of Fame. The list was filled with Cooperstown Hall-of-Famers, many of whom have their number or semblance on the left-field wall at Busch. Even those not memorialized on the outfield wall are historically great players.

Whenever a list like this gets bandied about, it makes for interesting conversation. What the Cardinals have essentially done is announce those individuals who current ownership believes are inner-circle Cardinals greats. So, I thought it might be interesting to see how the inaugural group of Cardinals Hall-of-Fame inductees compare to one another and their fellow Cardinals using Fangraphs Wins Above Replacement (fWAR).

fWAR is a stat that attempts to get the whole picture of a player's skill. It quantifies a player's ability to generate runs with his bat and baserunning along with his ability to prevent runs in the field. Ten runs better than replacement equals one Win Above Replacement. The following chart contains the top 29 players in St. Louis history by their fWAR production as a Cardinal. Those members of the first ever Cardinals Hall of Fame class are highlighted in gold.

TOP CARDINALS POSITION PLAYERS BY fWAR

• Chick Hafey sticks out like a sore thumb. In his fifth full season in St. Louis, Matt Holliday will likely surpass Hafey's eight season's worth of Cardinals fWAR. Yes, Hafey is in the Cooperstown Hall of Fame, but so are a lot of folks who knew Frankie Frisch. One wonders why he joins so many no-doubters in the first ever Cardinals Hall-of-Fame class.
• Who wants to draft the petitions to get Curt Flood, Ted Simmons, Ray Lankford, and Jim Edmonds inducted into the Cardinals Hall of Fame? The four players offer a nice generational variety. I'm interested to see how much the Cardinals expand the membership of the organization's Hall. Will it include any of those four players?
• As soon as the personal service contract ends, and Albert Pujols is inducted into Cooperstown, the Cardinals will be able to fit him for a red blazer, make a spot on the left field wall for No. 5, and enshrine his likeness in the Cardinals Hall of Fame.
• Will the Cardinals honor Mark McGwire? Should they honor McGwire?

TOP CARDINALS PITCHERS BY fWAR

• Bruce Sutter is a pretty underwhelming candidate. His inclusion--presumably, because he's a Cooperstown Hall-of-Famer--makes me wonder how the Cardinals Hall will approach relievers. Lee Smith (5.0) and Jason Isringhausen (4.6) have better cases for inclusion based on fWAR than Sutter.
• I was suprised that, by fWAR, Adam Wainwright already has a better case than Chris Carpenter. Of course, Carp has a Cy Young and a collection of tremendous performances on baseball's postseason stage. Wainwright has some catching up to do in those important areas.
• I've got to admit that I'm a little bummed out that Silver King didn't rank higher. But I still think he needs to be inducted into the Cardinals Hall of Fame.