Article:Baseball Notebook: Piazza a Hall of Fame Candidate?

Now that Mike Piazza has announced his retirement he begins his five year wait to be eligible for Hall of Fame voting. He has a lifetime batting average of .308, a .377 on base percentage and .545 slugging percentage. Most catchers would like to have a .545 slugging percentage just once in their career but Piazza averaged that over his 19 year career. He fell 873 hits short of 3000 but catchers aren't expected to have 3000 hits since they usually take a day off every few days. He hit 427 homers and drove in 1335 runs. Baseball-reference.com lists him 39th in home runs. He has hit more homers than Billy Williams, Duke Snider, Al Kaline, Dale Murphy and '''Johnny Bench. ''' Of those players only Murphy has not been voted into the Hall of Fame.

His .545 slugging percentage which is 30th best alltime is higher than the slugging percentages of Hack Wilson, Duke Snider, Frank Robinson  and Al Simmons  all of whom are in the Hall of Fame. His 9.217 OPS is better than Hall of Famers Duke Snider, Al Simmons  and '''Mike Schmidt.  His 16.20 at bats per home run is better than Hank Aaron, Willie Mays  and Eddie Mathews, Willie Stargell  and Frank Robinson ''' who have all been admitted into the Hall of Fame.

It would be interesting to know what the readers think about his chances of going into the Hall of Fame are and if they think he deserves being enshrined at Cooperstown. I for one think he has excellent credentials to be voted into the Hall of Fame when he becomes eligible.