You occasionally hear baseball fans kick around the idea of a “Hall of Very Good.” This captures the idea that there are certain players who we know in our hearts don’t belong in the Hall of Fame, but whose accomplishments nonetheless deserve to be remembered. I like this concept because it can help liberate us from the idea that excellence in baseball can now be reduced to a single number and that Hall of Fame debates are just a matter of fine-tuning our WAR formulas.

With a Hall of Very Good, we no longer need limit ourselves to the 200 (or whatever) most valuable players ever; we can memorialize other aspects of the game. Here are my first-ballot nominees for the HoVG – not the five best players who aren’t in the HoF, but five who embodied some aspect of Very Goodness in the same way that Ty Cobb and Babe Ruth embodied Greatness.

Paul Blair

Accomplishment: winning

Blair’s center field defense accounted for nearly half his 37.8 career bWAR. He was a key component of the Robinson-era Orioles that went to four World Series in six years, whose elite defense regularly allowed Jim Palmer and company to outperform their FIP by half a run or more. Among position players who never played for the 20s-50s Yankees, Blair’s career winning percentage of .620 is by far the best (Carl Furillo is a distant second at .604). He played in more wins than much more accomplished, long-suffering Hall of Famers such as Billy Williams, and even multiple-time champions like Johnny Bench.

Some recognition is due mediocre 20s-30s catcher Jimmie Wilson, who played on five pennant winners despite an abysmal career winning percentage of .432 dragged down by his time on the Phillies during their stretch of 30/31 sub-.500 seasons.

Harold Baines

Accomplishment: competence without excellence

Relative to other major sports, the number one pick in the MLB draft has produced more than its share of busts. Harold Baines was decidedly not one, but neither did he develop into the star the White Sox surely expected when he tore up AAA ball at age 20 and was their starting right fielder at 21. Baines’ bWAR was positive every year from ages 22-40, but amounted to a career total of 38.5, fewer than his one-time teammate Albert Belle put up in just 12 big-league seasons. Baines led the league in slugging at the age of 25, and never again put up anything resembling an MVP caliber season (despite five All-Star appearances). In each of the following categories, he ranks among the top 100 career leaders without finishing in the top ten in more than one season: hits, extra base hits, home runs, singles, walks, and runs created, He never won a World Series despite an .888 OPS in six postseasons.

Special mention to Joe Judge, who put up 14 consecutive two-win seasons without ever exceeding four and who bested Baines with 46.9 career fWAR.

Jack Morris

Accomplishment: playoff stardom

Morris’ case for the Hall of Fame rests heavily on the adequately debunked claim that he gave his best effort when it mattered most and therefore had a greater impact than his stats suggest. His reputation as a postseason legend, however, holds up to scrutiny. By Baseball Gauge’s measure of Championship Win Probability Added, Morris is second only to Madison Bumgarner among starting pitchers. His ten-inning shutout in the deciding Game Seven of the 1991 World Series is one of the top 50 game scores in Series history. When he induced Sid Bream to ground in to a double play in the top of the 8th, he recorded the second biggest (positive) postseason play by a pitcher. His overall postseason numbers are dragged down by four starts for the champion 1992 Blue Jays at age 37; he would be out of the league two seasons later.

It’s puzzling that individual postseason greatness, as opposed to simply being a member of a dynasty, has counted for so little with Hall voters. Alan Trammell had an OPS north of 1.300 in the Tigers’ 1984 championship run, and Dwight Evans had a .977 OPS in two World Series. Both are outside looking in at players with fewer WAR and less postseason success. We’ll see how Carlos Beltran and David Ortiz fare with the voters.

Al Rosen

Accomplishment: a Hall-caliber peak

Rosen’s 1953 MVP season, during which he put up 10.1 bWAR and came within .001 batting average points of a Triple Crown, remains the greatest season by an (eligible, non-tainted) position player not in the Hall of Fame. Rosen’s 30-win five-year peak is comparable to Chipper Jones’ (31.1) and featured two World Series appearances (though he had just one at-bat in the Indians’ last title in 1948.) After injuries forced Rosen out of the game at 32, he went on to be president of the 1978 champion Yankees and the 1989 pennant-winning Giants.

Dwight Gooden, whose age 20 season is still the greatest in the live ball era by a pitcher per bWAR, would also have to receive consideration here.

Curt Flood

Special recognition as a pioneer

Flood’s 1970 lawsuit against Major League Baseball helped break the Reserve Clause system that artificially depressed player salaries, and helped inaugurate the modern era of free agency. Even if the right to earn millions – for consummate talent – doesn’t elicit the same sympathy as the right to vote or the eight-hour day, Flood deserves recognition as a labor and civil rights hero. For his efforts, he received death threats and was blackballed from the game despite finishing fourth in the MVP voting just two years before his lawsuit. Had he played through his late thirties at the four-to-five win pace he had established through age 31, he would have had a serious Hall of Fame case, though likely wouldn’t have made it without breaking 3000 hits. His 42.1 bWAR through age 31 place him just behind Tony Gwynn, and his 1854 hits rank between Paul Waner and Willie Mays among outfielders.