Francisco Lindor Is Already a Believable Corridor of Famer

Final week, my colleague Jay Jaffe famous that Mets shortstop Francisco Lindor had simply entered the record of prime 20 shortstops in JAWS, his system for assessing gamers’ Corridor of Fame worthiness, which elements in a mixture of profession worth (WAR) and peak worth (WAR over their seven greatest seasons). That’s not the one notable factor about Lindor’s season, in fact, as after a sluggish begin to 2024, he has compelled his method into the NL MVP dialog. With a .270/.339/.492 line, 135 wRC+, and seven.2 WAR, he could also be having his greatest season in a profession that has him wanting more and more Cooperstown-bound.

It appears nearly absurd, however Lindor’s OPS didn’t take even the tiniest of peeks over .700 till June 5 — he’s been so sizzling that you simply’d suppose he was produced in Brookhaven’s Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. With Shohei Ohtani preventing for the primary ever 50-50 season, Lindor could now be the largest impediment to the previous’s coronation. Given the comparatively modest influence even the largest baseball stars have compared to their friends in soccer or basketball, no particular person can actually carry a group, however Lindor is actually making an attempt his greatest: The Mets have the second-most wins in baseball for the reason that begin of June (54), with the offense going from seventeenth to sixth in seasonal wRC+ over the identical timeframe:

In that stretch, Lindor has edged out the opposite NL hitters by practically 2 WAR. One of many odder penalties of the form of Lindor’s efficiency is that it might lead to a Corridor of Fame participant having missed the All-Star Sport in the very best season of his profession. In reality, regardless of rating fifth in WAR amongst hitters for the reason that begin of 2020 (behind Aaron Choose, Juan Soto, Freddie Freeman, and José Ramírez), Lindor hasn’t made an All-Star squad since 2019. I wouldn’t have thought it was potential for a participant who performs in baseball’s largest market and has a $341 million contract to be underrated, however right here we’re!

Rating twentieth at your place in JAWS is already a mighty spectacular feat, but it surely’s much more spectacular if you’re solely 30 years outdated, that means there’s a lot of time left so as to add heft to your profession WAR, which makes up half of JAWS. With Lindor’s (comparatively) disappointing 2021 Mets debut even farther again within the rear-view mirror, it looks as if an excellent time to offer an replace on his rest-of-career projections:

Even projecting a typical decline via his 30s — there’s a motive the overwhelming majority of Corridor of Fame instances are largely constructed when gamers are of their 20s — Lindor’s imply ol’ ZiPS forecast gives ample alternative for him to place up some critically gaudy profession totals. The median ZiPS projection has Lindor ending with 400 profession homers on the nostril, sufficient to rank him as among the best power-hitting shortstops in baseball historical past:

Whether or not you take a look at gamers who primarily performed shortstop or solely contemplate efficiency whereas taking part in the place, Lindor options prominently. His 30 residence runs this season offers him 245 for his profession, tenth all-time amongst shortstops, whereas ending with 400 can be sufficient to place him fourth all-time. If we glance solely at residence runs whereas taking part in brief, Lindor is sixth and is simply over 100 homers behind Cal Ripken Jr. for the highest spot. On condition that Lindor is an elite defensive participant, it doesn’t look like he’s ticketed for a neater place anytime quickly, wanting a critical harm that necessitates a transfer.

Earlier than final season, I gave ZiPS the power to challenge profession JAWS. In an period that’s wealthy in star shortstops, Lindor is presently projected to complete on the prime of this technology. Right here’s a projected JAWS chart, as soon as all of the presently lively main league gamers have headed off into the sundown:

Even simply the median projection would make Lindor a shoo-in on his first Corridor of Fame poll and put him meaningfully forward of the opposite shortstops who debuted within the twenty first century — for now, not less than. If Bobby Witt Jr. retains his beast mode switched on, he’ll rocket up this record pretty rapidly (Gunnar Henderson simply missed the record, together with Trea Turner). Given his already spectacular place in historical past, I feel Lindor would nonetheless make the Corridor fairly simply even when his profession ended tomorrow, because the Sandy Koufax of shortstops. The Mets’ penchant for sudden, usually hilarious implosions makes watching them typically really feel like an particularly cringe-inducing episode of The Workplace. However should you aren’t tuning into their video games, you’re lacking out on the height of a potential future Corridor of Famer. And as numerous gamers from Mike Trout to Miguel Cabrera to Ken Griffey Jr. have demonstrated, the chance to see these gamers at their greatest is continuously way more fleeting than we hope.