Most Likely Hall of Famer from Each Team - National League

A few days ago, I wrote about a simple concept inspired by an ESPN.com article. The article discussed which player from each NBA team was most likely to one day be enshrined in the basketball hall of fame. I decided to apply the same idea to the MLB and predicted which American League players I thought would eventually make it to Cooperstown. Now it's time for the National League.

NL West:

San Diego Padres - Fernando Tatis Jr.: This kid right now is one of the most exciting and fun players in baseball to watch. The son of a former big leaguer who's only claim to fame is hitting 2 grand slams in one inning, Tatis Jr. does everything you want in a player. He has a potential to be a future 40-40 guy in addition to having the best arm among all MLB shortstops. He's only 21 years old but is already one of the top players in the league and should be for many more years to come. Did I mention his father hit 2 grand slams in one inning? I bet you've never heard that before. If I could somehow copyright that fact and profit off of it every time an announcer mentions it on air, I'd be a millionaire by the time Tatis Jr. retires.

Fernando Tatis Jr. thinking about that time his father hit
2 grand slams in one inning.

San Francisco Giants - Buster Posey: In the last 55 years, 5 catchers have won an MVP award. Johnny Bench and Pudge Rodriguez are already hall of famers, Joe Mauer will be eventually, Thurmon Munson would have been if his life wasn't cut short during his playing career, and the last is Buster Posey. Posey is a 3x World Series champ, has caught 3 no hitters, and has some silver sluggers and gold gloves in addition to an MVP award. Of all of his accoldaes, none are as impressive as somehow surviving 3 seasons as teammates with Aubrey Huff.

LA Dodgers - Clayton Kershaw: If you go to this page that lists the pitchers with the best ERAs in baseball history, you'll see the headshots of the top 24 players. 23 of those pictures are black and white and the other is, well, it's not Clayton Kershaw. It's Mariano Rivera. But for a long time, Kershaw was the 24th slot but a "bad" year last year where he only finished 10th in the MLB in ERA with a 3.03 dropped him out of the top 24. His career ERA now stands at 2.44 which is mindblowingly low for a modern day pitcher. Over his career, Kershaw has won 3 Cy Youngs and has 7 top five finishes in addition to winning the MVP in 2014. He's one of the best starting pitchers of all time and is a no-brainer hall of famer.

The international sign for Clayton
Kershaw in the playoffs

Arizona Diamondbacks - Madison Bumgarner: Admittedly, I'm not big on evaluating any player's career on postseason stats. The postseason is usually a small sample size in comparison to the rest of a player's career and that goes for all sports. However, Bumgarner's postseason stats are too impressive to ignore. His career postseason ERA is in the low 2's in addition to having 3 World Series rings and a World Series MVP. In 36 innings of World Series pitching, he's allowed only 1 run (100 points to anyone who can tell me who homered off him to score it) and has the lowest World Series ERA of all time at 0.25. Unfortunately Bumgarner is as unlikable as they come, as he's one of those players who throws a tantrum every time anybody acts like they're having fun. If only he applied those same rules to riding dirt bikes or swimming in the ocean.

Colorado Rockies - Nolan Arenado: Over the last 5 years, Arenado's has posted remarkably consistent season totals in just about every category, in addition to being one of the best defensive players in the league. He's an MVP candidate every year but it's hard to overlook the Coors effect as his batting average and on base percentage are 60 points lower on the road than at home. If he was an Astro, there would be some cause for suspicion. Instead he's a Rockie so the fans are probably way too baked to even give a shit.

NL Central:

St. Louis Cardinals - Yadier Molina: Yadier in his prime was a wizard behind the plate and did something most catchers today are incapable of doing - batting above like .210. He's also one of three Molina brothers to have caught in the big leagues and all 3 of them rank in the top 5 slowest players to ever play the game (Bartolo Colon and Dmitri Young are the others). In all seriousness though, Yadi is one of the best catchers to ever play the game and plays the game the right way. It's not like the Cardinals would ever get caught in a cheating scandal. 

Chicago Cubs - Javy Baez: Former Cubs manager Joe Maddon once said that Javy Baez is the best tagger he's ever seen. I had no idea what that even meant, and then I saw this play and realized, holy shit Javy Baez is the best tagger I've ever seen.  Baez can play anywhere in the infield, is super aggressive on the bases, and will swing at just about anything and still make contact. He's one of Chicago's fan favorites, along with freezing cold weather year round and getting shot while walking down the street.

Milwaukee Brewers - Christian Yelich: After getting out of the dumpster fire that is the Miami Marlins organization (more on that later), Yelich's career exploded with an MVP award and a 2nd place finish in his first two years with the Brewers. He's a top player in baseball with insane all around numbers and bares a striking resemblance to SNL cast member and comedian Pete Davidson.

It would be easy to mistake Christian Yelich for Pete Davidson, but
unlike Davidson, Yelich can hit baseballs and make people laugh

Cincinnati Reds - Joey Votto: In the 9 season from 2010 to 2018, Joey Votto led the league in on base percentage 7 times. One of the years he didn't win the OBP crown he missed 100 games. The other year he posted a career high OBP of .459 but lost the title by a fraction of a point to Bryce Harper. Votto has an MVP to his name and 5 more top 10 finishes in addition to being one of funniest guys in baseball.

Joey Votto is a hall of famer. No doubt aboot it.

Pittsburgh Pirates - Josh Bell: Every team in the NL Central has at least one hall of fame lock, and then there's the Pittsburgh Pirates. Josh Bell is an enormous human being who had nearly 30 homers and 85 RBI before the 4th of July last year. He ended up cooling off around the all star break, but prior to that he was a treat to watch, routinely sending balls into the Allegheny river to reside with the fans hopes of ever seeing their team make the playoffs. 

NL East:

Washington Nationals - Max Scherzer: This guy might be the scariest pitcher in baseball to face because he's uber competitive and pitches with a ton of emotion. He also has two different color eyes and might be a terminator. Scherzer has finished in the top 5 in Cy Young voting each of the last 7 years having won the award 3 times across both leagues and was able to finally win a World Series last year. He's a no brainer for Cooperstown.

Max Scherzer is a friend of Sarah Connor

Atlanta Braves - Ronald Acuna: Twenty eight players in National League history have hit 30 homers and stolen 30 bases in the same season. Acuna is one of them. Only 4 players in MLB history have hit 40 homers and stolen 40 bases in one season. Last year, Acuna was 3 stolen bases shy of becoming the 5th, but it's only a matter of time before he reaches those totals. Additionally if there is ever a guy to be the inaugural member on the 50-50 club, it's Acuna. He's only 21 years old and already a top three player in baseball. Go back and read all the underlined words in red. Sorry Atlanta.

New York Mets - Jacob Degrom: At one point, Zack Wheeler was the Mets best pitching prospect. Then Matt Harvey went on a 2 year run of dominance. During all of this, Noah Syndergaard was regarded as having the best stuff. Meanwhile, Jacob Degrom kept chugging along posting absurd numbers that have led to back-to-back Cy Young awards. Over his last 2 seasons, Degrom has posted a 2.05 ERA. That means he's giving up and insanely low TWO RUNS EVERY NINE INNINGS and only has a 21-17 record to show for it. When all is said and done, Degrom has a really good chance of passing Ed Kranepool as the greatest Met of all time.

Philadelphia Phillies - Bryce Harper: You know what current Philly had an MVP award, four top 5 MVP finishes, a top 5 rookie of the year finish, 4 silver sluggers and 5 all star appearances before the age of 28? Actually it's Andrew McCutchen, but Bryce Harper is pretty good too. Harper came into the league with more hype than anyone in MLB history. He was hitting 500 foot home runs while in high school and had the ability to play any position in baseball. Just about every minor league game he played in sold out and he made his MLB debut as a teenager. By age 22 he was an MVP, rookie of the year, and 3 time all star. He'll likely end up really huge career totals but despite all of the accolades, baseball fans are left wondering if he will ever live up to the hype. It just seems like unrealistic expectations were set from the beginning and the hype got to his head. The fact that he's kind of a dick makes it easy to call him overrated. The Washington Nationals winning the World Series the same year he left in free agency didn't help his case either.

The floor is the NLCS

Miami Marlins - Ryne Stanek: I have no idea. The Marlins are a disaster and there is a less than 0 chance anyone on this roster makes the hall of fame. Stanek at least possesses the unique trait of being one of the original "openers" in baseball. He's good at what he does but is far from hall of fame caliber so I will use the rest of this blurb to bash the franchise that currently pays him.

The Miami Marlins are the most poorly run franchise in all of sports. They make the Cleveland Browns look competent. This franchise at one point signed a bunch of stars to backloaded contracts, used this talented roster to secure a lucrative TV contract and a brand new stadium paid for mostly by tax payers, and then proceeded to trade all of those star players before the the higher annual salaries kicked in. The owner then sold the franchise and made a huge profit. Derek Jeter then came in and proceeded to trade Giancarlo Stanton, Christian Yelich, and Marcel Ozuna which you can argue would be the best outfield in baseball right now. This continued a tradition of the Marlins trading all of their good players. Of the top 25 players in Marlins history, 23 have been traded. The other two are AJ Burnett who left as a free agent and Jose Fernandez who sadly died before the Marlins could trade him away too. Somehow, the Marlins have never lost a playoff series and have two World Series titles but are as big of a joke as any team in all of sports, with no disrespect aimed at the players who suit up every day. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.


Additional notes:

-The National League needs a DH. Pitchers hitting is a gigantic waste of everyone's time.

-Nolan Arenado and Matt Chapman, the two best defensive 3rd basemen in all of baseball, were on the same high school team.

-Top position players in baseball: (1) Trout, (2) Yelich, (3) Acuna, (4) Lindor, (5) Bellinger, (HM) Betts, Arenado, Bregman*, Freeman

-Top pitchers in baseball:  (1) Degrom, (2) Cole, (3) Verlander, (4) Scherzer, (5) Strasburg, (HM) Buehler, Ryu, Morton, Hader

-Fernando Tatis once hit 2 grand slams in one inning

-I rip on Derek Jeter a lot but really he is a great GM when it comes to negotiating player contracts because he doesn't range very far from where he starts