Each MLB team’s current Hall of Famer

Los Angeles Dodgers: Clayton Kershaw

While this could be his last season wearing Dodger blue, it’s hard to imagine that Kershaw could do enough in another uniform anywhere else to warrant changing the hat on his MLB Hall of Fame plaque once he’s inducted, which already is a near-certainty.

Kershaw debuted in 2008, and from that point, he’s certainly been the most dominant left-handed pitcher in the major leagues, and arguments could be made quite easily that he has been the best pitcher in baseball since he came in the league. However, the bar for Kershaw’s excellence is so high that he tied for the major league lead in wins in 2017, led the National League in ERA, and he struck out 200+ batters, yet nearly no one considered him a reasonable threat to win the Cy Young Award over Max Scherzer.

The incredible part is that with his amazing resume already (3 Cy Young Awards, 7 top 5 CYA finishes, MVP, 7 All-Star Games, Gold Glove), Kershaw just turned 30 in Spring Training. He has an opt-out in his contract after this season, so he could hit the free agent market, but even if he stays, he will still be done after 2020.

Injuries have kept Kershaw from pitching more than 175 innings the past two seasons, but his numbers are already past Hall of Fame level if he doesn’t throw another pitch, frankly, with a Black Ink score of 66, while the average MLB Hall of Fame member has 40. On the Hall of Fame Monitor register, he has a 167 score, while the average MLB Hall of Fame member has a score of 100.

Even with injuries, if Kershaw to pitch to 35 at the level he’s thrown over the last three seasons, he would finish with 234 wins, 3,051 innings, 3,470 strikeouts, and a 95.2 bWAR. That would put him among the elite left-handed pitchers of all time. In fact, the bWAR would be the 3rd highest all-time among left-handed pitchers. He already sits in 14th place among lefties in history, to give perspective.

Next: Giants