The Mark Buerhle Legacy: Does He Have a Shot at the Hall?

Now that Mark Buehrle has two no-hitters to his name, one a perfect game, where do we rank this guy among modern day pitchers?

Mark Buehrle was the best pitcher no one outside of Chicago cared to talk about. Until Thursday. We kind of knew he threw a no-hitter some time previously. But so did Jose Jimenez, Bud Smith, Chris Bosio, and Joe Cowley. In other words, before Thursday, he wasn't a big deal.

But that was the problem. Buehrle should have been a big deal. He is the new Tom Glavine minus the Cy Young awards. Ok, maybe not quite Glavine-esque at first glance. If he could get those HR numbers down, though, then I think we would see a striking similarity.

Buehrle has a better career WHIP, better career BB/9 rate, and a better career K/BB rate. Admittedly, we have yet to see the back end of Buehrle's career where these numbers can start to suffer. 

But through age 30, Buehrle has a better WHIP, 1.258, than Glavine did at 30, 1.296. Buehrle's BB/9, 2.0, is much better than the 3.1 that Glavine had. Glavine's ERA+, 116, was worse than Buehrle's 123. 

I am not by any means declaring with confidence that Buehrle is a better pitcher through 30 than Glavine was. All I am saying is that their numbers are remarkably similar. In fact they are so comparable that they should not be ignored.

Also, take into account that Buehrle has the same number of World Series rings that Glavine has: one. Plus he has a no-hitter and perfect game. 

Of course I haven't mentioned the glaring statistic that Hall of Fame voters are in love with: Wins. Glavine has 305 of them. Buehrle is far behind at 133. This can be a bit deceiving, however.

Wouldn't you know it that Tom Glavine had 139 wins through age 30. At the end of this year Buehrle should be close to 140 as well. Glavine won 166 games after age 30. Or, in other words, for 12 more seasons Glavine averaged 13 wins.

Let me say that I do not believe averaging 13 wins per season from ages 31 to 42 is an easy task. It's not. But Buehrle has the makeup of a pitcher who could do that so long as he keeps his walks down. If Buehrle can somehow find a way to lower is HR/9 rate (currently at 1.0) then 300 wins is something that is attainable for Buehrle.

So what does this all mean? For starters, Buehrle was clearly underrated before his perfect game, and perhaps still is. But most of all, if you believe Glavine is a Hall of Famer then Mark Buehrle is definitely on the right track to be the same.

You can put that on the board. Yes.