Mike Piazza is arguably the best hitting catcher of all-time, and top 20 sluggers in baseball history. Mike finished his career with a batting average of .308, while hitting 427 homers, 2127 hits (one 200+ hit season), and he drove in 1335 RBI’s, all over the course of playing in 1912 games. Piazza had 6 seasons in which his stats reached the stratosphere; in 1993 (ROTY that year) and between 1996-2000, the big catcher produced a batting average of .329, a slugging average of .587, and averaged to hit 37 homers along with 115 RBI’s over the course of 146 games/season. If Piazza played in more than an his average of 126 games/season for more than his 16 years, then the total numbers in some categories would have been equal to many of the great slugging first basemen, but because of his struggles behind the plate and rural behavior, he ended up shy of 2000 games played. There is not much argument against his hitting value being Hall of Fame worthy, but there are two reasons besides hitting that may have cost him a ticket to Cooperstown after his 3rd failed attempt on the ballot.
Piazza was a thrill to watch swing the bat, but behind the plate, he was no better than average, as he was sloppy and slightly undisciplined. Although he moved quite well at catcher (range factor per 9 innings was above league average), he was sloppy with the glove. Per season behind the plate, Mike Piazza allowed 17 passed balls (the ball falls out of the mitt after being perfectly thrown to it; basically a catcher’s wild pitch). Mike did have a pretty strong arm though, but accuracy is a big part of throwing out a base runner, which he was not good at, only throwing out 23% of potential stealers (the league average during Piazza’s time was 31%). Mike wasn’t that great at being aware of the runners; only having 6 pickoffs in his career, when multiple Hall of Fame catchers have at least 20. His average type performance behind the plate could be a big factor in why he is not getting enough votes for the Hall, as a catcher’s role is to be the leader, along with the shortstop, in organizing the team’s defense.
The other factor in why Piazza is not getting enough votes for the Hall is the suspicion of steroid use. Mike played during the heart of the steroid era between 1990-2008, where players was using some type of steroid to bulk up their numbers. Because Piazza stood at 6 foot 3 inches, 200 pounds, while producing a slugging percentage of over .500, of course people got suspicious. The thing is that Piazza came into the league and came out around the same size; also there have never been any tests that claimed that Piazza used steroids or any other substance. So what might have cost him the Hall of Fame votes for a third time is the fact that during his career, over 50% of the league most defiantly used some sort of steroid, which means that Piazza, because he was a big guy with huge numbers, was automatically in the steroid discussion. Overall though, despite his below average performance behind the plate, his spectacular hitting numbers and absence from using roids, should eventually put him into the Hall within the next few years.
