Leading up to the Baseball Hall of Fame class announcement on Jan. 21, we’ll be examining the cases of notable candidates every Thursday. Félix Hernández got us started; below is an analysis of another first-time nominee who made a career of mowing down American League hitters.
It's not unprecedented for the Baseball Writers Association of America—a fickle, ever-changing beast—to go years without inducting a starting pitcher into the Baseball Hall of Fame. For instance, no pitcher who was primarily a starter made the Hall by that method from 1999 (Nolan Ryan) to 2011 (Bert Blyleven).
