Ohtani needs four more seasons to be eligible for the Hall.

This is Shohei Ohtani’s offseason, and the Baseball Hall of Fame has been a hot issue this past month. Why not combine the two topics?

We debate all the time whether a player who is currently playing is “already a Hall of Famer.” For those who simply enjoy talking about sports, it’s a great topic for sports talk radio or pub chat. It’s a matter that will be settled upon years from now, therefore to put it in the present tense, there is no right or incorrect response. I listed the ten active players who come closest to having a Hall of Fame resume last week. That’s excellent material for talk shows and bars, so why not stick with Ohtani?

Does Shohei Ohtani currently have Hall of Fame status? How else would he go about his remaining career years to earn a spot in the Hall of Fame?

My first impression is that he isn’t eligible for induction yet, but when he is, he most likely will be.

Regarding the latter, Ohtani must have played 10 seasons of Major League Baseball in order to be eligible to appear on the BBWAA ballot, which is where players begin. Right now, he’s just six. He’s still four seasons away, but given his 10-year contract with the Dodgers that hasn’t started, he’s almost certainly going to rocket past the required 10 years with ease. That means the whole “is he already a Hall of Famer” response is categorically no on this front.

Even at 29 years old, Ohtani still has at least four more seasons left to establish himself as a Hall of Famer. Furthermore, I don’t think it would be detrimental if he began to be referred to as a “future Hall of Famer”. This is the reason.

MVPs

Ohtani has two MVP awards. He is among the 30 players in history to repeatedly lift that hardware. They are almost all Hall of Famers. Ohtani, Roger Maris, Dale Murphy, Juan Gonzalez, Miguel Cabrera, Bryce Harper, A-Rod, Albert Pujols, Mike Trout, and Barry Bonds are the current Hall of Famers who aren’t. Five years after retiring, Cabrera, Pujols, Trout, and probably Harper are all going to Cooperstown. Bonds and A-Rod are PED-related outliers.

Put simply, there aren’t many players who have won multiple MVP awards who, barring extraordinary circumstances, are inducted into the Hall of Fame.

If Ohtani wins another MVP, three or more MVPs put you in the Hall of Fame unless you were an A-Rod or a Bonds player. Apart from that pair, the following players have won three MVP awards: Mike Schmidt, Pujols, Trout, Jimmie Foxx, Joe DiMaggio, Stan Musial, Roy Campanella, Yogi Berra, Mickey Mantle, and Mike DiMaggio.

8.5+ WAR seasons

Over the previous three seasons, Ohtani has averaged at least 8.5 WAR (baseball-reference.com version). That is a very big figure. Few players in history have accomplished this feat three times during their career, much less three seasons in a row.

Lefty Grove (six times), Roger Clemens (five), Randy Johnson (four), Pedro Martinez, Greg Maddux, Bob Gibson, and Bob Feller are the only pitchers to have accomplished this feat during the live-ball era. There have been three seasons with 8.5+ WAR or more for twenty-three position players. Similar to the pitcher list, all 19 of them are Hall of Famers, some (like Bonds and A-Rod) are PED-tied, and some (like Pujols and Trout) have never been on the ballot.

I understand that Ohtani’s WAR is tallied with pitching and hitting WAR, but that’s just one aspect of his potential Hall of Fame argument.

The Fame Factor/Eye Test

Apart from career WAR and accolades, Ohtani’s numbers will be more difficult to compare to other Hall of Famers than anyone we’ve ever seen, with the possible exception of Babe Ruth, who only really overlapped as a pitcher and full-time bat for two seasons. He’s already been overtaken by Ohtani in both directions.

Ohtani’s difficulty in pitching and hitting at the high level he does should provide him a significant advantage over other players who appear similar. You should speak with some players, regardless of how much attention the media and MLB fan base give him for this. His work has left them deeply in awe. People talk about him like he’s a rock star and they can’t even begin to understand how he manages it while they’re strolling around All-Star media day.

Last April, CC Sabathia informed me that Ohtani is the greatest player of all time.

When I inquired about if fans realised how difficult it is to be a two-way player, Sabathia responded, “I don’t think so, which is why I give him such high praise.” “People like to compare him to Babe Ruth, but there wasn’t that much overlap and I don’t think the players were as good as they are now.”

He also mentioned the modern-day pattern that MLB starting pitchers follow.

That’s what makes it so incredible, Sabathia remarked. “I couldn’t picture doing all of that preparation work to prepare to pitch every five days and still be one of the team’s greatest hitters—producing in that manner. What he’s capable of is amazing.”

For me, this completely undermines any statistical comparisons.

When delving into figures, it’s also simple to lose sight of such things, but I always make sure to bring up the “feel” test. Does it seem like you’re viewing greatness when you watch a player?

I mentioned before that my response to what we’ve seen from Ohtani over the last three seasons is, holy smokes, definitely yeah. He feels like a member of the Hall of Fame.

Statistical Similars

Ohtani has a career as a hitter.274/.366/.556 hitter with an OPS+ of 148. That’s a great Hall of Fame track based on rating. With 437 RBI, 428 runs, 129 doubles, 171 home runs, 681 hits, and 86 steals. He’s a fantastic pitcher, so even though his counting metrics would be a little below where we’d like a compiler to be at his age, there’s still a tonne of time left.

David Ortiz and Fred McGriff, two Hall of Famers, are among Ohtani’s top 10 most comparable hitters through the age of 28. Baseball-reference.com provides a useful feature that displays the most statistically similar players. Among them are major league players such as Tony Clark, Ryan Howard, Pete Alonso, Mo Vaughn, Matt Olson, and Cecil Fielder.

He is 38-19 in 481 2/3 innings pitched, with a 3.01 ERA, 1.08 WHIP, and 608 strikeouts. Good arms like Yu Darvish, Tim Belcher, Alex Cobb, and Jacob deGrom are among the top 10 most statistically comparable pitchers in his list through the age of 28.

And once more, they must be combined. Imagine if Matt Olson or David Ortiz threw like Alex Cobb or Tim Belcher. Ohtani is demonstrating that, so I suppose we don’t need to think too hard about it. Going forward, we must not take it for granted, so remember those instances.

What more needs to be done?

Assuming Ohtani performs at least as well as he did throughout the previous three seasons, let’s imagine he recovers from his elbow surgery in 2025 and resumes his mound career. He merely needs to complete the ten years, in my opinion. Honestly, the figures probably don’t matter all that much. He’s already had three seasons that may easily be MVP-caliber. He only needs to pile up a couple more there to be at home.

What might cause him to lose his course? Things we’d prefer not to consider that would keep him from playing for a decade or a disastrous performance that doesn’t even seem possible to imagine. Players such as Andruw Jones have suffered from statistical downturns, although Jones only ever placed in the top seven of the voting and never won an MVP award. He wasn’t even close to the level of success that Ohtani currently has. Still, he was a star. In other words, Ohtani’s numbers need to drastically decline in order for him to reach 10 years of service and avoid being inducted into the Hall of Fame.

There will be a Hall of Famer in Shohei Ohtani. I have a lot of faith in this. All that’s required is to wait for him.