Troy Percival Retirement Commentary

It looks like another solid baseball career has come to an end as Rays' pitcher Troy Percival has retired

And just like that one of the more dominant closers of this era has moved on from professional baseball. During his time as a closer for the Angels (1996-2004) he was one of the elite closers in the game. While he didn't exactly go out on top [he's spent most of the year on the DL and he didn't exactly play great in the 14 games he pitched] at least his career didn't end by him being DFA'd or released.

While he leaves baseball at #8 all time in saves....I get the feeling that he's going to be one of the forgotten stars of this era as his strong career is going to be overshadowed by the careers of closers such as Mariano Rivera and Trevor Hoffman.

If I had a vote I would heavily consider placing him in the Hall of Fame, especially since closers are slowly but surely getting their due. However, it's likely that this honor will not come to him.

Looking at the bottom part of his baseball-reference page, it is clear the odds are stacked against. The three HOF metrics placed on his page [gray ink, HOF monitor and HOF standards] show Percival's career numbers falling well short of the Hall of Fame.

Another thing not working in Percival's favor is the 10 most similar players list. First of all, none of the top 10 similar players is in the Hall of Fame. Also, Percival's similarilites to the first player on that list has a non-HOF precedent to it. This player (Robb Nen) had a very close career trajectory to Percival's. Nen had a similar 8 year dominant stretch as a closer (1994-2002) made it to a few all-star games and saved 300+ games.....Nen also got a whopping .4% of the vote in his first year of Hall of Fame eligibility [while i'm not going to argue he should be in the Hall of Famer he deserved to get at least 20% of the vote ].....point being is Percival's dominance is going to be forgotten quicker than it should be