Let me take you inside the mind of a baseball tangent extraordinaire – yours truly. So, I am working my way through Jane Leavy’s biography of Sandy Koufax, “A Lefty’s Legacy,” and loving every page of it. Also on my mind is an upcoming trip to Tampa, FL for work (ABF Freight), and I have started to do some preliminary baseball experience research for my trip. Through my Tampa research, I found out that my hotel is very close to the NY Yankee training facility and Tampa’s Jesuit High School. Which then prompted my brain to ask, ‘hmmm, I wonder if (Dwight) Doc Gooden’s high school is within travel distance of my hotel.’ Hillsborough High School is in fact within a reasonable distance of my hotel. Then, my baseball brain asks, ‘why isn’t Dwight Gooden in the National Baseball Hall of Fame?’

My prime time baseball fan era was from about age 5 to age 18. For those keeping score at home, that would be the years 1977 to 1990. I lived, breathed, slept baseball. I went to games, I played competitively on several levels in school and in the summers in North Kingstown. I collected cards, I collected memorabilia, I subscribed to Sporting News and Sports Illustrated and bought baseball magazines. I was a baseball junkie and I was absolutely hooked 100% of the time. With all due respect to any pitcher throwing in a major league game between the years 1977 and 1990, the two best pitchers I saw during that time were Roger Clemens and Dwight Gooden.

Gooden pitched for the New York Mets. He was a teenager throwing baseballs passed grown men at the early age of 19. He wasn’t just good, he was unhittable. He was athletic and could field his position. His leg kick was epic, ballerina like, and his whipping arm was a giant slap in the face of hitters. Doc, as I like to refer to him, struck you out with power and finesse. He threw a sizzling fastball and a ridiculous curveball. My friends and I would emulate his motion during wiffleball contests, just trying to capture a tiny bit of how he did it. Dwight Gooden was the best pitcher in the National League for as long as a decade after he entered Major League Baseball. Shouldn’t that be enough to get him into the National Baseball Hall of Fame?

Oh, you’d like some comparisons? Sure, let’s start with the book’s subject I am currently reading – Sandy Koufax. Let’s hop over to the old reliable Baseball Reference website for some numbers. Well, look at that, Koufax made his debut at 19, just like Doc. Stats – 165 wins, 87 losses for Koufax. Gooden – 194 wins, 112 losses. How about the stats I love – 162 game averages. Koufax – 16 wins, 8 losses, 222 innings pitched, 229 strikeouts, 78 walks, 2.76 ERA. The stuff of legends and by all accounts, Koufax may be the greatest pitcher for the time he pitched of all time. Now Gooden’s 162 average – 16 wins, 9 losses, 227 innings pitched, 186 strikeouts, 77 walks, 3.51 ERA. Koufax pitched for 12 seasons, Gooden for 16 – I am just wondering what Gooden’s 162 average was for his first 12 years as a comparison. I bet it was as good or better than Koufax’s!!! Here are the two legend’s stats for your viewing pleasure, courtesy of Baseball Reference.

How about another teenage comparison from another era? Bob Feller, plucked from the cornfields of Van Meter, Iowa, thrilled the nation at the tender age of 19 by showcasing an arm few had seen and many could barely believe. Feller played in 18 Major League Baseball seasons over a 20 year period, taking time out of professional baseball to serve our country in the United States Navy. Feller was a star from the start and had a prolific, Hall of Fame career. His 162 game average for his career goes as follows – 17 wins, 10 losses, ERA 3.25, 167 strikeouts, 114 walks, 247 innings pitch. An absolutely epic pitcher who dominated Major League Baseball players for nearly 20 years, including barnstorming leagues, and naval baseball exhibition events. In my opinion, Doc Gooden’s stats stack up pretty good with Bob Feller. Feller, like Koufax, is in the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Dwight Gooden is not.

In 2010, Dwight Gooden was inducted in the New York Mets Baseball Hall of Fame. Certainly, a wonderful honor for a NY Met star that brought a ton of fans to Shea every fourth or fifth day to see Doc dismantle National League hitters. Here is his tribute post courtesy of the NY Mets Hall of Fame page:

Rookie of the Year at 19, then Cy Young at 20 years old? Youngest ever Cy Young Award winner. Triple Crown of pitching like few can even imagine, yours truly included. In 1985, Gooden won 24 games, struck out 268 batters, and had an ERA of 1.53. Are you kidding me? 16 complete games to pile on about how 1985 may have been the best year a pitcher has ever had on a professional baseball mound. 4th in MVP voting, he also added 21 hits and a home run at the plate (Pitchers batted back then). 1985 was the year everyone gravitated to their radios, TVS, and if you were lucky enough local ballparks to watch a historic Dwight Gooden pitch for the NY Mets. What a talent.

In my opinion, Dwight Gooden should be in the National Baseball Hall of Fame. He has my vote, a fan’s vote because he is one of the greatest baseball players I have ever seen. His stats are Hall of Fame worthy. Okay, there is some off the field stuff. And maybe that off the field stuff is preventing baseball writers from electing him. For me, having read a million lines of copy about baseball players from 1890 to the present, who doesn’t have off the field stuff??? And many of the worst off the field stuff players are in the National Baseball Hall of Fame!

I’ll end with this – Dwight Gooden should be in the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY.