[VanillaGorilla]

The time Jim Bunning spent as oldest pitcher to be inducted lasted just one year. John McGraw, though still the oldest member of the Hall, is no longer the oldest player to give an induction speech. That honor now belongs to 78 year-old Percy Coleman.

For a guy that made only 6 starts in RL, Coleman was treated nicely by the player development dice and wound up logging 24 years of big league service.

Coleman was taken in the 9th rd of the Inaugural Draft back in 2004 by the Angels. He retired following the 2027 season with a record of 244 wins, 182 losses, and a pair of saves. He posted a career OOTP ERA of 3.67 for an npa ERA+ of 129.

No system is perfect. The system in use that is the basis for these inductions works from the Ink Standards and the HOFm/s formula developed by Bill James.

Coleman's value was incredibly understated by these numbers. That is why there is a Veterans Committee, in the first place, to honor players who, for one reason or another, slipped past the voters.

Percy Coleman enters the HOF as the 8th winningest pitcher in league history (between Rube Waddell and CC Sabathia). Hi 3156 career strikouts rank him 33rd all-time. Coleman is 10th on the career WAR list. With the players who were voted in, this year, no player ranks higher on either the win list or the WAR list that is not already inducted.

Coleman got to 244 wins pretty much 12, 13, and 14 wins at a time.

12 times he won between 10 and 14 games in a season. In those 12 seasons, he was only below .500 once, and is 50 games over .500 for those 12 years. He did not play for good teams either.

Only 3 times in 24 years did Coleman reach the post season, and none of those teams made it to the WS.

In 2010 and 2011, Coleman won 16 games in each season. Injuries limited him to 7 starts in 2012, but he again won 16 in 2013.

Though Coleman struck out over 3000 men, he was not a strikeout pitcher, in comparison to others in the HOF. He struck out 200 men only 3 times and his career high was 223 in 2011. Those three 200 K years also happen to be his 3 16 game win seasons.

Coleman is technically a floor breaker. He has a Gorilla Composite under a 2, but he is the best player entered in this, or either of the previous HOF with a GC below the 2 line.

As I looked over his career, his numbers reminded me of Jamie Moyer's BBREF page. When I looked at Moyer's page, I was amazed at how close Coleman's career here and Moyer's RL career are.

I cam to this conclusion, then I had to do a double take when I noticed that Coleman's 10 career shutouts is the same number as Moyer, IRL.

Coleman played in 3 AS games.

The numbers in parentheses that follow are those from Jamie Moyer's RL career, for comparison:

Black Ink: 4 (3)
Gray Ink: 97 (106)
HOFm: 66.5 (56)
HOFs: 43 (39)

Gorilla Composite: 1.8 (1.7)

I think Jamie Moyer will get in the RL HOF, but like Coleman, it will come as a Vet Committee selection.