Were they among the best during their time in baseball? Pretty simple to judge, especially in an age of advanced metrics. BAA, ERA+ (park & team adjusted), K/BB ratio, and so on.
If they were top 3, or 5, or 10 for their era, wins don't count as much.
Sandy Koufax only had 165 wins, but for 7 years his stats say he was the best pitcher in baseball. In fact, it's not that close. Sandy is in the HoF, and he belongs there.
Wins are useless now in the era of 5 man rotations & skipping starts. They are extremely dependent on appearances and they just don't pitch as much anymore.
Kershaw has ZERO chance of hitting 300 wins, but I can't see anybody making a credible claim he wasn't in the handful of best pitchers of his era. Same with Scherzer.
The voters are going to have to rethink the "automatic" entry points.

for president (of the Baseball Writers' Association of America)!!!




Your approach seems sound to me, Prof.

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