Lucky Hall Of Famer Number 47 - Ross Youngs

Ross Youngs is a really tricky Hall of Fame candidate. Since I recently did a post on Addie Joss, I guess now is as good a time as any to talk about Youngs. He played parts of ten seasons in the Big Leagues (1917-1926), batting .322 for his career with a 130 OPS+.  Youngs was diagnosed with Bright's disease in early 1926 but played through the illness, batting .306 in 95 games. He was bedridden by the next year, and died on October 22, 1927 at age 30. 

    What do you think? By inducting him into the Hall of Fame in 1972, did the Veteran's Committee make the right decision? Unlike Joss, Youngs fit official Hall of Fame voting criteria by playing in ten different seasons (although he only played seven games in 1917), and was playing at a very high level when illness struck him down. He had good rate stats, but played only 1,211 games in his career, leaving him well short of typical Hall of Fame counting statistics. Had he survived, he may or may not have finished out what would have been a Hall-worthy career. 

My opinion: Undecided 

Ordinarily, a player with counting statistics like Youngs would never make the Hall of Fame. However, I am sympathetic toward players who died in the middle of their careers, and Youngs was still hitting over .300 when he had to stop playing. I can only wonder if his counting stats would have come around if he'd survived.