JAWS and the 2017 Hall of Fame ballot: Every candidate's case

Who should make this year's cut for Cooperstown? Jay Jaffe takes a look at the candidacy of everyone on the ballot.

The 2017 Hall of Fame ballot is out, and as 34 former players vie for the honor to be inducted into baseball's most exclusive club, the members of the Baseball Writers Association of America must weigh their choices to pick the men they believe deserve a bronze plaque in Cooperstown. But which players should make the cut, and who comes up short?

All month ahead of the Dec. 31 deadline to submit a ballot, SI.com baseball writer and Hall of Fame expert Jay Jaffe will be breaking down the individual cases for each player on the ballot, from the top candidates to the likely one-and-done players. Using the statistic that he developed to measure a player's Hall of Fame contributions—JAWS—Jay will look back at the careers of everyone on the 2017 ballot and provide a stat-based valuation of their numbers, as well as examine recent and historical Hall voting trends to see what the future may hold for each man's Cooperstown hopes.

Below, you can find all of Jay's published JAWS profiles, which are are listed below in order of publication, with the most recent on top; you'll also find a quick introduction to JAWS. And don't forget to pre-order Jay's upcoming book on the Hall of Fame, "The Cooperstown Casebook," out June 2017.