A grand total of 22,858 human beings have played Major League Baseball. Just 270 of them have earned induction into the Hall of Fame. Only six — Goose Gossage, Mariano Rivera, Lee Smith, Bruce Sutter, Trevor Hoffman and Rollie Fingers — were pure closers. John Smoltz, Dennis Eckersley and Hoyt Wilhelm also relieved a great deal, but Smoltz and Eckersley started a ton and Wilhelm was far from a contemporary-style closer. So, six is the number.
There are 27 first basemen, 26 shortstops and 79 starting pitchers. And even though relief pitching has only operated in the modern sense for less than a third of baseball’s existence, the dearth of relievers with bronze plaques in Cooperstown is glaring. It is a problem that won’t soon be remedied, a problem that will only grow in scale as the years roll by.