Jon Lester's Hall of Fame case is more interesting than you'd think

Sep. 27—Don't look now, but Jon Lester is in the thick of another team's magical run.

Since being traded by the Washington Nationals to the St. Louis Cardinals at the trade deadline, the longtime Red Sox and Cubs ace and three-time World Series champion has played a key role in the team's late-season surge. The 37-year-old has turned back the clock to post a 4-1 record and a 4.13 ERA with St. Louis, and over the past few weeks the club has run off an epic win streak. Once barely a .500 team, the Cardinals are now the clear frontrunner to claim the second NL Wild Card spot and could conceivably play spoiler in the one-game elimination round.

During that stretch Lester also won his 200th career game, achieving a milestone that's becoming increasingly rare in baseball. That accomplishment underscored what has quietly been true about Lester for a long time, that he is one of the best and most consequential pitchers of his generation and may have a stronger Hall of Fame case than many realize.

Lester is far from a slam dunk, in fact it's likely his candidacy will be highly controversial when he appears on the ballot in the mid-to-late 2020s. Why? The case for Lester is extremely old school and he will likely draw significant opposition from more analytic-minded voters who won't be as impressed by his advanced metrics.

So what is Lester's resume? In terms of conventional figures, he will finish with more than 200 wins, a career ERA of around 3.70 and will soon become one of 40 pitchers in history to record more than 2,500 strikeouts. He is a five-time all-star, finished top five in the Cy Young Award voting three times (including a runner-up finish in 2016) and threw a no-hitter in 2008.

What about the advanced metrics? His 44.5 Wins Above Replacement would rank near the bottom of all Hall of Famers, and according to sabermetrician Jay Jaffe's JAWS stat — which specifically aims to quantify Hall of Fame worthiness — Lester's score of 39.5 comes in below contemporaries like Cliff Lee, Jamie Moyer and Carlos Zambrano, though it is notably higher than recent Hall of Fame inductee Jack Morris.

Much like Morris, Lester's candidacy will hinge heavily on his performance in the postseason. He won the deciding Game 4 of the 2007 World Series for the Red Sox, went 4-1 with a 1.56 ERA during Boston's 2013 World Series run and was 3-1 with a 2.02 ERA in the Cubs historic 2016 World Series run to break the 108-year-old curse. Overall he has appeared in 26 playoff games, and his 22 starts, 154 innings, 2.51 ERA and 133 strikeouts in the postseason all rank among the top 10 in baseball history.

One other thing Lester has going for him is his durability. Since his first year as a full-time starter in 2008 Lester has never missed extended time to injury, and he has made 30 or more starts in all 12 years that was possible until this year, when he will finish with 28.

That is a big reason why Lester's been able to rack up 200 wins, and even granting that wins and losses are a flawed measure of a pitcher's ability, you don't get to 200 career wins in this day and age without being really good for a long time. Lester is now only the seventh pitcher who has primarily played in the 21st century to reach 200 wins, and the only other active pitchers close behind are Max Scherzer and Clayton Kershaw.

Will all of that add up to a plaque in Cooperstown? It's too soon to tell, but Lester has definitely made sure that's an interesting conversation when the time comes.

Email: mcerullo@northofboston.com. Twitter: @MacCerullo.