The Athletic is already making wild pronouncement about Kevin McGonigle as RoY case builds

It's still a little hard to believe that Kevin McGonigle is not only as good as he is, but is a Tiger for the long haul.

Sure, the Tigers have drafted and developed relatively well over the last few years and made a spending splash with Framber Valdez, but McGonigle belongs in his own category. He's a bonafide superstar, he already loves being a Tiger, and he's not going anywhere anytime soon. This is a guy — the guy — that Tigers fans can point to and say, "he's ours."

The realists among us are still waiting for McGonigle to come back down to earth, but he's declined to do so, so far. Entering play on Friday, he's hitting .319 with a .907 OPS and is the fourth-most valuable position player in baseball. His defense at shortstop and third isn't perfect, but it's getting better, and he's made some fantastic plays at the hot corner that point to growth still to come.

And he's doing all of this without ever setting foot in Toledo.

His immediate superstardom already has Jayson Stark of The Athletic predicting not only big things but the biggest thing for McGonigle's career. Less than 30 games into his career, Stark told fans to mark their calendars for McGonigle's Hall of Fame induction.

The Athletic's Jayson Stark is already making a Hall of Fame case for Kevin McGonigle

Stark provided a few parameters and examples to guide his answer — "every player in 106 years who A) drew at least 90 walks in a season, B) had more walks than strikeouts in that season and C) were 21 or younger at the time" — based on the projection that McGonigle will walk 92 times and strike out 84 times in his rookie season.

All of the players who meet that criteria are Hall of Famers: Ted Williams, Mel Ott, Rickey Henderson, Jimmie Foxx, Eddie Matthews, and Joe Morgan.

Obviously, there's a lot more than went into all six of those players' careers. McGonigle has years and years of a career still ahead of him, and the game is fickle.

But there's no denying that everyone — Tigers fan or not — feels like we're watching the beginning of something special. McGonigle doesn't have to live up to Cooperstown potential right now; he just needs to keep doing what he's being doing from his first major league at-bat: help this team win.

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