LPGA Hall of Fame Watch, September 2014 Edition

I usually wait till Thanksgiving and the end of the LPGA season to revisit an old Hound Dog LPGA question:  who will be the next player to qualify for the LPGA Hall of Fame?  But given how well the top golfers on tour have been playing, and how much is at stake during the tour's 2nd Asian Swing and beyond, I figured I'd review where everyone with at least a halfway decent chance of making the Hall stands right now.

Here are the criteria from LPGA.com:

1. Must be/have been an "active" LPGA Tour member for 10 years;
2. Must have won/been awarded at least one of the following - an LPGA major championship, the Vare Trophy or Rolex Player of the Year honors; and
3. Must have accumulated a total of 27 points, which are awarded as follows - one point for each LPGA official tournament win, two points for each LPGA major tournament win and one point for each Vare Trophy or Rolex Player of the Year honor earned.

Check out how quickly Lorena Ochoa qualified in points in Hound Dog's follow-up post--although he couldn't have predicted then that she'd retire so soon, before actually meeting criterion #1!  So assuming Laura Davies and Ochoa will either play their way in or be voted in, who are the top candidates for entry right now?  

Check me on this, but here's how I believe the points breakdown stands right now:

1. Ya Ni Tseng (23)
T2. Inbee Park (18)
T2. Cristie Kerr (18)
4. Suzann Pettersen (16)
5. Stacy Lewis (14)
6. Ji-Yai Shin (13)
7. Paula Creamer (11)
T8. Na Yeon Choi (9)
T8. Ai Miyazato (9) [the only one on this list who doesn't meet criterion #2]

I'm going to go out on a limb here and officially doubt that Kerr will make it to 27 points.  And given how Shin, Choi, and Miyazato have stalled, it's difficult to have much confidence that Park, Pettersen, or Lewis will catch Tseng very quickly--although given how well Pettersen has played in Asia in her career and how hot Park and Lewis are, who knows?  Tseng, meanwhile, needs to take a deep breath, realize that everyone runs into rough patches in a golf career, refocus, and learn to crawl again before she tries to run.

In short, everyone on this list has made a name for themselves, but it takes more than that to make history.  With so many 1st-time major winners this season, the only points that are left besides wins are for Player of the Year and for the Vare Trophy (for lowest scoring average).  Right now, Lewis has sizeable leads in both races.  Let's see if she can lock them up in the next 2 months!