It's helpful to see that Lajoie, Speaker, and Young got into the Hall of Fame in 1937 -- voted on by people who saw them all player -- and Collins didn't make the cut that year.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/awards/hof_1937.shtml
The next year, Alexander got in, but no one else.
It wasn't until 1939 that Collins got in, along with Sisler and Keeler.
That gives a pretty strong impression that as great as Collins was statistically, he wasn't thought of as that ultra-top-tier great by his contemporary critics.
As an aside, I'm a pretty big Eddie Collins fan - of all the famous ballplayers who have come out of New York, none of them came from as close to where I grew up in the lower Hudson Valley. Collins came out of Tarrytown, NY!