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MisunderestimatedI am also a big Reulbach fan so please consider the following as more of an explanation for why he isn't in the HOF than a criticism of his merits.
As a general rule there are 2 avenues to the HOF for players:
1) Big careers with gaudy lifetime numbers accumulated over the long haul. For pitchers the primary example is win totals and the "magic" number of 300. So far every pitcher who has reached this threshold has been inducted. (Roger Clemens may test this rule, but we'll leave that for another day) Even pitchers who were not generally regarded as "great" or "the best" at any point in their careers who reach this milestone get in -- see e.g. Don Sutton, Phil Niekro, and (from what I've read) Pud Galvin and Mickey Welch.
2) Short term dominance; truly great seasons; carrying a team, setting records and now winning Cy Young awards. This explains HOFers like Sandy Koufax, Dizzy Dean, and Jack Chesbro and why Smokey Joe Wood is still being considered.
Obviously most HOFers combine these to some degree or another and the greatest of all have tremendous career numbers based on consistent dominance. (GC Alexander, Walter Johnson, Lefty Grove etc.)
Big Ed clearly lacks the long term numbers so his case must be based almost entirely on the second option. Unfortunately as great as he was never really in the mix for the hypothetical Cy Young award. In fact, he was never even recognized as his teams ace, 3 Finger Brown was. When the Cubs really needed a game or had to face Mathewson, they used Brown. As far as I know there are no HOF pitchers who were never really ace's in the HOF who didn't compensate by building up much bigger career numbers than Ruelbach.
This is not to say he shouldn't get in. Ed was a crucial member of the Cubs dynasty of 1906-10, a team with a winning percentage that has not been matched since. Four members of that team are currently enshrined but just one is a pitcher. I am also sympathetic to the argument that his career (and hence his totals) suffered because of the owners. Unfortunately the HOF voters have never been sympathetic to this as evidenced by Tony Mullane's exclusion and the absurd lenghth of time it took to admit Amos Rusie (a truly dominant pitcher with strong career numbers). Even today the voters are clearly pro-owners: they select a mediocre Commissioner like Bowie Kuhn but fail to elect Marvin Miller.