A Hall Of A Day

Dawson, based on that, is closer than last year. If that includes the Chicago Tribune writers, then he may not get in, since they all voted for him. If it doesn't, he may have a pretty good shot.

The HoF balloting system is seriously flawed. Years ago, the balloting was given to the BBWAA because it was assumed that they were the only people who would have seen everyone play enough times to know how good they were. This, of course, was in the pre-television era.

There has to be a way to make this better. Unfortunately, the HoF board of directors is filled with dinosaurs who don't want to cede power to anyone else.

They could fix this, or MLB could (even though the Hall is an independent organization, MLB could wield power if they wanted to), but no one seems interested, despite widespread disgust with the way the voting is handled.

I personally think the baseball writers do a pretty damn good job. I believe the "first ballot" concept is pretty stupid but I do understand that over a 15-year period, in the mind or voters, someone can go from being a non-HoF player to a HoF player when looking at it from a historical viewpoint.

Yes, there are a handful of players who are debatable that are both in and not in the hall. But the thing is that they are debatable. It is debatable that Ron Santo, Andre Dawson, Bert Blyleven and Goose Gossage are Hall of Famers. All of these guys are borderline, certainly tremendous ballplayers, but their HoF status is debatable. I, for one, would much rather have a few players not make than have a Hall of Fame that is watered down. It should be exceedingly difficult to get into the Hall.

DmL

Example:

Pitcher A won 14
Pitcher B won 13

Pitcher A is Jason Marquis on the 2006 Cardinals with a 6.02(!) ERA!

Pitcher B is Roger Clemens on the 2005 Astros in one of the best pitching performances in the history of baseball. ERA+ was 226!!!

Blyleven was a stud:  Breaking down years by ERA+, here are his total years above...

150 - 2
140 - 5
130 - 6
120 - 11

I might as well just give credit where it is due.  Look here:

http://vegaswatch.net/2008/01/its-almost-over.html

That article breaks down why Blyleven should be in even though he probably won't and why Jack Morris probably will even though he is doing it on the strength of one no-hitter and that game 7 against the braves.

Oh and also... someone is voting for Morris because he started 14 Opening day games.  Wow...just, wow.  That is the worst argument of all time for anything ever.

Basically, either Blyleven needs to be in with the current standards, or the standards need to become stricter and then he should be left out.

I read an interesting article a while back about the HOF and how it would mean something if they restricted it to 50 or 100 players and then every time someone came up for a vote, they would have to take someone out of the HOF to get in.  It would be interesting to see but it would help ensure that only the best players would actually be in.

Since we rightly admit these dominant pitchers who suffered from relatively short careers, I think it's only fair that we include their counterparts. Blyleven's lack of relative dominance should be more than made up for by his ERA throughout such a prolific career, his number of CG shutouts, his lofty rank on the career strikeout list, his IP, and finally his high career win total.

I think it speaks to our love of round numbers that Blyleven has been thus far ignored by HOF voters by ending his career 13 games shy of 300 wins. He was basically one more decent season away from accumulating the necessary win total to virtually assure his inclusion in the club. Personally, i consider the wins too much either way. If anything. 287 wins should help his case, not hurt it.

Now that I've gone to the trouble to make Blyleven's case, allow me to bash the HOF: It's a sham organization anyway. It's just as inconsistent as anything else. There are plenty of relatively weak hitting infielders on the plaques in that museum. Honestly, I don't care how good Luis Aparicio's glove was: his offensive stats suck (even for his pitching dominated era). His career OPS+ is 82!

How in the world can he have 60 shutouts and not be dominating?  

The Cy Young award argument, which you don't make but others do, is absolute bullcrap.  In 1984 Blyleven won 19 games for a wretched 75 win Indians team.  If he'd have won one more game, they would have given him the Cy Young.  But the unwritten rule back then was that starting pitchers had to win 20 to get the Cy Young and people were fascinated with closers.  He finished third behind Willie Hernandez and Dan Quisenberry, the closers for the two division winning teams.  So now we should punish Blyleven again because the sportswriters of the eighties were morons?  (Heck, it's the same guys voting today for the hall.)

Blyleven pitched for two World Champions (Pirates '79, Twins '87) but neither one was a dominating team.  Most of the rest of his career was played for the crummy Twins teams of the seventies and the absolutely dreadful Indians teams of the early eighties.

If he'd have pitched for Detroit like Jack Morris did, he'd have gotten 320 wins and we wouldn't be having this conversation.

People keep going back to the wins and losses thing.  I don't know how many times we have to beat it into people's heads that those are team stats.

I think Rice and Dawson, along with Henderson, get in next year.

Name other outfielders in the HoF who were as good defensively and running the bases as Dawson.

It has little to do with reality.

It's a weird list. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that everyone that voted for Tim Raines also voted for Jack Morris.

It seemed quite well-thought-out and logical to me, which is why it'll never happen.

(The current process IS a total abomination, incidentally. I can't see how you can argue otherwise.)

A total of 2,907 individual votes were cast, an average of 5.35 per ballot.

That leaves at least 32 ballots that were NOT received by the December 31 deadline. Include the 3 submitted blank ballots, that's at least 35 "no votes."

Rick Telander has a right not to cast a ballot. His point is that there MAY be players on the ballot that "roided up" or used HGH. He doesn't know, so he didn't vote.

Shame on you, Mr. Telander. Voting is a privilege. You were asked to judge what these players did on the field. You chose not to cast a ballot because you don't know whether or not players like Rice, Dawson, Smith, John, maybe even Bert Blyleven used PEDs?

You said you would "bet [your] life Hawk didn't," but you didn't cast a ballot because "swollen Mark McGwire soils the ballot."

Rice, Dawson, and Blyleven would not have received enough votes even if every one of the 32 non-participating ballots named all three on their ballots. Rice would have fallen 8 votes short (575 ballots requires 432 votes; Rice would have had 424). And this assumes exactly 575 were distributed when it is published that OVER 575 ballots were distributed.

Your vote, and the vote of those that did not send theirs in, could have made a difference under different circumstances.

I don't ground my 17-year-old daughter every weekend because she MAY be going to keg parties or because her under-aged friends drink. I know she's been to parties, but she comes home sober. I trust her to make wise choices.

Let's trust that Rice, Dawson, Blyleven, Smith, John, and many others on the ballot are deserving without the aid of PEDs.