Baseball Hall Of Fame

Let's make this the Baseball Hall of Fame thread. Who should be in, who should be out, etc.

But I'll kick it off by congratulating Andre Dawson for getting voted in yesterday. He was really a class act. One of only three men to hit 400 homers and steal 300 bases (along with Barry Bonds and Willy Mays). Pretty good company .

But I did feel that Robbie Alomar should have made it. In my opinion, he was the best second baseman of his generation. Sorry Jeff Kent, but Robbie was better all around. It was just my Mets luck that he fell apart as soon as he got here .

I think Robbie will be a shoe-in next year because here's the 2011 list: Wilson Alvarez, Carlos Baerga, Jeff Bagwell, Bret Boone, Kevin Brown, Cal Eldred, John Franco, Juan Gonzalez, Marquis Grissom, Bobby Higginson, Charles Johnson, Al Leiter, Tino Martinez, Raul Mondesi, Jose Offerman, John Olerud, Rafael Palmeiro, Paul Quantrill, Steve Reed, Kirk Rueter, Rey Sanchez, Benito Santiago, B.J. Surhoff, Ugueth Urbina, Ismael Valdez, Larry Walker, and Dan Wilson.

Now Gonzalez and Palmeiro would have been guaranteed admission, but they can forget about it because of the steroid scandal. Jeff Bagwell is a no-brainer; a first ballot lock, but I think Alomar edges out the rest of the competition.

Come on, Counselor, help me out here .

Bagwell is a sure Hall of Famer, whether it's the first ballot or not next year.

I was also very happy to see Dawson get elected. He hit consistently for power and average, and was a tremendous defensive player in center. He was great at every aspect of the game, and was the keystone in one of the best outfields I have ever seen. The Expos of the late 70s and early 80s also had Warren Cromartie and Ellis Valentine. Dawson richly deserves his spot in the Hall, which was overdue.

Still overdue is the admission of Bert Blyleven, who came within a fraction of a percentage point of getting elected. He remains the biggest oversight of the Hall. I've posted before that I haven't seen a better curveball than his, and he was a meaningful part of two world champions. He didn't get the big market exposure, but his place on the all-time strikeout list as well as his 287 wins speaks highly of the dominant pitcher he was.

Alomar deserves to be in the Hall, but I thought some voters would withhold votes from him in his first year because of the Mark Hirshbeck inciddent. He and the umpire are friends today and have done good work together. I agree that Alomar is a slight notch above Kent as an all around secondbaseman. I would say that in my lifetime of watching baseball, only Joe Morgan and Ryne Sandberg were better. Utley has years to go before his career can be assessed at this level.

Yes, Klyd. Bert was almost an afterthought to me, because he's been eligible for so long. Alomar was more fresh in my mind, so he's who I based my post around.

With 300 wins quickly approaching extinction, Bert's 287 will stand up against almost anyone's. It's a real shame. I agree, he's the Hall's biggest oversight right now (with Gil Hodges leading the pack for the "old" old timers).

might as well bring this up since this is the hall of fame topic.

pete rose- should be inducted years after he died.

'shoeless' joe jackson- should be inducted.

ron santo- how can he be left out of the hall for this long!?

o yea another complaint...why is the voting process messed up? i mean really why do they have to do 75%, why not just the top 3,4, or 5 get in. also too why do some voters not vote?

I agree that Blyleven needs to be in. Should have been this year as I feel he has waited long enough.

I think Alomar is a HOFer, but the fact that he did not get in on the first ballot does not bother me. Had he not spit on an umpire, I bet he would have been inducted yesterday. That incident forever changed how some viewed Alomar.

Blyleven in '11! He'll get it in. For some strange reason the HoF voters seem to enjoy making guys wait. I think it's the only thing they have power over in their lives.

Also helped Dawn that he was never suspected of juicing. Oh nostalgia...

You guys have to understand, that alot of those 70s/80s players that weren't first ballot shoe-in selections, they cannibalized each other's votes. Notice that after Lee Smith and Jim Rice and Andre Dawson, how the others have risen slowly. Notice that Jack Morris is at over 50%.

Alomar not getting in was a fluke, just by looking at how he nearly went in.

2011 will be Alomar, Blyleven, and (maybe) Jeff Bagwell.

And McGwire, Palmeiro, Gonzalez will clog up the ballot, taking away pity and strident defenfers' vvotes away from guys who never used steroids. All around the 20-25% range.

I agree with this. Many of the writers who voted against Alomar will be content to just make him wait a year and vote him in next January. There's no real media hate there, they just wanted to teach him a lesson.

Alan Trammell???

Hall of Fame

Trammell should get a lot of consideration. Had he played in NY or Boston, he'd be in.

I think four-and-a-half years is enough time gone by to bump this thread .

Anyway, I loathe the Braves with the white hot passion of a thousand suns. But seeing Cox, Glavine and Maddux go into the Hall together, just about made my day.

Oh yeah, that Torre fella's an old Brave, too .

Larussa seemed like he may have had a couple of pops in him and loved frank thomas calling out the steroid era

Fun fact: Frank Thomas is the first Hall of Famer to have more at bats as a DH than as a position player.

Frank Thomas gave my buddies dad a shout out in his speech yesterday, that was a pretty solid HOF class considering the era that they played in

I never liked Frank Thomas... when I was a kid at a Yankee game i stuck my hand out with the ball real early before the game, and there was nobody around me and he just chuckled and kept walking...so i always hated him !

but if tis true that he was not involved in roids, then his numbers make him more than worthy of the honor

his former teammate should be in too... Albert Belle... but the hof is a popularity contest, and he never had a chance because he was "not nice" to reporters

the 15 years to 10 years on the ballot was also clearly designed to keep the dopers out as well... less time for voters to change their mind

Sux barry bonds did the PEDs because without them he was best player in baseball and then with them became greatest of all time... im not a bonds fan but without the PEDs he is one of best ever but will never get in... Pete Rose should be in too!

That jerk was a first ballot Hall of Famer before he ever stuck a needle in his ass .

I never liked Frank Thomas either. I personally think he roided up during his playing days, but there's no proof to it (just my gut feeling). The reason I never liked him was because he was jealous of Michael Jordan when he retired from basketball in 1993 and was trying to make the White Sox roster. Thomas was jealous Mike was taking the spotlight away from him and I just never cared for him after that.

Bonds and Clemens would get my vote...

ALOT of players used the juice...but none dominated the game for as long as they did

but no matter how you view it...its just sad that one day I will have to explain to my kid why all of these guys who were the best players in the sport when I was growing up are not in the HOF

As a lifelong White Sox and Chicago sports fan, I am the first to admit that Frank Thomas was not always a pleasant guy... but neither was Michael Jordan. There are countless stories from insiders and non insiders that attest to that fact.

The difference is Frank has redeemed himself in the city after a less than favorable departure a few years back. He has admitted this and has spent the last couple of years making amends and fixing a lot of wrongs. He is beloved and is our guy on the south side. As far as him roiding back in the day.. l'm not certain but I doubt it.

I'm happy for him and think he deserves every bit of recognition he receives. He has brought a lot of joy to Sox fans during his tenure here. Go Sox!

One of the strangest aspects of the Joe Jackson case is that no one ever takes up the Hall of Fame case of pitcher Eddie Cicotte. Like Jackson, he took the money and confessed to the fix, and had good personal stats in the Series (2.91 ERA). They say that Comiskey's tight-fisted ways drove the players to set up the fix, and Cicotte was the most-directly impacted in this way - he was held out of the rotation for two weeks in September when he was approaching a bonus for 30 wins. At the time he was barred he had won 209 games, 90 in the previous four years. He was 36 then, but he was probably headed for a career win total way over 250, and he threw a knuckleball a lot so he might well have gone over 300 wins. He wasn't quite the pitcher that Jackson was a hitter, but it's hard to see why Jackson gets so much attention while Cicotte is just another of the Black Sox.

That's a good point. Looking at some of Cicotte's contemporaries:

Ed Walsh only had 191 wins (albeit an ERA a half run lower than Cicotte), and is in the Hall of Fame.

Rube Marquard had 201 wins, a significantly higher ERA, and is in the Hall of Fame (the last five years of Marquard's career were in the Live Ball era, which drove his career ERA up).

Charles Comiskey was indeed an infamous tight wad. Players had to pay for their own uniforms to be laundered. One of the many factors that led to the fix.

Pete, thanks for the information about Cicotte. I had no idea about his stats and he should be also inducted in the hall along with Jackson.

Was Comiskey the only owner that actually did that to his players? And, I wonder if that kind of thing stopped when Landis became commissioner.

I have been to the Hall of Fame several times and the funny thing about Joe Jackson is that there is a display for him showing his contract and some equipment of his. If they are going to profit by him they should induct him. (Along with Pete Rose) I can't remember the sportswriters name but his quote was classic: "Heaven is for good people, the Hall of Fame is for baseball people".

The Hall of Fame is not only a monument to celebrate the greatest of the greats, but it serves as a chronicle of the history of baseball through the times. It recognizes personalities, perhaps unworthy of being enshrined as a member of the Hall, who have had a consequential or curious impact on the game.

There is ample evidence that Cicotte and Joe Jackson, great players of their time, conspired for profit to fix the outcome of the 1919 World Series. Accordingly, I don't believe they should be honored as members. Ted Williams was the biggest proponent of admitting Jackson, citing his 1919 postseason stats, but in the particular games that were thrown Jackson did not produce and neither did Cicotte. These players were undoubtedly treated unfairly by ownership, but that does not excuse their desecration of the game.

Another more recent time where ownership acted outrageously and unfairly against players happened in the mid-1980s when all of the owners colluded to ignore talented free agents and reduce their salaries far below market value. Fortunately the PA sued and recouped some of the money for the players, but the relationship between the union and the owners has never been fully repaired.

There's a section on collusion in Ken Burns' 1994 Baseball documentary. This from Marvin Miller, former head of the MLBPA:

"...tantamount to fixing, not just games, but entire pennant races, including all post-season series."

http://www.bizofbaseball.com/docs/Brown_Collusion_Neyer_Blunders.pdf

Former commissioner Peter Ueberroth initiated the collusion shortly after his election, claiming that spending millions to win a World Series was "damned dumb" and that it was "not smart" to sign players to long-term contracts.

From what I understand, Bud Selig and Jerry Reinsdorf were the two collusion ringleaders from the owners side. If that's the case, Selig does not deserve to be in the Hall of Fame.

Damages from the three rounds of collusion grievances totaled $280 million. Former commissioner Fay Vincent has stated that the addition of the Rockies, Marlins, Rays and Diamondbacks was a direct result of this, as the owners needed to raise revenue to pay that settlement.

All of this is absolutely true. Fay Vincent only lasted three years as commissioner before having to resign after a vote of no confidence because he was honest when he called the owners a pack of thieves. Not only were free agents not getting signed outside of their old teams, but the contracts they were getting from the old team were often for less money and limited to one year. In the rare cases where free agents signed with other clubs, it was only after their former owners secretly communicated among the conspiring owners that they weren't interested in re-signing the player. In the mid-80s the total payroll of baseball actually declined.

The players' union present distrust of ownership is related to these episodes.

You still see that to this day -- in the 2006 CBA, the owners had to kick back $12 million in a settlement over collusion in 2002-03.

Vincent's only problem was that he wasn't a willing puppet of the owners. Not only did he call them out for being thieves, he also owned a map -- the last straw was him trying to correct the National League so the Braves and Reds were in the NL East and the Cubs and Cardinals in the NL West.