Man that is a tough list to choose from. Pudge in for sure, 'Roid scum out for sure, and a bunch I’d have to deep dive the numbers on to give final decision.
I had to vote for Vlad just because one of my very favorite baseball memories is seeing him hit a home run off a pitch that bounced in front of the plate.
If Pudge doesn’t get in I’m going to stop reading polls. He’s all around the best qualified of this whole list.
Only 33 votes in, but based on 75% rule, we’ve elected only Bagwell and Clemens. Bonds and Pudge are each one vote short, which is stunning to me.
I guess I forgot how strongly Pudge was tied to PEDs. I can’t keep them all straight, which is the biggest reason I said screw it this year and voted for known PED users.
Did we not vote for baseball HOF last year? In searching I could only find the 2015 HOF ballots here, which had 85 voters.
I’m flummoxed at Pudge. I’d like to know what the argument against him is. I understand people are angry at Bonds, fine, but if Ivan Rodriguez isn’t a Hall of Famer, what catcher is?
I believe it’s due to rumors he used PEDs (most likely during his MVP season when he hit 35 home runs).
Probably, but that applies to Clemens too. The evidence against Clemens is at least as strong as anything against Pudge.
I’m a small Hall guy:
Bagwell
Hoffman
Kent
Raines
Walker
My only must be HOF is Bagwell
You can find last year’s here: The Baseball Hall of Fame Class of 2016 poll and thread - The Game Room - Straight Dope Message Board
We elected just one player: Ken Griffey.
Piazza and Bagwell came close.
I chose five: Bagwell, Rodriguez, Raines, Walker, and Guerrero. The year of the Expos outfielders, I guess.
Every year I wonder if I can pull that trigger for the “known” steroids guys (those who admitted it, those who failed drug tests, or those for whom there just seems to be lots and lots of evidence pointing in that direction). Every year I decide I can’t quite do it. This year, the same. [One issue that looms increasingly large is that if I’m going to vote for these folks I’d like to have some other guys back on the ballot. If I’m picking Ramirez, for instance, I’d like to choose Palmeiro and McGwire as well, and that’s not happening.]
I came close to voting for Gary Sheffield, who always seems like he was unfairly overlooked, but in the end I didn’t. I think he and Fred McGriff both lost some points with voters by bouncing around from team to team as much as they did. I liked Lee Smith a lot and Hoffman was terrific, but they were both relief pitchers who, as RickJay points out, just didn’t pitch that much. Rightly or wrongly, I feel the same way about Edgar Martinez–I have real trouble putting a full-time DH on my ballot.
The two I left off that I’m least sure about–same last year–are Mussina and Schilling. I know they both rank very high in the analytical measures such as WAR, which I do take seriously (I think I read somewhere that other than Clemens, Mussina has the highest WAR of any pitcher not in the HoF), and I know they both have very strong followings. But I just don’t see it, in either case. Anyway, I’m leaving them out, and since Griffey and Piazza made it last year, Edmonds dropped off the ballot altogether, and Trammell used up his eligibility I’m voting for five.
Thanks for putting this together. I don’t get very exercised about the HoF, but it’s fun to see the reasons that people have for voting for (or against) certain people.
Okay, so now we have a specific person we know didn’t vote for maybe the greatest catcher who ever lived. Can I ask why? Why is Jeff Kent more deserving than Ivan Rodriguez?
Just for reference, here are all time catchers ranked by WAR. All catchers with more than 50 WAR. (Not sure if this is B-R or Fangraphs, but whatever):
- Bench
- Fisk
- I-Rod
- Carter
- Yogi
- Piazza
- Torre*
- Dickey
- Buck Ewing**
- Cochrane
- Simmons
- Hartnett
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- Torre played fewer than half his career games at catcher, but played there more than either of the other positions he played, so is counted as a catcher by most people.
** - All 19th century stats so take that for what it’s worth.
- Torre played fewer than half his career games at catcher, but played there more than either of the other positions he played, so is counted as a catcher by most people.
Where does Roy Campanella rank, if his MLB career is projected to the length of a normal MLB career?
Campanella is accredited with 38.2 WAR by Fangraphs, p[utting him, I dunno, 20th? 25th? I know that seems shockingly low for a guy who won three MVP Awards, but
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He did not get to play in the major leagues until he was 26, due to his skin being the wrong color. If he had been white there is little doubt he would have started several years earlier; he was recognized as a player of exceptional ability very early on. This could have cost him more than 10-15% of his career “value.”
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His career was ended by the accident at age 35, and
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He basically stopped hitting for average his last two years in the league, dropping his value to almost zip.
Obviously, I think Roy Campanella’s a Hall of Famer. In terms of career value maybe he’s lower than most, but there are extenuating circumstances and some credit has to be given for a very high peak.
One of my favourite trivia bits about Roy Campenalla is that when someone asked Ty Cobb in the 1950s what he thought of the players of that time, he said Willie Mays was the one he’d pay money to see, but the one who most reminded him of himself was Roy Campanella. Honestly, that is just the weirdest answer, isn’t it? Roy Campanella was similar to Ty Cobb as a ballplayer only in that they both used wooden bats. You’d be hard pressed to find a great player LESS similar to Ty Cobb. Cobb was a lefthanded center fielder who ran like hell and did essentially everything well. Campanella was a righthanded, lumbering catcher who game was, basically, to hit home runs, and ran like he was carrying Duke Snider on his back. I could never understand that, but then on other occasions Cobb expressed great admiration for Campanella, so I guess he just took a shine to him for whatever reason.
I can’t understand the argument for Jeff Kent. Willie Randolph has been mentioned a few times in this thread and he has a much stronger case than Kent.
Since relief pitcher and DH are positions, I’m okay with the elite players going in but it galls me somewhat to see Hoffman get so much more support than Mussina and (ugh) Schilling. Edgar should go in, and in five years, Big Papi too, imho.
Great breakdown RickJay. I learned a ton and I don’t have really anything to add. I do wonder what your opinions are on how BR calculates WAR—mainly the defensive component—vs how FanGraphs does it.
I had no idea Pudge was that good. I’d heard that Piazza was pretty much the best offensive catcher in baseball when he played, but I didn’t realize that Pudge was ahead of him in WAR. 1st ballot he is, then; you’ve convinced me.
Schilling was often the only reason to watch many of those awful Phillies teams he was stuck on the early part of his career.
I don’t have a problem, per se, with putting a closer in the Hall. It’s a position, and IMHO, the Hall should recognize the greatest players of their time. OTOH, long snapper is a position in football, and I wouldn’t advocate that the greatest long snapper of their day should be in their sport’s Hall of Fame. If we’re going to put a reliever in, are we pretty much decided that it’s going to be Rivera, and no one else? Pity Wagner and Drayton McClain couldn’t see eye to eye. At his peak, I think Wagner was better than Hoffman, and with a few more season with that Astros team, I think Wagner could have put up Hoffman-type career numbers. Tremendous stuff, anyway.
In no particular order: Bagwell, Bonds, Clemens, Mussina, Raines, Schilling, Pudge, Walker, Manny. I remember Kent having a better career than he actually did. Hmmm…I want to put Vlad and Renteria in the ‘Hall of the Very Good’, but honestly I feel like I’d have to put Walker and Moose there too. Let’s give #10 to Vlad.
This is my ballot. Upon further reflection, I probably should have voted Walker instead of Guerrero, though.
At this exact moment we are electing…
Nobody.
Clemens leads with 74.47%. (so close…)
No one else breaks 70%.
This thread has definitely become my favorite part of the whole HOF process over the last several years, so, yay.
Also, in years’ past I’ve voted for Curt Schilling under his full name, Curt Schilling, Terrible Human Being. Then he went so far above and beyond this year that it’s just implicit in his name alone. So that will save some words in future years. Because on his baseball career alone, he still belongs.
My ten:
J. Bagwell
E. Martinez
T. Raines
L. Walker
M. Ramirez
B. Bonds
R. Clemens
M. Mussina
C. Schilling
I. Rodriguez
I think it’s a pretty even ten this year - the last few years there have been too many qualified players for the number of spots, but there isn’t anyone past that group that I’d even come all that close to supporting. Kent is probably the next closest but I’m just not there on him.
(On preview, looks like I ended up with the same list as RickJay. Which is good, I guess? Though a little boring.)
If you voted in this poll, please vote in the SDMB Hall of Fame Project poll.
With 49 ballots cast, Clemens is now at 73.47%. Ivan Rodriguez, whom I thought would be a no-brainer if not for the steroid connection, is at 67.35%. So again, some folks voted for Clemens but not IRod. And some voted for IRod but not Bonds. Strange.
Also notable are the single-vote-getters (AKA the Danny Tartabulls): Mike Cameron, Edgar Renteria and Arthur Rhodes.
I almost forgave the PED users, so I’m weakening, maybe I’ll be able to bring myself to vote for them next year. If they were guaranteed to have comments on their placards stating “Career enhanced pharmaceutically”, I think I would be more willing to vote for them.