Great players, no doubt about it. Walker doesn’t have the counting stats, but take a look at JAWS for right fielders. He’s 10th all-time. And he only had 8030 Plate Appearances. That’s remarkable. Sure, he’s no Clemente or Kaline, but his peak puts him on the same plane as Reggie, Guerrero and Winfield.
I feel like I’m trying to sell is candidacy, lol.
This is an important year for Walker on the real BBWAA ballot. He went from 21.9% in 2017 to 34.1% in 2018. 2019 will be his 9th year on the ballot, so only one more after that. But he’s still got a long way to go. I’m comfortable saying he will not get voted in by the BBWAA, but the veterans will probably get him in like they did with Alan Trammel.
Looking back at other guys who the BBWAA elected in their final years on the ballot, they usually were getting 60+% with 2 or 3 years remaining. Jim Rice, Bert Blyleven, even Bruce Sutter was getting 60% with a year to go. Can’t find an instance of someone going from 40% or less with only a couple years of eligibility remaining and then getting voted in.
Players are automatically put on the ballot if they had played for ten years. That’s why Ankiel is there.
Dempster seems to have been left off on a technicality. Though he didn’t play in 2014, he did not officially retire until after the season was over. So he should be eligible next year.
Just throwing out that I can’t read this guy’s name without remembering how irritated I was that the Yankees traded him away early in his career for Jeff Weaver. Hall of Famer? Absolutely not, but I would have preferred him to the hilariously overpaid disappointments that followed his departure.
No where near as bad as when we traded Al Leiter for Jesse Barfield, but the Lilly trade was stupid.
As I recall, “The Boss” was frustrated with Ted Lilly struggling in the 5th, decreed trade this guy and get me a starter. Cashman got Jeff Weaver who disappointed and disappointed and then got moved landing us the grossly overpaid moron Kevin Brown. Who surprisingly was OK year one until he punch a wall in the playoffs and broke his hand.
Meanwhile the 2003-2006* Ted Lilly ate innings, got decisions and overall was about a 4.50 ERA pitcher. So as frustrating as it was, it wasn’t the worse decision by any means.
Heh. My dad is a longtime Yankees fan. Ever since I was a kid, he’d make up silly, sometimes clever nicknames for Yankees and Mets players. But oh boy did he hate that trade. He was so frustrated that the best he could manage was “Jesse Suckfield,” which he continues to call him to this day.
All he really had to do was take the “ield” off the end of Jesse’s name. 
I graduated 1 year after Al, I grew up in the same HS baseball circuit. I remember when he struck out 26 batters in a game. I was really excited when the Yanks drafted him. That and the Yogi firing were probably the two worse Boss moves to me. I was incredibly angry about both.
I’m generally a tight-hall guy and there are guys I’d kick out if I could. But there are some good players - and a lot of very good players - on this ballot.
I voted for:
Bonds
Clemens
Halladay
Martinez
Mussina
Ramirez
Rivera
Sheffield
I see that many agreed with me and that’s good. On the steroids issue, I’ve always thought of it as a red herring. Yes, Bonds used them. But if you check on Mantle and some of the other greats they’ll admit to using amphetamines and other performance enhancers to play ball. I would be astonished if players all through time didn’t attempt to enhance themselves on way or the other in ways legal and not. The money - and therefore the incentive - is just too strong.
Ditto Clemens. I am 51 years old and was blessed in my 20s to see two pitchers who were worthy of inclusion in the all-time best. Up there with Christy Mathewson, Walter Johnson and Warren Spahn are both Greg Maddux and Roger Clemens.
On the subject of Jeff Kent, from Rick’s OP. Remember, Ryne Sandberg was also a 20th round pick. There may be a research study in there on whether low drafted infielders are more likely to surprise than other positions.
These poll results are weird. Rivera is now probably the only guy who will get elected.
Falling just short are Roy Halladay and Manny Ramirez(!?) each with 71.05%. Meanwhile, Bonds and Clemens are between 50% - 60%. I’m sorry, but how does one vote for Manny over those guys?
Bonds & Clemens aren’t getting the votes as they were the faces of steroid use and also assholes to the press that carried over to pissing off the fans. It isn’t all that confusing. Manny, who also cheated, was basically one of baseball’s oddballs. Likable, scary hitter and entertaining. Not that I voted for him, but I get it.
Pretty much, this. Bonds, Clemens, and Schilling, I suspect, are all losing votes here (and probably with the actual voters, too), due to the “quite the asshole” factor. Some voters believe that what was done on the field should be all that matters. Others feel differently.
So take steroids completely out of the equation you still think Manny gets more votes than Bonds or Clemens? That’s unjustifiable.
I don’t, but I also didn’t vote for Manny.
I doubt it; I think that, for enough voters, it’s the combo platter of steroids and asshattery for those two. And, it probably doesn’t help that, while there were a lot of players who were using PEDs at a greater or lesser level, Bonds and Clemens were, by far, the poster children (at least in media coverage) for being heavy users while making categorical (and, IMO, really unbelievable) denials about it.
I would add Big Mac & Sammy Sosa to the face of steroids list though. Maybe A-Rod too. He was the face of it in the NY area at least. Not as sure nationally.
If Clemens or Bonds were clean, I would vote for them despite being an asshole. Hell, I voted for Curt Schilling despite mostly hating him.
Actually if Manny was clean he would probably get a vote from me. He is not as good a Clemens or Bonds, but he was an RBI machine and helped his teams win.
Steroids or no steroids, Bond and Clemens or no Bonds and Clemens, I don’t see how you can omit Manny, with a career BA of .312 with 555 HRs.
This is a popular argument that just doesn’t work for me. Steroids are just different than greenies. It’s the bazooka of PEDs versus a pop gun. I’m more swayed by the argument that “everyone” was using PEDs and thus these players were still that much better than their peers, but that argument requires the dubious assumption that the majority of players were juicing. I think it’s a big number, but if it’s anywhere south of 80% then the argument falls apart.
If you ask me if Bonds, Clemens, A-Rod or Manny were one of the top 50 players of all time, it’s an unequivocal yes. Hell, I think Sosa and McGuire may have still been fringe HOFers without PEDs. But the PED use is disqualifying, not because it turned non-HOFers in HOFers, but because it’s a character/rule breaking thing similar to gambling.
The HOF isn’t for the best players, the HOF is for the best examples of players.
“McGwire,” and honestly I don’t think he’d have been in baseball anymore without steroids; they helped him come back from injuries that were derailing his career in 1993-1994.
I don’t think steroids are anything like gambling. There is only one example of that stopping someone’s HOF case; Pete Rose. (Shoeless Joe Jackson didn’t bet on his own games; he was banned for participating in a conspiracy to lose the World Series in return for payment, which he accepted part of. As it happens the payments came from people making money from gambling, but it wasn’t Jackson doing the gambling.)
The problem with gambling is that a player or manager who gambles on his own games bring into question whether he is trying to win or trying to lose. It is the ultimate conflict of interest; a player would be also banned for life for, say, secretly accepting payments from a rival team.
A player who took steroids isn’t in a conflict of interest. It’s cheating, or at least it was now - it wasn’t until 1991 there was any rule against it, and HGH wasn’t banned until 2005 - but spitballs are also cheating, greenies are cheating, so on and so forth. I don’t like cheating, and it should be punished, but it’s not a conflict of interest. Say what you will about Bonds, Clemens and Manny, but they were trying to win. Pete Rose… I’m not sure. And by placing himself in an “I’m not sure” position, he deserves what he gets.
Fun column for the all the non-Placido Polanco supporters (and other interesting observations).