I picked the five guys I’ve heard of.
Eh, the analysis of Griffey is frankly wrong. For the first decade of his career he was among the best centerfielders in history, both offensively and defensively. For the last decade of his career he suffered a lot of injury shortened season and generally reduced production, but his numbers each season were still usually better than an average player offensively, per plate appearance (obviously his injury shortened seasons don’t have the counting stats of an average player in that year.)
If you look at the Jaffe WAR Score System, Griffey is the best at his position in recent memory, and by a good margin. The average JAWS for a CFer is 57.2, and Griffey was at 68–so he increased the average performance of a CFer in the HOF. The only men above him have the names of Mays, Cobb, Speaker and Mantle. He’s above Joe DiMaggio for Christ’s sake.
If you go to the more traditional WAR number, Griffey is 83.6. There are no position players with a WAR above that who are not in the HOF and who are eligible, among recent position players (active/retired/already in the hall) few have a WAR above Griffey.
My short list (not in any particular order):
Pujols (99.7) – and a first ballot HOFer when his time comes
ARod (118.9) – probably a HOFer the same time they decide to let Bonds and Clemens in, which will likely be many years from now
Cal Ripken (95.5) – first ballot HOFer
Bonds (162.4) – see ARod
Rickey Henderson (110.8) – first ballot HOFer
Wade Boggs (91.1) – first ballot HOFer
Adrian Beltre (83.8) – barely above Griffey, and has some years left, a HOFer when the time comes
I think people were expecting a unanimous vote because the BBWAA had purged a lot of people that were essentially dead wood and shouldn’t have been voting in the first place. The hope was that when you have someone like Griffey, whose statistics make him among the best of all time, you’d see evidence the BBWAA voting would start to look a little more sensible and you’d see a unanimous vote. There is just no logical argument to have Griffey anywhere below about 3rd on your ballot, so he should have been a unanimous 10, and the only ones who should be above him would be Clemens/Bonds if you are willing to look past their negatives.
Rickey Henderson was another good example of a player who clearly should’ve been a unanimous choice. I don’t think it’s that there was anything super special about Henderson, Cobb, Ruth, Mays, etc all should’ve been unanimous choices. But the BBWAA voting has always been bloated, had voters that are out of touch with reality and some who hold personal grudges with an athlete who slighted them in some way during their career covering them. I think people were just hoping with the voter base being purged down, the first 100% unimpeachable steroid era guy after the voter clean up would go in unanimously. It’d sort of show what I think a lot of people were looking for from these votes.
Well his first ten years were spent playing in the Kingdome and that turf wasn’t much better.
:rolleyes:
How helpful.