Baseball HOF

[billchao]

But I try not to get too worked up about it, otherwise the fact that some people left Greg Maddux off their ballots would drive me insane.

I've read somewhere that some people simply refuse to vote for 1st year eligible players. That might have been the case, here.

In looking at the whole list of voting, it seems like they might just pay a lot of attention to the "magic" numbers.  In Biggio's case, 3000 hits.  In Frank Thomas' case, 500 homers.  Maddux and Glavine both reached the magic 300 win number, whereas Jack Morris, Curt Schilling, and Mike Mussina did not.

A friend of mine is a huge statistics guy and he hates the traditional numbers. His imaginary ballot goes Bonds, Clemens, Maddux, Thomas, Piazza, Bagwell, Mussina, Schilling. The argument he gave is that Biggio and Glavine (and Palmeiro) all put up numbers because they were good for a long time, but aren't dominant enough to be deemed Hall worthy.

[MS256]

But it could gave him an extra 5+ years of viable playing time. That is what most people don't get. Steroids doesn't have to be for hitting home runs or throwing faster baseballs. It can be used to diminish wear and tear.

I am not saying Maddux took steroids, but longevity has been a crucial part for getting into the HOF. If steroids gives you an extra 5 years, that could be the difference in breaking the 500 HR mark or not.

Of course it could. I wasn't making any implication otherwise. My implication is that the guy that retired in 1975 is under no such suspicion by HOF voters or reporters and there were plenty of PEDs available and used at that time.

[geauxforbroke]

I've read somewhere that some people simply refuse to vote for 1st year eligible players. That might have been the case, here.

I've heard the same, and I think it's absolutely asinine to not vote for someone simply because it's their first time on the ballot. If a player isn't "worthy" the first time they are on the ballot, what makes them more "worthy" in later years? This practice typifies the old guard crap that is making baseball less and less popular, especially with younger generations.

The argument he gave is that Biggio and Glavine (and Palmeiro) all put up numbers because they were good for a long time, but aren't dominant enough to be deemed Hall worthy.

Isn't the fact that they were good for a long time hall worth? To me, being great for a long time is more impressive than being dominant for 3 years out of a 8 year career.

[billchao]

I've heard the same, and I think it's absolutely asinine to not vote for someone simply because it's their first time on the ballot.

Agreed.

Isn't the fact that they were good for a long time hall worth? To me, being great for a long time is more impressive than being dominant for 3 years out of a 8 year career.

I guess not, to my friend. I am inclined to agree with him, though. His argument is that being good for a long time is not the same as being great and therefore does not make one a HoF player.

Take Craig Biggio, for example (and let's use traditional statistics for simplicity). He has a lifetime .281 BA and only eclipsed the 200 hit mark once in his 20 year career. Yea, he has 3,000 hits, but I'd say he was an above average player at best who happened to play a long time. Does that make him a Hall of Famer? Personally, I like Bagwell over Biggio as well.

BTW, your example wouldn't qualify for HoF. However, what if a player was dominant seven years out of a ten year career? Would you consider him more impressive than a player who was dominant three out of twenty?

[geauxforbroke]

Take Craig Biggio, for example (and let's use traditional statistics for simplicity). He has a lifetime .281 BA and only eclipsed the 200 hit mark once in his 20 year career. Yea, he has 3,000 hits, but I'd say he was an above average player at best who happened to play a long time. Does that make him a Hall of Famer? Personally, I like Bagwell over Biggio as well.

BTW, your example wouldn't qualify for HoF. However, what if a player was dominant seven years out of a ten year career? Would you consider him more impressive than a player who was dominant three out of twenty?

I don't disagree about Biggio. He's borderline HOF to me. I was thinking more about Glavine. As far as your example, it, like everything else, would just depend. If a pitcher had 3 great years, and struggled for the other 17 years of their career while bouncing around to whatever team would take him, then probably not HOF material.

Then again, we can't get too analytical with HOF voting. It's obviously a crap shoot anyway.

[Golfingdad]

I've read somewhere that some people simply refuse to vote for 1st year eligible players. That might have been the case, here.

Yep, I have also heard this.  I linked to the one guy earlier that said he would never vote for any PED era players, but I suspect that he's an outlier, and the other 18 or so voters who left Maddux off their ballot are these "not in the first year" goofballs.

I've heard the same, and I think it's absolutely asinine to not vote for someone simply because it's their first time on the ballot. If a player isn't "worthy" the first time they are on the ballot, what makes them more "worthy" in later years? This practice typifies the old guard crap that is making baseball less and less popular, especially with younger generations.

I completely agree.  They haven't played in 5 years as it is ... nothing they could do over the course of the next 15 should have any bearing on their baseball playing careers, so wtf??  I did also just learn today that each voter is allowed to pick 10 guys.  I'd be OK with the "no first year players" guys if they only had, say, 3 or 4 votes per year and their little rule was basically a way of saying that they still have older guys taking up those spots.  But with 10 votes, there is never a shortage of room for a guy like Maddux on there.  Asinine is right.  I swear they'd be better off if they just let us schmuck fans do the voting.

[jamo]

I swear they'd be better off if they just let us schmuck fans do the voting.

We know how Deadspin readers would vote: http://deadspin.com/revealed-the-hall-of-fame-voter-who-turned-his-ballot-1496558341 Dan Le Batard (anonymously until today) gave them his vote to put up to fans. Their top 10 were Maddux, Thomas, Glavine, Piazza, Biggio, Edgar Martinez, Bagwell, Clemens, Bonds, and Curt Schilling. (Of course, you can't really compare their results to the actual results apples-to-apples because the Deadspin voters were allowed to "induct" more than 10 players.) If I could put together a ballot of more than 10 guys, I would include those 10 plus Raines, McGwire, Mussina, Sosa, and Jeff Kent (without looking at the stats too hard).

[Golfingdad]

We know how Deadspin readers would vote: http://deadspin.com/revealed-the-hall-of-fame-voter-who-turned-his-ballot-1496558341 Dan Le Batard (anonymously until today) gave them his vote to put up to fans. Their top 10 were Maddux, Thomas, Glavine, Piazza, Biggio, Edgar Martinez, Bagwell, Clemens, Bonds, and Curt Schilling. (Of course, you can't really compare their results to the actual results apples-to-apples because the Deadspin voters were allowed to "induct" more than 10 players.) If I could put together a ballot of more than 10 guys, I would include those 10 plus Raines, McGwire, Mussina, Sosa, and Jeff Kent (without looking at the stats too hard).

Was gonna ask "why not Jack Morris?" ... And then I realized he was done playing before you we're even born! Ugh, I'm old. I'm totally cool with all of the guys you mentioned ... Would probably vote similarly.

[MS256]

Was gonna ask "why not Jack Morris?" ... And then I realized he was done playing before you we're even born! Ugh, I'm old.

I'm totally cool with all of the guys you mentioned ... Would probably vote similarly.

There was a voter on TV this morning explaining his picks. He seemed to take it very seriously and the hardest decisions he had to make were whether to leave off guys that had his vote for years to include somebody on the first ballot.

He ended up leaving Glavin off and keeping Morris on because it was his last year on the ballot.

P.S. You aren't old. When I was coaching kids and would mention Koufax, Drysdale, Marichal, or Gibson they didn't have a clue who I was talking about.

[geauxforbroke]

I did also just learn today that each voter is allowed to pick 10 guys.  I'd be OK with the "no first year players" guys if they only had, say, 3 or 4 votes per year and their little rule was basically a way of saying that they still have older guys taking up those spots.  But with 10 votes, there is never a shortage of room for a guy like Maddux on there.

There was a voter on TV this morning explaining his picks. He seemed to take it very seriously and the hardest decisions he had to make were whether to leave off guys that had his vote for years to include somebody on the first ballot.

He ended up leaving Glavin off and keeping Morris on because it was his last year on the ballot.

That's why I think the 10 player rule is arbitrary and pointless. If there are 15 guys that deserve to be in the hall and they garner the votes, then why not induct all of them? Baseball (and really all sports) have really bad systems for voting for HOF, awards, etc.

[Golfingdad]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jamo


Their top 10 were Maddux, Thomas, Glavine, Piazza, Biggio, Edgar Martinez, Bagwell, Clemens, Bonds, and Curt Schilling.

If I could put together a ballot of more than 10 guys, I would include those 10 plus Raines, McGwire, Mussina, Sosa, and Jeff Kent (without looking at the stats too hard).

OK, if I had a vote (of only 10) here's what I would choose from this years ballot:

Maddux, Glavine, Thomas, Piazza, Morris, Raines, Clemens, Bonds, Biggio, Bagwell

And I'd also make Piazza and Clemens sit next to each other.

Quote:

Originally Posted by geauxforbroke

That's why I think the 10 player rule is arbitrary and pointless. If there are 15 guys that deserve to be in the hall and they garner the votes, then why not induct all of them? Baseball (and really all sports) have really bad systems for voting for HOF, awards, etc.

One other thing that should be considered, although I doubt it's why some of the writers have those silly rules, is that it's really good (for the city, at least) for there to be a big ceremony every year.  There certainly aren't Hall of Fame worthy players coming up for election every single year, so it's probably nice to have some guys from a couple of the previous years waiting in the wings to help fill up the Cooperstown hotels in July.

EDIT! @jamo I didn't quite realize what you were saying about Le Batard "giving" his vote to Deadspin.  I thought you meant he just told them who he voted for, when in actuality, he let them (readers) make his picks for him.  And he did it out of protest towards idiots like this Ken Gurnick guy (the one I linked to earlier who didn't even vote for Maddux because he played during the "steroid era").  I'm a fan of Le Batard now.  He said:

Quote:

In a piece posted on Deadspin, Le Batard wrote, in part, "I hate all the moralizing we do in sports in general, but I especially hate the hypocrisy in this. I always like a little anarchy inside the cathedral we've made of sports."

Le Batard addressed the matter again Wednesday during his ESPN TV show, "Highly Questionable."

"I probably won't have [a vote] next year because I gave mine to Deadspin," he said, "because I don't like how they do business over there at the Hall of Fame, where they're sitting there and they're being sanctimonious and they're keeping all the steroid guys out."

[phan52]

In looking at the whole list of voting, it seems like they might just pay a lot of attention to the "magic" numbers.  In Biggio's case, 3000 hits.  In Frank Thomas' case, 500 homers.  Maddux and Glavine both reached the magic 300 win number, whereas Jack Morris, Curt Schilling, and Mike Mussina did not.

The reason I say that is because Thomas got in on his first try with 84% (that's right, I rounded up! ;)) of the vote (478 votes), whereas Luis Gonzalez got 5 votes.  Luis Gonzalez' numbers are, for the most part, lower than Thomas', although he does have more hits, but they don't seem enough different to justify only 5 votes if Thomas is getting 478.

Similarly, I'm surprised that Jeff Kent only got 15% vs. Biggios 74%, since he is one of the best hitting (power hitting at least) second basemen of all time.

However, I do not recall if perhaps Luis Gonzalez was a steroid guy ... and maybe that's why he got so little love?

They are going to have to lower that bar because I doubt that anybody will do it again.

[Golfingdad]

They are going to have to lower that bar because I doubt that anybody will do it again.

Good point.  Do you think that 3000 hits is also going to become virtually unattainable soon as well?  Definitely 500 homers too, I would imagine.

[saevel25]

OK, if I had a vote (of only 10) here's what I would choose from this years ballot:

Maddux, Glavine, Thomas, Piazza, Morris, Raines, Clemens, Bonds, Biggio, Bagwell

And I'd also make Piazza and Clemens sit next to each other.

One other thing that should be considered, although I doubt it's why some of the writers have those silly rules, is that it's really good (for the city, at least) for there to be a big ceremony every year.  There certainly aren't Hall of Fame worthy players coming up for election every single year, so it's probably nice to have some guys from a couple of the previous years waiting in the wings to help fill up the Cooperstown hotels in July.

EDIT!  @jamo I didn't quite realize what you were saying about Le Batard "giving" his vote to Deadspin.  I thought you meant he just told them who he voted for, when in actuality, he let them (readers) make his picks for him.  And he did it out of protest towards idiots like this Ken Gurnick guy (the one I linked to earlier who didn't even vote for Maddux because he played during the "steroid era").  I'm a fan of Le Batard now.  He said:

If I had to pick 10 It would be

Maddux, Glavine, Thomas, Piazza, Bagwell, Clemens, Bonds, Schilling, Mussina, McGwire.

Screw the steroids issue

If people are basing HOF based on wins, that is absurd. It is one of the most absurd stats to keep. Baseball is a team sport, that means the only stat that matters for wins is based on teams. The only time wins should be considered for a pitcher is they do a complete game. What if a reliever lets a few guys on base, and the closer saves the game. What if he didn't. Its crazy to say, Oh 300 wins is a benchmark when a lot of wins are outside the hands of the pitcher. Look at Felix Hernandez a few years ago. Had the best ERA in the AL, and won less than 15 games. He had so many games lost like 3 to 2, or 2 to 1. Believe me, I had him on my fantasy baseball team. He should have had 20+ wins if he was on a team with a slightly than better run scoring team. Should Felix be penalized by the HOF committee because his team couldn't produce runs.

[geauxforbroke]

If people are basing HOF based on wins, that is absurd. It is one of the most absurd stats to keep. Baseball is a team sport, that means the only stat that matters for wins is based on teams. The only time wins should be considered for a pitcher is they do a complete game. What if a reliever lets a few guys on base, and the closer saves the game. What if he didn't. Its crazy to say, Oh 300 wins is a benchmark when a lot of wins are outside the hands of the pitcher. Look at Felix Hernandez a few years ago. Had the best ERA in the AL, and won less than 15 games. He had so many games lost like 3 to 2, or 2 to 1. Believe me, I had him on my fantasy baseball team. He should have had 20+ wins if he was on a team with a slightly than better run scoring team. Should Felix be penalized by the HOF committee because his team couldn't produce runs.

You have a point. But take the win numbers away, and I think certainly Maddux, and maybe Glavine, would still be HOF material.

[phan52]

Good point.  Do you think that 3000 hits is also going to become virtually unattainable soon as well?  Definitely 500 homers too, I would imagine.

I think 3000 hits and 500 homers are possible because guys are staying fit and playing well into their 40's these days. The reason I don't think it will happen with 300 wins for pitchers is the use of pitch counts these days. 200 innings is considered a lot today, while the guys in the past would routinely pitch over 300. The "quailty start" (6 IP; 3 runs or less) has become the norm and, as a result, the guys today don't get the win when it is decided late.

[jamo]

If I had to pick 10 It would be Maddux, Glavine, Thomas, Piazza, Bagwell, Clemens, Bonds, Schilling, Mussina, McGwire. Screw the steroids issue :-D If people are basing HOF based on wins, that is absurd. It is one of the most absurd stats to keep. Baseball is a team sport, that means the only stat that matters for wins is based on teams. The only time wins should be considered for a pitcher is they do a complete game. What if a reliever lets a few guys on base, and the closer saves the game. What if he didn't. Its crazy to say, Oh 300 wins is a benchmark when a lot of wins are outside the hands of the pitcher. Look at Felix Hernandez a few years ago. Had the best ERA in the AL, and won less than 15 games. He had so many games lost like 3 to 2, or 2 to 1. Believe me, I had him on my fantasy baseball team. He should have had 20+ wins if he was on a team with a slightly than better run scoring team. Should Felix be penalized by the HOF committee because his team couldn't produce runs.

I think it's fine to keep wins as a basis for inclusion in the HOF, but I wouldn't use them for exclusion. 300 wins is impressive no matter what team you played on, but a hall of famer shouldn't necessarily have to have 300 wins.

[Golfingdad]

If people are basing HOF based on wins, that is absurd. It is one of the most absurd stats to keep. Baseball is a team sport, that means the only stat that matters for wins is based on teams. The only time wins should be considered for a pitcher is they do a complete game. What if a reliever lets a few guys on base, and the closer saves the game. What if he didn't. Its crazy to say, Oh 300 wins is a benchmark when a lot of wins are outside the hands of the pitcher. Look at Felix Hernandez a few years ago. Had the best ERA in the AL, and won less than 15 games. He had so many games lost like 3 to 2, or 2 to 1. Believe me, I had him on my fantasy baseball team. He should have had 20+ wins if he was on a team with a slightly than better run scoring team. Should Felix be penalized by the HOF committee because his team couldn't produce runs.

Completely agree.  I thought the writers learned something when they gave Felix Hernandez the AL Cy Young in 2010.  He had 13 wins, which was good enough for 18th in the AL.  But his ERA was almost a full run lower than CC Sabathias, he pitched almost 80 more innings than Clay Buckholz, and he also led the league in BA against.  I thought the dummies would still give it to Sabathia because he was the only one to break the magical 20-win barrier, but kudos to them for not doing that.

However, when you look at the HOF voting, I don't think it's a coincidence that the only pitchers to get in were the only non-Roger Clemens' on the ballot to have more than 300 wins, so I think they mistakenly DO place too much emphasis on that stat.

You have a point. But take the win numbers away, and I think certainly Maddux, and maybe Glavine, would still be HOF material.

I'd like to think that, but if you take away the win numbers of those two, then aren't you basically talking about Jack Morris (254), Curt Schilling (216), and Mike Mussina (270)?  Their other numbers are all (fairly) comparable.  Maddux has a considerably lower ERA than all of the rest, (and Morris' is the highest) but they are all in the 3's and Glavine (3.54), Mussina(3.68) and Schilling(3.46) are all within 0.24.

I wished the voters wouldn't put so much stock in the "longevity" numbers, but this one voting list (I've not looked at others of the past) suggests otherwise.