Baseball
Established in 1936, and currently based in Cooperstown, New York, the Baseball Hall of Fame may be the most prestigious of any Sports Hall of Fame. Although Baseball may have taken a backseat to Football in recent years, there is no doubt that Baseball’s version of the Hall of Fame is by far the most relevant and the most difficult to get enshrined in. At present, a player has to receive seventy five percent of the votes from the Baseball Writers Association of America, which has proven to be no easy task. Failing that, a player could be inducted by the Veterans committee, though few have been inducted this way. Our list will focus on the players only, and although we could easily do a tally focusing on mangers, broadcasters or other vital personnel, as always it is far more enjoyable to discuss the merits of those on the field as oppose to those off of it.Until Then, Let’s get some peanuts and cracker jacks and cast some votes of our own!
Sincerely,
The Not in Hall of Committee.
You may have noticed many sportswriters who have a Hall of Fame ballot for the Baseball drink a little more these days. The PED question is now utterly unavoidable with the new wave of eligible candidates as the sport’s biggest stars of the last two decades are now eligible for Hall of Fame enshrinement.It is not that our baseball list has not been controversial in the past. We have already put it through serious revisions when we initially created a “1a” and a “1b” to accommodate the fact that both Pete Rose and “Shoeless” Joe Jackson are ineligible for the…
Couldn’t we just say look at the previous Barry Bonds entry and say “Ditto”? Seriously, the parallels are too great to ignore. Like Bonds, Clemens may have had a Hall of Fame career before he allegedly took PEDs, and like Bonds, he dominated the steroid era as he did the decade before. He has the career statistics (353 wins and 4,672 strikeouts), the dominating seasons (seven Cy Youngs and an MVP), and two World Series Rings. “Rocket” Roger Clemens is arguably the best Pitcher in the past twenty-five years.
Statistically, there is no argument about the Hall of Fame qualifications of Pete Rose. Even the most casual baseball fan is aware that “Charlie Hustle” is the all-time hit king with 4,256 hits; a record that may never be broken. Rose also was a seventeen-time All-Star, and proved to be a clutch performer as evidenced by his three World Series Rings; including a World Series MVP. Sadly, as much as casual sports fans are aware of Rose’s on-field accomplishments, many who have never turned their dial to ESPN knows his off-field embarrassments.
Let's get all the derogatory stuff out of the way…and we know there is a lot.While we talked about PED use a lot with Mark McGwire, Roger Clemens, Barry Bonds, et all., they were baseball superstars who took enhancements (allegedly) when the players' union and Major League Baseball had not yet agreed that they were banned substance. That is important to note, as Alex Rodriguez was caught when there were penalties in place, leaving no doubt that he cheated and was suspended from the game for the entire 2014 season. There is more, of course.The Yankees famously tried everything to get…
Did he or didn’t he conspire to fix to the 1919 World Series? Over eighty years after the fact, there is still a sizable debate as to whether “Shoeless” Joe Jackson was involved in the “Black Sox” scandal that saw the Chicago White Sox throw the World Series for financial gain against the Cincinnati Reds.
Playing with Alan Trammell for virtually his entire career, Lou Whitaker was one half of the longest running double play combination in Baseball history. Like Trammell, Whitaker was a great player with both bat and glove and a big part of Detroit’s World Series win in 1984.
A dominating pitcher for a few seasons in the early 1880s, Jim McCormick was a bruising Scotsman whose underhanded prowess netted him 265 wins in what was a relatively brief career. Of course, he played in a time, when teams essentially rode the same two pitchers. It wasn’t like McCormick could blame his manager in those early seasons; he was the Player/Manager.
If you think that all of the Turn of the Century Baseball Players that should be in the Hall of Fame is already in, then we ask you to think again. We offer you the case of “Bad” Bill Dahlen, whose Hall of Fame campaign is being championed by sabremetricians and traditionalists alike.
Outside of Boston, it may be forgotten how good Dwight Evans was. It could be because he played on teams with the more popular players, but Evans was a huge component in both the 1975 and 1986 World Series runs.
For the record, we love outspoken athletes. They may not always be popular with fans (and other players), but they sure make for far better sound bites than “we gotta go out there and give 100 percent” or other such statements from the “Athlete’s guide to dealing with the Media”. Ironically, Schilling is now part of the media, but remains as outspoken as ever.
With all due respect to Ivan Rodriguez and Vladimir Guerrero, statistically speaking, Manny Ramirez is the top dog of the new possibilities for the 2017 Class. We will also say, he was the most entertaining. We are all aware of the eccentric “Manny being Manny moments, but ahead of all that was a man who was an incredible hitter who had a career slash line of .312/.411/.585/.996 that included one Batting Title, three On Base Percentage Titles, three Slugging Titles, and three OPS Titles. Most importantly of all, Ramirez maintained his offensive production in the Post Season and was the…
Kenny Lofton took the city of Cleveland by storm in the early 90’s and by doing so, got the baseball world to notice the Tribe again. By the decade’s end though, power numbers took over the game, and many forgot how good he really was.
There was so much to love about the game of Carlos Beltran. The 1999 American League Rookie of the Year showed out of the gate that he had a lot of skills as he could hit, hit for power, had speed and good defensive skill. Beltran began his career with the Kansas City Royals where he won the aforementioned Rookie of the Year Award, but KC knew that they would not able to afford him once he became a free agent and he was traded to the Houston Astros for their stretch run.
We imagine that there are younger baseball fans that are oblivious that there really was a Tommy John and that it was not just the name of a surgery. This would be unfortunate, as Tommy John has to go down as one of the most durable pitchers in baseball history.
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This one is a little tough. We recognize (and we are sure most people agree) that the overall career numbers of Roger Maris does not equate to a Hall of Fame Baseball player. However, many very good players have been excluded from Cooperstown because they lacked moments of greatness. Nobody could ever doubt that Roger Maris had a year that was part of baseball immortality.
Athletes are competitive by nature, but 99.9 percent of them paled to the competitive juices of Wes Ferrell. He was known to get violent whenever he lost and take it out on himself and inanimate objects. He may have been animated himself at times, but his teammates have always said they wanted him on their side.
It is possible that this candidate is shrouded with more controversy than our 1A and 1B candidates combined?
Just what would Keith Hernandez be most famous for? Could it be for his eleven consecutive Gold Gloves? How about his 1979 MVP? The two World Series rings perhaps? Maybe his tenacious play as a Met? It could also be for his association with cocaine. Likely, there are many who think of Keith Hernandez and remember that episode of Seinfeld instead. Just as long as it isn’t for those terrible Just for Men commercials.
At the time of the infamous steroids trial, Rafael Palmeiro seemed to come off so good. Of course when you are sitting next to a man who suddenly suffered from amnesia (Mark McGwire), a man who suddenly forgot the English language (Sammy Sosa), and the man who broke the “bro code” (Jose Canseco) a defiant and confident-sounding Rafael Palmeiro could not help but look good. A few months later, Palmeiro was suspended by Major League Baseball for testing positive for steroids.