SBNation.com's MLB Hall of Fame Voting Results
by WholeCamels on Jan 4, 2010 2:05 PM EST
Email
PrintThe SBNation.com baseball bloggers decided to get their heads together and do a vote for the baseball Hall of Fame based on this year's ballot. Each team blog got two ballots, the non-team blogs each got one. I hope you like these spec-fic exercises I much as I do. Results (and each blog's ballots) after the jump...
Congratulations to Bert Blyleven, the sole inductee under the BBWAA's 75% rule. Second place candidate Roberto Alomar came up one vote short.
| Player | % Vote | Total Votes |
| Bert Blyleven | 92.3% | 48 |
| Roberto Alomar | 73.1% | 38 |
| Barry Larkin | 63.5% | 33 |
| Tim Raines | 53.8% | 28 |
| Mark McGwire | 51.9% | 27 |
| Edgar Martinez | 48.1% | 25 |
| Alan Trammell | 40.4% | 21 |
| Andre Dawson | 32.7% | 17 |
| Lee Smith | 26.9% | 14 |
| Fred McGriff | 25.0% | 13 |
| Dale Murphy | 17.3% | 9 |
| Jack Morris | 13.5% | 7 |
| Don Mattingly | 11.5% | 6 |
| Harold Baines | 7.7% | 4 |
| Dave Parker | 3.8% | 2 |
| Kevin Appier | 3.8% | 2 |
| Ellis Burks | 1.9% | 1 |
| Ray Lankford | 1.9% | 1 |
| Shane Reynolds | 1.9% | 1 |
| Not receiving votes: Andres Galarraga, Pat Hentgen, Mike Jackson, Eric Karros, David Segui, Robin Ventura, Todd Zeile | ||
And here's a link to all of the ballots, listed by blog. For the sake of disclosure, my ballot was the one for The Good Phight that named five candidates (Blyleven, Tim Raines, Alan Trammell, Roberto Alomar, and Mark McGwire). I went back and forth on Barry Larkin and eventually omitted him, although the day after submitting the ballot I changed my mind. But by then it was too late. Sorry, Barry. I will let our other voter out himself if he wishes.
I can see a really good argument for Edgar Martinez, and I think Fred McGriff was kind of screwed by history, entering the league on the cusp of the offensive explosion, which made his quite terrific slugging numbers look sort of ordinary.
Anyway, discuss away, blast me or the other balloters, etc.
49 comments
|
0 recs |
Do you like this story?
Comments
Surprised that Dawson got so little. I have a feeling he’s going to make it (along with Blyleven) when the HOF class is announced on Wednesday. Alomar’s going to make it eventually, but not this year (there will be voters who dock him a year because of the spitting incident). Larkin will probably make it too eventually.
Agreed about Larkin
If not this year, then next year.
by philiafan14364 on Jan 4, 2010 2:34 PM EST up reply actions
I agree on the Hawk. I think Dawson may get in and I’m a little surprised by the lack of love at SBN.
Wish I could find the source
But I saw Dawson being interviewed on MLB Network (Costas, maybe) saying that when he played in the 80’s all of his coaches advised him a walk was a win for the Pitcher. Dawson’s role was to get extra base hits and drive in runners, if the Pitcher walked him, Dawson failed to do his job. He stated he was sure he could have gotten more walks and had an OBP closer to .400, but he was always instructed the opposite.
Whether he could have or not, I have no idea. But, I think his point was a good one. OBP is a statistic which became way more noticed after Moneyball and Billy Beane, Theo Epstein, etc. If you went your whole career (or at least your development time) being instructed a Walk was a failure, the low OBP makes sense.
I’ve heard this argument perpetuated quite a few places that ‘walks weren’t important’ when Dawson played the game.
The retort is – when is getting on base NOT important in the history of baseball?
by jemagee on Jan 4, 2010 6:00 PM EST up reply actions
This misses the point. Based on Cormican’s account, it’s clear that Dawson wasn’t saying that getting on base wasn’t important to the run-scoring process as an objective matter. What he was saying was that it wasn’t important to his superiors and coaches to whom he reported and who taught him how to play.
Pretty much right
I took it as, clearly Dawson’s role was to drive in the runners, not to become one. For Pete Rose, as a leadoff guy, Walks were fine, but Dawson’s role in the 4 or 5 spot was to get RBIs. That’s moreso how the managers ran the teams Dawson was on.
skeptical
Not sure I buy this line. Mike Schmidt and Dawson were more or less contemporaries and were both middle-of-the-order types. Schmidt walked a ton.
I don’t really feel like giving a guy a pass because he was poorly coached. OBP is and was extremely important, whether or not it was recognized as such.
http://www.thegoodphight.com
Two possibilities. The Expos could have been a less walk-friendly organization. Or Schmidt could have been less coachable than Dawson. The latter seems pretty likely, knowing Schmidt’s personality. Also, since Schmidt was a better home run hitter than Dawson, he would have had more leeway to get away with doing things the way he felt like doing them.
I personally don’t doubt Dawson’s story, but would still agree that it shouldn’t play a role in deciding whether to give him a HOF vote. The vote isn’t meant to pass judgment on someone personally, it’s just an evaluation of his career, which is always partly the product of the player’s coaching influences, for good or ill. If the results aren’t there, the player unfortunately needs to suffer even if it wasn’t his fault.
In my opinion, Blyleven, Dawson, Alomar, Larkin, and McGriff should be in eventually.
Blyleven mostly played before my time. His black ink’s not great, but his grey ink is ridiculous.
Dawson’s borderline, but falls more towards the good side. He may not get in this year, but he should be in by 2012.
Alomar was a high-performance player for over a decade. Not flashy, but just dang consistent. His entire time in the AL, his OPS+ never dropped below 100. I think he should be in.
Barry Larkin – the NL All-Star Team shortstop for the whole freaking 90s (except 1992 and 1998). Another consistent player. No black ink at all, and only a (relative) smidgen of grey ink, but he was a solid batter for years and an above-average fielder at SS. Probably not this year, but soon.
McGriff’s borderline. He was solid for a long period of time,but he wasn’t a stellar fielder, and he wasn’t often in the top 10 in stats, even before the expansion. I think he should be in, but I think he’s the weakest of the five.
"When you make your final stand
I'll be right there
I'll never leave
And all I ask of you is
Believe"
McGriff not often in the top 10 before expansion? He was in the Top 5 in his league in homers, SLG%, and OPS seven straight years (1988-1994). (Expansion was in 1993.)
He has a total of 105 grey ink notations. The average for a HoFer is 144. I phrased that poorly, though – he wasn’t in the top 10 as often as one would expect for a HoFer.
Yes, he was top 10 for those three categories 7 times each, but he was there for hits 1 time (9th in 94), and for batting average 1 time (8th in 1990), and only 4 of his 7 OPS years were accompanied with a top 10 in on-base percentage (89-92, 4-2-3-4). He basically had 7 years where he hit the ball really hard, and a bunch of years where he was above average but not tops in the league.
Should he be in? Probably, but I see him as being about on a level with Bagwell or Galarraga.
"When you make your final stand
I'll be right there
I'll never leave
And all I ask of you is
Believe"
Crawfish Boxes
One of the ballots from Crawfish Boxes, the Astros blog.
I dunno. I kind of think that, if this exercise were repeated in 10-15 years and Pat Burrell’s name appeared on the ballot, I’d throw him a vote out of recognition, even if he falls well short of being a HoF’er.
http://www.thegoodphight.com
Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaybe I would too...
actually, the pair of votes for Kevin Appier is more disturbing, now that I think about it.
Do you realize that your lack of a vote is what kept Larkin out of SBNation’s mythical Hall of Fame? 39 votes would have put it exactly at 75%.
I was the other TGP voter
Bert, Alomar, Rock, McGwire, Larkin… and I think Trammell. Edgar Martinez was a just-miss for me.
by dajafi on Jan 4, 2010 11:28 PM EST via mobile reply actions
While on the subject of the HOF...
The Class of 2011 is a doozy, with one guarantee (Jeff Bagwell), another very likely (Larry Walker), a quadruplet of iffies (Juan Gonzalez, John Franco, John Olerud, Kevin Brown) and Mark McGwire’s evil twin (Rafael Palmeiro)
The Class of 2012 is Bernie Williams, with a sprinkle of votes in the direction of Jeromy Burnitz
The Class of 2013 is ‘Roiders Row: The Holy Trinity of Bonds, Clemens, and Sosa obscure the sure first balloting of Mike Piazza and Craig Biggio. Curt Schilling’s in here too.
The Class of 2014 has three one-and-in members (Maddux, Glavine, and Frank Thomas) and three more that may miss the first time because the first three ate up all of the votes (Kent, Mussina, and Gonzo). Then throw Kenny Rogers, Moises Alou, and Jim Edmonds in on top of that.
According to stat guru/geek Bill James's Hall of Fame Monitor and Career Standards...
Which is set up so that over 100 and 50 respectively means an average HOFer…
16 players, therefore, are shoo-ins for the HOF through 2014 (In order of highest Monitor Number)…
-The 4 Roiders of the Apocalypse (Bonds, Clemens, Sosa, and Palmeiro are 1, 2, 5 , and 8 respectively)
- In order, Greg Maddux, Mike Piazza, Roberto Alomar, Frank Thomas, Tom Glavine, Craig Biggio, Jeff Bagwell, Larry Walker, Edgar Martinez, Jeff Kent, and Mike Mussina, and Bly.
Those within five points of CS, but in by Monitor standards are Curt Schilling, Bernie Williams, Barry Larkin, Luis Gonzalez, and Fred McGriff (Those are also in order of Monitor)
Those who are in by Monitor, but not close enough in CS…
Tim Raines is a 90/47
Mark McGwire is a 170/42
Alan Trammell is a 118/40
Andre Dawson is a 118/44
Lee Smith is a 135/13
Don Mattingly is a 134/34
Dave Parker is a 124/42
Jack Morris is a 122/39
Dale Murphy is a 116/34
Andres Galarraga is a 114/35
John Franco is a 124/11
Juan Gonzalez is a 120/40
And last, but not least…
Jose Mesa is a 113/1
Given that
Anyone who doesn’t get in this year is going to be hard pressed to get in at all in the next 5 years. This is, frankly, a pretty weak to average class this year.
I haven’t looked at any stats, but just going on memory I always felt like Larkin would be in the HOF and Alomar wouldn’t.
Maybe it was just because Alomar was so unlikeable…
likewise
Neither of them was at all a difficult vote for me. Alomar was actually one of my favorite players during his Jays/Orioles/Indians years, and Larkin is the only great ballplayer who’s ever made fun of me.
(Why? Because I was a Phillies fan. I worked with him on NBC’s online coverage of the 1997 playoffs. Really a great guy, but he was not impressed with the Phils organization at that point. Hard to blame him.)
Yeah. I liked him before that, and he and the ump made up. Everyone can have a bad day. Dude was a great fielder, a really good hitter—Utley with a bit less power—and he slept with Mary Pierce.
This should be some sort of category —not only were their peripherals great, they bagged some hot-looking babes! In like vein I’m looking at the subtext of WC’s all-MLB guys we hate post, which is, “He’s a prick who sucks against everyone else except the Phillies, and I can’t believe he bags some hot-looking babes!”
Only Dawson
Very surprised by this. To me both Larkin and Alomar are first ballots, just because they weren’t power hitters, that doesn’t need to determine HOF characteristics like it apparently does today.
Burt was only 5 votes away.
According to Callis via ESPN chat, there are some voters who just don’t believe in first ballot guys – they’ll vote for Alomar next year (which is asinine)
by jemagee on Jan 6, 2010 2:15 PM EST up reply actions
agreed…a guy who hasn’t played in 5 years isn’t a HOFer on the first ballot, but he’s worthy on the second, third or fourth?? his stats stay the same.
if the guy had a HOF career, then vote him in with his first year. if you don’t believe it, then don’t vote for him. these bbwaa guys need to stop acting like god.
Chase Utley is so good that on one pitch he stole second, third and the shortstop's hat.
What is the point if they are going to get in regardless. Doesn’t matter if it takes 1 or 15 years. Like with Burt, regardless of his losses, his stats are amazing. But he is judged because of how many games he lost… is it his fault even with his great ERA his team couldn’t hit?
Bert was in the 74% area and Alomar with 73%, Jack Morris was 4th
by Ant on Jan 6, 2010 2:22 PM EST up reply actions
What I don’t understand is why people change their minds.
Seriously – between the first year, or the 15th year – the numbers don’t change…
It’s a silly process
by jemagee on Jan 6, 2010 5:17 PM EST up reply actions
agreed on the process. As I age I have less patience for honorifics like this unless they acknowledge their inherent silliness, which is why I prefer watching people getting bombed at the Golden Globes rather than the Academy Awards.
My sense is that this sort of 1st year-vs15 year pettiness doesn’t get better short term, and I’m thinking it comes as a result of the relative pauperization of the BBWAA vs. MLB players. This vote is the only short hair they have left to pull. As better SABR-sensitive writers take over the ballots of old farts like Conlin and his ilk, there may be better consensus.
It would have really sucked for Bly if the five blank ballots hadn’t been submitted. Without those five, there would have been 534 ballots. Blyleven’s 400 votes would have been 74.9% of the votes. He’s thees steenkin’ close
"When you make your final stand
I'll be right there
I'll never leave
And all I ask of you is
Believe"
I will say that this was without a doubt a FAIL year for the voters...
Not for voting Dawson (though he was VERY borderline to begin with), but for snubbing Bly yet again and for their first-year avoidance of Alomar.
Those two NEED to get in next year. If Bly misses in year 15, I will personally lead a petition to change the rules of who votes or how the vote goes to avoid failures like this.
Next year’s vote should be along the lines of “Bly, Alomar, Bagwell, Walker, and either Larkin or Palmeiro (depending on your view of him)”
Palmeiro has steroid taint – he’s not getting in
by jemagee on Jan 6, 2010 5:17 PM EST up reply actions
Comments For This Post Are Closed
Secondary Sidebar
User Tools
FanPosts
Community blog posts and discussion.
Recommended FanPosts
Recent FanPosts
Next Game
Washington Nationals
@
Philadelphia Phillies
Tuesday, May 22, 2012, 7:05 PM EDT
Citizens Bank Park
Jordan Zimmermann vs Roy Halladay
Partly cloudy,rain. Winds blowing out to left field at 5-10 m.p.h. Game time temperature around 70.
In Association With
Big League Stew - MLB - Yahoo! Sports
- Reds fan catches two home runs in same inning — and then gives both balls away
- Aroldis Chapman arrested after police clock him going 93 mph (in his car) on suspended license
- The Juice: Felix Hernandez bests Yu and the Rangers, Chris Capuano and Dodgers keep rolling
- Giancarlo Stanton busts Marlins Park scoreboard with tape-measure grand slam (VIDEO)
- Baltimore’s tradition of fans shouting ‘O!’ during national anthem sparks interleague feud
