2017 MLB HOF ballot released

E5 Yaz

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I think this might be the worst Hall of Fame ballot ever submitted. Even the guys who left theirs blank could make something of an argument about not knowing who could have possibly played clean. But this guy looked at all the names on the list and somehow decided to select just those two. Baffling.View attachment 13684
He did the same thing last year. Junior instead of Vlad

http://www.newsday.com/sports/baseball/2016-baseball-hall-of-fame-ballot-by-newsday-s-steven-marcus-1.11283872
 

the moops

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So, you think he's the kind of dude that'd be okay being publically denied 7-8 times before getting in because he has that sort of temperament and ability to see the big picture?
Of course he isn't that type of dude. I think that was the point. IF he could STFU (he can't) for a little while, he may have gained some momentum. But as you said, he has nowhere near the temperament to idly sit by while he is "publicly" shamed by writers.
 

Snodgrass'Muff

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I think this might be the worst Hall of Fame ballot ever submitted. Even the guys who left theirs blank could make something of an argument about not knowing who could have possibly played clean. But this guy looked at all the names on the list and somehow decided to select just those two. Baffling.View attachment 13684
So many questions. Why Hoffman and not Wagner? Why Vlad and not Bagwell or Walker? Both have better cases with not a lick more evidence regarding PEDs.

If you want to make a stink about the entire Steroid Era, submit a blank ballot. This is just inconsistent and weird.
 

Papelbon's Poutine

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So many questions. Why Hoffman and not Wagner? Why Vlad and not Bagwell or Walker? Both have better cases with not a lick more evidence regarding PEDs.

If you want to make a stink about the entire Steroid Era, submit a blank ballot. This is just inconsistent and weird.
In order - saves, he was so big he had to be using something and Coors Field.

I'm not saying those are valid or that I agree with any, just that's probably what he would say.
 

Mueller's Twin Grannies

critical thinker
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Raines and Bagwell (88%) are tied for top vote-getters. Hoffman is tied with Ivan Rodriguez in 3rd (81%).
That's what I get for not double-checking, but yes. Slightly less interesting given that Raines is in his final year and I think a lot of guys who were on the fence before feel more compelled to vote for him now that he's facing elimination from the ballot. Even if he misses, though, you have to think he's a guy the Veteran's Committee will enshrine, right?
 

Savin Hillbilly

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The wrong side of the bridge....

Tyrone Biggums

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If Selig is in then it's time to let Manny Bonds Clemens McGwire Sosa etc in. Not up to me to agree or disagree with this as far my personal beliefs go but the fact is the person who presided over the Steroid era should be held accountable just like Bonds Clemens etc...
 

axx

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Up to 52 now... looks like it's going to be Bagwell and Raines. Maybe Pudge. Schilling's net is now -4, looks like he picked up a few voters recently.

If Selig is in then it's time to let Manny Bonds Clemens McGwire Sosa etc in. Not up to me to agree or disagree with this as far my personal beliefs go but the fact is the person who presided over the Steroid era should be held accountable just like Bonds Clemens etc...
It'd just be Bonds+Clemens... and the two look like they are gaining support but not quite there (yet?)
 

Gdiguy

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Edgar is also looking like he's gaining quite a bit of ground relative to before... definitely won't be enough to get in this year, but he might be the beneficiary of the stats community with Raines gone next year (one way or the other).

I agree with the Selig/Bonds/Clemens thought, but I've given up barking up that tree. I'll just continue to vote with my feet (I don't really have any desire to visit a HoF that ignores Bonds (and to a lesser extent Clemens)).
 

Mueller's Twin Grannies

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Up to 52 now... looks like it's going to be Bagwell and Raines. Maybe Pudge. Schilling's net is now -4, looks like he picked up a few voters recently.
Still only 12.4% (as of a few seconds ago) of known ballots counted, though, so it's still very early to call. But, yeah, the numbers are holding steady (with the caveat that a roughly 3% increase in known ballots was likely not going to bring much in the way of shocking changes to those totals) for Raines and Bagwell and they appear to be the frontrunners for this year's class, but I'll be very surprised if Pudge isn't within a few votes (or better) of the necessary total by the time the recount is done. The whole PED allegations aside, he was one of the best catchers in the modern era on both sides of the plate, won an MVP and was in the discussion a couple other years, and has so many Gold Gloves and Silver Sluggers that he probably needs a whole room just to put them all on display. For a guy like that to not get in on his first try would be a bit of a shock considering his position and legacy.

I think Hoffman eventually gets in, but I have the feeling it won't be until after Mo and maybe not until his last year or two of eligibility. Lee Smith, on the other hand, is going to be a forgotten man by the looks of his vote totals.

Do we think Sheff and Wagner stay on one more year? Both are hanging dangerously close to that 5% threshold.
 

E5 Yaz

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There's what, 440? or so voters? It's fun to follow the ballots being released but if we are only at 52...
Adding to this, what we discovered was that the ballots that never made it to the spreadsheet last year changed moved the needle on several players ... Hoffman most notably. Guessing anything until Thibs gets more than 50% of the vote is useless
 

axx

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There's what, 440? or so voters? It's fun to follow the ballots being released but if we are only at 52...
It's a decent enough sample size, if you understand that it is optimistic by several percent for most players. Which is why I say Pudge is a maybe when he's currently at 80% of the known voters.
 

E5 Yaz

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It's a decent enough sample size, if you understand that it is optimistic by several percent for most players. Which is why I say Pudge is a maybe when he's currently at 80% of the known voters.
What's your basis for this?
 

InstaFace

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I would presume, the trend the last several years where the voting rate for most of the top candidates was much higher for public ballots than for the private ballots whose aggregate totals are only known when the vote result comes out.
 

E5 Yaz

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I would presume, the trend the last several years where the voting rate for most of the top candidates was much higher for public ballots than for the private ballots whose aggregate totals are only known when the vote result comes out.
You can look back two posts to see I'm making the same point. I'm more interested in Axx's assertion that the early numbers are "optimistic by several percent for most players." The numbers shift for those who get the most votes, but it's not an across the board certainty and for some, like Hoffman, the percentage went up as non-public ballots were added.
 

InstaFace

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Well, nothing's a "certainty" when we're talking about statistically-based projections, but given the consistent difference in average number of votes per ballot between the public and private samples, his statement is quite reasonable.
 

Mueller's Twin Grannies

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Isn't everyone who casts a vote trying to vote someone in?

Either way, 56 public ballots (including four anonymous ballots) is still a very small sample size.
 

singaporesoxfan

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So, you think he's the kind of dude that'd be okay being publically denied 7-8 times before getting in because he has that sort of temperament and ability to see the big picture?
From what I see he thinks he's the kind of dude who after being denied 3 times should get a little cross.
 

E5 Yaz

polka king
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60 ballots on the spreadsheet ... and 10 voters have taken away a vote from Schilling
 

moondog80

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More important than the size of the sample at this point is the non-randomness; those who release their ballots early are likely to be very different form those who do not.
 

E5 Yaz

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Keith Law ESPN Senior Writer
There are 18 position players with higher WAR than Tim Raines (69.1) who are not in the HoF.
* Eight are active or not yet on the ballot.
* Five have been kept out due to PED rumors, suspicions, or a vague scent.
* One bet on baseball and is banned for life.
* The others are Lou Whitaker (74.9), Larry Walker (72.6), Bobby Grich (70.9), and Alan Trammell (70.4).
Walker would make my ballot, but his production came at Coors, which probably hurts his candidacy. The other three belong in the Hall, especially Whitaker. So omitting Raines is just repeating the same mistakes the electorate made before; he's among the very best eligible players not enshrined.
 

InstaFace

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Wait, what about Schilling who has 79.9 WAR and is currently on the ballot, and has no PED anything attached to him? OK he's not a "position player" but he's got much more valid gripes than Raines' fans.

Here's the pitcher "not yet in the HOF" WAR rankings:

1. 140.3 Clemens - PEDs. Behind only Cy Young and Walter Johnson in WAR. I hate the scumbag but he should have a plaque.
2. 83.0 Mussina - On the ballot, 4th year, should get in.
3. 79.9 Schilling - Posting dumb shit on social media?
4. 75.8 Jim McCormick, a 19th-century pitcher
5. 70.0 Rick Reuschel - Long career of being moderately above-average in the 70s and 80s
6. 68.3 Kevin Brown - Got 2.1% in 2011, fell off ballot
7. 66.7 Luis Tiant - Peaked at 30.9% in 1988, his first year on the ballot; lasted all 15 years and aged off it
8. 64.6 Roy Halladay - Eligible for 2019 ballot
9. 62.5 David Cone - Got 3.9% in 2009, fell off ballot. At least he won the 1994 CYA.
10. 62.0 Tommy John - Peaked at 31.7% in 2009, his 15th and last year on the ballot.

If you don't like Clemens, Mussina or Schilling, and you think Halladay will fare no better than his neighbors on that list, then you're a loooooong wait away from getting more worthy pitchers on. Your top active guys are:

1. CC Sabathia (58.7 WAR, 35 years old)
2. Greinke (54.4, 32)
3. Kershaw (54.4, 28 - clearly likely to be enshrined in 15-20 years)
4. King Felix (51.6, 30)
5. Hamels (51.1, 32)
6. Verlander (50.2, 33)
7. Bartolo Colon (48.0, 43 - only 20 more years and he might have a real shot)
8. Lester (40.2, 32)
 

Average Reds

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Using the metrics you have provided, Kevin Brown is almost as deserving as Schilling, but he was a miserable prick who hated reporters, which is why he got just over 2% and fell off the ballot.

Whether reporters like and/or admire the player shouldn't matter, but unless you are a slam dunk Hall-of-Famer, it does.
 
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BuellMiller

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Mar 25, 2015
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Using the metrics you have provided, Kevin Brown is almost as deserving as Schilling, but he was a miserable prick who hated reporters, which is why he got just over 2% and fell off the ballot.

Whether reporters like and/or admire the player shouldn't matter, but unless you are a slam dunk Hall-of-Famer, it does.
I don't think his mention on the Mitchell Report helped much either.
 

Rovin Romine

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3. 79.9 Schilling - Posting dumb shit on social media?
It goes a bit beyond that.

There's also the whole taxpayer money fiasco in RI. AND does anyone think he'll be an ambassador for the game? You know, without pointlessly engaging in 8th grade controversy every single week? A good way to deal with Schilling is to keep him on the ballot but make him wait. Perhaps he'll grow a brain in the next few years.
 

InstaFace

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Look, I get why the guy is disliked. But the HOF should be about on-field accomplishment* unless there's a Pete Rose or Shoeless Joe-level reason to look beyond that. There are plenty of HOFers who have no interest in serving as an ambassador of the game, or who after induction only get the negative kind of publicity (e.g. Alomar, Marichal, Whitey Ford, McCovey and Snider, and on and on). And being a failed businessman is hardly a disqualifier - he didn't embezzle the money or anything, the RIEDC was star-struck and gave him way too much with way too little due diligence - the list of HOFers who start a restaurant or other type of retail business and crash and burn with it is quite long.

He's not going to stop being publicly incendiary about his political views, any more than my in-laws are going to stop being casually racist 'eventually'. If they make him wait a few years, fine, but he more than deserves election based on his on-field accomplishments.

* I view PEDs as being something on-field enough to fairly weigh, even though I personally give it almost no weight because of the witch-hunt nature of how the steroid era is discussed.
 

Rovin Romine

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Look, I get why the guy is disliked. But the HOF should be about on-field accomplishment* unless there's a Pete Rose or Shoeless Joe-level reason to look beyond that.
I'd disagree with that strongly as an aspirational statement, and it's simply not true as a factual one.

http://baseballhall.org/hall-of-famers/bbwaa-rules-for-election
5. Voting: Voting shall be based upon the player's record, playing ability, integrity, sportsmanship, character, and contributions to the team(s) on which the player played.
 

Mueller's Twin Grannies

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Half the problem with Schilling is he was always a bit of a fringe candidate at best, his credentials heavily bolstered by his postseason record. If he'd been healthy enough to pitch at any point in 2008, especially that part, they might have gone back to the Series that year instead of losing to Tampa Bay. And they might have even beaten the Phillies. That would have made him more of a legitimate candidate for enshrinement...but with things having gone the way they did, his best chance was to be ingratiating enough to earn enough "aww, he's a good guy" votes to squeak in during the back end of his eligibility in a year with a weak pool of potential honorees. At this point, he's strip-mined his image to the point where he's just too toxic for anyone who cares about the character aspect of the profile.
 

lexrageorge

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The Hall of Fame will never be, nor should it be, the WAR enshrinement award. I'm certainly OK with the voters considering other factors beyond the raw numbers.

Rightly on wrongly, Schilling is perceived as a borderline candidate. His bWAR of 80.7 is above the HOF average of 70 for pitchers. He'd be 14th among all HoF pitchers in K's, and as horribly imperfect ERA is as a stat, his 3.46 career ERA would be very close to that of contemporaries such as Tom Glavine, John Smoltz, and Dennis Eckersley. And there is his post-season success.

Hurting him are his low win total of 216, despite playing 20 seasons, and the slow start to his career. After a couple of decent seasons at the age of 25 and 26, he did not emerge as an All Star until he was 30. No Cy Young awards, although he came in 2nd multiple times. Then there's his career OPS of 0.348 as a batter.

Putting the above together would make him a classic "multiple years on the ballot" selection; players like that tend to get more appreciation as time goes on and the voters can take a more retrospective view of the player's career against his contemporaries and against former greats. And once one looked at his numbers, very few would have a real problem with his being selected. By all rights, he's more deserving than either Jim Rice or Kirby Puckett.

However, to get to that point, personality matters. Schilling had a great story: bloody sock, part time baseball announcer, his fight against cancer, etc. Even the RI tax break issue was survivable; lots of businesses fail every day. Unfortunately, he now comes across as both a racist and misogynist, and he's done nothing to combat that image other than declaring war on the HoF voters and expressing his interest to run for the US Senate to represent the alt-right.
 

axx

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Tibbs up to 101 ballots... Pudge is at 86%. He may make it in on the first ballot after all.
 

Mueller's Twin Grannies

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Not sure if this should go in the Pos thread or this one, so I will put it in both...
Joe Posnanski is counting backward thru his HoF ballot, from least deserving to most deserving. Of course, he will never finish it, which is why he started from the bottom, to get some guys stories out there. So far, so good. This is right up Pos' wheelhouse.

The first two are up, Arthur Rhodes (what a strange and awesome career) and Matt Stairs. Well worth reading.

http://joeposnanski.com/no-34-arthur-rhodes/

http://joeposnanski.com/ballot-33-matt-stairs/
These were enjoyable but, ye gods, does he not have even a basic grasp of proofreading?

Tibbs up to 101 ballots... Pudge is at 86%. He may make it in on the first ballot after all.
Bagwell around 97% and Raines at 91% with almost 25% of the vote collected. Looking good for a big class.
 
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Plympton91

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I think the people looking at pitchers like Schilling and Mussina, and Hoffman and Wagner, as borderline candidates are making a mistake. As of now, the only pitchers getting in from the 1986 to 2004 period are the true all time greats, the pantheon types. If none of those second tier pitchers get in -- the ones like Schilling who finished second to Pedro, Johnson, and Maddox in Cy Young voting his whole life -- then that should implicitly be a black mark on the hitters of that era. Because, if there just weren't many Hall of Fame pitchers hurling between 1987 and 2004, maybe that's another reason why the offense was so inflated over that era. And, if all time great relievers are just failed sarters, then maybe the hitters shouldn't get as much credit for hitting off them despite the gaudy WHIP and K rates. So either they need to start electing more pitchers from that era, or they need to keep the Edgar Martinez's and Ivan Rodriguez's out too.
 

Mueller's Twin Grannies

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Rodríguez is one of the best catchers to ever play the game, period. Catcher is the least represented position in the Hall (if you don't count DH) too. He may not be the best example for that comparison. Also, there have been several pitchers inducted recently who played during those years, including Randy Johnson, Pedro Martínez, Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, John Smoltz, Bert Blyleven, Goose Gossage, and Dennis Eckersley. If you use 1987 as a cutoff, Don Sutton and Bruce Sutter also count in terms of guys inducted in the last 10 years. Nolan Ryan too. I think it's the most represented position in Cooperstown too. Finally, there are guys still playing who played between 1987 and 2004, including a couple guys with an outside shot or better of getting into the Hall as pitchers: Bartolo Colón, C.C. Sabathia, and Zack Greinke. There are also others who played between those years who have not yet become eligible.