Poll: SoSH votes for 2020 BB HOF induction

Please check the candidate(s) of your choice


  • Total voters
    157

InstaFace

The Ultimate One
SoSH Member
Sep 27, 2016
21,754
Pittsburgh, PA
Congrats everyone, you're all BBWAA members. Who are you voting for this year?

We've got a thread to discuss the actual Cooperstown-affecting vote, but might as well get everyone on record here and see how we shake out, as a site. I had to limit the choices (there are 41 on the full ballot), so there was some editorial discretion here, which you're welcome to yell about. I chose the current top-10 vote getters on the current HOF Tracker (last year's results as a tiebreaker), which I'm not linking here because you should make up your own mind first. If you would vote for a player not on this list to the exclusion of one on this list (e.g. Pettitte, Andruw Jones, Sosa, Sheffield, Abreu), feel free to post that below.

Instructions from the ballot:
Players listed are eligible for election to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2020. They are the only players eligible. Please check the candidate(s) of your choice. You may vote for up to 10 players. You are not required to vote for 10, but you may not vote for more than 10. Ballots must be submitted by Dec 31st, 2019.

Career top-line stats for all players are, of course, available at BRef:
https://www.baseball-reference.com/awards/hof_2020.shtml

Rules for election.

Have at it.
 

Bergs

funky and cold
SoSH Member
Jul 22, 2005
21,613
I do not care about steroids. It was the era, and both Bonds and Clemens would have been in prior to using. Jeter is Jeter, and I might be a bit biased on Manny. Those were my 4.
 

EvilEmpire

paying for his sins
Moderator
SoSH Member
Apr 9, 2007
17,178
Washington
Jeter, Bonds and Clemens.

Manny has the numbers, but in addition to steroid use (which I think it is probably time to get past), he's a traveling secretary abusing, wife beating POS.
 

John Marzano Olympic Hero

has fancy plans, and pants to match
Dope
SoSH Member
Apr 12, 2001
24,536
Bonds, Clemens, Helton, Jeter, Manny and Walker.

I could also be convinced on Wagner, Sheffield, Rolen and Andruw Jones.

But again, I'm a big hall guy.
 

lexrageorge

Member
SoSH Member
Jul 31, 2007
18,096
Bonds, Clemens, Jeter.

The first two because it's time to get them off the ballot. Jeter just because he's worthy.

Could be convinced to vote for Larry Walker. That's about it. I'm sort of a "medium Hall" person.
 

mauf

Anderson Cooper × Mr. Rogers
Moderator
SoSH Member
I voted Bonds, Clemens, Helton and Jeter.

Jeter is obvious, and should be a unanimous choice.

We’re past the point where we can pretend that no one who used PEDs has been enshrined. Perhaps it’s fair to hold PED use against players with questionable candidacies, but Bonds and Clemens are all-time greats who probably had HOF resumes before they started using; the Hall of Fame is diminished by their exclusion. Put those two in and reassess the other cases in a future year.

I understand the case against Helton — his 285/391/442 career road line is nowhere near Hall-worthy for a first baseman who played mostly in the ‘90s and ‘00s. But Coors Field has been around long enough for us to know that Helton’s numbers aren’t purely a function of his home park; no one else has done anything close to what Helton did there, even though some talented guys have played in Denver since 1993. It seems unfair to penalize Helton for maximizing the advantage he enjoyed in the half of his games that were played at altitude. He’s not the Stan Musial clone that an uncritical view of his numbers might suggest, but he should be in.

I’m on the fence on Vizquel and would throw him a vote if I thought he was in danger of failing to clear the 5% threshold to make next year’s ballot.
 

nvalvo

Member
SoSH Member
Jul 16, 2005
21,479
Rogers Park
I voted for 10; I'm a big Hall guy. I think that you should be inducted to the Hall either for being excellent or for being a mixture of very good and very interesting. But I don't mind infamy for these purposes: Bonds used steroids, and likely hit his wife; Clemens also used steroids and likely slept with a 15 year old girl. I understand that others may have different priorities.

It's a museum.
  • Bonds – Best hitter in baseball history. 162 WAR. If the Hall doesn't include him, it is no longer a museum of baseball history. Barry Bonds' WAR7 is more than Derek Jeter's career WAR.
  • Clemens – 139 career WAR is two HoF careers.
  • Schilling – Longtime record holder for K/BB, good ERA in the teeth of the steroid era. (Schilling has terrible politics, but that doesn't even register on the jerk scale we're talking about here.)
  • Walker, Jeter, Rolen – 70 WAR is quite an achievement. While I don't think you need 70 WAR, basically all the players with more than that who aren't (yet) in the Hall should really be in the Hall: Bonds, Clemens, Rose, Schilling, some weird 19c pitcher who threw multiple 500+ IP seasons, Adrian Beltre, Albert Pujols, Zack Greinke, Mike Trout.
  • Manny – .312/.411/.585 line, 555 HR, 2500 hits, 1800+ RBI including a season with 165 RBI in 147 games, 154 OPS+. Just a tic shy of 70 WAR. Answer to the question: what if Todd Helton had hit 200 more HR playing at sea level?
  • Wagner – Take a second and reflect on a reliever throwing 900 IP, 1200 K, and only 300 BB, and doing it over 16 years starting in 1995. It's hard to accrue 27.8 WAR as a relief pitcher: that's a tenth of a win behind HOFer Trevor Hoffman, Wagner's close comparable and near-exact contemporary. If Hoffman's in, it's hard to argue against Wagner without placing undue emphasis on the save stat.
  • Vizquel – I can definitely see a case against with only 45 WAR — fewer than Pedroia — but my sense of what the Hall of Fame is is that it should include a player if that player has a truly remarkable achievement like being the record-holder for games played at SS — more than 2700! Played a beautiful shortstop well into his 40s.
Others I might consider: Sheffield, Pettitte, Jones.
 

InstaFace

The Ultimate One
SoSH Member
Sep 27, 2016
21,754
Pittsburgh, PA
I’m on the fence on Vizquel and would throw him a vote if I thought he was in danger of failing to clear the 5% threshold to make next year’s ballot.
His 42.8% BBWAA vote share last year suggests that this is a danger only on SoSH.

He certainly has a Jack Morris-esque campaign from the statistically inclined going against him, but also a lot of sentimental support from the rest of the baseball universe. An 82 OPS+ (and only 2 seasons out of 24 above 100), even as a superlative defender at shortstop, puts him shy of the standard even among Hall centrists like SI.

Ozzie Smith was better both with the glove and the bat, and breezed to a 91% first ballot induction. I'm perfectly willing to throw WAR-based arguments out the window when we're talking about arguably the greatest defensive player to ever play the game. Baseball involves a lot of defense, and the Hall should tell that story. But is Vizquel truly in the same league? His 11 gold gloves, highest career Fielding% among shortstops and flashy barehanding highlights suggest yes, but other stats suggest that may not be the full story - that he may have been a cautious fielder, rather than the athletic marvel that his awards case suggests. Ozzie Smith and Mark Belanger dominate both Defensive WAR and WAR Runs Fielding leaderboards, and 3rd place is ~20% behind the two fo them in both cases. Vizquel ranks 7th and 13th respectively, in those career counting stats. And Smith played in a different offensive context, as well - he had 80% more career WAR than Vizquel (76.9 to 45.6), making him blow past the fuzzy threshold area. That latter article I link goes into great depth on the defensive stats and comps, and explains why he comes up short on a lot of things that should matter. e.g.:

We need to put some perspective on the “WAR runs from batting” number. Omar Vizquel’s negative 244.3 is really, really miserable, almost as miserable as Rabbit Maranville’s minus 228.5. Since 1901, there are have been 201 shortstops who have accumulated at least 3,000 plate appearances. Of those 201, Vizquel ranks #191 with respect to WAR runs gained or lost due to batting. That’s 11th to last in 119 years of baseball. That may seem hard to fathom for a man who racked up 2,877 hits but 79% of those hits were singles and Omar made a lot of outs along the way as well.

There are 36 players who finished their careers with between 2,700 and 2,999 hits. Of those 36 players, Vizquel is last in OPS and OPS+, by a lot. He made the most outs in this group.
Vizquel may end up being quite a polarizing case over the next 6 years.
 

Ale Xander

Hamilton
SoSH Member
Oct 31, 2013
72,432
Clemens bonds manny

Walker too since he was a 5 tool Canadian

Jeter should be in based on longevity/counting stats and rings and off the field accomplishments (i.e. fame in the popular sense) but his defense at a historically defense-first position wasn't good enough to be unanimous and figured everyone would vote for him
 

Rwillh11

Member
SoSH Member
Apr 23, 2010
225
First 4 are easy:
Bonds
Clemens
Jeter
Manny

Larry Walker's 1997-2002 is quite the peak, and he ended with a .400 OBP. He should go in.
I would have voted for Scott Rolen and Andruw Jones had they been listed.

Vizquel is a tough one, but I think he's on the wrong side. Amazing defensive shortstop, but he really couldn't hit other than a BABIP driven 1999 season.
Helton just doesn't have enough for me as a first baseman playing in Colorado during that era.
 

Plantiers Wart

Member
SoSH Member
Oct 16, 2002
4,092
west hartford
Bonds. Clemens. In with or without roids.
Jeter. Overrated but eminently qualifies.
Manny. Greatest RH hitter I ever saw. And I’m 56.
Schilling. Hate his politics. Hate his dickishness. But he belongs
Larry Walker. Damn, he hit. Not only in Colorado, but everywhere
 

Seels

Member
SoSH Member
Jul 20, 2005
4,948
NH
I'm okay taking a stand against the steroid users.

Jeter and Walker make it for me. Clemens and Bonds can make it in once they own and seek contrition for what they did, and not a second before that. Bonds is a stain on baseball and made a mockery of the game
I'd probably reluctantly vote for Schilling too. I can't separate the piece of shit he's become after leaving baseball though, and wouldn't lose sleep if he fell of the ballot.


Vizquel is among the more overrated players of my life time. I feel like he's going to make it in at some point despite being nothing more than a mediocre player for a very long time. 24 years in the big leagues and he gets a single 9th place vote for MVP one year. I'd be shocked if there was a single post ww2 player with less MVP shares than Vizquel in the hall, or even with over 50% of the vote any given year. 5.3 wins above average for his career. He'd be nearly as bad a pick as Baines.
 

Marciano490

Urological Expert
SoSH Member
Nov 4, 2007
62,312
I'm okay taking a stand against the steroid users.

Jeter and Walker make it for me. Clemens and Bonds can make it in once they own and seek contrition for what they did, and not a second before that. Bonds is a stain on baseball and made a mockery of the game
I'd probably reluctantly vote for Schilling too. I can't separate the piece of shit he's become after leaving baseball though, and wouldn't lose sleep if he fell of the ballot.


Vizquel is among the more overrated players of my life time. I feel like he's going to make it in at some point despite being nothing more than a mediocre player for a very long time. 24 years in the big leagues and he gets a single 9th place vote for MVP one year. I'd be shocked if there was a single post ww2 player with less MVP shares than Vizquel in the hall, or even with over 50% of the vote any given year. 5.3 wins above average for his career. He'd be nearly as bad a pick as Baines.
I never get this line of thinking. How do you know Jeter and Walker didn’t juice?
 

Yelling At Clouds

Post-darwinian
SoSH Member
Jul 19, 2005
3,405
I said this in the other thread, but Sammy Sosa really gets a raw deal in these conversations. His only positive test for steroids is from the 2003 survey testing, the same list that snared David Ortiz. But Ortiz will probably sail in while Sosa is treated like a pariah on par with Rafael Palmeiro. Manny Ramirez tested positive twice more than Sosa, and he gets a lot more support in these conversations. If you want to argue that he's too one-dimensional, then I expect you all to stop voting for Omar Vizquel. If you want to talk about his post-playing career, then he's not done anything nearly as objectionable as Schilling has.

(For the record: Bonds, Clemens, Jeter, Jones, Ramirez, Rolen, Schilling, Sheffield, Sosa, Walker)
 
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Ale Xander

Hamilton
SoSH Member
Oct 31, 2013
72,432
I said this in the other thread, but Sammy Sosa really gets a raw deal in these conversations. His only positive test for steroids is from the 2003 survey testing, the same list that snared David Ortiz. But Ortiz will probably sail in while Sosa is treated like a pariah on par with Rafael Palmeiro. Manny Ramirez tested positive twice more than Sosa, and he gets a lot more support in these conversations. If you want to argue that he's too one-dimensional, then I expect you all to stop voting for Omar Vizquel. If you want to talk about his post-playing career, then he's not done anything nearly as objectionable as Schilling has.

(For the record: Bonds, Clemens, Jeter, Jones, Ramirez, Rolen, Schilling, Sheffield, Sosa, Walker)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/early-lead/wp/2017/07/13/sammy-sosas-appearance-gets-even-more-peculiar/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/other_sports/us_sport/2970198.stm
 

InstaFace

The Ultimate One
SoSH Member
Sep 27, 2016
21,754
Pittsburgh, PA
While I don't think you need 70 WAR, basically all the players with more than that who aren't (yet) in the Hall should really be in the Hall: Bonds, Clemens, Rose, Schilling, some weird 19c pitcher who threw multiple 500+ IP seasons, Adrian Beltre, Albert Pujols, Zack Greinke, Mike Trout.
Ha, I like that link of yours. Lose 40 games at age 22 (while throwing 546 IP in a 10-WAR season), win 45 games at age 23 (only a slight bump to 10.5 WAR in a 657 IP season!). Those 1880s sure were wild.

And yeah, everyone you list is either still active in baseball, on the commissioner's exempt list, or under strong consideration in the voting for the Hall. Plus that scottish guy.
 

Seels

Member
SoSH Member
Jul 20, 2005
4,948
NH
I never get this line of thinking. How do you know Jeter and Walker didn’t juice?
Neither of us is going to win the other over in this argument. I'm not going to play the hypoethical what if X player was juicing. We know that Bonds and Clemens were.
 

axx

Member
SoSH Member
Jul 16, 2005
8,126
Voted for Jeter and the Steroid Duo. Do only expect Jeter to get in.

BTW looked at the 2021 ballot and you might get a goose egg from the BBWAA. And if they won't vote for A-Rod, 2022 might be nobody too.

I said this in the other thread, but Sammy Sosa really gets a raw deal in these conversations. His only positive test for steroids is from the 2003 survey testing, the same list that snared David Ortiz. But Ortiz will probably sail in while Sosa is treated like a pariah on par with Rafael Palmeiro.
Ortiz also has the DH baggage to go with it. There definitely will be voters who won't vote for him because of that. Ortiz is more of a wait and see what happens with the first vote.
 

Diamond Don Aase

Member
SoSH Member
Jan 16, 2001
1,069
Merrimack Valley
Shoot. Rolen was an oversight on my part. I'd add him late, but I'm limited to 10 options.
Rolen is much more deserving than Helton and Vizquel and at least as deserving as Kent and Wagner (although @nvalvo illustrated Wagner's strong credentials well). Unfortunately, his best path to election by the BBWAA would be to build support to Schilling / Walker levels and hope that the increased attention during the more fallow ballots of 2021/2022 allows voters to give his case the consideration it deserves.
 

PC Drunken Friar

Member
SoSH Member
Sep 12, 2003
14,540
South Boston
Voted for Jeter and the Steroid Duo. Do only expect Jeter to get in.

BTW looked at the 2021 ballot and you might get a goose egg from the BBWAA. And if they won't vote for A-Rod, 2022 might be nobody too.



Ortiz also has the DH baggage to go with it. There definitely will be voters who won't vote for him because of that. Ortiz is more of a wait and see what happens with the first vote.
/
Not to single you out because there are multiple people that had similar votes...but why Bonds and Clemens but not Manny? If steroids aren't an automatic killer, in what world is Manny not a first ballot, near unanimous pick?
 

mauf

Anderson Cooper × Mr. Rogers
Moderator
SoSH Member
I'm okay taking a stand against the steroid users.

Jeter and Walker make it for me. Clemens and Bonds can make it in once they own and seek contrition for what they did, and not a second before that. Bonds is a stain on baseball and made a mockery of the game
I'd probably reluctantly vote for Schilling too. I can't separate the piece of shit he's become after leaving baseball though, and wouldn't lose sleep if he fell of the ballot.


Vizquel is among the more overrated players of my life time. I feel like he's going to make it in at some point despite being nothing more than a mediocre player for a very long time. 24 years in the big leagues and he gets a single 9th place vote for MVP one year. I'd be shocked if there was a single post ww2 player with less MVP shares than Vizquel in the hall, or even with over 50% of the vote any given year. 5.3 wins above average for his career. He'd be nearly as bad a pick as Baines.
The only argument he should be in is if you think he was a defender on par with Ozzie Smith. It sounds like advanced stats suggest that he wasn’t. But if he truly was deserving, lack of recognition during his playing days is a poor reason to keep him out — that’s the sort of thinking that boned Ron Santo (during his lifetime) and Dwight Evans (to this day).
 

mauf

Anderson Cooper × Mr. Rogers
Moderator
SoSH Member
/
Not to single you out because there are multiple people that had similar votes...but why Bonds and Clemens but not Manny? If steroids aren't an automatic killer, in what world is Manny not a first ballot, near unanimous pick?
Barry Bonds had 162.8 bWAR. Roger Clemens had 139.2 bWAR. Manny had 69.4 bWAR. Sure, WAR isn’t the be-all and end-all, but one of these is clearly not like the others.

Most players at Manny’s bWAR level are in, but not everyone — Carlos Beltran, Kenny Lofton, and Graig Nettles are all in the high 60s, for example. Even in a world where PEDs aren’t an absolute bar to the Hall, a guy with Manny’s numbers who tested positive twice is going to end up on the outside looking in.
 

axx

Member
SoSH Member
Jul 16, 2005
8,126
Not to single you out because there are multiple people that had similar votes...but why Bonds and Clemens but not Manny? If steroids aren't an automatic killer, in what world is Manny not a first ballot, near unanimous pick?
It has to be an extremely high bar for the Steroid Guys. Plus you could argue that the two were HoFers before they really started juicing.

I'm really not sure what's going to happen with A-Rod.
 

uncannymanny

Member
SoSH Member
Jan 12, 2007
9,079
Bonds will never get my vote nor will Clemens...thanks for asking.
I don’t care about contrition, but I would need an admission from both. As someone said, it was the era, but if you want my vote don’t treat me like an asshole. Other people’s lives become collateral damage in efforts to keep these charades going (see Braun, Ryan).
 

nvalvo

Member
SoSH Member
Jul 16, 2005
21,479
Rogers Park
These arguments never really get anywhere because they bear on the question of what the Hall is and is for. Obviously, if it is an endorsement of the players as human beings or even as sportsmen, then... yikes. A lot of these guys aren't great, it's true. But if it isn't, if it's a more value-neutral presentation of the most significant figures in the game's history, then that's another matter.

Because my view is closer to the latter, I think that excluding a Bonds or a Clemens makes a mockery of the entire enterprise. But obviously, insofar as it an endorsement of these people as people, you might reasonably argue that these are cheaters (and moral monsters in other respects) who should not be given that recognition, lest they... make a mockery of the entire enterprise. That's not my view, but it's not at all an unreasonable view.
 

Dewey'sCannon

Member
SoSH Member
Jul 18, 2005
869
Maryland
I went with Bonds, Clemens, Jeter, Kent, Schilling (hate the man, love the player) and Walker. I'd also vote for Rolen. For now, it's a no on Manny - defense and steroids make me hesitate.
 

Yelling At Clouds

Post-darwinian
SoSH Member
Jul 19, 2005
3,405
So what? This is unusual, but I can think of worse sins.
This also seems like kind of a random place to draw the line, especially since your post in the other thread indicates you'd be ok with voting for someone who was suspended as the result of a positive steroid test (two, for the record). Steroids are ok, but corking one's bat isn't?
 

Ale Xander

Hamilton
SoSH Member
Oct 31, 2013
72,432
So what? This is unusual, but I can think of worse sins.

This also seems like kind of a random place to draw the line, especially since your post in the other thread indicates you'd be ok with voting for someone who was suspended as the result of a positive steroid test (two, for the record). Steroids are ok, but corking one's bat isn't?
Unusual is putting it mildly. Dude went whiteface, presumably because he was racist against his own people.
 

Ale Xander

Hamilton
SoSH Member
Oct 31, 2013
72,432
Barry Bonds had 162.8 bWAR. Roger Clemens had 139.2 bWAR. Manny had 69.4 bWAR. Sure, WAR isn’t the be-all and end-all, but one of these is clearly not like the others.

Most players at Manny’s bWAR level are in, but not everyone — Carlos Beltran, Kenny Lofton, and Graig Nettles are all in the high 60s, for example. Even in a world where PEDs aren’t an absolute bar to the Hall, a guy with Manny’s numbers who tested positive twice is going to end up on the outside looking in.
WAR doesn;t value defense effectively, no?

If you go by offensive WAR, hes got 81.8, higher than Boggs, higher than Yaz, higher than Kaline.

Everyone above him is either in or will be in (Pujols, Jeter). Or should be in (Bonds, Arod, Rose)

Oh and huge apologies to Jeter, longevity or not.
 

stepson_and_toe

New Member
Aug 11, 2019
386
WAR doesn;t value defense effectively, no?
As I understand things (hopefully correctly), oWAR+dWAR <> WAR.
oWAR contains an average value of defense per position rather than the calculated on for a player, so a catcher and a DH, say, who have completely identical hitting stats will have different oWAR but the difference in their respective WAR could be greater or lesser depending on how their fielding stats compare to others playing the same position(s). In other words, two catchers with completely identical batting stats could have different WAR.
 

InstaFace

The Ultimate One
SoSH Member
Sep 27, 2016
21,754
Pittsburgh, PA
Schilling only getting 58% of the SoSH vote, where he's a freakin member who at one point had a private blog of his baseball thoughts for us, is probably not a good sign for his long-term candidacy.
 

CarolinaBeerGuy

Don't know him from Adam
SoSH Member
Mar 14, 2006
9,419
Kernersville, NC
I voted for Bonds, Clemens, Jeter, Ramirez, Schilling and Walker. I considered Wagner as well and could be talked into voting for him.

EDIT: I would add Sheffield, Andruw Jones, Sosa and maybe Pettitte. I'm a big hall guy.
 
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Plympton91

bubble burster
SoSH Member
Oct 19, 2008
12,408
Schilling only getting 58% of the SoSH vote, where he's a freakin member who at one point had a private blog of his baseball thoughts for us, is probably not a good sign for his long-term candidacy.
Meanwhile, Manny Ramirez, who in addition to the steroid issues, physically assaulted a member of the Red Sox staff and tanked an at bat in a game against the Yankees because he was piqued, is at 76%.
 

InstaFace

The Ultimate One
SoSH Member
Sep 27, 2016
21,754
Pittsburgh, PA
So in the end, SoSH elects Jeter by comfortable first-balloter margins, narrowly elects Bonds and Clemens, elects Manny by the skin of his teeth... and puts actual boardmate and local-team 2-time-WS hero Curt Schilling farther behind (at 57%) than the last year of actual BBWAA voting did (61%). Vizquel (10%) gets less than half of Jeff Kent's support (21%), and Larry Walker falls short in his final year of eligibility (49%, down from 55% last year).

I guess we're harsher in some areas but gentler in others, and there's no easy descriptor to give it rhyme or reason.
 

Lose Remerswaal

Experiencing Furry Panic
Lifetime Member
SoSH Member
I think the local dissing of Schilling can be partially explained by his politics. There is likely a smaller percentage of SoShers who agree with his statements than there are national media members who agree with his statements.
 

Jim Ed Rice in HOF

Red-headed Skrub child
SoSH Member
Jul 21, 2005
8,252
Seacoast NH
I think the local dissing of Schilling can be partially explained by his politics. There is likely a smaller percentage of SoShers who agree with his statements than there are national media members who agree with his statements.
Partially? I think you're underselling it a bit. If Schilling disappeared after he retired he'd probably be about 25-30 points higher in this poll. His career stats, what he did here, etc. would have him in the 80's.
 

The Gray Eagle

Member
SoSH Member
Aug 1, 2001
16,721
I don't care much about the Hall of Fame anymore, certainly not enough to get into circular nitpicky arguments about it.
But if I voted, I would go Bonds, Clemens, Jeter, Ramirez, Schilling, Walker, Sosa, Rolen, Andruw Jones, and Sheffield.

I'd vote for Palmeiro and McGwire if they were on the ballot too.