John Fay Abstains from HOF Voting to Avoid Casting Votes for Bonds and Clemens

[Vottomatic]

I think it's good seeing Fay practicing abstinence.

[REDREAD]

Originally Posted by _Sir_Charles_

IMO, what MLB did to Pete was appropriate. They kept him out of baseball. But I think this link between banishment from baseball and banishment from the hall needs to go. It's a museum celebrating the history of the game. And like it or not, Rose is a pretty major part of the history of the game. It's a Hall of FAME. Not a Hall of morals and ethics. If baseball decides to banish Clemens & Bonds from baseball for breaking the rules, I'm fine with that. But the Hall still needs to recognize what took place on the field. I don't want to read a world history book that leaves out Hitler just because he was a bad guy. That's what the Hall is attempting to do IMO.

Well, I agree, the HOF has become another way to punish players.. whether we agree with the reasoning or not, it's a punishment used. If anything, it's a statement of baseball's hypocracy. I remember and interview where Towers said that as the Padres GM, he knew Camminiti was juicing, but the Padres really didn't care.. He was putting up MVP seasons and selling tickets. No one cared until Camminiti died (and did they really care then? Or was that just crocodile tears)..

Heck, look at the punishment system today.. It was largely implemented only because Congress forced MLB to do it. You have guys like Manny Rammeriz who keep getting multiple chances. It's not unlike Steve Howe's drug use. In the end, the owners say it's cheating, but they condone it. When the player retires (or is at the end of their career), baseball suddenly become all moral about it.

When I was a kid, we used to play these board game war games. One guy wasn't particularly good at it, and he compensated by pushing a few extra tanks on to his home country when no one was looking. Sometimes he got caught, other times he didn't. We all knew he was "Cheating" but that was part of playing with him. We'd just laugh when we caught him. In a way, I think that's how the owners feel about steroid cheating.

[RedsManRick]

Originally Posted by REDREAD

By that logic, shouldn't baseball have caught Pete's gambling sooner?

Did Pete's gambling affect the outcomes on the field? I guess we'll never know, but it's hard to make an evidence based case that it did. In any event, they decide to explicitly ban him the from the game and he's never appeared on a HOF ballot. The decision was made and we didn't have to kvetch about it.

I disagree with this reasoning. How often would the players have to be tested in order to have a high degree of accuracy? Maybe daily? It's just not logistically possible. If anything, the current system is still flawed. Not a criticism of baseball, I just think it's going to be impossible to get 100% accurate testing.

That's completely fair and I'm not suggesting we should have perfect testing done daily. Rather, I'm saying that the "punishment" should fit the crime. If MLB itself doesn't see steroid use as a "crime" meriting a suspension for less than 1/3 of a season, why should it serve as the basis for keeping a player out of the HOF?

If having "tainted" stats means the player should be ignored after he retires, shouldn't the same logic justify permanent bans from the game for failed tests. In other words, if any of the stats you're about to put up lack legitimacy, then do we really want you putting them up. It strikes me as hypocritical to say that a guy should only lose a tiny fraction of his career for cheating and then to ignore massive swaths of his career after he retires.

Not that I care one way or another, but I can see why some people don't want to let cheaters like Clemens and Bonds in. They definitely changed what happened on the field by their cheating. In my mind, the damage has already been done, I really don't care if they get in the HOF or not.. Heck, the Giants 2012 division champship is somewhat tainted by roids.

I agree completely. The damage is done. The bottom line point is this. At the end of the day, we remember what actually happened. Having a history museum that leaves giant, gaping holes in our collective record does nothing to enhance our celebration of the game. A Hall of Fame that has all of the game's best players, some of whom were liars and cheats, is a better institution than one that has just some of the game's best players, some of whom prior to 1990 were liars and cheats and none of whom after then were ever caught. Just trying (and failing) to explain it succinctly serves to make the point.

[Brutus]

Originally Posted by Tadasimha

He's not actually going with his convictions at all.

If he was going with his convictions, he'd have voted for them to be in or not.

Not wanting to decide the fate of a controversial vote is still a conviction...

I didn't vote in the previous presidential election because I didn't support either candidate and wasn't going to vote just to say I voted if I didn't support one. Isn't that a conviction?

If people can't support for why they're voting for something, they shouldn't vote. I think he's doing more to preserve the sanctity of the HOF vote than by voting just to show he has a 'spine.'

[kaldaniels]

Originally Posted by Brutus

Not wanting to decide the fate of a controversial vote is still a conviction...

I didn't vote in the previous presidential election because I didn't support either candidate and wasn't going to vote just to say I voted if I didn't support one. Isn't that a conviction?

If people can't support for why they're voting for something, they shouldn't vote. I think he's doing more to preserve the sanctity of the HOF vote than by voting just to show he has a 'spine.'

Conviction is defined as a strong persuasion or belief. Fay just seemed wishy washy about the whole thing. His vote was prepared the night before, then he wussed out.

It's not that I laugh at the end result, but instead it was the way it was handled and then written about in a way to make Fay look holy that seems silly.

[jojo]

By not voting at all, Fay is not only avoiding a controversial decision to exclude the two players who were clearly the best of their generation, he is also implying that no other players on the ballot warranted a vote.

Neither implication is particularly symbolic of a backbone or overriding conviction.

[RedsManRick]

Originally Posted by jojo

By not voting at all, Fay is not only avoiding a controversial decision to exclude the two players who were clearly the best of their generation, he is also implying that no other players on the ballot warranted a vote.

Neither implication is particularly symbolic of a backbone or overriding conviction.

I don't see how you arrive at the second point. A submitted ballot carries a vote on every player on that ballot. The HOF is not a typical poll where it's person A vs. person B and a race left unmarked has no impact.

It's not person vs. person, it's person vs. ballots. Every player on a submitted ballot has a vote cast for him or, by inference, against him. If you do not a vote a guy in, you are adding to his denominator but not his numerator.

If Fay could have removed a subset of players from consideration, adding to neither their numerator nor denominator, I get the sense that he would have done that. But to submit a ballot with blanks for players like Bonds, Clemens, etc. is to vote "no". And he couldn't in good conscious vote either yes or no for those guys. And since voting for anybody meant voting (for or against) for everybody, he abstained. It infers nothing about the remainder of the ballot.

[paulrichjr]

Originally Posted by Gallen5862

The thing about Pete Rose is that Pete Rose the player did not get caught doing something to tarnish his numbers. Pete Rose the player deserves a up or down vote on if his accomplishments deserve to be in the hall of fame. Pete Rose the manager violated the gambleing rules and was banned from baseball. Pete Rose the manager should not be put on the ballot for the manager side of the hall of fame, It was the manager that was banned from baseball not the player.

Well said. I never thought of it from that viewpoint.

[MartyFan]

Originally Posted by Gallen5862

The thing about Pete Rose is that Pete Rose the player did not get caught doing something to tarnish his numbers. Pete Rose the player deserves a up or down vote on if his accomplishments deserve to be in the hall of fame. Pete Rose the manager violated the gambleing rules and was banned from baseball. Pete Rose the manager should not be put on the ballot for the manager side of the hall of fame, It was the manager that was banned from baseball not the player.

I think this makes total sense....

Back to the John Fay portion of abstaining....it is a gutless move and he should lose his privilege to vote for HOF.

[jojo]

Originally Posted by RedsManRick

I don't see how you arrive at the second point. A submitted ballot carries a vote on every player on that ballot. The HOF is not a typical poll where it's person A vs. person B and a race left unmarked has no impact.

It's not person vs. person, it's person vs. ballots. Every player on a submitted ballot has a vote cast for him or, by inference, against him. If you do not a vote a guy in, you are adding to his denominator but not his numerator.

If Fay could have removed a subset of players from consideration, adding to neither their numerator nor denominator, I get the sense that he would have done that. But to submit a ballot with blanks for players like Bonds, Clemens, etc. is to vote "no". And he couldn't in good conscious vote either yes or no for those guys. And since voting for anybody meant voting (for or against) for everybody, he abstained. It infers nothing about the remainder of the ballot.

By abstaining, Fay is in essence failing to vote for anyone regardless of whether they are worthy or not. So either he felt only Bonds and Clemens rose to the level of hall of famer or he basically is saying no one deserves consideration until he determines the appropriate course on the two best players of their generation.

I think it's irresponsible for a voter to abstain unless he feels it's a zero ballot. That's not the argument that Fay made though.

[oneupper]

Originally Posted by edabbs44

It might be different when your opinion actually means something.

Perhaps. But that's the responsibility that comes with the job. Fay just wants everyone to like him, something that's not possible when you actually make decisions with which many will disagree (one way or another).
Its a cop-out.

[Red in Chicago]

At the very least, he should have voted for Alan Trammell.

[Brutus]

Originally Posted by kaldaniels

Conviction is defined as a strong persuasion or belief. Fay just seemed wishy washy about the whole thing. His vote was prepared the night before, then he wussed out.

It's not that I laugh at the end result, but instead it was the way it was handled and then written about in a way to make Fay look holy that seems silly.

Well that's certainly fair. But like Rick said, he is preserving the sanctity of the vote because he's not impacting the percentages of people he would vote or not vote for. It seems a lot of people are chastising him because he's a voter so therefore he should be obligated to vote. I respect him for not influencing the vote based on the premise being debated.

[kaldaniels]

Originally Posted by Brutus

Well that's certainly fair. But like Rick said, he is preserving the sanctity of the vote because he's not impacting the percentages of people he would vote or not vote for. It seems a lot of people are chastising him because he's a voter so therefore he should be obligated to vote. I respect him for not influencing the vote based on the premise being debated.

I will agree those who turn in an empty ballot in protest are doing worse than what Fay did.

[_Sir_Charles_]

Originally Posted by mth123

Bert Blyleven and Jim Rice would disagree.

Yes, they would. But both of those guys are the poster boys for borderline HoF'ers IMO. I'm happy for both of them. They were both great players and I enjoyed watching both of them play. But even now I'm not 100% sure they should be in the HoF.