Maybe the best question to ask about each player is this: did the game change because that player was in the league?
Maybe the best question to ask about each player is this: did the game change because that player was in the league?
Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. -- Carl Sagan (Pale Blue Dot)
I just don't get how we can take the Hall of Fame seriously as a museum without it having inducted the player with the most career base hits and the other player with the most career home runs. Those are pretty big statistical records.
My dad got to enjoy 3 Reds World Championships by the time he was my age. So far, I've only gotten to enjoy one. Step it up Redlegs!
mth123 (11-20-2020)
I'm not usually swayed by borderline HOF guys getting in because of their post-season exploits. Usually those exploits are more the result of small sample size than true talent level. But Schilling pitched 133 innings in the post-season and was lights out against elite competition. Not considering his post season to evaluate his body of work is just silly.
My ballot:
1. Bonds 162.8 WAR, 117.7 JAWS
2. Clemens 139.2 WAR, 102.6 JAWS
3. Schilling 79.5 WAR (plus postseason WAR which I'd guess is somewhere between 6 and 8), 64.1 JAWS
4. Helton 61.8 WAR, 54.2 JAWS. I think the park effect estimates hurt his WAR totals. His career road slash line is Hall worthy .287/.386/.469. Great player.
5. Manny 69.3 WAR, 39.9 JAWS
6. Rolen 70.1 WAR, 56.9 JAWS
7. Abreu 60.2 WAR, 50.9 JAWS. Underrated for most of his career.
8. Sheffield 60.5 WAR, 49.3 JAWS, 21st among non-pitchers in win probability added. Higher than all batters on this list not named Bonds.
Next group just missing: Andruw Jones, Jeff Kent, Sammy Sosa, Tim Hudson, Andy Pettite, Billy Wagner
Shouldn't be in the conversation: Omar Vizquel
Last edited by cincinnati chili; 11-21-2020 at 08:53 PM. Reason: typo
Stick to your guns.
Shane Victorino's walkup song seems like the most fun thing about his career. BobMarley'sThree little birds
"Reality tells us there are no guarantees. Except that some day Jon Lester will be on that list of 100-game winners." - Peter Gammons
Here is an interesting fact. Barry Bonds leads all players with 688 intentional walks for a career. Number 2 is Albert Pujols with 312. If that isn't a person who changed the game I don't know who is. I will freely admit that Bonds was and probably still is an asshat to the media and probably everyone that he had to deal with but is that a good reason to keep him out of the hall?
As far as the steroids are concerned, yes he used them but can't you also say that for a long period most players used uppers which were illegal as well. They put Gaylord Perry in the hall and he made a career out of cheating.
Barry Bonds was the greatest player I have ever watched play and as much as I think he is a jerk I don't think that should have anything to do with admittance into the hall of fame.
400 of Bonds intentional walks came after his 35th birthday, when he put more chemicals into his body than a 1980's racehorse.
That stat is meaningless as any kind of comparison to other players.
https://www.mlb.com/news/hall-of-fam...tion-standardsWith the release of the 2021 Hall of Fame ballot earlier this month, our thoughts turned to the institution of the Hall itself, and particularly this question: Are enough players being inducted? Or too many? What is the right number of players to have in the Hall, anyway?
There isn't a correct answer to that, of course. Maybe you're a "Big Hall" person, or maybe you like it to be far more selective. Either approach is fine, but without knowing the historic trends of what share of active players at a given time end up getting in, we're sort of shooting in the dark. If we look back through history, we can see if more recent players are getting in at a higher or lower rate -- which might help us answer whether more or fewer players should be inducted.
Edd Roush (11-28-2020),M2 (11-28-2020),RedsManRick (11-28-2020)
I'd put Schilling and Ramirez on my ballot.
Edd Roush (11-28-2020)
After Baines' induction, I see no way to have a more exclusive HOF. Tons of guys were more deserving than him and will be in the future. Keeping guys out that are significantly better than him, yet not at the truly elite level just doesn't seem right.
By saying "We didn't think Harold Baines belonged".
This is like saying "already got some racist in the hall of fame, guess I should vote for this other racist". Don't twist yourself into knots over something that is very simple: Just because someone else messed up doesn't mean you continue to mess up because they did.
I just couldn't vote that way. If the era committees are going to give special treatment to "their guys" and go the big HOF route, I'm not going to let guys that should be in miss out because they don't have the same connections that someone like Harold Baines has. It's insulting to guys that aren't in, are out of eligibility and are vastly superior to him.
Edit to your edit: The "already got some racist in the hall of fame, guess I should vote for this other racist" is essentially my stance on steroid users. I know there are users in there already, so I no longer see the point in excluding Bonds, Clemens, et al.
Last edited by Coopdaddy67; 11-28-2020 at 02:16 PM.
My top 4
1) Omar Vizquel
2) Manny Ramirez
3) Gary Sheffield
4) Curt Schilling
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