In the midst of the frenzy of relief pitcher signings and trades of average catchers, I wanted to take the opportunity to take some kind of unnoticed, unheard stand. If you know baseball at all, you know the BBWAA (Baseball Writers Association of America) has been derelict in their Hall of Fame election duties ever since the BALCO scandal broke. Their argument, repeated en masse by voting results, is "Nobody who played in the 90's is a Hall of Famer because steroids maybe!" I'd like to put aside the conceit of using baseball players as moral actors, because that isn't what they are, but we're not allowed to do that these days. Instead, I'll just ask for consistency. If it's OK that Hank Aaron used amphetamines, then it's OK that Mark McGwire used steroids. You can go on down the line with this- whether it was cocaine, amphetamines, steroids, or just being a terrible person, there is no 'clean' period in baseball history. You can tell me half this year's ballot doesn't deserve enshrinement because they maybe, probably, or definitely used performance-enhancing drugs. To that I say, welcome to baseball. Guys do bad stuff. Get over it. I believe great players are marked by great numbers, great consistency, and usually both. If they achieve it, they're Hall of Famers. Let our children and grandchildren decide if the transgressions of the 90's and 00's were really that much worse than the cocaine 80's, the amphetamine 60's, or the segregated first half of the 20th century. And the members of the BBWAA who no longer follow baseball but engage in blanket refusals to vote for anyone because they're too lazy to find the facts to match their moralizing and really just want the kids to get offa their lawn- they can fuck off and forfeit their ballot, in whichever order they choose. Till that day, here's my (Sadly limited to ten players) hypothetical Hall of Fame Ballot.
(Apologies to Curt Schilling and Mike Mussina, who would be easy ins if the ballot wasn't clogged. But if the ballot wasn't clogged, then there would be no BBWAA intransigence to write about and I wouldn't have to bother with this post.)
1. Greg Maddux. 4 straight Cy Youngs (92-95). 5 more seasons finishing in the top 5 of Cy voting. 8-time All Star. Best pitcher of the 90's, and I don't think there's really a discussion to be had here, given that Pedro wasn't Pedro until 1997 and The Big Unit took till the mid-90's to put it all together. Maddux represents a litmus test of sorts: he is so clearly one of the best of all time, there is no rationale that leads to not voting for him. I think Hall of Fame voters who pass on Mad Dog- even if the rest of their ballot is blank- should be shown the door and never welcomed back in. The Hall of Fame is for great ballplayers. If you consider yourself important enough to allow your problems with the era to prevent you from doing your job as a judge of greatness.... Well, I already said it.
2. Tom Glavine. He was never as dominant as his long-time Braves teammate, but his peak actually lasted quite a bit longer. Glavine's final truly great season was probably his 1998 Cy Young year, but he managed 4 All-Star appearances after that and his decline wasn't quite as sharp as Maddux's. And if you're into counting stats, hey, 300 wins. That Glavine is such a clear HOFer and still so clearly inferior to Maddux should remind us how important the Braves were to 90's baseball. There's always a team that's always in it, but Atlanta was that team for an ungodly length of time.
3. Frank Thomas. Dude had a .454 OBP as a rookie. His OBP didn't dip below .400 until 1998, the year where Jerry Reinsdorf decided to scrap the team and go with the Big Hurt, Ray Durham, and 7 rookies in the lineup. In 1994, he lapped the league in offensive production. He had seven effing years with an OPS over 1.000. I'm hopeful Thomas actually has a chance, because he was vocally anti-PED throughout his career and mopped the floor with the league anyway.
4. Craig Biggio. Played catcher and second base while turning in season after season of high average, high OPB, high doubles offense. Won 4 straight Gold Gloves at second base. 7-time All Star. An excellent base thief, with a career success rate of just under 80%. Durable. Led the league in runs, doubles, steals, and hit-by-pitch at various times. 2nd all time in hit-by-pitch. Crossed the magic 3,000 hit mark in his final season.
5. Barry Bonds. Your position on this player determines whether or not you and I can have a conversation about baseball. In a just world, he'd be a clear first-ballot Hall of Famer and we would get to relive the two five-year spans in which he was the most dominant offensive player on the planet. In the world where we live, he may never get in. Because OMG STEROIDS YOU GUYS. Look, if your position forces you to deem one of the three greatest hitters of all time unworthy of the Hall of Fame, your position is stupid and so are you. I wish I could be nicer about this. I really do. But more than that, I wish you could be smarter about this.
6. Roger Clemens. See above. I hate this guy, and I believe every nasty scandalous story about him. Doesn't matter. He's a clear Hall of Famer and among the best baseball players of all time. If you have a vote and you don't vote for Bonds or Clemens, you are saying that baseball from 1990-2008 has no credibility. And if you're saying that, well, first of all, congrats on wasting your life. Secondly, let's apply the same standards to baseball before 1990. I think the game falls short of your purity edict there too, but writers of the day were comfortable with it. That says more about you than it does the players under consideration. And you're not interesting enough for that "Why I don't want anyone to be a Hall of Famer" column you've already written to make up for another summer without an induction ceremony.
7. Alan Trammell. The first of two 80's guys on my ballot, I give Trammell a vote because 1) he's running out of chances, and 2) his career would be much more appreciated if he were having it now. Shortstops who play the position acceptably and draw plenty of walks just aren't something we see all the time. He was overshadowed by Cal Ripken throughout his prime, but a better comparison is Barry Larkin, a contemporary who earned election by virtue of playing in the National League while Ripken and Trammell were in the AL. Trammell (and his keystone partner Lou Whitaker) had a hell of a lot more to do with Detroit's good 80's teams than Jack Morris did.
8. Tim Raines. As Trammell was overshadowed by Ripken, so too was Raines overshadowed by Rickey Henderson in the "greatest leadoff hitter of all time"-off. I'm hopeful that the trend of Raines' growing vote totals continues and he gets in, but he may have another year or two to wait. He shouldn't. His steal success rate of 84.7% is 13th all time... And nobody above him is even close to his number of steal attempts. His longevity and his consistency in doing leadoff hitter things for most of his career make "Rock" an obvious Hall of Famer from my point of view.
9. Jeff Bagwell. Had seasons of 34, 39, and 43 homers while playing half his games in the Astrodome. Had 4 seasons of 39 or more homers after the move to Enron Field. Stole 202 bases. Remarkably durable up until his career-ending shoulder injury. Never had an OBP under .358, and that was in his final, injury-ridden season. Career OBP of .408. Had the misfortune of playing between 1990-2008, so probably won't get in.
10. Mike Piazza. He got more than 50% of the vote last year, and he should get in eventually. I could run down the numbers, but anyone who watched baseball when Piazza was at his peak knows this guy's a Hall of Famer. We knew when he retired. Hell, we knew when he was halfway through his career, answering questions about his sexuality in front of the New York media. He's not a maybe HOFer, he's not borderline. He's an all-time great. Obscene power from the catcher position. His defense was regularly derided, but the numbers suggest he was at least passable behind the plate. The 4 players with careers most similar to Piazza? Bench. Berra. Carter. Fisk. I've got him in that same class, and- like every other player in this post- the hall ain't worth a damn without him.
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