ESPN writer destroys credibility with one sentence

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

I was enjoying David Schoenfield's campaigning to get Edgar Martinez into the Hall of Fame, and was nearly buying his arguments, until I got to this paragraph:

Before we dig into the numbers, let's also make a perhaps obvious statement: The basic premise of the Hall of Fame is to enshrine the game's best players. Who are the game's best players? Those who help their teams win games more than other players. It gets complicated from here, of course. Some players are excellent for a short period; others are merely very good but have longer careers. Some voters only vote for "inner circle" Hall of Famers (Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Greg Maddux, Derek Jeter) even though the Hall of Fame is clearly not just about inner-circle guys.

Let's see. The (real) all-time home run leader, the guy generally decided to be the best all-round player ever, a 355-win pitcher, and ..... an over-hyped, under-ranged Yankee who has never even been the best player in his infield, much less the best player on his team?

Seriously, is there any real way Freaking Jeter can be mentioned in the same sentence with those players? Only if the sentence reads something like "Hank Aaron, Willie Mays and Greg Maddux are among the best players of all time, and Derek Jeter played, too."

The only possible reasons I can think of to have that sentence in there are:
-- Tom Verducci is his ghost writer
-- Smart people are off this week and unavailable to edit holiday week filler.
-- It's shameless SEO -- search engine optimization, which, trust me, is becoming more and more of a factor in what you read on line. We're lucky he didn't throw in "Brittany Spears" just to catch a few more Google clicks.

[metirish]

Well Schoenfield's a wanker isn't he?

Still , five years after jeter retires he gets into the HOF easily...I don't like it but he will I think......perhaps he'll even threaten Sever's percent record if that still holds.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Tom Sever would make a great companion to Neil Alien and Ed Brainpool in the pantheon of Gruesome Mets.

[Guest attgig]

Still , five years after jeter retires he gets into the HOF easily...I don't like it but he will I think......perhaps he'll even threaten Sever's percent record if that still holds.

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

Hey, I'm not saying Jeter won't get in the Hall, or might not be deserving of being in the Hall. But I don't think he fits in the imaginary "inner circle," the very best of the best, with guys like Mays and Aaron.

He is, at best, a Morgan, Stargell, Yount kind of guy who everybody thinks belongs. But you can't mention him in the same breath as Ted Williams and Warren Spahn.

[Benjamin Grimm]

You mean Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, and Greg Maddux.

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

You mean Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, and Greg Maddux.[/quote:2qw2aoxb]

Him, too! I'd put Maddux in that group.

[Gwreck]

Cap'n intangibles nonsense aside, I wasn't impressed with Schoenfeld's article.

I have never been a fan of "well, X is in, so that means Y should get in too" hall of fame arguments, particularly when X is a borderline-case such as the Jim Rices or Tony Perezs that Schoenfeld is using.