It's Dawson. Just Dawson

[Guest Edgy DC]

Rice won an MVP. That stuff sticks with folks.

[nymr83]

UTTERLY ABSURD. Tim Raines (30% of the vote) was by far a better player. Baines is probably better. Alomar is much better. I won't bother comparing to pitchers but Blyleven was robbed as well. A .323 OBP for a corner outfielder should almost automatically EXCLUDE you, instead he's the only guy who gets in. the dinosaurs who vote for the HOF need to go.

[G-Fafif]

On the day Roberto Alomar didn't become a Hall of Famer in Cooperstown, I became Roberto Alomar on Crane Pool Forum. Ironic, sort of.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Maybe I'm just moving on into another Kubler-Ross stage-of-righteous-indignance, but... well... FWiW, Dawson's a much better all-around player than Rice, and-- while a borderline guy, and not as deserving in most of our minds here as, say, Alomar or the Dutchman-- doesn't significantly lower the standards for HOF membership, the way that Mr. Fear did.

He'll be a little easier to explain to little LeiterWagnerPisserPooper in 6-7 years than Rice, or Tinker/Evers/Chance, or Maranville. So, there's that.

[Valadius]

I can't tell you how infuriated I was at work today when I heard the news. INFURIATED. Alomar got jobbed, Blyleven has to wait another year and occupy a spot on an already crowded ballot next year. This is why I want the voting percentage necessary for induction lowered, either to 70% or 65%. And this "first-ballot is only for Babe Ruths" crap is killing this process. Luckily we're going to have 2012 to clear some backlog, but come 2013, deserving names are going to fall off the ballot because of the "first ballot is sacred/hall purity/I refuse to vote for more than X players in a given year" crowd. And Jay Mariotti can go to hell. Filling out a blank ballot is worse than filling out no ballot at all. Utterly despicable.

[Frayed Knot]

Lowering the standards will still leave some guys just missing. I have no problem with 75% as there's always as many guys I wouldn't put in who are as there are guys I want in but fall short. That's just about the way it should be.


Turning in a blank ballot isn't stupid, turning one in for stupid reasons is - particularly if one of those reasons is; 'Hey, look at me and see how discriminating [read: curmudgeonly] I can be!'

[MFS62]

What I'm wondering is when the HOF-- a beautifully-designed little museum, with pretty terribly run entry protocols-- becomes the Academy Awards of baseball: something that's fun to look at, but not something any SERIOUS baseball scholar ever looks at as anything but an entertaining trifle?

Sort of like what the Sporting News has become in recent years.
Uh, let me change that. Not even fun to look at any more.

Later

[stevejrogers]

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: Edgy DC wrote: Dwight Evans, whose career I'd take over Dawson's nine times out of ten. Year Election Votes Pct 1997 BBWAA 28 5.9% 1998 BBWAA 49 10.4% 1999 BBWAA 18 3.6% and Out Should have had a cooler nickname. How or why the hell ornery Boston fans rallied around Fenway Phantom Jim Rice and not Dewey, I'll never know.

Perhaps;

1) To keep some sort of grand lineage going with Williams and Yaz for LFers in Fenway. Greenwell breaks that chain, and I don't know who held the spot in between Greenwell and ManRam. Interestingly enough, Warner Wolf one morning on 1050ESPN radio was pontificating on the HOF caliber LFers in Red Sox history listed Williams, Yaz and ManRam, and completely left Rice off the checklist! Course now many will cite Mark McGwire and soon Roger Clemens as reasons why Manny Ramirez WON'T get into Cooperstown, and that kind of will elevates Rice in many eyes. I wouldn't be shocked if that's why both Rice and Dawson got in actually.

and

2) To prove that they aren't as racist and/or hard on their star athletes as it seems they were portrayed as being for many years. You don't get too many of those stories in the last 10 or so years, but it was a big part of the perception of the Boston fanbase. So why not rally around Rice's bid for the Hall.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Frayed Knot wrote: Lowering the standards will still leave some guys just missing. I have no problem with 75% as there's always as many guys I wouldn't put in who are as there are guys I want in but fall short. That's just about the way it should be.

Yes.

Frayed Knot wrote: Turning in a blank ballot isn't stupid, turning one in for stupid reasons is

Yes.

[Frayed Knot]

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: What I'm wondering is when the HOF-- a beautifully-designed little museum, with pretty terribly run entry protocols-- becomes the Academy Awards of baseball: something that's fun to look at, but not something any SERIOUS baseball scholar ever looks at as anything but an entertaining trifle?

It's not perfect, but it never was and nothing based on subjective criteria ever will be. But so what, that's not a fatal flaw, and if a handful of ejits turn in stupid ballots each one is like 0.2% of the vote
Hell, there's plenty of disagreement in our small group here which is enough to show that there's not one correct answer to each candidate. Plus I think the choices have probably gotten better over the years rather than worse; certainly the veteran process is better.

[RealityChuck]

I don't see Dawson as that bad a choice -- his numbers fit snugly among HOF players, and he played on some pretty bad teams almost his entire career, which hurt him.

The fact that Blyleven and Alomar didn't get in has nothing to do with whether Dawson was a good choice. You're following the same logical fallacy as the people who refuse to vote for someone in his first year of eligibility.

[nymr83]

RealityChuck wrote: I don't see Dawson as that bad a choice -- his numbers fit snugly among HOF players, and he played on some pretty bad teams almost his entire career, which hurt him. The fact that Blyleven and Alomar didn't get in has nothing to do with whether Dawson was a good choice. You're following the same logical fallacy as the people who refuse to vote for someone in his first year of eligibility.

No, i'm not. Alomar (i'll use him and ignore trying to compare pitching/hitting at the moment) was better than Dawson, which does have something to do with whether Dawson was a good choice, because everyone who voted for Dawson but not Alomar made the rather indefensible decision to vote for a clearly worse player ahead of someone that they deemed not to be a good choice.
You can draw the "line" of how good someone had to be to get into the HOF wherever you'd like, but when you say that Dawson is above that line and Alomar below it you've made a bad choice.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Frayed Knot wrote: What I'm wondering is when the HOF-- a beautifully-designed little museum, with pretty terribly run entry protocols-- becomes the Academy Awards of baseball: something that's fun to look at, but not something any SERIOUS baseball scholar ever looks at as anything but an entertaining trifle? It's not perfect, but it never was and nothing based on subjective criteria ever will be. But so what, that's not a fatal flaw, and if a handful of ejits turn in stupid ballots each one is like 0.2% of the vote Hell, there's plenty of disagreement in our small group here which is enough to show that there's not one correct answer to each candidate. Plus I think the choices have probably gotten better over the years rather than worse; certainly the veteran process is better.

Fair point. It is kind of weird, though, that these guys are voting on what's essentially a merit-award-cum-promotional-vehicle for that which they cover. You don't see war correspondents voting on who gets Silver Stars, or science journal writers voting on the chemistry Nobel.

I think I misspoke earlier: it's more like the Golden Globes of baseball.

[Frayed Knot]

Well, for better or worse, the writers assoc got the vote chores/honors back in the pre-TV days when they could legitimately claim to be the ones who saw the most games and therefore knew the best and supposedly were free of biases. And over the years they haven't been bad keepers of the flame even though there are some bad choices and others which are arguable. Their membership rules aren't lax and recently we've seen them open up to internet writers and others who hopefully bring an expanded way of thinking to the process but there'll always be disagreements.
Plus, we saw what the smaller and more hand-picked panels did with the vets vote all those years. So I'll take the tyranny of a well-meaning majority (super majority actually) and live with their decisions. Most of them take it very seriously and I have faith that the good outnumber the stupid. In the meantime, pay attention to those who do good work and never stop mocking the Mariotti's of the world.

[G-Fafif]

Marty Noble, in an mlb.com roundup of its writers' HOF choices, espouses the Single Spitter Theory:

Marty Noble: Barry Larkin and Dave Parker Alomar will probably be elected, and based on performance through most of his 17 seasons, he ought to be. But he will go without my vote this year. I don't like to use the ballot in this manner, but the best second baseman since Joe Morgan -- and probably the best ever -- doesn't deserve my vote for at least one year because of two spitting instances. We're all aware of the one involving John Hirschbeck. I don't care that Hirschbeck forgave Alomar for spitting at him; I haven't. It was unacceptable behavior. And during his 222-game tour with the Mets, Alomar repeatedly spit in the face of the game by playing with conspicuous apathy. His father and brother didn't deserve that, nor did the game. Larkin was a gentleman, an MVP and a genuine offensive force who played the most important defensive position at a high level. He was an easy choice. Parker remains the the best player I ever have covered. He beat opponents every way possible, running over them, if necessary. And he was better at keeping a clubhouse loose than any player I've experienced. I hadn't voted for him until now because of his involvement in the 1985 cocaine mess in Pittsburgh. But I had supported the Hall candidacy of Keith Hernandez, the second-best player I ever covered, despite his involvement with cocaine. That inconsistency had to be rectified. I can forgive their flaws more readily than I can forgive Alomar's. Wait till next year.

Rob Neyer, meanwhile, reads minds:

If I may indulge in a bit of speculation ... Alomar is obviously one of history's greatest second basemen. A huge majority of ballots already made public included Alomar's name. I can only guess that a significant number of voters were simply too apathetic about baseball during Alomar's career to pay any real attention. I don't say that to explain why he didn't get elected this year. I say that to explain why he'll get elected next year, as a few dozen voters say to themselves, "Hey, this Alomar fellow was almost elected last year. I guess I should probably vote for him!"

[Benjamin Grimm]

I don't understand "INFURIATED"

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

The fact is Alomar was aloof even when he performed at a high level.

[duan]

i'm not sure about marty noble's logic about "for this year" thing.
Either decide the fucker disgraced the game in a way that's unforgiveable or don't.

Now, you can revise your opinion (and that IS fair), but to suggest (as Marty seems) that he's already decided to vote for him NEXT year is a bit off.

The whole "not a first ballot" is bollocks full stop too.

[Frayed Knot]

I don't agree with Noble citing Alomar for apathy - especially for a small portion of his career - as reason for a 'No' vote in the same breath as citing Parker as an example of an all-out player.
Parker exemplified exactly what a lot of critics were afraid of in the still-new FA era and that's the athlete who got fat (literally and figuratively) as soon as his wallet did. Parker had HoF talent, IMO, but not enough HoF seasons to make an HoF career.

[MFS62]

Well, I guess if you're going to vote for a guy nicknamed "Hawk", Dawson is a better ballplayer than Hawk (not to be confused with ex-Mets catcher Sammy)Taylor and Hawk Harrelson.
But none of them should be in the Hall, especially over some of the other candidates on this year's ballot.

Later

[Guest Edgy DC]

When Alomar was a top player, writers loved him. He was still aloof and distant and useless to them for quotes, but they'd wax on about what a pleasure his gamecraft was --- how he'd use batting practice to, among other things, practice bunting foul, because a foul bunt in the first inning could bring the third baseman in the rest of the game and might, just might, lead to a game-winning hit in the eighth. The sort of stuff reserved for Jeter.

It seems the aloofness is a tolerable thing in an All-Star, but not in a strugglign vet. Eddie Murray was another guy whose commitment to his game had him tagged as a high-character guy when he was an MVP candidate, but got tagged as low-character due to his aloofness (which had always been there) when his game faded.

Credit for consistency to Noble, anyhow. He apparently gives points for field- and clubhouse-leaders and is trying to apply that consistently. But deciding to vote for a guy despite factoring him lowly in this department, but not until next year --- debit him for that.

Hey, Marty, not to sound too morbid, but next year may never come. Maybe not for Alomar, maybe not for you. Carpe deum, dude.

(OE: Oops: "diem.")

[Theoldmole]

Seize God?

[Guest Edgy DC]

Well, lower-case. Sieze a god. Not the God.

Typed the last line and hit submit while a colleague was standing over me. It happens.

[ashie62]

Alomar was a nasty prick and that translated into less votes

[MFS62]

Ashie62 wrote: Alomar was a nasty prick and that translated into less votes

That must mean that Bonds will come up with a negative tally, even discounting the steroids.
I hope so.

Later

[Willets Point]

Ashie62 wrote: Alomar was a nasty prick and that translated into less votes

And Alomar allegedly did nasty things with his nasty prick.

[smg58]

Is now a good time to mention that Tim Raines had a higher career OPS than Dawson?

[nymr83]

smg58 wrote: Is now a good time to mention that Tim Raines had a higher career OPS than Dawson?

Tim Raines had a better career than Andrew Dawson, I'm at least going to concede that Dawson had a better peak which may (legitimately) sway some voters. The gap in vote% between them is alarming.

[Guest Edgy DC]

In his defense, I don't think it's fair to refer to Dawson as a "corner outfielder." He spent the first half of his career in center and was damn good there, winning six Gold Glove awards and maybe even deserving some of them.

[MFS62]

Baseball Prospectus' take on the HOF voting:

At the end of my final Hall of Fame ballot breakdown of the season, published mere hours before the voting results were announced, I noted that I wouldn't be at all surprised if the JAWS-approved slate of seven candidates�Roberto Alomar, Bert Blyleven Barry Larkin, Edgar Martinez, Mark McGwire, Tim Raines, and Alan Trammell�were shut out, while Andre Dawson gained election. Well, that's exactly what happened. Dawson had received more than 65 percent of the vote on each of the previous two ballots, and surged to the forefront with 77.9 percent of the vote, enough to gain admission. Though Dawson falls fairly short on the JAWS scale, his election is not a travesty, or at least not a garment-rending travesty on the order of Jim Rice's election last year. He was far from a one-dimensional player in his prime, he piled up hardware and other honors, and despite his injuries, he played into his early forties. Still, his hackstastic ways�camouflaged a bit by a higher intentional walk total than I gave him credit for in my writeup�leave him with the lowest career OBP (.323) of any enshrined outfielder, 20 points lower than the previous low man, Lou Brock. He is not, as I incorrectly claimed on a pair of radio hits yesterday, the owner of the lowest OBP of any Hall of Famer: Player OBP Bill Mazeroski .299 Joe Tinker .308 Luis Aparicio .311 Monte Ward .314 Rabbit Maranville .318 Brooks Robinson .322 Andre Dawson .323 On the other hand, Dawson now holds the distinction of owning the worst strikeout-to-unintentional-walk ratio of any Hall hitter: Player PA OBP BB IBB K K/UBB Andre Dawson 10769 .323 589 143 1509 3.38 Willie Stargell 9026 .360 937 227 1936 2.73 Lou Brock 11235 .343 761 124 1730 2.72 Roberto Clemente 10212 .359 621 167 1230 2.71 Orlando Cepeda 8695 .350 588 154 1169 2.69 Kirby Puckett 7831 .360 450 85 965 2.64 Tony Perez 10861 .341 925 150 1867 2.41 Jim Rice 9058 .352 670 77 1423 2.40 Ernie Banks 10395 .330 763 198 1236 2.19 Reggie Jackson 11416 .356 1375 164 2597 2.14 Bill Mazeroski 8379 .299 447 110 706 2.09 Carlton Fisk 9853 .341 849 105 1386 1.86 So there's that. But my point really isn't to knock the Hawk, a player whose career I enjoyed to a great degree during its day ,and one whose candidacy wasn't surrounded by the type of intellectual dishonesty that poisoned the latter-day Rice debate. I'm sure the next time I visit Cooperstown, I'll stop and give his plaque a nod.

Later