Oh man, I’m totally losing my memory in my middle age. Thanks for the reminder.
Like I said upthread, the PED stuff has just never bothered me that much. Everyone is looking for an edge, and has since the beginning of the game.
2022 Hall of Fame Class
- Thread starter E5 Yaz
- Start date
Like I said upthread, the PED stuff has just never bothered me that much. Everyone is looking for an edge, and has since the beginning of the game.
PEDs or no, are we all going to pretend the Mindy McCready stuff didn't happen with regard to Clemens and the character clause?
You mean the thing no one brings up or has cared about in forever? Yea, that's going to get ignored.
There's nothing like this issue to bring out cognitive dissonance, selective memory, and FanBoi-ism. A-Rod confessed to the feds to using PEDs for 3 years with TX, including HGH. Story broke in 2009. Then he said he for sure didn't do it with the Yankees. . .until Biogenesis.
He does not deserve the benefit of the doubt at all.
Feb 9, 2009, ESPN
His voice shaking at times, Alex Rodriguez met head-on allegations that he tested positive for steroids six years ago, telling ESPN on Monday that he did take performance-enhancing drugs while playing for the Texas Rangers during a three-year period beginning in 2001.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=994hkVav5qM
He does not deserve the benefit of the doubt at all.
Feb 9, 2009, ESPN
His voice shaking at times, Alex Rodriguez met head-on allegations that he tested positive for steroids six years ago, telling ESPN on Monday that he did take performance-enhancing drugs while playing for the Texas Rangers during a three-year period beginning in 2001.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=994hkVav5qM
Trivia question that I don't have an answer for: Is Lincecum the first multi Cy winner (back to back too) who didn't get 5% on the their first ballot?
Ortiz had a maybe test in 2003 without a confirmation. He denied using. His career had no odd blips. That's the whole scope of the scandal.
I can't say he used. . .but I'm open to the possibility. But that's all it is - a possibility.
Bring me more data and I may well change my mind on that.
Its happened more than you might think. Denny Mclain got a handful (like literally 1 to 3) in the three years he was on the ballot - the 5% thing was adopted in 1978 and then he was gone. Bret Saberhagen got 7 votes (1.3%) in 2007. Johan Santana got only 10 votes (2.4%) in 2018.
It’s brutal what the wear and tear of pitching can rob from a great.
Thanks Phillip Jeff Frye for the response.
Baseball is filled with such high and short-lived peaks, I'd imagine that you could stat up a very good team made up of the peak seasons of guys who didn't make the HOF.
Even excluding Bonds and Clemens from that sort of club, it would be interesting to see the Best HOF players best years, stacked against the second-best seasons of non-hall guys. (Bonus if they never cracked 5%.)
For example - Saberhagen, while not his best by ERA+, Saberhagen's second-best season was.
1985 20-6, ERA 2.87, K 158, BB 38, WHIP 1.015. Bref WAR: 7.1
Maybe that's a good time-killer if we don't get some movement on the CBA.
I'm not defending Roger Clemens, but the worst parts of the McCready story were reported only by a New York tabloid. And McCready herself later disavowed the most serious allegations, basically turning the entire story into a plain, vanilla (albeit still a bit creepy and slimy) extra-marital affair. And the HoF/BBWAA are never going to bother vetting candidates based on adultery accusations for a whole host of obvious reasons.
Unfortunately, McCready was obviously struggling with real demons that ended up costing her life, so we'll probably never really know for certain which, if any, of the allegations were true. Again, not defending Clemens, but the situation is a lot more complicated than people simply ignoring the story.
I was living in the Bay Area during his prime. Even then people were doubting that due to his size and max-effort delivery that he wasn’t going to last.
I feel bad for Manny. He isn't A-Rod/Bonds/Clemens, so he won't be held up as an example of PED's keeping a great player out of the Hall of Fame, so he will just kind of fade away. Maybe the most naturally gifted hitter I've ever seen; could have an OPS over 1.000 without looking like he was trying.
Yup. He's not an inner circle level guy like those 3, but statistically (and his story, at least before 2009, is excellent) he should be a stone cold lock. Per JAWS he's the 10th best LF of all-time, and Pete Rose is the only LF ahead of him not in the HOF. A 14 year prime when he averaged .317/.414/.599 and was a playoff monster (1st all-time in HRs and BBs). 12 time all-star and top 10 in MVP voting 9 times, plus a WS MVP. I imagine he (along with ARod) will get a lot more discussion in the future now that Bonds/Clemens have dropped off the list. For better or worse, the latter two were never caught and punished for their cheating. There will be people who argue that Manny and Arod were caught and punished already.
My HoF voting pet peeve are writers who vote for Sheffield and not Manny. I know that Manny has two busts on his record, but unless I'm remembering wrong, Sheffield admitted to using the cream (or the clear) when training with Bonds and was tied to BALCO. He also claimed not to know what he was putting on his body, which is probably bullshit.
And BTW, I think that both players should sail into the Hall of Fame. Sheffield, to me, was the scariest masher on those Yankee teams. And I'm sure the same could be said about Manny by Yankee fans.
And BTW, I think that both players should sail into the Hall of Fame. Sheffield, to me, was the scariest masher on those Yankee teams. And I'm sure the same could be said about Manny by Yankee fans.
Yeah, it's just that I feel like players like Manny (and Sheffield, Palmeiro, Sosa to an extent, even McGwire) are in this gray area where we know why they aren't getting in, but because Clemens/Bonds and now A-Rod have been the mascots for the PED guys not getting into the Hall, that second tier of players, some of whom are really all-time great performers who in another era would have been celebrated and cherished, are just kind of going to fade away. The lesser-superstars of a tainted era.
I understand why this has happened and you can say that those guys cheated and don't deserved to be remembered or cherished, but it's hard having watched Manny player every day for so many games to think that in a decade or two he isn't going to be remembered as a legendary player.
How does not being elected to the Hall of Fame mean he's not remembered? Being enshrined is an honor for players selected. Those who aren't still have the historical record they've always had and will be remembered as such. Manny is still the guy who crushed baseballs, cut off throws from 25 feet away, and high fived fans when he made catches. Being in or out doesn't change that.
And contrary to popular opinion among those who have clearly never been to Cooperstown, people who aren't elected are still well represented in the building. You can walk through there and see Bonds' bat, Schilling's sock, Manny's filthy helmet, and Pete Rose's jersey. You just won't see a plaque in the big room at the end (when you're probably too tired to look particularly closely). It's not like the people running the museum are pretending the steroid guys never existed.
There is a difference between happened with Sheffield (and Clemens/Bonds) and what happened with Arod/Manny. I don't know if being actually caught and punished is better or worse than everyone knowing they cheated without penalty (during their playing days), but there is a difference.
Agree with you on Sheffield, he was always terrifying, but I think his real issue isn't PEDs, it's that he doesn't have a constituency. 6 years with the Marlins, 4 with the Dodgers and Brewers, 3 with the Yankees, 2 with the Braves, Padres and Tigers and 1 with the Mets...does any group of fans or writers really about his candidacy? I guess it would be the Marlins (not only did he spend the most time there, it should have been his prime years and he won a WS title with them), but they are perhaps the weakest fan base in the league and he made the AS team just twice as a Marlin (and the first time, he had only been on the team for about 3 weeks before the AS game). Without any PEDs link I think he'd be a tough sell just because no one cares. Has any HOF'er been as transient as Sheffield?
Manny and Ortiz were pretty much equally dangerous and clutch, the reason you feared Sheffield more than A-Rod is that A-Rod quite often let his two cent head get in the way of his billion dollar skills, especially in the clutch.
Matsui was also in the category of the bigger the AB, the more dangerous he was, but by the time he got to the US, he wasn't quite in the same league as those other guys.
I think it's important to keep the museum and the Hall separate. Yes, all these players are remembered and even honored by their inclusion in the museum. Enshrinement in the Hall is a different thing. It's an individual honor, not unlike an MVP or a Cy Young. Sometimes the best or the most notable players don't win the awards. Doesn't mean they weren't good or won't be remembered.
It's true. I mean, I guess that's what's so confounding about this whole process, right? Manny and ARod were busted, they "paid" for their transgression. Bonds, Clemens, etc. were never caught, but they all were "known" to have done PEDs, but they never paid for their sins. And then you have players like Piazza and Bagwell, who looked like the juiced (one sportswriter--I forget which one--seemed to be obsessed with Piazza's back acne as proof) and flew in without a problem. And then you have people who were complicit in this mess like Selig and LaRussa, among others; whom no one gives a crap about. Baseball has fucked this up since Day One and it's no surprise that 500 writers can't agree on what to do.
I was listening to EEI last night and the overnight host (Mutnansky) was screaming that the Cooperstown needs to put whether a player is a PED abuser or not. I think Jeff Passen wrote the same column yesterday. I don't think that that's the right answer either.
Ultimately I think that the right answer is that most fans know which shitty thing that a ball player did and it doesn't need to be on a plaque celebrating his achievements. Cap Anson stopped playing ball almost 95 years before I was born and I know that he's a racist piece of shit. Shoeless Joe hasn't played since 1920 and we know about him. Babe Ruth was a drunk. Ty Cobb and Rogers Hornsby, not exactly the nicest guy around. Whitey Ford used to cut baseballs, Gaylord Perry spit on them and 90% of the players from the 60s on were on speed.
My point is that no one walks into Cooperstown not knowing who these men are and what they did (on and off the field), it sorta angers me that baseball writers consider us all idiots.
You can add Paul O'Neil to that list too. If you just think about those lineups for a minute, those Sox and Yankees teams were just stacked. I'm honestly surprised that a game from 2004 isn't still going on right now.
I'm not sure how much of this is actually true, but isn't the common thinking that a certain generation of writers have a lot of spite for the PED guys of the 90s/2000s because they were juicing right under their noses and they either looked the other way, or were totally ignorant to it? That would be the difference between the 60s and 70s guys on speed or greenies, and the Bonds/Clemens/McGwire/Sosa class. These writers feel personally betrayed by the athletes.
I saw something on Twitter either last night or this morning (so I can't remember who it was) saying that of the writers who've gotten their voting eligibility in the last five years, Bonds and Clemens were on something like 86% of their ballots. Whoever tweeted that was making the argument that it's the old-school guys who are gumming up the works and they changed the rules (15 years to 10 years) just to ensure that the newer guys wouldn't be able to outnumber them and vote Bonds and Clemens in before they fell off the ballot.
Most, if not all, of these guys will get in by the veterans committee, one would think. That said, I'm a little shocked Palmeiro was never put in given he was guilty of only the same transgressions... and lying to Congress.
Palmeiro's biggest problem baseball-wise is that while he was a very good hitter for a long time, he never had the requisite outstanding MVP-quality season or two that most such hitters have. Highest he ever got in the MVP voting race was fifth, during a year in which offensive numbers were vastly inflated across the league, with the exception of the games Pedro pitched. He wasn't an outstanding fielder at first base by any means. And he toiled for a number of bad Texas and Baltimore teams, only reaching the post-season 3 times, never once reaching the World Series. HIs power didn't really turn on until his age 26 season, although some of that may have been due to the fact he played half his early career games in that horrible death stadium (aka, pre-Ballpark) in Arlington. And he has an association with Canseco.
Fairly or not, he became one of the faces of the PED era with his Congressional testimony, and the fact he perjured himself did nothing to help his cause. The reality is that all of these things matter, and will continue to do so until and unless the Hall decides that PED use should be ignored completely when evaluating candidates.
I'm not convinced the Modern Era Committee votes will be as easy as gain as some think. There are a lot of procedural hurdles, and the voting process is completely opaque. And the Baines selection is proof that the committee members do not really care what anyone thinks of their decisions.
Last edited:
Or, at least when THAT is the moment you are remembered most for, rather than an on-field one, you have much more to overcome.
Palmeiro was definitely a very good player, maybe even Hall worthy. But yeah, he’s literally only remembered for the finger wag and winning a Gold Glove while playing like 25 games in the field. Not gonna help.
He's one of only six players in the 500 homer/3,000 hits club. By the numbers alone, he's a first-ballot HoF.
I agree with this sentiment. He's got the numbers but gosh he's a forgettable great hitter.
I really, really enjoyed this piece from The Ringer - The Uniquely Confounding Career of Curt Schilling.
It focuses on Schilling's early career being passed around from team to team.
It focuses on Schilling's early career being passed around from team to team.
He compiled those numbers by being good for a really long time, but never being great. Steroids help defy normal aging curves and Palmeiro had 169 of his homers and 699 from his age 36-40 seasons. If longevity is his only Hall of Fame qualification, I don't see how he's much different than Sammy Sosa, who also has a single Hall of Fame qualification that people attribute to steroids.
This may have already been posted, but I haven't seen it here: Pedroia thinks Manny should not be in the Hall:
https://www.masslive.com/redsox/2022/01/dustin-pedroia-doesnt-think-ex-red-sox-teammate-manny-ramirez-should-get-into-hall-of-fame-obviously-theres-rules.html
https://www.masslive.com/redsox/2022/01/dustin-pedroia-doesnt-think-ex-red-sox-teammate-manny-ramirez-should-get-into-hall-of-fame-obviously-theres-rules.html
The lede of the linked article: "Dustin Pedroia was thrilled to see former Red Sox teammate David Ortiz be elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame on Tuesday, but he doesn’t think Manny Ramirez should join Ortiz in Cooperstown."
That's Rosenthal talking/characterizing. I want to actually see if Dustin says "Manny" or "Ramirez" himself.
All Pedroia said is he's [Manny] "one of a kind"
All Pedroia said is he's [Manny] "one of a kind"
Did you watch the video too? At the 5:21 mark, Rosenthal asks the question that is quoted in the article about whether Pedroia sees Manny as a Hall of Famer or in a second category ("great but...") and Pedroia says it's the second category.
View: https://youtu.be/-GA_4xXu2zU?t=321
The quote is no doubt in response to Ken Rosenthal's question about Manny. So the headline is accurate. Go to the 33:00 mark of the video
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KF8ZIo4Ia-U
Edit: beaten to the punch.
In my opinion, Pedey is rather unsophisticated about Schilling. Unless he interprets the morals clause to be limited to wife beating, betting on the games, etc. In my opinion, suggesting that the baseball writers should be hung, with all the resonance in American history of lynching, and a number of other things he's said, go beyond what is acceptable speech. Obviously Pedroia doesn't think so.
I'm sorry if my post seemed too V&N ish. But there are reasons that someone as talented as Schilling is polling so low. We know it's not steroids, which are okay to discuss, so it must be something.
I don't care if folks don't want to talk about it here and will let it go.
I don't care if folks don't want to talk about it here and will let it go.
I don't think it's being political to say that Schilling's second and third careers did not end well for reasons that were pretty much all of his own doing. Even if the voters didn't want to count his more recent statements and actions, there was plenty there before. Add to that his public (if denied) request to be off the ballot this year and a large part of the BBWAA basically probably felt like there he was never an option. He can rest easy knowing the majority voted for him, I guess.