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Well, the commenting has died down on last week’s ballot discussion posts, so without further ado, we present the Pitchers Hit Eighth ballot for the Baseball Bloggers Alliance‘s 2010 Hall of Fame voting (with links leading to our discussion threads for each player.
Roberto Alomar – Robbie was a quick yes vote. His dominance was clear when reviewing the numbers.
Bert Blyleven – We circled Bert.
Andre Dawson – The Hawk makes the cut on our ballot. Josh’s early reminder that Dawson was both quick and slick with the glove made me a quick believer.
Barry Larkin – Larkin was another player who seemed fairly obvious after only a short review of his credentials. One of the greatest shortstops of recent history.
Edgar Martinez – Love the DH or hate it, Edgar Martinez was one of the best in league history. HOF-worthy. (Sorry Josh, the commenters agreed with me!)
Mark McGwire – The new Cardinal hitting coach deserves to be in Cooperstown. If not elected, there will be plenty of other names that also must be removed from consideration in future years.
Tim Raines – Rock was an outstanding leadoff hitter, one of the best of his time.
Lee Smith – As a one-time leader in all-time saves, how is it possible that Smith stays out of the Hall?
Alan Trammell – I must admit I was surprised by his qualifications. Trammell ranks right with his contemporary shortstops, and thus deserves enshrinement.
So there you have it. Nine players of an available ten slots. I wouldn’t normally consider myself a “Big Hall” guy, but I reckon putting together a joint ballot makes it possible for the number of names to balloon quickly. I certainly don’t expect all of these players to make it through on the official vote, but I’m certain their cases will continue as long as their names will remain on the ballot.
Thanks to everyone for following these posts, Josh and I had a great time debating them – and you! – to put together our ballot.
{ 4 comments }
Enjoyed your HoF discussions, and this looks like a nice ballot.
My take, based on nothing but pure bias:
Dawson: If Jim Rice is in, then the Hawk has to go in too, although I don’t think either belong.
McGwire: He’s a gutless turd, but you can’t front on 583 HR, 162 OPS+ or 10.6 AB/HR.
Smith: Love the high K rate and low K/BB and HR/9 ratios. Racking up saves doesn’t impress me, though (too teammate-dependent, as with pitcher wins). And I’m just not a fan of enshrining relievers, save (see what I did there?) for maybe Rich Gossage, who is the all-time leader in FMARP (Fu-Manchu above replacement player).
Thanks Jeff.
Don’t necessarily disagree with you on McGwire, but as I’ve said repeatedly – I have a suspicion that there are going to be some hypocritical voters come time for Bonds, Clemens, et al to be on the ballot.
Smith and Martinez strike me as similar cases. Both very dominant at what they did, lots of folks just disagree with their position being valid.
Yeah, Martinez and Smith are analogous in terms of position. But even as an NL guy, I think a DH does more to help his team than does a reliever if that makes any sense. And I think Martinez belongs.
Sure makes perfect sense. Relievers, although used more frequently, still aren’t going out there every day.
Edgar was a stud.
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