Steroids, designated hitters, defensive wizards, crowded ballots, and protest ballots are all coloring the decision for the 2018 Baseball Hall of Fame class.
The inductees to this year's class will be officially announced on January 24. A handful of sportswriters have made public their ballots, though, and the debate on who is to be elected is afoot.
Whatever happened to the days of just voting for the best (former) players?
Steroid usage -- proven or otherwise -- is something weighing heavily on minds of writers and fans alike. Those firmly against will say these players tarnished the game, they cheated to get ahead, they have no integrity.
On the other side of the coin, it's easy to argue that players such as Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens were already on the trajectory for hall of fame careers. Players such as Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa might have had a more difficult time in one day being voted in.
Placing ten players on the ballot is the limit. You want to put only Omar Vizquel and Jim Thome on the ballot because you're a Cleveland writer? Fine, but at least do a top-five. I find it kind of hard to believe out of all the eligible players, even with the steroid debate mixed in, there are people who only think two players are worthy.
There are valuable points on both sides of the debate. In the end, much of what is debated is subjective. Notably, the argument of "so and so" only excelled in one area. That same could be said on a whole variety of those already in the hall of fame. He only hit home runs. This pitcher only had a lot of saves. This guy only hit triples.
Which brings us to Vizquel and Edgar Martinez.
The Edgar Martinez and Omar Vizquel conundrum
Both Martinez and Vizquel are being knocked for being "only" a designated hitter (Martinez) or excelling on defense (Vizquel).
Martinez was one of the better hitters of his generation. The specialized function holding him back is, as a designated hitter, all he had to worry about was hitting. During the course of his career, Martinez won a couple of batting titles, had 309 home runs, 2,247 hits, 514 doubles, had a .933 OPS, and hit .312 for his career, with a high of .356 in 1995.
He was part of a great run of Seattle Mariner teams in the mid-90's to early aughts. Martinez also made seven all-star appearances and finished in the A.L. MVP voting top-10 twice. Oh, and he had a career .952 fielding percentage (in 1,672 career chances)
Vizquel, meanwhile, really was a defensive wizard. In 24 seasons of professional baseball, Vizquel only committed 183 errors. He finished with a career fielding percentage of .985.
The shortstop was a stalwart of the powerhouse Cleveland Indian teams of the 1990's. He did collect 2,877 hits but only hit .272 (notably, 10 points higher than hall of famer Ozzie Smith). Vizquel made three all-star games, but most importantly, took home 11 Gold Gloves.
A crowded 2018 class
Gaining entry into Cooperstown is saved for being the best of the best. Back in the day, this might have been an easier process. Writers might have gone only off box scores or seeing the players live while relying very little on television highlights. The stats were right in front of them and perhaps more cut and dry in who got in and who got out.
Different ideas of is great and who isn't worthy has taken on different thoughts over the years. Maybe Vizquel is worthy because of all the top-10 highlights we've attributed him to. Or we remember a key playoff home run or bloody sock incident to cement greatness in the legacy of our minds.
This year's class has a whole host of players. Bonds. Clemens. Vizquel. Martinez. Curt Schilling. Chipper Jones. Andruw Jones. Jeff Kent, Carlos Zambrano, Billy Wagner and Trevor Hoffman are just a few of the many names on the 2018 Hall of Fame ballot.
There will be some very good players who may never appear on a ballot again after this year due to not receiving the required votes.
In deciding who I would vote for (in playing the "if I were a baseball writer" game), I would honestly have a pretty old school approach by using the basic stats that have been used for a long while. Wins. Losses. Home runs. Batting average. All-Star appearances (though this can be skewed as well). Awards.
I do not believe in WAR. I see its usefulness but am not a fervent believer in it, as I am with most of these new age stats used as barometers. Especially when using these stats to apply to players retroactively. Have we gone back and looked at the saves category for prior to when it was an official stat? Maybe there is a pitcher out there who has tons of saves who is not in the hall of fame. If we haven't done this, I'd like to have that job. You hear me Elias Sports Bureau. (And if someone has already done this, I apologize. Keep up the good work.)
That being said, here is my top-10. Martinez makes it this year while Vizquel does not. I do think the shortstop deserves the nod one day though it may never happen and if it does, it might be a veteran committee choice.
- Barry Bonds
- Roger Clemens
- Chipper Jones
- Trevor Hoffman
- Vladimir Guerrero
- Jim Thome
- Edgar Martinez
- Larry Walker
- Jeff Kent
- Mike Mussina
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