hall of fame, next vote...

oh damn Larry Walker made it!

Jeter one shy of unanimous lmao

Really happy about Walker. Was anyone closer on their last year?

COMPLETE VOTING TOTALS

Derek Jeter: 396 votes (99.7 percent)

Larry Walker: 304 (76.6)

Curt Schilling: 278 (70.0

Roger Clemens: 242 (61.0)

Barry Bonds: 241 (60.7)

Omar Vizquel: 209 (52.6)

Scott Rolen: 140 (35.3)

Billy Wagner: 126 (31.7)

Gary Sheffield: 121 (30.5)

Todd Helton: 116 (29.2)

Manny Ramírez: 112 (28.2)

Jeff Kent 109: (27.5)

Andruw Jones: 77 (19.4)

Sammy Sosa: 55 (13.9)

Andy Pettitte: 45 (11.3)

Bobby Abreu: 22 (5.5)

Paul Konerko: 10 (2.5)

Jason Giambi: 6 (1.5)
Alfonso Soriano: 6 (1.5)

Eric Chávez: 2 (0.5)
Cliff Lee: 2 (0.5)

Adam Dunn: 1 (0.3)
Brad Penny: 1 (0.3)
Raúl Ibañez: 1 (0.3)
J.J. Putz: 1 (0.3)

Josh Beckett: 0
Heath Bell: 0
Chone Figgins: 0
Rafael Furcal: 0
Carlos Peña: 0
Brian Roberts: 0
José Valverde: 0

Schilling has to be a shoo-in for 2021--Hudson and Buehrle are the WAR leaders coming onto the ballot, and there are no non-PED guys close behind him. Maybe he could help his case by not talking for the next 12 months.

Paul Konerko: 10 (2.5)
Jason Giambi: 6 (1.5)
Alfonso Soriano: 6 (1.5)
Adam Dunn: 1 (0.3)

Certainly not advocating for any of these guys, but that's a lot of HR for 23 votes.

That's cute; Larry Walker says remember on old 45s "where you didn't know the song on the other side? ...I'm the B-side" to Jeter.

— Susan Slusser (@susanslusser) January 21, 2020

Rolen, Sheffield, and Wagner basically doubled last year's vote%. Helton came close to that. Jones had a good gain but was only up to 19%. Sosa, Pettitte, Kent, Ramirez not making the necessary moves quite yet. Vizquel is.

Not counting out Schilling, in terms of saying something incredibly stupid.

who fuckin voted for jj putz

Hopefully the one who didn’t vote for Jeter.

we've been willing Larry's election for a few years now, good job all around to the ILB team.

yeah we're on a roll with blyleven/rock/edgar

I guess Lou Whitaker takes his place next in that line (Schilling would have been if he weren't Curt Schilling).

Check that--I guess it's Rolen, Whitaker having moved on to the Veteran's Committee.

Whoever left Jeter off is my hero. Sending a gift basket if I ever get his name.

Walker is 2nd Canadian HOFer after Fergie Jenkins.

Whoever left Jeter off is a selfish prick who doesn’t take his job seriously

I’m sure he’ll get all the attention he’s so desperately hoping for

hahaha <3 Hadrian, you Bronx tool

went to check sardell's projections right after the totals came out (he was most accurate last year) and with a few exceptions he got ridiculously close

https://twitter.com/sarsdell/status/121975042238827724

fuckin twitter

here

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EO1si0SX4AE4aBp.jpg

Walker is 2nd Canadian HOFer after Fergie Jenkins.
― jaymc

And first to have played for a Canadian team.

Remember there were three people who didn’t vote for Griffey. I woulda bet my life savings that he’d be the first unanimous one.

jeter was my fav athlete growing up and I think coming one vote short is pretty funny

iirc b-ref's sean forman said he was not voting for jeter for strategic reasons -- he'd have done so had he not been limited to 10. dunno if he changed his mind, but whatever, it's fine

Jetes was never my favorite Yankee and I guess it is kind of funny but also come on

What a moment for Larry Walker 🇨🇦❤️ pic.twitter.com/o8tW3SH2ea

— Offside (@OffsideDH) January 22, 2020

I love how the guy begins "I'm calling to let you know that you did not..."--cruel!

iirc b-ref's sean forman said he was not voting for jeter for strategic reasons -- he'd have done so had he not been limited to 10. dunno if he changed his mind, but whatever, it's fine

― mookieproof, Tuesday, January 21, 2020 10:19 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

forman's ballot was public, he voted for him

Ok here it is.

Decided I couldn’t take the heat dropping Jeter. #notproud

Decided to add Sosa, 8th year and needs votes.

10 vote limit casualties: schilling and Sheffield maybe in future.

This was difficult.

My process: https://t.co/depiSNfnpx

CC: @NotMrTibbs pic.twitter.com/UOwnXEkfeo

— Sean Forman (@sean_forman) December 30, 2019

Really happy for Walker. He was polling at 10% six years ago and trending downward. The first few ballots he appeared on were the most crowded ones ever, but still, it's an amazing comeback.

two years from now it's gonna be a wild one: last year on the ballot for Bonds, Clemens, and Sosa (would be for Schilling but i assume enough voters will be holding their noses and checking his name next year and he'll get in). plus the first year on the ballot for A-Rod and Ortiz.

three years from now it'll be Kent's last year and Beltran's first.

four years: Beltre, Mauer, Utley debut. Sheffield's last.

five years: Ichiro, Sabathia...?

i think one thing (but not the only thing) that really hammers Sheffield's chances is the fact that he was seen as a bit of a nomad or maybe less generously a mercenary. he played for eight teams and didn't last more than iirc five w/any of them, and therefore doesn't have the same narrative as he would have if he'd stuck with one team (or even 2-3 teams). but everywhere the guy went, from his batting title season w/San Diego to the first half of his first season w/Detroit, he hit the shit out of the ball.

somehow i thought we were still waiting for chipper to become eligible : /

time keeps on slippin

Jay--Saw Ted Simmons over the weekend. He repeatedly and effusively thanked the analytics community for, as he said, "bringing him back to life" as a Hall of Fame candidate. Trying to make sure everybody hears that.

— Bill James Online (@billjamesonline) January 22, 2020

here are the (non-PED tainted, non-gambling*) guys on the outside looking in, showing their all-time rank by bWAR.

Some of these guys will never become the next cause célèbre, obviously. i know Pettitte and Brown had some smoke around them w/r/t PED use but i think for the former it's never come into play since it was a murkier situation than others iirc and he doesn't seem like a dick, he's just a guy who seems to fall short. Brown was amazing but also does in fact seem like a dick which is probably why he didn't even get to 5%.

65. Curt Schilling (20) 79.5
72. Jim McCormick (10) 76.2
74. Bill Dahlen (21) 75.4
78. Lou Whitaker (19) 75.1
92. Bobby Grich (17) 71.1
100. Scott Rolen (17) 70.2
106. Rick Reuschel (19) 69.5
118. Kenny Lofton (17) 68.3
120. Graig Nettles (22) 68.0
124. Kevin Brown (19) 67.8
126. Dwight Evans (20) 67.1
130. Tony Mullane (13) 66.5
133. Buddy Bell (18) 66.3
136. Luis Tiant (19) 66.0
137. Willie Randolph (18) 65.9
143. Reggie Smith (17) 64.6
156. Ken Boyer (15) 62.8
Andruw Jones (17) 62.8
161. David Cone (17) 62.3
167. Jack Glasscock (17) 61.6
168. Sal Bando (16) 61.5
Tommy John (26) 61.5
172. Todd Helton (17) 61.2
173. Tommy Bond (10) 60.9
175. Charlie Buffinton (11) 60.7
Willie Davis (18) 60.7
Wes Ferrell (15) 60.7
180. Jim Edmonds (17) 60.4
Keith Hernandez (17) 60.4
185. Andy Pettitte (18) 60.2
189. Bobby Abreu (18) 60.0

*maybe some of the old timers were gamblers? idk. there are some 19th century cats on this list.

Reuschel is a dude who should get a Blyleven-esque second look, he was an incredible pitcher who didn't wind up on an actual good team for a full season until he was 40 years old, if i'm researching correctly. he was one of those supremely unathletic-looking soft tossers who didn't inspire much fear but who got the job done. a better pitcher than Jack Morris, but one with a more tepid mustache and worse teams behind him.

Lofton should be in the HOF, i think. he's another guy whose traveling ways cost him. he did spend 10 years w/Cleveland but he also played for ten other teams, playing no more than 129 games for any one of them (that was w/the Dodgers in 2006). and even w/Cleveland it wasn't ten consecutive seasons, he had a season in Atlanta bookended by 5 and 4 seasons with CLE, and then finished his career w/52 games with them in 2007.

Grich was one of the (if not the very first) early preoccupations of Bill James; I do think he'll hit right with the Veteran's Committee one year. I think Whitaker will get in for sure, Lofton and Evans probably, Reuschel maybe. I don't think Luis Tiant or David Cone will, although I'd personally put them in ahead of Reuschel. (Tiant's maybe my favourite guy on the whole list, but then I'm one of those simpletons who's swayed by nostalgia.)

Sal Bando and Buddy Bell and Graig Nettles (and Boyer, I suppose) are a category unto themselves; maybe Rolen will open the door for at least one of them.

My own sense is that Grich/Whitaker/Evans/Tiant (maybe).

Cone was a great pitcher who had some poor luck by peaking in KC, and during the strike, which cost him 200+ wins. Plus an injury a bit after that. Regardless he likely would’ve suffered the same fate as Brown (a pretty similar pitcher in some respects tho Brown was better). Though he’d also have cleared the slightly more *~~magical~~* 70+ bwar threshold with a bit more time.

Those third basemen are to an extent the poor man’s Santo, who is the old man’s Rolen.

i know Pettitte and Brown had some smoke around them w/r/t PED use

According to pages 215-217 of the Mitchell Report, both of these guys were turned in by Kirk Radomski with validated purchasing receipts and signature tracking shipments of vast quantities of HGH.

...but to your point, maybe they just bought it to collect it or save it for a rainy day or what have you.

(nevermind, Randomski testified under oath he injected Pettite with HGH)

Oh yeah I guess Kirk snitched on those guys too I remembered some Pettitte thing with “injury recovery” used as an excuse, and he was very “ashamed” iirc. Obviously never did it before that, very out of character, etc.

I think Cone came out about even for the strike year in terms of his HOF résumé : you're right, it may have cost him 200 wins (although he would've needed 22 on the year), but he eked out a Cy Young that he could very well have lost to Johnson or Key or Mussina if the season had played out.

guys andy pettitte was just trying to get healthy so he could help the team

For just those two days out of his whole entire life.

from that list, grich and whittaker should already be in

i will fight for lofton and evans

i will root for reuschel, the only decent thing about some truly horrible mid-80s pirates teams

It would have been great if Big Daddy's comeback started in Chicago in '84, they could have used him and with a good Reuschel in the rotation, they might have won it all.

The baseball play I would have loved to have seen and I guess there is no video of is that Jim Abbott hit a triple off Big Daddy in spring training.

Reuschel looked like the ringer pitcher on any Indiana slow pitch softball team in the 80s. For authenticity, you know they are good if they are wearing work boots on the field.

Grich and Lofton should 100% be in. The case for Grich is stronger, but Grich was a little before my time so I feel more emotionally engaged with the case for Lofton.

Lofton's career box is kind of amazing: 10 years in Cleveland (two tours), exactly one year with 10 other teams. Not saying it should--I think he was far more a player that teams always wanted rather than wanted to get rid of--but I'm sure that's a big part of what's holding him back.