Results tagged ‘ jack Morris ’

2012 Hall of Fame Recap

 

As expected, the BBWAA elected just one player to be enshrined into baseball’s Hall of Fame.

 

Congrats to Barry Larkin. He was a deserving candidate and I’m happy to see him get the required number of votes. Larkin and Ron Santo, elected posthumously by the veterans committee, will be enshrined this coming July.

 

Jack Morris received the second highest vote total.  66.7% of the voters thought that he was worthy of the HOF. It was the largest percentage he has every received in his 13 years on the ballot, but short of the 75% needed for election.

 

Jeff Bagwell and Lee Smith were next with 56% and 50.6% respectively. It represented an increase in vote totals for both players.

 

If there is any good news for Morris, Bagwell, and Smith; it’s that every player except one (Gil Hodges) that has ever topped the 50% mark has eventually made it into the Hall.

 

It was disappointing to see Tim Raines (48.7%), Alan Trammel (36.8%), and Edgar Martinez (36.5%) garner such little support; especially Raines, a guy that should be in already.

 

And as has been the case the past few years, the writers said no to the PED’s crowd with Mark McGwire (19.8%) and Rafael Palmeiro (11.0%) falling far short.

 

Next year’s ballot should be very interesting with first time nominees Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Sammy Sosa, Mike Piazza, Craig Biggio, and Curt Shilling. But that’s a discussion for another time, so…..

 

Congrats to 2012 HOFers Barry Larkin and Ron Santo

 

 

You can read my HOF ballot predictions HERE.

 

 

2012 Hall of Fame Ballot Part I

 

Each year the Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA) holds its annual election for the purpose of electing members into the Baseball Hall of Fame.

 

That sentence is almost verbatim right out of the HOF election rules. However, I’m not in the BBWAA so I don’t have to play by their rules. I don’t have to seal my ballot, I don’t have to wait until next week, I don’t even have to limit myself to the names on the official ballot; so here is my 2012 Hall of Fame ballot.

 

Barry Larkin: This is a no-brainer. No really, anyone not voting for this guy has no brain. The fact that Larkin only received 62% of the vote last year tells me just how out of touch the writers are when it comes to HOF voting. Larkin is one of the top 10 best offensive shortstops of all-time. I don’t want to get heavy into numbers during this post, but some need to be posted to make a point. Larkin’s career Wins above Replacement (WAR) is 68.9. That’s 8th all-time among shortstops. Throw in 3 Gold Gloves, 10 All-Star games, 9 Silver Slugger Awards, and 1 MVP Award and Barry Larkin is as rock solid of a hall of famer as anyone.

 

Jack Morris: No. Look, I get that he pitched one of the best games in World Series history. I could make a solid argument that it was the greatest game pitched in the WS. But one game doesn’t get you in. The guy wasn’t dominating during his career. His biggest problem, his 3.90 career ERA.  That would be the highest of any pitcher in the hall. His career ERA+ is 105. To put that in perspective, AJ Burnett is at 105, Kevin Millwood is at 107, Barry Zito is at 111! And yes I know that somebody has to have the highest ERA, but you gotta make up for that in some other way. You need 300+ wins or 3,000 K’s, Morris just doesn’t have them.

 

Lee Smith: I was a no for a while, but I’ve changed my mind. Yes, Lee Smith is a Hall of Fame worthy pitcher. Over the years we have had a hard time placing the reliever into the overall picture of baseball history, mainly because the position has evolved more than any other in the game. And because of that, we’ve had difficulty quantifying what the value of a reliever and the stat now most identified with his position, the save, is worth. First let’s just look at the raw number, 478 saves, that is 3rd all-time. But go beyond that, he is 5th all-time in WAR for any pitcher that has pitched 80% or more of their games in relief. He is 9th all-time in ERA+ for relievers with 1000 or more innings pitched (better than Fingers or Gossage). When it comes to relief pitchers, Lee Smith should go in.

 

Parts II and III to come…………….

 

 

Stats Lie????


Did anyone get to watch the MLB Network’s coverage of the
HOF announcement yesterday? They had multiple guests and commentators on the
show talking about all the Hall candidates before the actual announcement of
the inductees.

 

They profiled most of the top candidates for Hall entrance and
then gave opinions about whether the player should be in or not. Then they also
talked about players that have been on the list for a while but were not likely
to gain entrance. Some of the commentators were allowed to “plead” the case for
some of these players. It was during this segment that I heard something that I
thought was ……strange/odd/curious.

 

Peter Gammons was talking about Jack Morris. Please forgive
me because I don’t remember the exact quote. But he basically said something
along the lines that the internet (and by extension, Sabrmetrics) doesn’t do Jack Morris
justice, that you had to see him pitch, had to know his leadership on the
field. It seemed to me that he was suggesting that some of the newer voters may
have been just using Morris’ stats against him.

 

An excellent example of the kind of stats being held against
Morris can be found in a wonderfully written piece found Here by one of the
newer members of MLBlogs, Baseballpedia. I suggest you read this post when you
have a chance.

 

But is the new “Sabrmetric” voter holding back players like
Morris?

 

I think……No. In fact, I think it’s the other way around.

 

Jack Morris first became eligible for HOF voting in 2000.
His vote percentage that year, 22.2%. Over the next four more years his totals
ranged from 19.6% to 26.3%. If anything, I think it was during this early
period of voting on Morris that people were applying the “eye test” that
Gammons seemed to think was crucial for Morris’ case. It’s only been in the
subsequent years after sites like Baseball Reference have come along that have made
stat comparisons and research easier, that Morris’ vote totals have rose.

 

I think the same can be said of Bert Blyleven. Blyleven’s
HOF voting totals bounced around between 14% and 35% for the first 7 years of
his eligibility. It wasn’t until 2005 that Blyleven jumped above the 40% mark
on his eventual climb to yesterdays HOF election.

 

In my mind, there is no doubt that the power of stat
research (Sabrmetrics) and the internet are the sole reason that Blyleven made
his richly deserved assent to the top of the baseball world yesterday. And why
Morris probably never will.

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