Comments on: Your first blank Hall of Fame protest ballot of the year

By: goirishgo

goirishgo — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 23:55:00 +0000

How is a player more Hall-worthy after an extra year or two or ten of retirement?

By: stlsportsfan84

stlsportsfan84 — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 20:25:40 +0000

Bonds admitted to using steroids, just not “knowingly” using them.

By: moogro

moogro — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 18:52:05 +0000

Maybe the writers should defend each choice on their ballot at the SABR convention, and let the applause meter or the boos be the final filter. Efficient and satisfying. That would be great to see.

By: dirtydrew

dirtydrew — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 17:56:21 +0000

It’s like Lance Armstrong. In a sport where the best are top players are linked to cheating, it is now a safe assumption the greatest performers are also cheating. So when Bonds hits 73 bombs in his late 30′s, it is considered proof of his roid use. He never tested positive, never convicted in court of steroid use of any kind. But even I assume he was roiding. The same standard must be applied to Cal Ripkin and Nolan Ryan, even if there nice guys and Bonds was a jerk. So we either let them in as the greatest players of a tainted generation, or shut it all down. What a joke. All the great players of the last 30 years are questionable when it comes to roids. Not just the black or Latin ones. Or the ones who smiled big like Ken Griffey JR.

By: hisgirlgotburrelled

hisgirlgotburrelled — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 14:09:26 +0000

Between this and Bob Brookover saying Schilling lying to reporters about dipping goes against the character clause, it’s just ridiculous… Blank ballots, not voting for someone one because it’s their first ballot. Yes, this is why you have the vote: we want strict morality police and we want you to intentionally create levels of hall of fameness. Jerk offs.

By: 1historian

1historian — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 12:52:01 +0000

open letter to craig, with thanks to Ann Landers

You have a point, but if you keep your hat on maybe no one will notice

By: albertmn

albertmn — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 04:23:57 +0000

Well, they can only list a max of 10 names on their ballot, so they can’t vote for everyone.

By: albertmn

albertmn — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 04:22:46 +0000

drew – Now, you are just going to throw Ripken (notice the spelling) and Ryan under the bus as steroid users just because they had success late in their career? I haven’t heard any claims of steroid use for those guys previously. You are just on a witch hunt. I’m glad you don’t have a ballot.

By: albertmn

albertmn — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 04:20:48 +0000

wp – Your argument about a blank ballot protecting the integrity would carry more weight if the writer’s ballot was blank because he thought no one deserved to go in. Instead, the writer admits it is just a protest and he doesn’t think it will be blank next year. That is grandstanding and not basing the ballot on merit of the players. He deserves to have his ballot rescinded and to be removed from the list of voters going forward.

By: digbysellers

digbysellers — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 01:16:31 +0000

Gator loves to say gonads. Mike Greenwell wouldn’t approve.

By: bagsy5

bagsy5 — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 23:15:43 +0000

It may be considered watering down pool, but I think it would be hilarious if someone voted for everyone and then made a public statement calling out this schmuck and saying it is a protest of his protest.

By: phillyphannn83

phillyphannn83 — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 22:04:08 +0000

Pot meet Kettle

By: Bob

Bob — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 20:42:23 +0000

That philosophy is ridiculous. A guy is either a Hall of Famer on the first ballot or not at all. It’s one reason Hall voting is such a joke.

By: takingbovadasmoney

takingbovadasmoney — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 19:37:10 +0000

Don’t be so hard on yourself Craig, I don’t think you are that self righteous.

By: vikesfansteve

vikesfansteve — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 19:24:04 +0000

Baseball stats are so skewered towards the era in which a player played and even down to the umpires calling the game. It’s all realtive. During his first few years in baseball Sandy Koufax lost more games than he won. Then from 61-66 he led the league in ERA and had 4 no hitters, a perfect. Game. The 60′s were also considered the golden age for pitchers because of the high mound and widened strike zone. He is a HOF and considered maybe the best pitcher ever for 6 amazing years of dominance. So looking at the HOF based on numbers is too subjective. The umpires have so much to do with the game. Especially how the game is called. If you don’t believe this try watching Ken Burns baseball. It will give you new ways of thinking to determine what player is HOF worthy or not as compared to looking up stats that can be manipulated by many different factors. Apples to oranges, stats and era’s are that different and hard to compare.

By: wpjohnson

wpjohnson — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 18:08:02 +0000

Not on the first ballot.

By: wpjohnson

wpjohnson — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 18:07:06 +0000

The blank ballot does far more to protect the integrity of the Hall of Fame than does a ballot listing ten players of dubious credentials. The Hall doesn’t need any more mediocre players like Jack Morris. It needs only the best of the best and no more “one of the best of the decade” types. There are too many of those pretenders in there now.

By: cur68

cur68 — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 17:46:14 +0000

You are cherry picking what he said. Plenty of HOFers cheated. Many admitted to having done so. No one wants them out of the HOF. As for the rest: character clause. This is an old and tired argument. You are going to have to find something a bit newer and better to refute dirtydrew’s point.

By: somekat

somekat — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 17:17:48 +0000

We beating, cheating, drinking, killing, cocain…..how does any of that effect play on the field? It doesn’t. It’s not the “nicest guys to play the game”, it is the hall of fame. You are in there for what you did on the field, not off of it. What those guys did, on the field, was cheat

By: dirtydrew

dirtydrew — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 15:52:10 +0000

I think it is time to take the votes away from writers. According to them, no one I grew up watching should be in the HOF? Bonds, Clemens, A Rod, Bagwell, Piazza, But ROIDERS like Cal Ripkin and Nolan Ryan are in? That makes no sense. When everyone is cheating, it is hard to believe the guy who never missed a game and had over 400 hr’s, and the guy throwing in the high 90′s at 45 years old were not cheating also. If the writers are using the HOF vote to punish suspected ROIDERS, they have to clear out the HOF. We have wife beaters, adulterers, drunks, murderers, not to mention cocaine and speed abusers in the 60′s and 70′s. If you dominated your era, you deserve to be in. You play when you play, and when these guys played, everyone was using roids. Let me in or close the hall. No hit king ( Pete rose), to hr king in Bonds. Time to fix this or shut it down.

By: Old Gator

Old Gator — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 14:46:24 +0000

You’re too young to be using language like that, and getting into an exchange with you would be forensic statutory rape. Come back when your gonads drop and you can conduct this discussion without squeaking.

By: Old Gator

Old Gator — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 14:44:36 +0000

If you were my age, nobody would want to see yours first either.

By: donaldduckmg42

donaldduckmg42 — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 14:42:27 +0000

I guess Craig Biggio and his 3,000 hits just don’t cut it.

By: Walk

Walk — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 14:04:10 +0000

Oops dog ate my homework, ill do it next year. There has to be someone on the ballot this year he believes is worthy. By not voting for anyone he is not protesting. He is simply stating that it is not worth his time at this point and trying to prove to himself that he is far more important than any player even those that are hof worthy.

By: 4d3fect

4d3fect — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 08:58:17 +0000

yes, believe that’s called peyote.

By: joerymi

joerymi — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 06:27:32 +0000

If a riot breaks out and only a small group of the rioters are scrutinized while other rioters of that riot are let off the hook even though they rioted. And oh yeah, at the time, the rioting was encourage by the same writers that are now condeming the rioting.

What a dopey argument.

By: weaselpuppy

weaselpuppy — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 05:54:33 +0000

Sails/Submarine

By: thebadguyswon

thebadguyswon — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 05:48:03 +0000

Honey Boo-Boo/Television

By: zzalapski

zzalapski — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 05:20:21 +0000

And they wonder why the general public could give two shits about ballclubs moving the press box down the right field line.

By: djpostl

djpostl — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 05:19:57 +0000

Yes. They can vote for whomever they please…until the BBWAA yanks their voting credentials if they ever saw fit. This has zip today with being in a free country or not since it’s part of an organization’s rule structure.