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2016 MLB Hall of Fame Thread


Joe Lucia

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Hall of Fame ballot is out tonight. Garret Anderson is on it, and all of those vicious, negative feelings I had towards him during his career with the Braves are popping back up again.

God, I fucking hated him.

Didn't he only play one year with the Braves? I hated him from his Angels years. He always seemed to be a Yankee killer.

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Hall of Fame ballot is out tonight. Garret Anderson is on it, and all of those vicious, negative feelings I had towards him during his career with the Braves are popping back up again.

God, I fucking hated him.

Geez, did he kick your dog or something?
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Randy Winn potentially receiving a HOF vote is... something....

a fucking joke
I say if you vote for a guy who gets less than 10 votes or fail to vote for a guy who gets 95% of the vote, you lose your voting privilege cuz it's obvious you're just a douchebag.
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Trusting that Baseball Reference is accurate, the following folks could have made the HOF ballot but didn't

 

 

Jeff Weaver, Russ Ortiz, Gary Matthews, Cristian Guzman, Bob Howry, Bengie Molina, Fernando Tatis, Russ Springer, Jose Guillen

 

That means two members of the screening committee picked Randy Winn over some of these other folks

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Brief history of my Garret Anderson hatred...

 

The Braves needed a left fielder in 2009. They got bupkis from the entire outfield in 2008, were foolishly still committed to Francoeur in right for '09, and seemed content to push Jordan Schafer into center that season. They were clearly trying to contend after signing Lowe and trading for Vazquez. They had been tied to Griffey the entire winter, and late in February, he signed with Seattle. Whatever, Griffey would have sucked. Bobby Abreu was also an option that signed around the same time as Griffey that would have worked out fine. FWIW, I was big in the Adam Dunn camp because he was still good and was exactly what the lineup needed, defense be damned. Hell, they could have thrown him at first base since they were planning on rolling out Casey Kotchman that year, which ended as poorly as you'd expect.

 

So after Griffey signed with Seattle, the FO essentially said that a prospect named Brandon Jones would be the left fielder. Cool , I liked Jones - he was a top 100 guy in 08 that was still only 25 and showed *some* promise between AAA and the majors that year.

 

Not even a couple days after giving Jones their support, they signed Anderson to a major league deal despite the fact that he was 36, had no power, had no speed, was a mediocre defender who had been getting reps at DH over the recent years in Anaheim, and was a hollow batting average at that point. The explanations from the FO were the usual bullshit: professional hitter, veteran presence, all that nonsense.

 

Of course, Anderson was awful. He didn't hit lefties, he didn't hit righties. His fielding was atrocious. Old man Cox jammed him into the 3-4-5 slots in the order constantly. The offense actually did get worse overall (like I adeptly predicted on Talking Chop when Anderson was signed) and the team finished third (again, like I predicted). Anderson was gone the next year and retired after coming off the bench for the Dodgers.

 

The Braves engineered the disastrous Melky experiment in 2010, played an infielder in left in 11-12, then finally got a real left fielder in Justin Upton for 13-14...and the guy who logged the most innings in left this year was Jonny Gomes. Next season, it'll probably be Nick Swisher or Michael Bourn, both of whom may be outplayed by corpses with tomahawks across their chests in 2016.

 

Brandon Jones never ended up doing anything in the majors...but we'll never know what could have been. They knew what the ceiling was for Anderson, and even if everything went right, there wouldn't have been much of a difference between him and Jones. Nothing really did go right with Anderson, and the Braves STILL don't have a franchise left fielder.

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Brief history of my Garret Anderson hatred...

The Braves needed a left fielder in 2009. They got bupkis from the entire outfield in 2008, were foolishly still committed to Francoeur in right for '09, and seemed content to push Jordan Schafer into center that season. They were clearly trying to contend after signing Lowe and trading for Vazquez. They had been tied to Griffey the entire winter, and late in February, he signed with Seattle. Whatever, Griffey would have sucked. Bobby Abreu was also an option that signed around the same time as Griffey that would have worked out fine. FWIW, I was big in the Adam Dunn camp because he was still good and was exactly what the lineup needed, defense be damned. Hell, they could have thrown him at first base since they were planning on rolling out Casey Kotchman that year, which ended as poorly as you'd expect.

So after Griffey signed with Seattle, the FO essentially said that a prospect named Brandon Jones would be the left fielder. Cool , I liked Jones - he was a top 100 guy in 08 that was still only 25 and showed *some* promise between AAA and the majors that year.

Not even a couple days after giving Jones their support, they signed Anderson to a major league deal despite the fact that he was 36, had no power, had no speed, was a mediocre defender who had been getting reps at DH over the recent years in Anaheim, and was a hollow batting average at that point. The explanations from the FO were the usual bullshit: professional hitter, veteran presence, all that nonsense.

Of course, Anderson was awful. He didn't hit lefties, he didn't hit righties. His fielding was atrocious. Old man Cox jammed him into the 3-4-5 slots in the order constantly. The offense actually did get worse overall (like I adeptly predicted on Talking Chop when Anderson was signed) and the team finished third (again, like I predicted). Anderson was gone the next year and retired after coming off the bench for the Dodgers.

The Braves engineered the disastrous Melky experiment in 2010, played an infielder in left in 11-12, then finally got a real left fielder in Justin Upton for 13-14...and the guy who logged the most innings in left this year was Jonny Gomes. Next season, it'll probably be Nick Swisher or Michael Bourn, both of whom may be outplayed by corpses with tomahawks across their chests in 2016.

Brandon Jones never ended up doing anything in the majors...but we'll never know what could have been. They knew what the ceiling was for Anderson, and even if everything went right, there wouldn't have been much of a difference between him and Jones. Nothing really did go right with Anderson, and the Braves STILL don't have a franchise left fielder.

I don't get how you can hate Anderson...he played exactly like he did prior to signing with the Braves. You should be mad at the idiots that signed him.

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Trusting that Baseball Reference is accurate, the following folks could have made the HOF ballot but didn't

 

 

Jeff Weaver, Russ Ortiz, Gary Matthews, Cristian Guzman, Bob Howry, Bengie Molina, Fernando Tatis, Russ Springer, Jose Guillen

 

That means two members of the screening committee picked Randy Winn over some of these other folks

 

Aw. Poor Sarge.

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Does Hoffman get in on the first ballot? I say that he should, without a doubt. You know that Mariano is going in on the first ballot, so why wouldn't the only other guy in the history of the game with 600 saves get the same treatment?

 

I would hate to see Hoffman get the bone like Biggio did. 3000 H? HOF, first ballot. Unless you are Rose or Palmeiro, obviously.

 

Same deal should go for such a ridiculous SV total.

Edited by grilledcheese
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Hoffman and Wagner are the first real modern closers to be on the ballot. Will be very interesting to see how they're treated. They're a bit helped because this is a baby soft first time class except Griffey, and four guys getting in last year helped clear some of the backlog.

 

Shorter: I have no idea.

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I guess this'll go here, former Braves pitcher, among other teams, Tommy Hanson has died, he was 29. Went into a coma after having breathing issues on Sunday and died of catastrophic organ failure. I really have no clue what to make of that, but that's way too young. RIP

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We already started some discussion since the full ballot was released.

 

And the HOF just told BBWAA to go "Fuck Itself" and kept the max number of players you are able to vote for at 10 (BBWAA had proposed raising it to 10).

 

I will probably move the other posts in once I am not lazy

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Sidebar: I somehow never knew before today that Trevor Hoffman started his career with Florida, not San Diego. Not sure how I missed that.

Personally, I don't think Hoffman belongs. Oh, there's no doubt he was good at his job for a really long time. I just think you gotta be "special" to be in the HOF as a closer and Hoffman wasn't. Career 2.87 ERA (not great for a closer), only 2 years under 2.00 despite playing a lot of years in a park that HEAVILY favored pitchers. And not exactly his fault, but not really any postseason resume to bolster his case a la Mariano. They both had a ton of saves but that's really where the comparison ends. Mariano: 11 seasons under 2.00 ERA, just one (as a reliever) over 3.00. Hoffman: 2 under 2.00, 7 over 3.00 (and 2 more at 2.98 and 2.99). The HOF certainly wouldn't be tarnished by Hoffman's entry, I just don't think he was quite special enough at what is, really, a very, very limited position.

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The problem with both closers and DH's is that both are such one-note positions, it's hard for me to wrap my head around who belongs and who doesn't. I love Edgar Martinez, but I don't think I can convince myself of his candidacy for the HOF.

 

Anyway, I would like to see Griffey and Hoffman, and for my own selfish reasons Alan Trammell. I loved watching him when I was a young lad, and although I know there are lots of arguments on both sides, I just don't see how he is on the outside if both Larkin and Smith are in.

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Trammell is one of the bigger snubs of the last 20 odd years. Pretty crazy to me that he's not in. Whitaker being pretty much one and done on the ballot is pretty baffling as well.

 

Not that I think he should be in, but does anyone know why Bill Madlock never got any HoF support? One ballot and 4% and gone. He was before my time, but he came up when batting average was king and very few players have won 4 batting titles. His OBP is nothing great, but would that have really been a consideration at the time? You'd think 2000+ hits, the batting titles and being an important pickup for the 79 Pirates would have at least got him through a couple years of ballots.

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Now as good a time as any to remind people that the Tigers could have had Ozzie, too, if they hadn't been so cheap with their signing bonus offer. Ozzie wanted $10k after the Tigers drafted him and the Tigers offer $8500 and wouldn't budge.

But, yeah, Trammell belongs in. Elite defensive shortstop for a looooong stretch, pretty good (sometimes really good) hitter at a time when those two things rarely went together. If he'd done backflips or something, he'd be in.

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Trammell is one of the bigger snubs of the last 20 odd years. Pretty crazy to me that he's not in. Whitaker being pretty much one and done on the ballot is pretty baffling as well.

 

Not that I think he should be in, but does anyone know why Bill Madlock never got any HoF support? One ballot and 4% and gone. He was before my time, but he came up when batting average was king and very few players have won 4 batting titles. His OBP is nothing great, but would that have really been a consideration at the time? You'd think 2000+ hits, the batting titles and being an important pickup for the 79 Pirates would have at least got him through a couple years of ballots.

 

Something similar happened to Bobby Grich being one and done. Don't think he's a Hall of Famer, but didn't he merit more than a sliver of discussion? Shit, same with Lou Whitaker, Moises Alou, and Kenny Lofton recently.  They're not joke candidates like Jacque Jones and Mark Grudzielanek, but shit.

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7th in JAWS at 2B. Everyone else in the top 10 is in, along with 13, 14, 15, 19, 20. Slightly abbreviated career, and like Tabe said, the low BA probably mattered more than his great OBP.

 

HOF discussions both entertain and enrage me.

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Bobby Grich is a guy who definitely merited more consideration. Decent power for a 2B but low batting average at a time when that mattered a lot to the voters.

Not much offense at the keystone for Earl in that era. But plenty of Defense. :)

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