Committee Chairman

The Lee Smith Debate: 2015

Dec 29, 2014

Published in Hall of Fame Debates

This is the twenteth of our series where we here at Notinhalloffame.com, do what else? Debate the merit of twenty-four men on the most loaded Baseball Hall of Fame ballot in our lifetime.

Joining me, the site's Committee Chairman, in this debate are D.K. of the site's Phillies Archivist blog and Darryl Tahirali of the site's DDT's Pop Flies blog. This looks to be a very important part of our site, and we hope you will enjoy reading this as much as we enjoyed writing it.

Chairman: I don’t know about the two of you, but my biggest turn around over the past ten years has been on Lee Smith, and not for the better. I was all in on respect for closers and I was taken in by the 478 Saves (retiring with the all time Saves record) and four Saves Titles. This is still an accomplishment to celebrate, but when compared to a true dominating closer like Mariano Rivera, he doesn’t come close. Forgetting the Saves, we have Rivera’s 1.000 WHIP to Smith’s 1.242, Rivera’s 205 ERA+ to Smith’s 132, and a bWAR of 56.6 to Smith’s 29.4. I haven’t even talked about how he shit the bed in his two playoff appearances. What was I thinking?

Perhaps the writers are thinking the same as this is Lee Smith’s 13th year and like so many others here, he hit his low last year with a 29.9%, down from 50.6 two years ago. I don’t think it is looking good for Mr. Smith.

D.K.: Lee Smith’s case for the Hall of Fame brings up an interesting topic. Should someone who once led a sport in a statistical category be a Hall Of famer if that record has been surpassed or even obliterated? Smith’s 486 Saves was the record for at least a decade until that total was surpassed by Trevor Hoffman and Mariano Rivera.

Well you could say that before Babe Ruth came to prominence a guy named Gavvy Cravath was the all-time home run leader. No one brings his name up for the Hall of Fame in the Pre integration (1871-1945) category. The same is true for other sports:

In the NFL Philadelphia Eagles 1950s and 1960s receiver/kicker, Bobby Walston was once the NFLs all-time leader in Scoring and Billy Howton another star of the 1950s and early ‘560s was briefly the all-time pass receiving record holder with 503 catches.

Today, however these NFL stars accomplishments have pretty much been forgotten. Smith is likely to receive the same treatment from writers as sportswriters have given Cravath, Walston and Howton in the past.

To add to the gloom of Smith’s case you have to note that he finished his career 21 games below .500 (71-92), had a significant number of blown Saves (103) and led the league as often in Blown Saves as he did in Saves (four times in each category).

Darryl: D.K. brings up a good point about pioneers who have since been surpassed, and Lee Smith I think is the prototype of the "one-inning closer." As such, he falls between two stools: One stool has the "firemen" from the previous eras—Hoyt Wilhelm, Rollie Fingers, Goose Gossage, Bruce Sutter—the relievers who stepped in to quell the rally and stayed in to finish the game, and the other stool has the lights-out closers who followed Smith including Dennis Eckersley (although technically Eckersley's career began before Smith's, Eck was a starter until 1987), Trevor Hoffman, Mariano Rivera—and Billy Wagner, who I think has a legitimate Hall case, but that is for another time. Smith may have blown 103 saves, but his .823 save percentage is still better than the four Hall of Fame relievers I just named.

And although the Chairman thinks the newly-instituted 10-year rule for ballot appearances is a conspiracy theory to eliminate the PEDs candidates, I think it is also to slough off clean guys like Smith, who have hung around year after year but who are stalled at a voting plateau and show only negative movement. In other words, in each of more than ten ballot appearances, Lee Smith has simply not been impressive enough to garner the three-fourths needed for election. And there is a very good reason why: Lee Smith was very good but not elite.

Chairman: D.K., I like your analogy about holding an all-time major statistical category for over a year as a huge deal, and one that should be celebrated, but I personally don’t view the Save as a major stat anymore, and I don’t see it anywhere near as important as a Home Run. A Home Run is not ambiguous, a Save can be obtained so many ways, and you frankly have a lousy two thirds of an inning, let in a run and allow three people on base, and still get a Save.

At the end of the day, I just don’t see Lee Smith as an elite guy, just like Darryl states. We have seen some relievers change the game; and Lee just isn’t that guy.

D.K.: If part of the reason that Lee Smith dropped from around 50% of the vote to about30% was because of the competition heating up with three first time eligibleMaddux, Glavine and Thomas reaching the Hall, then things won’t get any easier forhim this year. Something tells me that the writers will definitely put Craig Biggio over the top after his near-miss last year. Then you have Randy Johnson, John Smoltzand Pedro Martinez becoming eligible this year and with those factors plus the 10vote maximum per writer and you can see how lesser candidates like Smith could getsqueezed out.

After the rule change was adopted limiting new candidates to 10 years on the
ballot, Smith will be the last candidate to get a full 15-year run on the ballot, ending in 2017. The extra years probably won’t help him much.

Darryl: Good point, Chairman, and not to put too fine a point on it, but while the game did change during Smith's tenure, to an interventionist bullpen capped by the one-inning closer, it was an institutional change and not as a result of Smith's impact. He was merely an instrument used for that change and not the catalyst for that change.

Chairman: Here is where I like the extra time to think about it. If I had a vote seven years ago, I would have said yes. I would have been wrong, and I vote no.

D.K.: NOPE

Darryl: No.

The Gary Sheffield Debate: 2015

Dec 28, 2014

Published in Hall of Fame Debates

This is the nineteenth of our series where we here at Notinhalloffame.com, do what else? Debate the merit of twenty-four men on the most loaded Baseball Hall of Fame ballot in our lifetime.

Joining me, the site's Committee Chairman, in this debate are D.K. of the site's Phillies Archivist blog and Darryl Tahirali of the site's DDT's Pop Flies blog. This looks to be a very important part of our site, and we hope you will enjoy reading this as much as we enjoyed writing it.

Chairman: I forgot just how much Gary Sheffield accomplished. 9 All Star appearances, 509 Home Runs, a Batting Title, an OPS Title, 6 OPS seasons over 1.000, a 60.2 bWAR and a World Series Ring. Screams Hall of Fame right? Here we may have another Rafael Palmeiro (without the wagging finger to congress) but with a more surly attitude. Here is another difference; I wouldn’t be surprised to see Sheffield hang on the ballot another two years like Raffy did.

D.K.: Sheffield was sort of a Dick Allen with better numbers and more career longevity. While 509 home runs is great to put on his HOF resume, like Allen he was one of the more divisive players in any MLB dugout, any time, any place. Love him or hate him one thing was certain - and Sheff could care less. Yankees beat writers circa 2004-2005 and media found him to be a clubhouse cancer. Things were never harmonious with Sheff around. He sometimes seemed to be more interested in proving what a BADASS he was than in winning games.

It’s interesting that now in retirement he’s putting up a lot of his own money to build a baseball stadium and instructional baseball camp in Pasco County, Florida (just North of Tampa/St. Pete/Clearwater) to teach the game properly and to develop some future major leaguers. If this kinder, gentler edition of Sheff had been present during his playing days then he’d have a lot easier time in securing writers’ votes to put him into the Hall of Fame.

Darryl: The Dick Allen comparison is good, but Gary Sheffield has always reminded me more of Dave Winfield. Both have reached Cooperstown milestones—Sheffield with 500-plus home runs, and Winfield with 3000-plus hits—both were excellent hitters for whom you put up with their deficient defensive skills (although, surprisingly, Winfield was a designated hitter just over 400 times in a nearly 3000-game career, while Sheffield DH'ed about 300 times in more than 2500 games), and although neither was the superstar in the lineup, you didn't want either one to beat you—because each could.

But, gentlemen, let's make explicit what the Chairman alluded to: performance-enhancing drugs. Sheffield was named in the Mitchell Report as having received PEDs from the Bay Area Laboratory Cooperative, and the BALCO scandal has been the biggest bugbear to Barry Bonds—with whom

Sheffield is associated as he worked out with Bonds in 2001, during which time Sheffield's trainer applied "the clear," a topical application reputedly containing steroids and obtained from BALCO, to Sheffield. Chairman, you may be right about Sheffield hanging on, then disappearing, as did Rafael Palmeiro. In any case, on an overcrowded ballot with a PEDs taint hanging all over him, Gary Sheffield, whom I think is definitely borderline, won't need to book a flight to Cooperstown anytime soon except as an onlooker.

Chairman: I hate to use the likability card, as I completely agree with you Darryl that this should have absolutely no merit as to whether a candidate gets in or not, but there is always that human element. The baseball writers have met a lot of these guys and there is no doubt in my mind that many of them have held grudges against certain people and refused to vote for them.

With Sheffield, this is a guy who ruffled more feathers than Barry Bonds did, and while his numbers are Hall of Fame worthy, they are not Play Station numbers like Bonds. I only bring this up to add a little fuel to the potential one and done of Sheffield on the ballot. If you were a writer torn between Sheffield and let’s say for argument sake Mike Mussina as the tenth guy you would pick, maybe you go with the guy who didn’t blow you off for an interview.

Again, that should never be a factor, but it’s like why I keep my mouth shut at the airport; I am not giving anyone with power over me for that brief period of time a reason to use it.

D.K.: One and done, Darryl? - I don’t think it’s going to play out that way, but who knows how the voters will treat Sheff his first ballot? My guess is he’ll get closer to 25% of the votes than 5% and that he may be stuck in that neighborhood for years to come.

Darryl: Yes, I can see that if it came down to choosing between two candidates, and you know both of them, and one of them has been more of a jerk than the other, how you might vote for the nicer guy. Writers are only human, after all. I think Sheffield may play out more like Mark McGwire: Career numbers on the bubble and a PEDs taint although not of the finger-wagging hubris of Rafael Palmeiro. He may survive for several years with percentages in the 20s and 30s.

Chairman: I think Sheff is going to get “Palmeiro’d”, but in other years he would get my vote. Here, I have to pass. Just too much competition, and I vote no.

Darryl: No.

D.K.: He probably hurt his teams with his attitude as much as he helped them with his talents. - NO.

The Curt Schilling Debate: 2015

Dec 27, 2014

Published in Hall of Fame Debates

This is the eighteenth of our series where we here at Notinhalloffame.com, do what else? Debate the merit of twenty-four men on the most loaded Baseball Hall of Fame ballot in our lifetime.

The Tim Raines Debate: 2015

Dec 28, 2014

Published in Hall of Fame Debates

This is the seventeenth of our series where we here at Notinhalloffame.com, do what else? Debate the merit of twenty-four men on the most loaded Baseball Hall of Fame ballot in our lifetime.

Joining me, the site's Committee Chairman, in this debate are D.K. of the site's Phillies Archivist blog and Darryl Tahirali of the site's DDT's Pop Flies blog. This looks to be a very important part of our site, and we hope you will enjoy reading this as much as we enjoyed writing it.

Chairman: For the record I have always loved Tim Raines and wanted to throttle anyone who ever called him a poor man’s Rickey Henderson. Although I grant that Henderson had the more impressive career, Raines had one hell of a run, and was overshadowed by a better base stealer. “The Rock” enters his eighth nomination and with the reduction from fifteen years to ten years on the ballot has potential to be the biggest victim from the change.

Raines had 46.1% last year, which is down from finally hitting the 50% mark last year. Gentlemen, if Raines was on for fifteen years, I would bet my house that he would get inducted but in ten years? I am keeping my deed to the property.

Darryl: You'll have to throttle me, then, because I've been calling Tim Raines the poor man's Rickey Henderson for some time now. On the other hand, I've been calling Kenny Loftonthe poor man's Tim Raines, and he was criminally a one-and-done two years ago.

But here's my Raines story: Years ago, I was in a technical writing certification program, and one report-writing course I took included feasibility reports. I did mine on a fictitious Hall of Fame "Underdog Committee" that looked at bubble candidates who would be retiring soon. I picked Raines, Edgar Martinez, Fred McGriff, and—don't laugh—Andres Galarraga (hey, he looked pretty good back then), and had to evaluate them and pick one to recommend. I went in figuring I'd pick Martinez, but after evaluating them, I picked Raines as the best (most feasible) candidate. Funny how that worked out on the real ballots years later, yes? But you're right—I was pretty sure after last year that Raines would struggle on the ballot, and that'll be even more so now. Some Expansion Era Committee is going to have to fight to get him in the Hall.

D.K.: If you think of the Hall Of Fame as the greatest team of players ever assembled then you’re going to need every component of a great team, including you’re speed guys and table setters. With 808 stolen bases and a career .294 hitter hardly any player has filled the bill for that role better than Raines since the late 1970’s except Rickey Henderson. Lou Brock, Henderson and Raines posted career totals not seen since the dead ball era days when running was a most critical and necessary part of the game.

His seasons of .320, .334 where he led the National League in ‘86 and .330 is a pretty nice career peak that he reached between 1985 and 1987. He finished his career with 2,605 hits and better than a hit per game average and he reached 70 stolen bases six consecutive years (1981-1986), taking four NL stolen base titles, and reaching a career high of 90 SB in 1983.

A veteran of 2502 games in 23 years he had tremendous longevity also. With his vote totals of about 50% the last two elections, he’s been a bit underappreciated so far by the writers. I’ll be very interested to see if Raines vote total makes some progress towards election, come January 6th.

Chairman: So let’s call him a rich man’s Maury Wills then? If Maury can get solid Veteran’s support, maybe there is a hope for Raines that way, as I have a strong suspicion he will see a percentage decrease again this year, and he is not going to get in by “traditional means”.

“The Rock” (and is that because of what he liked smoking the best?) has to consider it a win just to get back to where he was two years ago. I wonder if the Expos deal hinders him a bit. I know that his teammates Gary Carter and Andre Dawson got in, but Carter had a couple good years with the Mets and was just one of those guys that people loved. Dawson had the MVP season with the Cubs, and many people associate “the Hawk” with Chicago more than Montreal. Raines never had a signature season outside of Montreal. Am I reaching or am I bordering on another conspiracy theory here?

D.K.: Although the writers have asked the HOF if they may increase the maximum number of players they can vote for in any election to 12. As far as I know, if 12 votes is approved per writer it won’t go into effect for the election at hand. Even with only 10 votes I’ll fit “The Rich Man’s Maury Wills (Tim Raines) in there somewhere.

Darryl: Gary Carter and Andre Dawson may be good examples, and not just because they were also Expos. It took Carter six tries to be elected, and it took Dawson nine tries--and both did it in years that did not have the embarrassment of riches that Raines is facing now. Shhh! Everyone is trying to forget that Raines was one of several MLB players implicated in the Pittsburgh drug trials of the mid-1980s. Supposedly, Raines slid head-first into bases so he would not break the cocaine vial in his back pocket. But given the obvious punishment being meted out to the PEDs guys, you have to wonder whether some writers have not forgotten about Raines's involvement in this quiet, although significant, drug scandal in baseball.

Chairman: This breaks my heart because I think he is a Hall of Famer. He is my 11A candidate, but sadly my vote is no.

Darryl: This is my last speech. Probably. I've been calling Tim Raines a Hall of Famer since 2002. Yes, that was in his last year before retirement. I've been calling him that ever since. But based on his voting history, I don't think that he has a chance on the writers' ballot. My primary approach in this (hypothetical) vote is, with a few exceptions, to clear the ballot by voting for as many candidates who have a good chance of actually being elected and thus enable voters to more seriously consider candidates such as Raines, who is a SABR darling who does not have that Hall of Fame glow about him. (Spoiler alert: I'll be saying the same thing about Alan Trammell.)

Thus, it pains me to say it, but my vote is no. Not this year.

D.K.: Maybe it’s because I was small in stature in elementary school but I always appreciated baseball’s smaller, pesky, feisty little guys that batted lead off or #2 to set the table...the Richie Ashburns, Curt Floods, Lou Brocks , Luis Aparicios, Maury Wills, Ron Hunts, Pete Roses, Nellie Foxs and Ricky Hendersons of this world ....and Tim Raines. I see that I think much more highly of Tim than my colleagues. I ranked Raines as my #3 candidate and that results in an emphatic YES vote!