2023 Hall of Fame Class

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  • #210589
    blingboy
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    Within the last few years I can remember an issue arising with the Cardinals OF defense. We never made any errors, but I think the issue was range. I distinctly recall Mo saying “we catch it when they hit it to us”. (If anyone can add some specifics to what I can remember about that, please do.) That sort of thing muddies defensive stats, including for third basemen.

    I can remember Ken Reitz having to get to hot shots on that astroturf infield at Busch Memorial. For those too young to remember the early astroturf era, is was like playing baseball on a billiard table. The hot corner was red hot in those days and Reitz was a master. That feat was appreciated here but he was not a highly rated defender. (It has been mentioned now and then that his one and only Gold Glove came in the year he logged the largest negative dWAR of his career, if anyone can explain that) I would be very interested to see how some of the great defensive third basemen would have done there in Reitz’s place.

    #210590
    1toughdominican
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    Bikemike…Yep, the solitary piece of criticism I can offer up towards Rolen has to do with when he spoke with the press about his displeasure of being held out of the starting line-up for a game or two during the ’06 post-season. It would have been okay if he’d have waited until the NLCS and WS was over, however he stirred things up while the Redbirds were in the midst of a battle for a WS Championship. Not at all good. TLR spoke about the issue only after Rolen had opened up the proverbial Pandoras’s box.

    #210591
    1toughdominican
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    I remember Ken Reitz to be thought of as one of the best defensive players of his era. His problem regarding the lack of collecting a lot of GG awards was much the same as that of Tommy Herr in the sense that he played 3B during the same era as Mike Schmidt, whereas Herr was overshadowed at 2B by Ryne Sandberg.

    #210601
    bicyclemike
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    Those of us who saw Reitz play usually rave about his defensive skills, but he does not have very good dWAR numbers – less than 2 defensive win for his entire career. Brooks Robinson, probably the gold standard for defense at third, had almost 40 defensive wins.

    Schmidt was better, but still falls short of the numbers in the list I previously posted. Terry Pendleton comes out about equal to Schmidt, and thus well ahead of Reitz; each in the .7s using my stat.

    I think what probably hurt Reitz was the thing you do not see so much with defense, and that was lack of range. He made some outstanding plays, but I think a lot of balls got through when hit to his left, and probably down the line as well. I think that is where Arenado exceeds Rolen, as his range to his left is terrific.

    Out of curiosity I checked some old time guys, like early 20th century and Jimmy Collins, a guy you never hear about as his career went back to the 19th century and into the 20th, was really good. Still not the Arenado/Robinson “good”, but better than most.

    Oh, and there is sometimes debate about Ken Boyer being a Hall of Famer and how he compares to Ron Santo. Boyer’s dWAR was better than Santo. Putting my stat to their career numbers Boyer comes in at .526, and Santo .387. Both still well below those guys that get over 1.00.

    #210604
    1toughdominican
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    Although Boyer’s best seasons were just a shade before my time, I saw plenty of Santo and he was really good. I’ve always maintained that if Santo’s a HOF’er, Ken Boyer is too. Their career offensive numbers are similar with Santos holding a bit of an edge in total numbers, but Boyer overcomes that edge with a NL MVP award and by being a primary component of a WS Championship team. On the defensive side of the game, it’s a dead heat at 5 GG’s apiece. Not that it matters, but in my book, if Santo has a plaque, Boyer does too.

    #210607
    blingboy
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    My earliest baseball memories are the 64 and 65 seasons. I remember the low overhead pipes in the men’s room at Sportsman’s Park and I remember Nelson Briles and his leg kick (my grandpa kept saying ‘its going to get stuck like that’, and I kept waiting anxiously for it to happen), but I do not remember Boyer at all. My loss.

    #210610
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    1td…I agree with Boyer and Santo.

    #210611
    bicyclemike
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    Obviously I have been a lobbyist for Boyer’s inclusion in the Hall, especially after Santo got in.

    That salami in game four turned the ‘64 Series around. It was looking like the Yankees were going to go up 3 games to 1, then boom! (as the late John Madden would say). Boyer gets about as clutch of a hit as you can get.

    #210615
    1toughdominican
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    Yeah to reiterate, I was 7 years old in ’64, so Boyer’s best years were a touch ahead of my time as a young boy who was just beginning to grasp a basic understanding of the baseball action on the field. I do recall my parents, uncle and some of their friends watching that ’64 WS on our old Admiral color TV set. My dad would go out to the garage to get a couple of draws on one of his ever present White Owl cigars between innings and my younger brother and I would follow him out. He had an old portable black and white out there and he’d smoke until the next inning began and then rush in to see the action on the color set…Haha! At that age, I was more focused on the wild reactions from the adults who were watching than the game itself. Watching them go absolutely out of their minds, I remember thinking, “hey this stuff must be pretty good”…Haha! I also attended a couple of games at Sportsman’s Park as a young boy, however my focus was probably on all of the good eats and souvenirs. Later on, I attended countless games at Busch Memorial with my dad, uncle and younger brother. At any rate, by the time the clock struck ’67, I was life long property of Big League baseball and the St. Louis, Cardinals.

    #210616
    blingboy
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    I do recall my parents, uncle and some of their friends watching that ’64 WS on our old Admiral color TV set.

    Wow, a color set in 1964. You must have been the envy of the kid world. We had a Zenith B&W up until the early 70s. I well remember late 60s baseball in black and white, but televised games were few and far between.

    #210625
    bicyclemike
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    Great memories. Yeah, color television was almost non-existent in the mid-’60s in my neighborhood. We had what I think was a 19 inch black and white set; a Magnavox maybe? I am not sure. It was probably ’67 before my dad sprung for a real nice Curtis-Mathes color set, in the nice wood console cabinet. Back then televisions were often a nice piece of furniture. I was 11 in ’64, and watched some of the Series games with my dad, at least the weekend games.

    There was an older lady down the street that got a color set around 1962 or ’63. She let me and the kid across the street come down and watch an All-Star game on it, and it was quite the novelty.

    My parents never smoked, which was also unusual back then as it seems most of my friends parents smoked. I would be across the street at my buddies’ house, and come home and my clothes had that cigarette smoke smell to them. Needless to say his parents passed away in their 50s and 60s, whereas my parents were into their 80s before leaving this life. And both were relatively healthy and doing well up until they said goodbye.

    #210627
    1toughdominican
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    That old Admiral set was still around at my parents house until well after I’d moved out to make a go of it on my own. Yeah Bikemike, those cigarettes are killers. My mom never smoked and I never saw my dad with a cigarette, but she told us that he once smoked them before switching over to his cigars. At any rate, he knew better than to light up one of his White Owls in the house because he didn’t want to be subjected to the silent treatment or end up in divorce court…Haha! He finally gave them up about a year before he said goodbye. I often wonder how he’d react to a lot of the changes to not only the game, but to the present world in general. I always get a good laugh when I think of what his impressions might be and what he’d have to say about it…Haha!

    #210629
    gscottar
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    We didn’t get a color television until 1982. Just in time for a great baseball season.

    #210630
    blingboy
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    My understanding is HoF ballets were turned in by New Years and results will be revealed later this month. Some voters choose to make their’s public, and so there is an idea how its going. As of yesterday, the guy Brian quoted to open this thread was up to 129 known ballots and Rolen at 80.6%.

    But guess what? You will never guess, so I will tell. There are wonks at work crunching the numbers.

    That extra space was to give you a moment to recover from the shock. They are analyzing past year’s public vs private ballots and the known results vs final results. Also, the known voting behavior of first time voters is a factor somehow. There are a growing number of voices out there who are thinking that no one will finish with 75% this year, including Rolen. If so, we know who to blame.

    #210666
    Brian Walton
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    Update

    #210667
    Brian Walton
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    This shows year-to-year comparisons.

    #210671
    1toughdominican
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    Looks like our old friend Billy Wagner moved up quite a bit from last season. I guess that’s okay, but I’m not quite certain he’s a HOF’er. He always tanked in his post-season appearances, but his best performance was as a NY, Met vs. the Redbirds in the ’06 NLCS in which he featured a 0-1 W/L record with a nice 16.88 ERA in 2.2 IP’ed. If he does indeed receive a plaque, my suggestion would be that it’s presented to him by none other than So Taguchi…

    #210690
    bicyclemike
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    Wagner had a lot of saves, but closers don’t fare too well as far as overall value numbers go. They just don’t pitch enough innings to really make a difference. But the innings they pitch are often high leverage, so that needs to be taken in to consideration.

    Other than Mariano Rivera, I can justify a closer not getting the call. Then again when they are enshrined, I am okay with it.

    #210696
    1toughdominican
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    I think some of the vanguard type closers belong. Guys like Sutter and Gossage often worked 2 or 3 IP’ed to record a save. Eckersley was once a 20 game winner as a SP’er early in his career and definitely belongs. Wilhelm was before my time, but he looks to be the prototypical closer sort of RP’er. Furthermore, any guy who records outs with a knuckleball until he’s almost 50 years old should have a plaque…These types of guys all worked over 1000 IP’ed in their careers. And oh…To me, Rollie Fingers qualifies for the HOF simply on the merits of a perfect baseball name and the outstanding cookie duster…Haha!

    #210700
    blingboy
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    Wagner absolutely belongs in the HoF. Career WHIP under 1.000 over 900+ innings. All those seasons with ERA under 3 right up to the end. Now days nobody can touch any of that.

    #210728
    bicyclemike
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    Yeah, Wagner was certainly good. 12Ks per 9 innings too. It’s just that when you look at a guy like Koufax – 1.1 WHIP but over 2300 innings, then those one inning guys pale in comparison.

    Not that they don’t belong, but when you have a guy like that you would love to use him more.

    #210730
    1toughdominican
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    I’ve no issue with Wagner getting a plaque. However, if he’d have won the battle with the great slugger So Taguchi, I might have a different view…

    #210732
    blingboy
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    Wagner was a good enough starter in AAA he should have gotten a chance to start in the bigs but never did. I checked who was in the Astros rotation the year he came up, 1996. Doug Drabek, Daryl Kile, Shane Reynolds and Mike Hampton. I guess that’s why Billy was a reliever.

    #210739
    1toughdominican
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    I don’t recall how much he got, but I remember when back in the early 90’s, Drabek signed for what was then an enormous amount of money after he’d won a NL CYA with the Pirates. I seem to recall that Hampton was near or at the top of the money pile for pitchers back then as well. At any rate, I’m sure it’s chicken feed relative to the going price for decent arms today.

    #210761
    bicyclemike
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    I recall Reggie saying something back in the ‘70s when he signed with the Yankees for a few mil over three or four years – not sure of the exact quote but it was something like, “Yeah, I am probably being overpaid, but that’s the world we live in.”

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