You seem to be forgetting one thing, Sarley. There are a whole bunch of Negro Leaguers in the Hall of Fame based on "woulda, shoulda, coulda". Monte Irvin sure isn't in based on his major league career which wasn't near the equal of Minoso's. You really think Minnie should be punished because he got stuck in minor league limbo after Robinson/Doby broke the color line because even Bill Veeck didn't have the nerve to stick two brothers on his team?

Nobody regards Billy Williams as the outfielder Minoso was. Wrigley Field was a tiny park in that time. I could understand a young guy not grasping that because in today's game it actually plays on the larger side. But what's your excuse? Minoso patrolled a vast left field.

Finally, I've never suggested Clemente was anything less than a great player. He just wasn't on the same level with guys like Mays, Mantle, and Aaron. He's closer to guys like Pete Rose, Al Kaline, and yeah, Minnie Minoso.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Roberto Clemente: .834 career OPS
Minnie Minoso: .848 career OPS

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

_________________
Proud member of the white guy grievance committee

It aint the six minutes. Its what happens in those six minutes.

You sold me on the Minoso/HOF concept with your Irvin logic. Well played.
Nobody compared Williams' fielding to Minoso. I just don't think you should compare Williams and Brock.
Williams was better than you give him credit for.
Lastly, I think you are right about Clemente not being Mantle and Mays, but I think he is better than the guys you lump him in with.
Personally, my HOF only has about 25 ballplayers in it.

_________________
Host of the weekly "We Fish ASA" podcast
Weekly columnist for the Northwest Herald
Bi-monthly columnist for Illinois Outdoor News magazine
Former host of The Outdoors Experience on WIND and The Great Outdoors on CLTV
http://www.wefishasa.com

I don't know about just 25 guys, but I agree that I'd like to see it more exclusive than it is. Also, I think it's silly that the writers have set up a kind of hierarchy for the Hall wherein some of them will only vote for certain guys on the first ballot while they make other, supposedly lesser guys, wait. Either a guy is a Hall of Famer or he isn't. I'd suggest giving each player a single chance to get in five years after his career is over and that's it. That would force the writers to be more careful and likely result in a Hall of Fame with only truly elite players.

But this conversation has me thinking about why the legends of certain guys grow after their careers are over while others are diminished. With Clemente, the untimely circumstances of his death is obviously a factor. I'm not sure how old you are. I'm guessing somewhere close to my age. I remember seeing Clemente play but I was pretty young. One thing that I think has made a lasting impression on guys our age is the highlight reel from that Clemente World Series that got a lot of play during rain delays back in the seventies and early eighties. There's a lot of mythology that's grown up around him. Any discussion about where he fits is likely to include someone making a statement like, "My dad says he was the best outfielder he ever saw". As if that's any kind of objective analysis of his play. If you read old baseball magazines from Clemente's time, you'll see he wasn't regarded the way he is today. He was considered a whiner, a malcontent, and sometimes seen as a malingerer. He was sort of like Hanley Ramirez in that regard. And he was always upset that he wasn't considered the equal of Mays, Mantle, or Aaron. But there was good reason for that. He just wasn't of their caliber. But he's gotten the last laugh. In some circles he's now actually seen as greater than those guys. That's something I find utterly absurd.

On the other hand, take a guy like Stan Musial. When he was playing he was viewed as the Ted Williams of the National League. Today he is largely forgotten outside of St. Louis. And I guarantee you can find lots of guys who will tell you Clemente was a greater player. It's kind of silly, really.

Then you have a guy like Bob Gibson. He's almost like Paul Bunyan. The mere mention of his name evokes visions of quivering batters pissing their pants at the plate while he goes into his wind-up. Of course it wasn't really like that. Somehow he has grown to the point where he is largely considered greater than guys like Seaver, Marichal, and Carlton. I'm not sure what drives such viewpoints, but I suspect Tim McCarver might be a culprit.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

WWN, dont ever change



Great thread.


JORR, your Yankee hate comes out a little bit more every day

here's the thing that i look at for every hall of fame--it's always flawed. and the reason is illustrated in this very thread. "i don't know how old you are", "did you ever see him play?", etc. if the HOF is exclusive and definitive like that, age should never be a factor.

but that isn't reality. the point is, all-time is hard to define (and maybe impossible) when it comes to "greatness" because the game always changes and the eras bring something new. think of starting pitchers now, and in the future. we're not going to have 300 game winners anymore. cy young winners are probably going to pale in comparison to pitchers of the 20's and 30's or 50's and 60's. but there will always be guys going into the hall of fame.

in any hall of fame, numbers don't tell the full story (even though baseball probably comes closest). there are always intangibles that can factor in.

interesting thoughts on perception. I agree on Clemente. Also he was a cultural icon.

But while Gibson's legend might be a little exaggerated. The 1.12 era is not. And it happened right around the mound change time. "They lowered it because Bob Gibson" might be a little much, but he was good enough to warrant most of the love he gets.

Another perception is that Don Mattingly was just a pretty good player who never won with the Yankees. Anyone who watched him play knows thats ridiculous.

Well, the reason it's important to have seen a guy play is to put him in context. If you're just looking at page of numbers, 25 homers is 25 homers. But there is a huge difference between a 1955 Cub hitting 25 homers and a 1955 Senator doing the same thing. That might be harder to grasp for someone who doesn't understand where they played, etc.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

that's what i'm saying. it's still subjective in some way.

I think they lowered the mound because Yaz lead the league at .301 as much as anything. Yeah, Gibson had the lowest ERA in the lowest scoring season. It was a great year. But it seems so much greater to a guy who can't put it in context. If you're used to seeing a 3-something ERA lead the league that number is mind-boggling. But let's look at his record. And here's why W/L record for starting pitchers isn't insignificant- or at least wasn't when starters went 300 innings.

In 1968 Bob Gibson started 34 games for a 22-9 record. That means that in twelve of his games another pitcher(s) had been more effective at least up until the time Gibson left the game. That's more than one-third of his starts. When you look at it in that light, it isn't quite as great as it seems. I mean here was King Kong on the mound turning batters into puddles of quivering goo just with his icy stare, and yet, more than a third of the time he took the mound, mere mortals out-pitched him.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

There should be an HBO special on mustaches in baseball like "When it was a game"

Big part of the game in the 70's-80's












/\ Not funny

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

The only way to eliminate the age/years factor is to have a player eligible only one time for a Hall of Fame vote - five years after they last play. You are a HOF'er or you aren't. You don't improve after you have finished playing. Forget all of these votes and special committees to look at players from the past who didn't make it.
The problem is with the writers. They should just do their jobs. The distinction between an HOF'er and a 1st round HOF'er exists only in the minds of the reporters.
Here's the solution: Any writer who does not vote for someone who gets over 80% of the vote loses their voting rights for next year's ballot. That will straighten out the guys like those who didn't vote for Seaver or Ryan the first time around. Reversely, if a writer votes for someone who gets less than 15% of the vote, he loses his priveleges too. The single guys in 2010 who voted for Kevin Appier and Diego Segui obviously aren't taking their jobs seriously.

_________________
Host of the weekly "We Fish ASA" podcast
Weekly columnist for the Northwest Herald
Bi-monthly columnist for Illinois Outdoor News magazine
Former host of The Outdoors Experience on WIND and The Great Outdoors on CLTV
http://www.wefishasa.com

JORR, I am 57 and have seen a lot of the guys we've been talking about play ball. Unfortunately, some may have already started their decline when I became interested enough in the game.
You really do know your stuff when it comes to baseball. You are the kind of guy who is great to have a few beers with while a game is on the television. You have the knowledge and you present your arguments well.
You are 100% right on about Musial. It's hard to say that a HOF'er is underrated, but he is. So is Yogi Berra. People today have no idea what great ballplayers they were.
What did you think about my recommended rues for HOF voting posted above?
Maybe we need a new thread to talk about how they vote for the HOF.

_________________
Host of the weekly "We Fish ASA" podcast
Weekly columnist for the Northwest Herald
Bi-monthly columnist for Illinois Outdoor News magazine
Former host of The Outdoors Experience on WIND and The Great Outdoors on CLTV
http://www.wefishasa.com

I like your 80% idea. If that many guys are voting for a guy and you aren't, something's wrong. I think if you have to argue about a guy, he probably isn't a Hall of Famer. I really do think Minoso was as good or better than Clemente, but I could accept an argument that Clemente is in the HoF for what he means to Puerto Ricans and the World Series heroics in '71 that Minnie doesn't have. Those are things that set him apart.

Great moments and history are important parts of the game. To me, Carlton Fisk is a borderline guy, but he's good enough that that indelible moment of him waving the ball fair is enough to put him in. That's why I have no problem with Mazeroski. He is regarded as the best defensive second baseman ever. He hit good enough for a middle infielder in his time. And then he has that huge homerun which is arguably the second most famous homer ever. I think when you look at all of it, he's worthy. That's as opposed to a guy like Rafael Palmeiro, who, ignoring the steroids, has an accumulation of HoF type numbers, but never really made the kind of impact I would want from a guy in my Hall of Fame.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Another hurler that caused the mound to be lowered was Dick "Turkey Neck " Hall! He had players defecating on themselves.

_________________
I'm going to bounce from the spot for awhile but I will be back at some point to argue with you about this hoops stuff again. Playoffs have been great this season. See ya up the road.

I'm out.