2017 Baseball Hall of Fame Ballot

I guess the three Cy Young Awards and the MVP before he left for Toronto don't impress Heyman.

That's really weird. Wonder if it's more a Boston-New York thing, or the legend of Clemens begging out of Game 6.

 

It really is amazing how many people are not voting for Pudge at all, how many people are voting for Vlad over Pudge and how mnay people are voting for Vlad at all on the first ballot.

 

Isn't that a steroid thing? Anyone without Pudge voting for Bonds / Clemens etc.?

 

It almost certainly is -- I figured the number of those voters would be smaller because there really is no evidence outside of Canseco's word. There is also the fact that the only first-ballot catcher is Bench, so I could see some holdouts. Of course if you told a lot of people that Tim Raines would be the top vote getter, they'd be stunned as well.

The Vlad love is really surprising. If the ballot wasn't as full I'd understand but there.

 

The Vlad love isn't super surprising to me, because he's probably one of the best "eye test" candidates we've had in a while. Like, the guy did things that almost no one else could, like hitting home runs from his knees or on pitches that bounced, etc. He's hurt by a quick downslide / lack of counting numbers in the back-end of his career, but I think the Hall voters are usually more likely to enshrine short, outstanding peaks vs. rewarding compilers.

Pudge not making it on the first ballot, ugh. Just silly to me.

 

I thought Vlad would be over 50 percent, maybe 60. But to be at induction line with 50 percent counted.....

 

Rob Gillies with an awesome ballot -- Walker and Vlad

 

Not a fan of some of his maudlin crap--and the whole Paterno debacle was of course embarrassment--but enjoying Joe Posnanski's walk through the HoF ballot:

Ballot 13: Sammy Sosa

 

Expos fan?

 

I found it kind of odd that he didn't vote for Raines.

 

Bill Livingston wanted to abstain.....but he signed and sent in a blank ballot with a note saying he wanted to abstain. And no one knows if that means it is going to be counted as a blank ballot. I mean you can't make this stuff up.

 

I'm sure it was touched upon earlier on this thread, but I do like the idea that all ballots will be public next year. If somebody wants to give Rob Deer a vote, they damn well should be held accountable.