Marvin Miller for HOF ???

Guy, I wasn't making the argument you thought. I should have compared apples to apples though. If Bill Veeck is in, and he is, most deservedly, then Miller sure as hell should be in.

 

I didn;t think you meant it that way, just a pet peeve that opened the gates for the Don Suttons & Gary Carters of the world.

 

boom, i understand why "fans" prefer the old system, in which players spent their entire career with the same trade unless they were traded.

but i don't understand how a decent human being can be ok with indentured servitude - which is exactly what the old system amounted to. that's not how we roll in the usa.

 

Bruhman- certainly what Marvin Miller did to free 800 odd baseball players from the tryanny of greedy owners was a noble gesture.

I am just not sure how it fits into the criteria for HOF, which uses the operative term "contribution to game". If you take the view that the game is about the fans than you could argue that Miller's contrubution had a negative impact on many cities.

 

Well, no, you can't, if you know anything about the history and economics of the game.

 

Fenian since you are such a historian of the game it might help me to understand better if you were to answer the question I asked you on pg 3 of this thread:



Fenian -the words hall of fame uses is "contribution to the game". If you were a voter how would you define "contribution to the game" ?

As follow up how would you consider postive or negative impact?

 

a) There has never been a period of time in baseball where there was "more balance between the teams financially."

The Yankees have been buying players from less financially stable teams since 1920. It was the Red Sox at first (they got Ruffing, Pennock, Mays, Dugan, Hoyt, Schang, Everett Scott, Joe Bush, Sam Jones and, of course, one G.H. Ruth from Boston) -- later, they were paying top dollar to Pacific Coast League teams (especially San Francisco) to get Lazzeri, Dimaggio, Crosetti, Gomez -- in the 1950s, they began poaching off the Kansas City A's (they got Boyer, Terry, Shantz, Ditmar, Duren, Trucks, Dickson). Obviously, we all know what Steinbrenner has done since free agency hit in the 1970s.

Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, the Phillies and Browns regularly sold off players to stay afloat. The Phillies were actually taken over by the National League in 1943 (a la the Expos in this decade) until a new owner could be found, because then-owner Gerry Nugent couldn't pay off his team's $300,000 debt. The only reason the A's stayed in Philadelphia so long was because Connie Mack wouldn't die -- his team's finances had been spiraling downhill ever since his last fire sale in 1932-33.

This has been going on forever. There has NEVER been financial balance in baseball. The good ol' days never existed. You "preferred a game" that never existed.

b) The reason players stayed with a single team their entire careers was because they were forced to by the collusive owners. The reserve clause was indentured servitude -- workforce slavery -- and if you're going to argue that you "preferred the game" that way, it's not very far off from arguing that one would "prefer" the American economy when it allowed slavery there, too.

Sorry, but there is no place in this country for slavery -- and that includes the National Pastime. Marvin Miller's impact here was undoubtedly positive.

 

I just don't think that you can compare baseball players to slaves.

 

No, baseball players were never slaves. They were highly skilled workers whose job opportunities and wages were artificially restrained by a cartel. Boom, do you really want to take the reserve clause-was good-for-baseball side of the debate?

 

Well, Boom, the "baseball history and economics" portion of the argument seems to have been made.
MM's "contribution to the game" was bringing the sonovabitch into the 20th century, with concurrent benefits to all involved. Which is a damned sight more than that miserable segregationist bastard KM Landis, did.

 

On that, all should agree.

 

It depends where you are coming from. If you are Dave McNally you might argue that getting rid of it was good. If you are a fan in Tampa you might not.

The Supreme Court upheld it so there is certainly some good debate either way.