The preemptive "I can't believe Tim Raines only got 32% of the vote" Thread

[DrungoHazewood]

Today at 1400 they announce the 2009 inductees for the Hall, and unless there's some divine intervention one of the top 10 LFers of all time will nudge closer to falling off the ballot than to induction in the Hall.

Rickey seems to be the only lock this year, but if the world was a just and fair place Blyleven, Trammell, and McGwire would go in, too.

Full list of nominees here.

Short, non-subscriber BP analysis here. Kind of neat in a train wreck kind of way that numbers 35, 38, 39, 75, and 81 (left fielders of all time) are in the Hall and numbers 6, 12, and 15 may never be.

Hardball Times analysis of Raines' case here.

[waroriole]

Drungo,

Not quetioning your reasoning, but why would you include Trammell in the Hall. IMO, he was a good SS, but not HoF worthy.

Agree about Raines, it will be a shame if he does not ever get in.

[sakata_catching]

You beat me to the preemptive "Jim Rice rides RedSox Nation's coattails into Cooperstown" thread, Drungo.

[DrungoHazewood]

Drungo,

Not quetioning your reasoning, but why would you include Trammell in the Hall. IMO, he was a good SS, but not HoF worthy.

Agree about Raines, it will be a shame if he does not ever get in.

Here's a quick bit that sums up my position:

Which brings us to Alan Trammell, who most certainly does have a real case for the Hall, if nowhere near the support he deserves. He spent 20 seasons as a Tiger, 15 of them as their regular shortstop, arriving in late 1977 along with Lance Parrish and Jack Morris, and debuting in the same game as Lou Whitaker, his regular middle-infield partner through 1994. He excelled both at the plate and in the field, led the World Champion 1984 Tigers in WARP (10.2; he was also the World Series MVP), and should have been the AL MVP in 1987, when he went .343/.402/.551 with 28 HR and 105 RBI, losing the vote to 47-HR outfielder George Bell. According to WARP, he was five wins better than Bell (9.7 to 4.7), though Roger Clemens (11.2, with a 20-9, 2.97 ERA, 256-K season) and Wade Boggs (10.4, off of a .363/.461/.588 year with 24 HR and 108 RBI) topped them both.

Trammell not only clears the JAWS standards by a wide margin, his score is better than all but five of the 20 shortstops in the Hall of Fame: Honus Wagner (117.5), Cal Ripken (89.7), Arky Vaughan (84.5), Robin Yount (83.9), and Ozzie Smith (83.3). Three of them were contemporaries, and while Trammell is a step below that trio in WARP, that's mostly a function of late-career playing time. He holds his own as far as EQA and fielding within that group:

Player EQA BRAR BRAA FRAA Career Peak JAWS

Ripken .283 742 353 108 113.6 65.8 89.7

Yount .285 739 366 52 104.7 63.0 83.9

Smith .261 353 18 388 105.7 60.8 83.3

Larkin .291 584 320 164 98.9 62.6 80.8

Trammell .282 526 242 154 93.6 56.5 75.1

I've thrown in Barry Larkin, who reaches the ballot next year and who may well face a similar level of indifference from the voters, whose expectations for what constitute a great shortstop have been altered by the Alex Rodriguezes and Derek Jeters of the last decade and a half. That's an issue for another day, and it shouldn't detract from Trammell's case. Overall, his peak score ranks 12th among shortstops, his career score ranks ninth, and his JAWS score ranks eighth. That's a Hall of Famer.

[Migrant Redbird]

Jon,

Quick question: I see WARP and WARP3 cited frequently in justification for HOF membership, but I've not found anyplace on the internet where I can look that up. Is that only available through a subscription to a premium site and, if so, how much is the subscription?

[DrungoHazewood]

Well, it's official. Rice and Henderson in, everyone else goes home for another year.

Rice, who is maybe the 35th-best LFer of all time is now honored as the 21st LFer in the Hall. While several players who're arguably top-10 at their positions are out, maybe forever (Raines, Trammell, Santo, McGwire). Not to mention Blyleven, who's probably a top-25 starter of all time (and there are, what, 80 or 90 starters in the Hall?).

[DrungoHazewood]

Jon,

Quick question: I see WARP and WARP3 cited frequently in justification for HOF membership, but I've not found anyplace on the internet where I can look that up. Is that only available through a subscription to a premium site and, if so, how much is the subscription?

I'm pretty sure the career player cards are available to everyone. Try this.

Note that they still don't have a full searchable database of WARP totals. Also, Clay Davenport is revamping the whole system this winter to fix the obvious problems WARP has had in valuing replacement level too low.

[DrungoHazewood]

Oh, and Raines got 22.6% of the vote, which is nearly criminal. If there's ever been hard evidence that the BBWAA has some indefensible problems doing its job with respect to HOF voting it's right here. One of the top 10 LFers in the 130+ year history of the game gets voted "no" by over 3/4ths of the pool, while Rice, Chick Hafey and Goose Goslin have plaques. Absurd.

[TinCup]

You beat me to the preemptive "Jim Rice rides RedSox Nation's coattails into Cooperstown" thread, Drungo.

:clap3:

This is a gold nugget. Rep coming to you when I can pass on more!

[CrimsonTribe]

How the ESPN guys voted.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/hof09/news/story?id=3819625

Wow. Pedro Gomez. Wow.

[BaltimoreTerp]

How the ESPN guys voted.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/hof09/news/story?id=3819625

Wow. Pedro Gomez. Wow.

Peter Gammons voted basically how I would have.

Pedro Gomez obviously still hasn't recovered from the fumes from whatever Bonds was injecting from all that time following him around.

[DrungoHazewood]

How the ESPN guys voted.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/hof09/news/story?id=3819625

Wow. Pedro Gomez. Wow.

You ever fill out one of those scantron tests just so it made a cool pattern?

[JTrea81]

Kudos to Timmy K for having the cajones to vote all those deserving guys in. People who didn't vote for Dawson, Raines or Blyleven should be ashamed...

[Moose Milligan]

I'm sorry, and I don't mean to sound like OldFan, but Trammell doesn't pass the sniff test when discussing the Hall.

Raines does.

I know people are holding Dawson's OBP against him but I remember when he played and everyone acted like it was a foregone conclusion that he was a Hall of Famer when he hung 'em up.

Oh well, at least we get to look forward to Rickey's induction speech...that should be rich.

[Migrant Redbird]

I'm pretty sure the career player cards are available to everyone. Try this.

Thanks! That works, or at least it seems to work for Stan Musial.

Carrying the exercise a little further, I decided to look up the WARP3 numbers for the top five players on a few of the teams which were mentioned. Could have made it six for the Dodgers if I'd included Campanella, but his numbers were a little low due to the tragic halt to his career.

I expected the 1998 Yankees to rank a little higher than they did, but I was more surprised by how far down the Gas House Gang teams were. I knew the "Frisch Gang" entries into the HOF had weak credentials, but I hadn't realized quite how weak they were. Part of that, I think, was that some of them had relatively short careers, but some of them just weren't all that good outside of the post season.

                       Player 1         Player 2         Player 3         Player 4         Player 5                              NAME    WARP3    NAME    WARP3    NAME    WARP3    NAME    WARP3    NAME    WARP3  Top 2  Top 3  Top 4  Top 51914-1915 Red Sox  Ruth      227.8  Speaker   174    Hooper     91    Gardner    76.4  Scott      45.2  401.8  492.8  569.2  614.41936-1937 Yankees  Gehrig    139.1  DiMaggio  121.9  Dickey    102.9  Lazzeri    85    Crosetti   56.5  261    363.9  448.9  505.41942 Cardinals     Musial    191.5  Slaughter 102.9  Marion     65.6  W.Cooper   54.6  Hopp       45.4  294.4  360    414.6  4601956 Dodgers       Reese     105.8  Snider     93.9  Robinson   91.5  Hodges     81.1  Furillo    76.1  199.7  291.2  372.3  448.41987 Pirates       Bonds     236.4  Pena       69.5  Ray        52.8  Orsulak    32.5  Lind       28.8  305.9  358.7  391.2  4201998 Yankees       Williams  106.3  Jeter     103.5  Posada     87.1  Lowell     65.7  Spencer    14    209.8  296.9  362.6  376.61932 Cardinals     Medwick    95.4  Bottomley  64.6  Hafey      48.3  Martin     38.7  Douthit    34.6  160    208.3  247    281.61931 Cardinals     Bottomley  64.6  Hafey      48.3  Martin     38.7  Douthit    34.6  Gelbert    22    112.9  151.6  186.2  208.2

I've repeated the totals below, so that people don't have to scroll to the right to view them.

                  Top 2  Top 3  Top 4  Top 51914-1915 Red Sox  401.8  492.8  569.2  614.41936-1937 Yankees  261    363.9  448.9  505.41942 Cardinals     294.4  360    414.6  4601956 Dodgers       199.7  291.2  372.3  448.41987 Pirates       305.9  358.7  391.2  4201998 Yankees       209.8  296.9  362.6  376.61932 Cardinals     160    208.3  247    281.61931 Cardinals     112.9  151.6  186.2  208.2

The order shuffles a little if you look only at the top 2 or 3 or 4 players, but the Ruth and Speaker combination trumps everything else.

What I didn't figure out was how to incorporate pitchers into the scheme. I didn't find anything as convenient as WARP3 for ranking pitchers' contributions to team wins. Any suggestions?