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

[Baltimoron]

My perception of Trammell isn't colored by Cal/Nomar/ARod/Tejada...primarily because Trammell didn't play too long against the Trinity and I'm old enough to remember what baseball was like before them. Yes, he stole a couple of Silver Sluggers from Cal when Cal had seasons that weren't up to his usual standards ('88, '90), but that doesn't make me hate on the guy.

I also find it very interesting that you hold up the "received MVP votes in 7 different seasons" as a reason for why he should be inducted when those votes are cast by the same writers you love to criticize for idiotic HoF and award voting. I mean, Andres Galarraga received MVP votes in 7 different seasons and had even more top 10 finishes in his career than Trammell did and I don't see you campaigning for his HoF chances.

I'm also throwing out his 1987 season as a huge outlier, for reasons that should be obvious. Yes, there are players that have had magical seasons before and never reached those heights again, but the 1987 season was the year of the juiced ball, the only season of the decade that totaled over 4,000 homers and beating the decades next highest total by 645. Not coincidentally, it is BY FAR Trammells best year ever...in a year where a lot of players had monumental years.

Lets take a look at Tony Fernadez, one of the other better shortstops in the AL for the 80s:

Hits: Fernandez: 2276 Trammell: 2365

Average: Fernandez: .288 Trammell: .285

Doubles: Fernandez: 414 Trammell: 412

Stolen Bases: Fernandez: 246 Trammell: 236

OBP: Fernandez: .347 Trammell: .352

Slugging: Fernandez: .399 Trammell: .415

Of course Trammell beats Fernandez with the longball, but it's not like Trammell was an all out masher. Trammell hit over 20 only twice (including the 1987 outlier) and only beats Fernandez by 16 points in his career for slugging percentage.

Per 162:

 AB    R    H   2B 3B  HR  RBI  SB CS  BB  SO   BA   OBP   SLG 594   79  171  31  7   7   63  18 10  52  59  .288  .347  .399 586   87  167  29  4  13   71  17  8  60  62  .285  .352  .415

So what now, Tony Fernandez for the Hall?

And as far as WARP and the whips dips and potato chips, you can see in this exchange that you could make a case for Jay Bell for the Hall of Fame.

Don't get me wrong, Trammell was a great player, a player anyone would like to have on their team....but he's not HoF worthy.

Congratulations, you have established Alan Trammell was a clearly better offensive player than Tony Fernandez. You could have also just said Alan had a career 110 OPS+, Fernandez 101 OPS+

Now what? Is it time to respond to Drungo yet?

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PS: Tony Fernandez played in 1987 too. But why are you talking about Tony Fernandez?

[Moose Milligan]

Congratulations, you have established Alan Trammell was a clearly better offensive player than Tony Fernandez. You could have also just said Alan had a career 110 OPS+, Fernandez 101 OPS+

Now what? Is it time to respond to Drungo yet?

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PS: Tony Fernandez played in 1987 too. But why are you talking about Tony Fernandez?

So for +6 homers and +8 RBI more per season makes a better case for the Hall of Fame for Trammell over Fernandez? That's cool, I guess.

[TommyD4207]

Congratulations, you have established Alan Trammell was a clearly better offensive player than Tony Fernandez. You could have also just said Alan had a career 110 OPS+, Fernandez 101 OPS+

Now what? Is it time to respond to Drungo yet?

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PS: Tony Fernandez played in 1987 too. But why are you talking about Tony Fernandez?

Clearly better, but not leaps and bounds. Apparently, that part of the post flew over your head.

[Baltimoron]

So for +6 homers and +8 RBI more per season makes a better case for the Hall of Fame for Trammell over Fernandez? That's cool, I guess.

Umm, yeah.

So now you want to argue Trammell has a worse case for the HOF than Fernandez because he hit more home runs and drove in more runs on an annual basis than Fernandez?

You done a bang-up job in this thread already, I'm sure you'll do the same with this one too.

Seriously, put down the beer and back away from the keyboard.

[Baltimoron]

Clearly better, but not leaps and bounds. Apparently, that part of the post flew over your head.

When do we get to the part where he bashes Cal's offense?

Trammel had a 110 OPS+, Cal a 112 OPS+?

We know Trammel's OBP was .022 higher than league average for his career, while Cal's was only .008 higher than league average.

OMG, this could get ugly.

[TommyD4207]

When do we get to the part where he bashes Cal's offense?

Trammel had a 110 OPS+, Cal a 112 OPS+?

We know Trammel's OBP was .022 higher than league average for his career, while Cal's was only .008 higher than league average.

OMG, this could get ugly.

It typically is ugly when you compare someone to another guy with 3,000 more career AB's. I mean, that's just silly!

[Moose Milligan]

Umm, yeah.

So now you want to argue Trammell has a worse case for the HOF than Fernandez because he hit more home runs and drove in more runs on an annual basis than Fernandez?

You done a bang-up job in this thread already, I'm sure you'll do the same with this one too.

Seriously, put down the beer and back away from the keyboard.

Wow, I'm sorry for disagreeing with Drungo. What was I thinking?

Check TommyD's post above....he's better, but not by leaps and bounds. So if you want to make a case for Trammell, why not make a case for Fernandez?

[DrungoHazewood]

Wow, I'm sorry for disagreeing with Drungo. What was I thinking?

Check TommyD's post above....he's better, but not by leaps and bounds. So if you want to make a case for Trammell, why not make a case for Fernandez?

Because that's a sure way to end up with an argument that Rich Dauer belongs in the Hall of Fame. For every player who deserves to be in there are many players who were 10% worse. If you want to use your standard, then once you've made your case for Fernandez you've also made the case that everyone 10% worse than him should be in. And eventually you get to Rich Dauer and Julio Cruz and Mike Bordick.

Trammell is essentially an average HOF shortstop on merit. The standard each player needs to meet is that of currently enshrined players. Fernandez, if he's 10% worse than Trammell, is 10% worse than an average HOFer. I think a reasonable place to draw a line in the Hall is somewhere around a currently average HOFer, because you have to have some way to deal with the egregious mistakes the Vet's Committee made.

Oh, and you can make a decent case for Tony Fernandez and the Hall. He would most certainly not be the worst SS in the Hall (not even excluding VC selections), not even close to the worst player. He was a very good player. I think it's a feather in Trammell's cap that he's 10% better than Fernandez.

[DrungoHazewood]

Very good post, man. Hats off to you. I agree completely, I always got the sense that Trammell was really nothing more than Tony Fernandez with a bit more home run power.

So, Trammell was similar to an excellent shortstop who played nearly 20 years for a variety of good teams, with about five MVP-ish years... just with more power? How is that an argument that he's not deserving of a spot in Cooperstown? Fernandez was a better player than HOFers like Rabbit Maranville, Luke Appling, Dave Bancroft, Travis Jackson, etc.

I think a lot of these HOF arguments are based on the idea that the Hall should have a much higher standard than it really does. In reality the Hall is very inclusive, not extremely exclusive as many would like. The real line, in real life, by the real Hall is drawn below Tony Fernandez, not somewhere above Alan Trammell.

Of course the line was drawn over 75 years and often looks like whoever did it was drunk, so you get players in the Hall clearly worse than Tony Fernandez and players excluded who are much, much better.

[TommyD4207]

So, Trammell was similar to an excellent shortstop who played nearly 20 years for a variety of good teams, with about five MVP-ish years... just with more power? How is that an argument that he's not deserving of a spot in Cooperstown? Fernandez was a better player than HOFers like Rabbit Maranville, Luke Appling, Dave Bancroft, Travis Jackson, etc.

I think a lot of these HOF arguments are based on the idea that the Hall should have a much higher standard than it really does. In reality the Hall is very inclusive, not extremely exclusive as many would like. The real line, in real life, by the real Hall is drawn below Tony Fernandez, not somewhere above Alan Trammell.

Of course the line was drawn over 75 years and often looks like whoever did it was drunk, so you get players in the Hall clearly worse than Tony Fernandez and players excluded who are much, much better.

This is a confusing argument...

So basically, you don't agree with many Hall of Famers, but since the mistake has already been made, you think it's only fair that we make the same mistake with future Hall of Famers?

I mean, I guess that's fair but I wouldn't call it logical...

[RShack]

This is a confusing argument...

So basically, you don't agree with many Hall of Famers, but since the mistake has already been made, you think it's only fair that we make the same mistake with future Hall of Famers?

I mean, I guess that's fair but I wouldn't call it logical...

Because of its inconsistencies, you can easily support either the pro or con argument about whatever point you're trying to make.

• If you think somebody who's borderline should get in, you can make the "compared to the crappy guys who are already in there" argument.

  This might be called the "It's just a museum" argument.

• But if you think somebody who's borderline should not get in, you can make the "if you do that, you'll wind up voting for Rich Dauer" argument

  This might be called "It's the freakin' HOF" argument.

So, for borderline Player-X, you can support whatever opinion you happen to have.

There are no more standards about this than there are about who's really in there.

Now, if we could just agree about whether it's a shrine vs. "just a museum", then maybe we could agree...

[DrungoHazewood]

This is a confusing argument...

So basically, you don't agree with many Hall of Famers, but since the mistake has already been made, you think it's only fair that we make the same mistake with future Hall of Famers?

I mean, I guess that's fair but I wouldn't call it logical...

My point was that there are no objective standards for inclusion in the Hall besides the de facto standards of who is already there. Who is already there includes many, many people who were worse players than Alan Trammell and Tony Fernandez.

Therefore, I think it's kind of hard to argue that we need to have strict standards for the future - pandora's box is already open. If you tell folks that Rabbit Maranville is in, but Trammell isn't, on some level you're telling them that Maranville was better than Trammell. When he pretty clearly wasn't.

We're stuck with a big Hall, no matter how much people want it to be a small Hall.

[Lester Freamon]

My point was that there are no objective standards for inclusion in the Hall besides the de facto standards of who is already there. Who is already there includes many, many people who were worse players than Alan Trammell and Tony Fernandez.

Therefore, I think it's kind of hard to argue that we need to have strict standards for the future - pandora's box is already open. If you tell folks that Rabbit Maranville is in, but Trammell isn't, on some level you're telling them that Maranville was better than Trammell. When he pretty clearly wasn't.

We're stuck with a big Hall, no matter how much people want it to be a small Hall.

Out of curiousity, is Dale Murphy someone you see as deserving, or not?

[BaltimoreTerp]

Out of curiousity, is Dale Murphy someone you see as deserving, or not?

http://joeposnanski.com/JoeBlog/2009/01/12/the-murph/

I hate to keep going back to Joe Posnanski, but he's already done a lot of basic research on a lot of these questions. He's slightly obsessive when it comes to baseball (and it's fantastic ).

[Lester Freamon]

http://joeposnanski.com/JoeBlog/2009/01/12/the-murph/

I hate to keep going back to Joe Posnanski, but he's already done a lot of basic research on a lot of these questions. He's slightly obsessive when it comes to baseball (and it's fantastic ).

Wow! Thank you very much, greatly appreciated.