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Miller is the obvious choice. Billy Martin is an interesting case. Actually, a lot of the managers are. I like Johnson and Herzog and Kelly but I haven't thought much about the qualifications needed to make one a HOF approved manager, so I'm not sure where they fit in. Mr. Jaffe...
- Herzog
- Martin
- Howsam
- Miller
There's one elector left to be announced.
Jim Frey? JIM FREY?
My brain hurts.
Miller
Harvey
Herzog
Howsam
Miller
Harvey
Herzog
Howsam
Not sold on Martin, huh?
A.J. Pierogi
Rusty Kuntz
Morganna
Bo Belinsky
Hilda Chester
Henry Wiggen
His managerial record certainly includes some flaws. But it also includes dramatic success in stop after stop; short-term success for sure, but success nonetheless. Moreover it includes remarkable adaptation to different styles (stealing home like crazy in Minnesota; never stealing at all in Detroit). Most definitely, it's a managerial record quite unlike any other in history.
Hilda Chester
If they ever build a fans' wing, the cowbell lady and Wild Bill Hagy would be on my first ballot.
He comes in at #5 on the list, although I could drop Howsam for him and not feel any pain.
There are two ballots with up to four votes each, so you could put in Martin if you wanted.
What, no Ronnie Woo-Woo?
Billy should go into the "scorched-earth" wing of the Hall
he was a sick demented drunken little dog
He's an interesting case, for sure. I'm torn on Billy because I came of age as a baseball fan with the Billy Ball A's and I'm irrationally still in love with that team. But it's also pretty clear Billy was a psychopath.
Is that a positive or a negative?
I would also vote for Howsam, Harvey, Miller, and Herzog, in that order.
There are way too many people on the list. That is why it is basically impossible to get to 75%. Just let Roland Hemond pick three every couple of years.
If I was an executive on the ballot, I wouldn't like the slight of being judged by an executive of that caliber.
I'm not too surprised, considering the general BTF dismissal of Yankees' success as being the product of nothing but money. How Tom Yawkey ever got in and Ruppert stays out is beyond me, but maybe that's because Ruppert didn't open up his hunting cabin to members of the press.
I don't believe I see the reason to support Miller's case. Then again I don't believe I would support a great many of these none-player types. My gut is that I would only support Bob Howsam. However, I am no Chris Jaffe. Good Golly, I am not even a Jay Jaffe or an El Jaffe.
Mmm, you're going to have to explain to me how Ruppert was more responsible than Barrow for the construction of the Yankee juggernaut.
That wasn't addressed to me, but why should it be a case of either / or?
Of course since it took Walter O'Malley until 2007 to get elected, nothing about those executive choices should really surprise me.
Yawkey got in because he was a huge HOF booster, which is not the worst reason. He gave millions to the Hall, as did his widow Jean later, as does the Yawkey Foundation to this day. And, no, none of it was with the expectation that he would be elected, which happened after he died.
Ruppert hired Barrow, hired Weiss, worked with both extensively, built the greatest stadium ever (in terms of its fame and symbolism, certainly, and its grandeur), and gave the people who worked for him a boatload of money to work with. He also bought Babe Ruth before Barrow got there. It was he who hired Weiss and directed him to build the farm system.
Ruppert hired Weiss? I'd always assumed Barrow did. Obviously I overlooked that (major) point in Dan's book.
I like the case you're making.
That's good to know, but Gene Autry makes it before Ruppert does.
Showing off his pair of world championships.
I know he had a losing record in his career, but on the whole he was a helluva manager. He's not HoF material, but not everyone on the preliminary list is - that's just the nature of the list.
As in "he will" or as in "he should"?
I guess my problem is that I've never been able to get a good handle on what exactly constitutes a HOF-caliber owner.
Will. At least people know who Autry is. I just can't see how 75% of the group is going to suddenly decide that Ruppert is a HOFer. On the other hand, two years ago 75% put in Barney Dreyfus so maybe I just don't understand how it all goes down.
I'm positive I don't. And as I say, I remain a bit unclear on the criteria for an owner deserving the HOF.
Personally, I don't believe someone who was just an owner should be in the HOF.
I know you said "will" and not "should," but Motherfucker of Mercy, that would make Jack Morris before Bert Blyleven the embodiment of good judgment by comparison. Gene Autry had the LA market dumped in his lap, got placed in the weakest division in baseball, couldn't even make it to the postseason for 18 years (and that only because he could outspend Charlie Finley and caught the Royals in a down year), and never even won a single pennant. Hall of Fame, my ass.
I ask because I think it's a reason I might overrate him.
Seem plausible. Rarely been much evidence of understanding of baseball history in these committees. Not saying Autry is a lousy choice, just that his case seems weaker than Ruppert. Or Kaufman (yes, YMMV)
This is a strong group and I'd expect Bill White to do very well in the voting. And the specific group that I'd expect to support him are those who will never support Miller.
Nothing wrong with White as a HOFer, but I see him somewhere around 10th.
For the record: Miller, Herzog and I'm torn among Harvey, O'Day, Ruppert, Kaufman, Howsam and Mauch. If given a mere 4 choices I suspect I'd turn in a different ballot at any given moment. And I'm pretty sure in certain moods I'd support others.
Here are the owners currently in the HOF, removing guys with impressive resumes as players or managers (Griffith, Commiskey, Mack, Spalding, Wright, etc.).
Barney Dreyfus, Tom Yawkey, Bill Veeck, Walter O'Malley
So, yeah, I can see why you are having a tough time. They have nothing in common.
And vice versa, seeing as I seem to be the only one in the thread who would vote for both.
My favorite story about Autry is the 1960 AL winter meetings ... Autry attends the meeting in the hopes of securing the broadcasting rights for the new Angels franchise, and walks out of the meeting owning the franchise.
Think about that: it's December of 1960. The AL is expanding in 1961, for the first time in its history. It's December of 1960, and the league still hasn't secured ownership for one of their expansion franchises. (I'm not sure exactly when the new Senators ownership was settled.)
It was a different era, that's for sure.
Um, Kauffman was the founding owner of the Royals.
EDIT: Oh! I get it now; you're referring to Finley. Got it.
And somewhere, a 20 year-old Jeffrey Loria went cold all over. When his friends ask what's wrong, he replies "I don't know...it's like a million voices were about to cry out, but then they weren't screwed over."
OK, just looked up MY OWN RESEARCH from an article I wrote years ago ... the league made the decision to expand on October 26th. The Senators' ownership group was created on November 17th, and the Angels, as stated above, in early December.
They sure didn't dick around in them days.
And was it Paul or a different Yankee executive (maybe it was George Weiss) that had the famous line uttered about him, "He threw around nickels like they were manhole covers."?
I do know in his "The Year I Owned the Yankees", Sparky Lyle says Paul "Would go into the vault to make change for a dollar."
The Senators were owned by a collection of investors, and the frontman (Quesada) was also identified about the same time. As I am sure Steve knows, it was thought that Hank Greenberg would land the Angels at the meetings, but he balked when he found out he had to indemnify O'Malley and be his tenant for four years. Autry happened to be hanging around the hotel when Greenberg backed off.
The expansion draft was a week later, and the team reported to spring training less than two months after that.
They sure didn't dick around in them days.
If there weren't every incentive to take as long as possible to decide on a group now, you'd see movement just as quick. When you're looking for the best group, the decision is pretty easy 90% of the time. Now, with the impetus being "Who will pay the biggest franchise fee?", dragging out the decision only helps bring in more groups and thus the potential for more money.
I'll grant you that Paul's work with the Reds in the '50s was impressive, and he did all right as part of the hydra-headed GM consortium with Steinbrenner's Yankees in the '70s. But his long tenure with the Indians in between could most charitably be described as "aimless." And he capped it off with the gift of Graig Nettles to the Yankees in November of 1972, before resigning in January of '73.
Ed Linn postulated that Paul traded Nettles knowing that he was headed to the Yankees. I am researching this very story these very days.
I give Paul credit for all those fantastic Yankee trades (Chambliss, Bonds, Figueroa/Rivers, Randolph/Ellis) which really built that team. (Free agency was the cherry on top.) But Paul didn't do nearly as well with bad teams.
I think this is true of most GMs. What is Rickey without Sam Breadon, for example?
Mauch
Kelly
Herzog
O'Day
Miller
Autry
Kaufmann
Ruppert
No way Billy Martin. I agree, the guy was sick.
Which just goes to show how influential by drum-beating can be.
Yeah, that's about how I've heard it went down ... both leagues were forced to expand as a result of congressional pressure brought on by the Continental League. Neither league really had their heart in it, but when the NL proceeded in a rather stately, prudent fashion, the AL slap-dashed it together in reactionary mode to that.
Given what came before and after, I don't see the fact that Paul couldn't turn the Indians into winners as a besmirchment of any sort. And what Paul himself did directly after he left only bolsters that.
(EDIT) "Next 30 years" should have been "next 20 years", changed.
If that's true, it sure doesn't say much for Paul's character/integrity. Though it does say something for his ruthlessness.
Mark, you met Paul's daughter at the NINE conference last spring, didn't you? She didn't describe her dad in the warmest of terms.
Not exactly. The Continental League was not an outlaw league--they intended to form with the good graces of the major leagues. Congress wanted the league, but mainly wanted knew teams. The CL folded in mid-summer when it was clear that the majors would expand--all of the owners wanted to be chosen by the majors, hence they were more than willing to sell out the league.
In the event, the NL chose the two best capitalized CL cities and owners (Houston and NY), so their expansion was pretty smooth. The AL ingored the 6 remaining CL groups and rolled their own. It was not smooth.
I expect Paul was like most Lords of the time. A real hoot. I am particularly fascinated by the guys who ran teams during this period, when players began to flex their muscles. Note that I have no idea if Paul screwed the Indians in the Nettles trade, that's just what (I recall) Linn wrote.
I did meet Jennie Paul, yes. She seemed like quite a hoot herself.
Sure, they weren't bad. Just sort of blah. But the issue was that Paul in Cleveland never seemed to put together any sort of coherent plan, or stick with one, anyway. He executed a steady stream of trades that didn't follow any pattern; they just seemed to be deals for deals' sake.
And amid those trades he surrendered quite a few young talents that would blossom elsewhere: Steve Hamilton, Ron Taylor, Tommy John, Tommie Agee. And Paul's inability to figure out what to do with Walt Bond was rather hilarious: after Bond hits .380 with 6 HRs in 50 ABs in his late-season call-up in 1962, Paul demotes him to double-A for '63. Huh?
This raises an interesting point. Suppose Torre does get elected by the VC. That's strictly his player resume, right? Will his plaque make any mention of his manager's resume? Can he be elected again as a manager? Because a manager's wing of the HOF (yes, I know there's no actual place) without Joe Torre doesn't seem right.
That's a good way to put it.
It was larceny. But, alas, robbing Horace Stoneham blind in that period wasn't exactly a difficult achievement.
Sorry Steve, did not mean to open old wounds.
I've never heard any dates atteached but Gabe Paul and George Steinbrenner were interested in buying the Tigers and asked Mike Burke of the Yankees to help them. They were surprised when he said CBS was interested in selling the team if they were interested. They jumped on it. CBS sold the team for less than they bought it 8 years earlier.
The Indians were such a lousy, poorly financed team at the time Gabe Paul may have felt he had to trade one player to get several prospects. Charlie Spikes did start out with two good years but fell off the earth after age 23. Nettles did last forever too. Must have been the corked bats.
Why is Steve O'Neill on the ballot?
The Gaylord Perry for Sam McDowell was knocked at the time for giving up s young 29 pitcher who threw harder than a 33 year old spitballer. But McDowell had a drinking problem that hurt him.
:-)
No offense taken.
But don't you dare bring up the name "George Foster."
it's not so much that he couldn't make the Indians a winner--its that he was responsible for choosing a succession of owners whose ONLY attribute was that they'd retain him as GM (or president or whatever his title happened to be). That ensured mediocrity at best for that franchise
now--his short tenure with the Yankees?? brilliant--he is almost solely responsible for the late 70s run with his trades made in the earlier part of the decade.
Of course, he knew from experience that the Indians had 2 good players--Nettles and Chambliss--and he got them both to the Yankees for essentially nothing
What I find amazing is that from 1961 to 1967, the closest AL team to the Angels was the Kansas City A's. Sounds like a tiring series of road trips.
But when Paul arrived with Steinbrenner it was announced he would be only an advisor (and Steinbrenner promised to be an absentee owner). Maybe Mike Burke was stupid enough to believe it but few others could see (as Marty Appel puts it) Gabe Paul limiting his job to deciding if 10,000 or 12,000 people should get in for "yankee Pen Day". Appel doesn't have too many kind words for Paul's management style in his book "Now Pitching for the Yankees."
Gabe Paul is like Casey Stengel or Joe Torre: an idiot before he comes to the Yankees and then turns into a genius.
This book covers the Continental League in detail:
Bottom of the Ninth
This is one of those choices which demonstrates James' point that stats matter more in the long run. When I first started to follow the game his name always popped up in discussions of great managers. Not quite sure why, but there were zillions of stories about the guy. Can't say that any of them made an impression though.
A lot of the voters will have the same familiarity with the name, and will probably have the sense that he was a great manager without really being able to tell you why.
Agreed. Howsam's tenure in St. Louis was quite brief; less than two-and-a-half years. But in that space he was able to pretty thoroughly rebuild the 1964 WS champion that was suddenly over the hill in '65 into the back-to-back pennant winner of '67-'68.
And along the way, Howsam pulled off one of the all-time great trades: Ray Sadecki for Orlando Cepeda.
Wait -- please keep sharp objects away from me for a while, okay?
no--that's what I said--he HAD been in Cleveland and, when he got to the Yankees, he knew that they (the Indians) had 2 good players
and yes--I was living in NYC at the time and the Chambliss trade was heavily criticized locally
("knowledgeable fans" my ass)
Gabe Paul is like Casey Stengel or Joe Torre: an idiot before he comes to the Yankees and then turns into a genius.
and then leaves the Yankees and turns back into a pumpkin
edit: Now I know of a book on Continental League.
He never had a losing season in his life. Only two men who lasted longer than five years can say that: Joe McCarthy and Steve O'Neill. Both were well over the five-year threshold. (Eddie Dyer had five winning seasons but no sixth year, which is why that's the cut-off point).
Sure, Al Lopez only misses because of some itsy-bitsy partial stretches in 1968-69, but those partial stretches existed.
EDIT: as a major league manager. I think he had some losing seasons in the minors.
STILL EDIT: Check out who managed the 1950 Red Sox if you get a chance. Neat, eh?
Read a book of interviews on the AFL "Remember the AFL". The beginning starts out on how since the female owner of the Chicago Cardinals couldn't decide whether to sell the team, Bud Adams and Lamar Hunt decide to form their own league in order to each have a team. Things were a lot more haphazard back then.
---
and then leaves the Yankees and turns back into a pumpkin
"Pumpkin" in this case apparently being defined as "only makes it as far as the NLCS each year."
I don't know if that's true (calling Chris Jaffee!!), but something that my brother and I noticed away, way back when our only source of baseball history was the old "All Time Rosters of Major League Baseball Teams" -- this is pre-MacMillan -- was O'Neill's remarkable work in turning around teams in mid-season.
The 1935 Indians: 46-48 under Walter Johnson, 36-23 under O'Neill.
The 1950 Red Sox: 31-28 under Joe McCarthy, 63-32 under O'Neill.
The 1952 Phillies: 28-32 under Eddie Sawyer, 59-32 under O'Neill.
I love this story. As much as Devine deserves all of the credit for the 1964 team (great trades), the team was basically a one-and-done team. Howsam, a Rickey disciple with no loyalty to the players on hand, has the guts/ruthlessness to get rid of Boyer, White and Groat, who were finished, then made the big trades for Cepeda and Maris.
It is really difficult to talk about baseball in this period without a disastrous Giants trade just happening to come up. I am trying, but I can only do so much.
Don't know about the socks, but Howsam was actually, IIRC, the original owner of the Broncos.
See post #86. My all-time favorite BTF Dugout trivia question is when I stumped the band with that one.
Other near misses (aside from Al Lopez):
Earl Weaver (if he'd never comeback, he'd make it)
Ron Gardenhire (a work in progress, obviously)
Herman Franks (really).
He also ran the Denver Bears for a long time, bringing them to Triple-A in the 1950s.
... and if he gets another chance, Grady Little.
Steve, it is my turn to remove the sharp objects from the house.
Bob Broeg, for one, detested him and wrote that Gussie Busch and Busch's liaison guy with the team's front office, Dick Meyer, had to prod Howsam into completing the Giants deal as Howsam was hemming and hawing and asking the Giants for even more.
Howsam no doubt was wise to break up the aging All-Star infield, but Alex Johnson was a disaster in St. Louis. Howsam also gave away Mike Cuellar as a throw-in in a Ron Taylor for Hal Woodeschick trade. Of course, his biggest sin was that he wasn't as personable as the popular Bing Devine, whom he replaced.
There was also a backlash to Howsam's implication after trading White that White was several years older than his stated age. White reviled Howsam for that, and his reaction to their entering the Hall together would be interesting (even with Howsam's induction being posthumous).
I actually talked to Howsam several years ago when I was working on an Alex Johnson story. Howsam traded for Johnson twice, and it sort of worked in Cincinnati.
On You Tube, there is an episode from What's My Line in 1959 with Branch Rickey as the mystery guest. In fact, here is the link. Rickey's "line" is that he's president of the Continental League, which is discussed as a done deal ("inevitable as tomorrow morning") with five cities already in place -- New York, Houston, Denver, Minneapolis-St. Paul and Toronto -- and three still pending. (Chuck Connors, once signed by Rickey, happens to be on the panel and helps identify him).
Link (Word 2003 document)
Other than Nettles, Agee, and John (already mentioned), I'd rank the guys sent away, based on what they did after the transaction, as follows:
Joe Rudi (whole career)
Luis Tiant (1970-1982, 154-108, 2286 IP, 112 ERA+)
Jose Cardenal (1970-1980, 4867 PA, .286/.351/.412, 108 OPS+)
Mudcat Grant (1965-1971, 67-47, 1061 IP, 108 ERA+)
Sonny Seibert (1970-1975, 65-56, 997.2 IP, 103 ERA+)
Vic Davalillo (1968-1973, 1794 PA, .277/.314/.363, 95 OPS+)
I don't know how much to count off for all of Mike Cuellar's career, as it took another 3 years and two franchises for him to do jack ####, at which point he was 29 years old, and he was "sent to the St. Louis Cardinals in an unknown transaction."
Now, who'd they get back?
Agee/John - Colavito (1500 PAs of 125 OPS+ before traded again when basically done), Cam Carreon (turned into Lou Piniella, who was taken away in expansion draft)
Rudi - nobody (Landis/Rittwage)
Tiant - with Stan Williams, for Dean Chance (done at this point), Bob Miller (traded again before he did anything, not much left to career), Ted Uhlaender (two years of 90 OPS+ in OF), and...Graig Nettles
Cardenal - Vada Pinson (1200 PAs of ~ 100 OPS+, traded again)
Mudcat Grant - virtually nothing (Stange had mild success after trade but after he was traded away again, Banks was nothing)
Seibert - Harrelson (900 PAs of 99 OPS+), Pizarro and Ellsworth (nothing much)
Davalillo - Jimmie Hall (bleh)
I'm not seeing a string of big giveaways here.
They didn't trade Chambliss to the Yankees until 1975. If they didn't know what they had, that's not Gabe Paul's ####### fault at that point.
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