I can tell you this. When you go to Cooperstown, there isn't a player enshrined (other than maybe Rabbit Maranville) who doesn't blow your socks off.

Either this guy hasn't looked at whose in the Hall, or he has an incredibly low "socks blown off" standard.

Rabbit Maranville doesn't blow this guy's socks off?

I thought that Maranville's hijinks presented an example of a guy who was in Cooperstown primarily because he blew your socks off, perhaps literally.

EDIT: Less troll.

When I was at Cooperstown, I distinctly remember George Kell not blowing my socks off.

I'm done, for the time being, with my previous steroid protests -- voting for no one last year, and extreme musclehead juicers Jose Canseco and Ken Caminiti before that.

He seems to be saying that two years ago, he voted for Caminiti and Canseco as a protest against steroid use(?!)

Baffling.

A cool thing about this column is that he omits the Blogging from Mom's Basement in Pajamas stereotype, and stereotypes the mainstream media writers instead.

Thanks for reminding us, you bald-headed, plaid-wearing, cigar-chewing, ink-stained Alzheimer's candidates.

He seems to be saying that two years ago, he voted for Caminiti and Canseco as a protest against steroid use(?!)

Yes. If I recall it was because they blew the lid off MLB's secret steroid usage ... until then, writers like Telander had no idea (no idea I say!) that such was going on. So, knowing they wouldn't get in, he gave them a nod.

Or it was ironic -- i.e. I'll leave off McGwire while voting for the two most obvious steroid users who put up worse numbers -- to thumb his nose at his brethren who voted for McGwire.

Possibly both.

Richard Dawson certainly belongs in the Match Game Panelist Hall of Fame, along with Arlene Francis, Jack Klugman, and Charles Nelson Reilly, whose DARPA (Double-entendres Above Replacement Panelist, Averaged) is off the board.

"Those guys are something. Tough company. Lords, if you will. Awe builds. Somberness"

This writing is something. Stupid ****. Crap, if you will. Boredom builds. Tediumness.

This writing is something. Stupid ****. Crap, if you will. Boredom builds. Tediumness.

I kept trying a while ago to get people to help make an index of mainstream columnists' S/PR (sentence per paragraph ratio). It was inspired by Telander, whose columns frequently had an S/PR of less than one, if you grade on the stringent scale that considers sentences beginning with "and", "or" or "but" to be fragments rather than true sentences.

He seems to have toned down that tendency now that he's writing more for web readers than print readers, and a constant barrage of thirty-word paragraphs looks a lot stupider on screen than in the narrow columns of a newspaper. A decade ago he probably would have written:

Those guys are something.

Tough company. Lords, if you will.

Awe builds.

Somberness.

Richard Dawson certainly belongs in the Match Game Panelist Hall of Fame, along with Arlene Francis, Jack Klugman, and Charles Nelson Reilly, whose DARPA (Double-entendres Above Replacement Panelist, Averaged) is off the board.

Arlene Francis? I think you mean Brett Somers.

I don't know if anyone else is going to, but I'm voting for Patti Deutsch.

I voted for five players this year, and all five are, I hope and pray, guys who didn’t walk around with syringes in their butts or Winstrol on their breath

What? I thought sportswriters know who is or isn't on steroids? Now of course, before a few years ago they had no idea about anything!

I remember a couple of years back Telander was a some NFL press conference and he got up and asked some jock a thoroughly rambling question that meandered for a minute or two and probably answered itself. After he was all done rambling the jock waited a second and then asked if there was a question in all that. He brought the house down. I think Telander's fellow reporters were just waiting for somebody to call him on it.

It was the tennis great Todd Martin who responded to the question "Where are you at physically right now?" by saying "Physically? I'm right here. Do you want to know where I am metaphysically?"

Interesting choices for his statement ... "all five men can reside in the same hall with Ruth and Ty Cobb and Carl Yastrzemski and Ozzie Smith and not have to blush or ask forgiveness."

Uh, he does know what Cobb was as a player right? That Cobb wouldn't have gone onto the same field as either Smith, Rice, Dawson, and Henderson, that Cobb attacked a fan during a game and did lord knows how many other disgusting things. But hey, he never did steroids therefor guys like McGwire should hang their head around him. Sheesh.

Of his 5 only Rickey would be on my ballot (if I had one) this year. Well, I'd probably put John on there too due to the 'pioneer' status of being the first guinea pig and doing fairly well for a long time. But no Blyleven, Raines, or Trammell? Sigh. At least he didn't vote for Morris.

I don't know if anyone else is going to, but I'm voting for Patti Deutsch.

Count me in as a PD fan -- she was way off the wall. I liked Fannie Flagg a lot too. I'd have to vote CNR, Patti, Richard, Brett and Fannie, in that order, as my top 5.

Tommy John was the first guinea pig? What about Pud Galvin?

(I thought Ed Delehanty injected such substances as well...but can't find evidence of it)

It was the tennis great Todd Martin who responded to the question "Where are you at physically right now?" by saying "Physically? I'm right here. Do you want to know where I am metaphysically?"

Awesome. Todd Martin should be elected to the hall of fame.

What about Pud Galvin?

Babe Ruth reportedly did so, too.

-- MWE

What? No Gene Rayburn love? What delivery!

But hey, he never did steroids

Are you sure? If ever there was a guy who looked like he had a perpetual case of 'roid rage, it's Cobb. And you can bet that if they had been around, he would have been taking them in between sharpening his spikes.

Raise your hand if your first consciousness of homosexuality was Paul Lynde. What a weird time.

OOOOOK before it gets to that point, I meant WATCHING Paul Lynde, wise guys.

My first understanding of the existence of homosexuality in the world was Lamar in Revenge of the Nerds.

I don't know if anyone else is going to, but I'm voting for Patti Deutsch.

She was always trying waaaayyyy too hard to confound. When EVERY answer is an unmatchable non sequitur along the lines of "seedless honeydew melon served at room temperature," the surprise flatlines.

What? No Gene Rayburn love? What delivery!

Rayburn artifically enhanced the size of his microphone. No.

Classic blatant misuse of ##s. Here's his brief justification for some votes, with my comment following.

Rickey Henderson.... ranks fourth all time in games played (3,081) and once stole 130 bases in a season.
** How about, all-time leader in runs scored? Wouldn't that one-liner be enough?

Tommy John.... 26 seasons of pitching, 288 wins and rebuilt arm
** So, how about John Franco's 22 yrs and 1199 games pitched (3rd all-time)?

Jim Rice.... seven seasons of hitting over .300 mean a lot. And Rice is the only man to have three consecutive seasons of 35 or more homers and 200 or more hits.
** He's convinced that hits are more impt to winning than, say, scoring runs (never led league and his total of <1300 is poor), and park effects don't exist (Rice's "road" OPS is 789).

Lee Smith. Third in major-league history with 478 saves.
** Thanks to his managers and Lee's penchant for finding any team that would make him their closer.

And the reason Rice is better than Raines is.... ?

I don't know if anyone else is going to, but I'm voting for Patti Deutsch.

She was always trying waaaayyyy too hard to confound. When EVERY answer is an unmatchable non sequitur along the lines of "seedless honeydew melon served at room temperature," the surprise flatlines.

Maybe it says something about me :) but I usually was able to detect the connection between Patti's answers and the question. I think you are being way too harsh on her. But that's what was great about The Match Game, there was something for everybody. We haven't even mentioned Betty White yet.

Match Game inner circle HOF: Rayburn, Dawson, CNR, Somers. Second Tier: Flagg, Klugman, Bergoff.
Johnny Olson and "slide the big one" Earl in on the first ballot as special contributors.

Tommy John.... 26 seasons of pitching, 288 wins and rebuilt arm
** So, how about John Franco's 22 yrs and 1199 games pitched (3rd all-time)?

How are these things in any way related?

I think I overrated Arlene Francis due to her performance on What's My Line. I didn't so much like Brett Sommers (besides the fact that she was there for nepotistic reasons), but I'd replace Francis with Patti Deutsch.