Last night, I was joined by Marco Maturo, a member of the BBWAA who spent 40 years covering sports for Gannett, which included 7 years on the Mets beat in the late seventies/early eighties.
When submitting his Hall of Fame ballot this year, Maturo wrote-in Pete Rose. Jack O’Connell, Secretary-Treasurer of the BBWAA, told Maturo that Rose received 2 write-in votes this past election. In 1992, what would have been Rose’s first year of eligibility, he received 41 votes. “He’s been getting about 20 write-ins over the period,” Maturo said.
...Maturo agrees. “If you cut to the chase, Old Petey boy, let me tell you he should be in the Hall. Especially to the extent that the Hall is meant to reflect baseball excellence. And it’s also meant to reflect moral excellence- the American variety. You remember Charlie Hustle? His work ethic, his dedication, he made the most of less-than-world-class athletic ability. This guy was a definite Hall of Famer. He gave so much to the game, to the fans. It’s a shame that he’s not in there.”
...“A lot of people, I think, want the Hall to be a place for ‘dashboard Jesus’ types.” Maturo added that he thinks “baseball needs him (Rose) maybe more than he needs personal rehabilitation. Who better to promote the game of baseball than a Pete Rose for what he did for it?”
Maturo also voted for Barry Larkin and Jeff Bagwell on this last ballot. I couldn’t let him go without getting his perspective on next year’s controversial election that includes steroid era candidates such as Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Sammy Sosa, and Mike Piazza.
“That’s a tough one. If Rose is not in there I couldn’t vote for them either. I think they deserve some time in purgatory as well as Pete did, right?”
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1. JJ1986 Posted: January 30, 2012 at 11:05 AM (#4049133)No, and this is pretty easy to figure out. The Hall of Fame has deemed those who are banned to be permanently ineligible. The Hall of Fame has not deemed those accused of using PEDs to be ineligible in any sort of way. There isn't even a gray area here.
Also, under the voting rules, write-in votes are not allowed. At some point the Hall has to sack up and tell these guys that are flaunting the rules that if you can't be trusted to follow simple instructions, that you can't be trusted to make reasonable decisions on who belongs in the Hall.
Question; wasn't Sosa one of the names on the "confidential" 2003 test like Ortiz and A-Rod? I'm not being snarky, I'm genuinely curious because I thought that was the case.
"according to lawyers with knowledge of the drug-testing results from that year." If they're willing to break their oaths to leak sealed information, then I don't trust them.
Wait, what? He votes for Rose but will not vote for Bonds because Rose isn't in? That is some odd logic.
This is the silliest thing I've read all week. It's Monday monring, mind you.
Moral excellence? Um, yeah.
Gambling on baseball was explicitly forbidden at the time Rose did so, and it is a cancer on the game, as a gambler may try to win today but at the expense of tomorrow's game. One could at least argue that steroids are similar to other forms of cheating to win, like scuffballs and corked bats and sign stealing by mechanical means.
Yes! Specifically, "the American variety".
If you would like to refute my statement, I'll patiently wait for you to make a cogent argument. Otherwise I don't see why if you don't understand something as simple as what "no write-in votes" means that you get to maintain your privileges.
What's nice is that the latter argument also applies to folks like Shoeless Joe Jackson and Eddie Cicotte and Hal Chase, for whom there might not have been a "prohibition against gambling sign" hanging in the clubhouse as in Rose's case.
1. Rules should never be enforced simply for the sake that they are rules. Rules are an essential part of society when they contribute to establish an order that allow for society (or, in this case, a vote) to work well. Rules are justified when there is a need for them. They are not when they exist only for the sake of existing. In this case, I feel the rule against writing in names is just a rule that has no justification. Remove it, and it'll change absolutely nothing to the voting process.
2. Some of the greatest social revolutions took place when people broke rules on purpose (I know I'm pushing it here, but Rosa Park is a good example - what would have happened had she decided to follow the rules?). Breaking rules leads to change. If 200 people wrote Pete Rose in, he wouldn't be elected, but it would force the HoF to review its writing in rule.
3. Breaking rules can be done after much and carefull consideration. I can't see the link between writing in the name of a player on a ballot and not being able to fill the rest of the ballot in a thoughtful manner. I'm pretty sure those who wrtite in Pete Rose names on the ballot do it after careful consideration of both his career and of the activities that led him where he is right now.
I'm not saying Pete Rose should be in the HoF. I'm just saying that kicking writers out of the voting process because they made the counscious decision of writing in his name on the ballot despite the existience of a rule prohibiting it is silly.
I'm probably a liberal anarchist in your mind (I live in French-Canuckistan, afterall...), but I truly believe that rules are there to be broken if it can help reform social (or voting) order.
And I'll take the less Franco-Canuckistan approach ...
Your statement seems unsupportable to me. How does choosing to not follow simple instructions imply that one can't make reasonable decisions? Pretty much anytime I'm out for a walk, I will at some point choose to ignore the simple instruction to not jaywalk but I am flummoxed as to how this reflects on my ability to decide who belongs in the HoF.
I'll note that this isn't even a case like those who have decided that pitchers aren't "eligible" for the MVP even though they clearly are under the rules.
To "punish" those who write in Rose by taking away their vote would have nothing to do with improving the process or removing moronic voters or preserving the integrity of the HoF, it would be to further "disappear" Rose.
And I'll note that we would have a completely different attitude towards somebody who was writing in Lou Whitaker.
if that happened, maybe the HOF would threaten to revoke the privileges of 200 guys dumb enough to do that. it's pretty plain that the no write-in was implemented to forestall rose somehow getting elected, or if that wasn't the original intent, it works now.
the HOF is not part of MLB, but they take their cue from those running MLB. selig has made it plain he doesn't want rose in there, period. so the HOF can pass any darn rule it wants to keep rose out, and good for them. pete rose is the absolute last person i can think of who should go in the hall of fame.
its really shocking to me that there are sports writers -- well, maybe not, since i've worked with a fair number of them over the years -- who actually think what rose did is not 100 times worse than anything mcgwire or bonds or sosa did or didn't do.
Saturday afternoon, I was killing some time watching some politics/business talking head show on CNN. The moderator asked the talking heads (starting with the one standing in for the conservative, laissez-faire side of the "argument") what "American exceptionalism" meant to him. The guy responded that the greatest example of the spirit of American exceptionalism was captured in the Oscar-nominated movie, "Moneyball." The protagonist, Billy Beane, was too much of a thinker, and such a thoughtful approach led to his being intimidated and getting paralysis by overanalysis when facing top big league pitchers. But leave it to, and I quote, "fat little Lenny Dykstra," who'll just grab a bat, jump in there, say "#### it," and take a Hall of Famer deep!
So when anyone asks you why America is great, remember ... it's because we're just like Lenny Dykstra.
I agree that immediately and permanently revoking these guys' votes would be a little extreme. That said, let's not get too crazy here. Writing in Rose isn't really akin to formenting revolution against an unjust state (#13), or even to judging that broad procedural rules used to govern millions of citizens may not be strictly applicable in all situations (#14). There are only about 500 HOF voters, and they are asked, literally, "which of these listed baseball players do you think deserve to be inducted into the Hall of Fame." If a voter starts writing in people who he knows to be inelligible; whether that's Rose, players who left the ballot due to the 15-year or 5% rules, or players who retired last year; I think it would be appropriate for the Hall to say "hey, if you don't abide by our election rules, we won't honor your ballot."
His other research also provides supporting facts that suggest that PEDS had no effects on baseball, at least in terms of scoring: http://highboskage.com/juiced-ball.shtml
I think amphetamine usage had a greater effect on baseball because some players would not have been able to deliver a full season of excellence if not for the use of speed. The book, "Ball Four", brought that out of baseball's closet and it's clearly been used for a long time. Most probably since World War II when the US government supplied all their soldiers speed like it was candy, and those soldiers brought that knowledge with them back to their regular life after the war, including the ballplayers who were soldiers.
So if the voters want to start removing players like Willie Mays from the Hall of Fame, for their usage of speed, then I can see maybe a push to keep the PED users out of the Hall. Otherwise, they should use their best judgement on who deserves to go and who not.
And since when did we let the writers out of purgatory for letting steroids usage blossom and grow under their noses? Why do they get to be holier than thou when they were the ones who were exactly in the position to do something about it long ago, when creatine was found in McGwire's locker, why didn't one of the enterprising reporters anywhere in the U.S. decide to follow up on that clue, like they did Gary Hart in that time period to find out that he was cheating on his wife? Maybe someone could have blown the lid on that back then, but baseball being a big draw for newspapers, reporters apparently yielded in the way of commerce (because baseball would not allow any access to that newspaper after that article printed, nor advertise in it anymore). So if they want to talk ethics, they aren't in a particularly good seat, their house is glass as well.
The way I see it, the writers by not voting for the players are doing it not for moral reasons, but as a way to pay penance for their overlooking the steroid's siutation long ago, as absolution for their sins in not following up on that huge creatine clue.
That is not what their Hall of Fame vote is for. It is for them to vote on the players in their era who were clearly better than the rest, and deserve to be up there with prior players voted in. They should use their expertise in following baseball to make that judgement. So for Barry Bonds, who many say was a clear Hall of Famer even before his alleged usage, they should take that into consideration in judging whether he gets in or not. Whereas McGwire most probably would not even be considered for the Hall if it were not for his homerun total and records.
And it is not for them to judge on whether any particular player cheated with steriods, and if anything, assuming all that Walker documents is true, they risked their health for nothing more than a potential placebo effect. If there is no science on what steriods can actually do to help a baseball player, then everything is supposition at best, lies at worse.
And as Walker detailed in his website, there really is no evidence from baseball statistics that such usage actually existed during the supposed "steroid era", and he went over what some doctors and professors say about the physics of baseball as well. Here is his conclusion:
""Tainted Records"
PEDs can affect, if anything, musculature, which in baseball translates to power. They do not, and cannot, do anything to improve hand-eye coordination, vision, ball judgement, timing, or any of the factors that go into hitting except actual power, the bat speed that determines the ball velocity and thus its travel distance.
Examinations of the actual records of major-league baseball for over a century, with an especial focus on the last 25 or so years, those now being attributed to a "steroids era", show clearly and conclusively--by a number of independent analyses by a number of independent analysts each using a different methodology--that there simply is not any power boost needing explaining: PEDs are an "answer" lacking a pertinent question. This fact has been disguised by the analytically faulty method of counting power events instead of determining their rate of occurrence in hitting, and further confounded by changes in the baseball, notably the juicing whose effects were felt in 1994 and possibly back in 1993, when the change occurred.
PED use, to whatever extent it may have existed, simply did not affect any of the performance records of major-league baseball."
And if there were no effects, then why such outrage over the usage? Why not have more outrage for the wife-beaters, alcoholics, drug-users, etc.? Not voting for these players does not absolve them of shirking their journalistic duties during that time period, either. They should not take out their anger at themselves on the players, who, if anything, was encouraged by the media who celebrated the feats of the early steroids users to use in order to curry attention by the media.
Or maybe they should just ban every journalist from that era from ever making the Hall of Fame, or maybe even take away their voting privilege due to their dereliction of their journalistic duties during that time period, they were the ones who were all asleep at the wheel.
I think the voters should make their best judgement as to who gets in, PEDS or not, particularly given that it is not exactly clear what benefit they derived from their usage. It would be like punishing players, say, for use leeches to improve their playing, because somehow someone thought it would help, or snake oil. So accept the career numbers, make a judgement about what they saw from the players, and go from there.
Personally, I think Rose should be in the Hall of Fame as a player. Anyone who saw Rose play knows that he gave 100% of himself in each and every game. If they want to ban him from being in baseball forever for gambling as a manager, I'm fine with that. But there is no way that Rose ever slacked off in any game he played in as a player, the gambling rule was put in to prevent taking a dive, but if he was betting on himself and his team, I don't see how that would affect his play in any particular game, he would always give everything he had in every game.
Heck, I hate that he ran over Ray Fosse in the ASG, I thought that wasn't necessary and I think it ruined a potentially good career for Fosse (there should be rules in the MLB on runners approaching home plate, much like the rules that currently exist in the minors and amateurs, I believe that since Fosse, not Posey), but if ever there was an excellent example of how Rose gave his all in every game, that was it, it was an exhibition, they still had half a season to play and it was during the prime of the Red Machine, and he still went for it, risking everything. To believe otherwise means to me that you never really saw Rose for most of his career and thus are not qualified to speak on how he was as a player.
Rose the player belongs in the Hall of Fame. If the all time hits leader is not in there, it is not the Hall of Fame to me.
Pete Rosa Parks?
No but nor is it akin to a matter of "trust" nor does it mean that the voter can't be "trusted" to vote for the HoF. And, sure, the HoF is a private organization and can do what it wants including "spoiling" ballots that include write-ins.
But the folks writing in Rose are protesting the HoF's decision to ban him. Whether I agree with that protest doesn't mean I can't recognize it for what it is. There's nothing to be gained by disqualifying such voters.
Another question: Among the glut of superstars about to come up on the ballot, starting in 2013, who will get the highest percentage?
If the whole steroids thing had never come up, who would've received the highest vote?
My answers:
1) 97%
2) Maddux
3) Bonds
The guy was the all-time hit leader, had the nickname of Charlie Hustle, and (even though it shouldn't count for the BBWAA voting) was already a successful manager. And that's before getting into the MVPs, AS appearances, the pair of gold gloves, the key roles on championship teams, and the perceived willingness to play wherever his team needed him to. The absolute floor for hit voting would have been 95%, and he could have very easily set the record for highest percentage.
1) 97%
2) Maddux
3) Bonds
1) More than 95%; at that point you're just splitting hairs. I don't know how someone would convince himself not to vote for a non-banned Rose, but I don't know how they did it for Mays or Musial either. Still, he's one of the guys that people would've predicted to be the first unanimous player, although he wouldn't have been.
2) Maddux.
3) I think Maddux might have pulled the highest percentage anyway. People didn't like Bonds before the steroid stuff; I don't know if it would have affected very many votes, but it wouldn't have had to affect very many to put him behind Maddux, who should miss unanimity by less than 10. Same for Clemens, although he wasn't as disliked as Bonds.
Agreed. Note also that according to this source, John Dowd said in an interview on the ESPN2 show "Cold Pizza" that Rose also bet on games when he was a player:
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2798498
No idea if that happened when Rose was player/manager or just as a player, but I can't see that it makes a difference.
Not for a narcissist.
Sure, but I'm not talking about lofty matters of "trust." A similar but not identical example: Many federal judges have page limits on certain types of brief submissions. If a judge has a 20-page limt and I submit an 80-page brief without asking for some sort of exception, and I keep doing that every time I submit a brief, the judge is going to get sick of it and tell me to knock it off. If I respond by saying "screw you judge, recognize my protest against your page limit for what it is, there is nothing to be gained by sanctioning me" things probably won't work out too well, even if I point out that my failue to abide by a clear procedural rule doesn't necessarily say anything about the actual arguments in the brief.
Maybe some people would cheer me on for this righteous spitting in the face of authority. I bet many others would just think I was kind of a petty jerk who liked telling people what a pretty peacock I am.
You suggested earlier that people would cheer for someone writing in Whitaker. I wouldn't. I would think that person, at best, was doing something silly and pointless or, at worst, that he thought the HOF was all about the voters and not about the players. If that person wrote an article explaining why Whitaker was unfairly overlooked, I would enjoy that. I feel the same way about Rose.
I dunno. If we have examples of writers who say that they suspect anyone who played in "the steroid era", why wouldn't you get at least a few who might not vote for a player who spent his high school years in Las Vegas?
1. I agree with RJ that he could have reached the highest percentage ever. 100% is probably impossible but that would've been the only question.
2. Agree on Maddux.
3. Clemens. I don't know the history of the voting but I think the hard throwing strikeout star would draw more votes than the more finesse style Maddux.
You probably will but even then I think Maddux has less "anti-votes" than any of the other top guys. He may lose some votes for being in the PED era and even for Vegas (though I doubt the latter) but he'll lose less than the other inner circle types will. The only other perceived inner circle types are Pedro and Big Unit and Pedro loses out in career length and Big Unit I think is simply viewed as less than Maddux.
this is all kinds of flawed.
knowing what you know about him now, how do you know that rose gave 100% in each and every game? and please ... i'll bet i saw him play more than you did. thanks to what he did, we now have no way of knowing what he was thinking, ever.
the gambling rules were put in to forestall any appearance of impropriety. that's why they are so black and white. which renders moot the whole train of thought associated with 'he bet on his own team, so how can that affect the game?', which, by the way, falls apart with the merest inspection. there is no way the guy betting on his own team to win is going to win all the time. in his efforts to do so, especially if he is the manager, he will start taking extraordinary measures that can't help but get noticed. one losing streak is going to put him in the power of the bookies. then what? a little signal that, well, maybe he's not exactly laying down money on the next game, or, even worse, a visit from a couple of guys with broken noses who have a suggestion about how to square his accounts.
the owners are simply not going to sit there and parse every instance of alleged betting and allow even the faintest suggestion by outsiders that the game is not on the level. by making the ban categorical they are able to police it more effectively and protect their investment in the sport. one of the few things i am in agreement with them about.
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