I use Win Shares as the base for my ranking system, though I am now using a modified version (any negative values are converted into zeroes) of BRAR, FRAR and PRAR for the NA.

I am integrating the conclusions made by DERA with Win Shares for all pitchers.

I do place (to a certain degree) domination at one's position during the player's era. That doesn't mean that domination-by-default will necessarily help you though (Gil Hodges may have been the best first baseman of his era, but he wont make my ballot).



1) Roger Bresnahan-C/CF (2): Greatest catcher of the Deadball Era not named Santop. The poor man's Buck Ewing (Johnny Kling was the poor man's Charlie Bennett) is still good enough to be here on my ballot. Slightly better than Noisy behind the plate, but the Duke played longer and at other positions. Best major league catcher for 1905, 1906 and 1908. Best major league centerfielder for 1903.

2) Cupid Childs-2B (3): Best second baseman of the '90s. Too short of a career to knock out McPhee for tops for the 19th century, but not that far behind. Considering the average second basemen of his era, he was fairly durable. Best major league second baseman for 1890, (almost in 1891), 1892, 1893, 1894, 1895, 1896, and 1897.          

Childs was the best major league second baseman more times in a season than Doyle was the best NL second baseman. IMO, there's no way that the Laughing One goes above the Little Fat Man.

3) Joe Gordon-2B (4): Best second baseman of the 1940's when you give him appropriate WWII credit. Best major league second baseman for 1940, 1942, 1943, and 1947. Best AL second baseman for 1939 and 1941.

4) Willard Brown-CF/LF/SS (5): Eric's new MLEs may give Brown that extra-added push. His HOF induction probably wont hurt, either.

5) Hugh Duffy-CF/LF/RF (6): "Only" the third best centerfielder of the '90s, but that position was very strong for that decade. Best major league right fielder for 1890 and 1891. Best major league centerfielder for 1892, 1893 and 1894.

6) Bob Elliott-3B/RF (7): Why Kell, but not Elliott? He could hit, field, and didn't have a short career. Best ML third baseman for 1943, 1944, 1947, 1948, and close in 1950.Best NL third baseman for 1949 and 1950.

7) Pie Traynor-3B (8): Best white third baseman of his time (though Beckwith was better). Best major league third baseman for 1923 (Beckwith was better), 1925, 1927, 1929 (Beckwith was better) and 1932.

8) Alejandro Oms-CF (9): Thanks to Chris' work, another gem has been uncovered. He should gather more and more support over the next few "years."

9) Minnie Minoso-LF/3B (10): Probably the best ML left fielder of the fifties, though only because Teddy Ballgame was in Korea and Stan the Man played considerably at other positions. Best ML left fielder for 1956 and 1959. Best AL of 1953.

10) Burleigh Grimes-P (11): Pitched for a long time behind crappy teams and defenses. Not a bad peak, too Best NL pitcher for 1921 and 1929.

11) Mickey Welch-P (12): Yeah, pitching was different back then, but he still distinguished himself regardless. Best major league pitcher for 1885.

12) Bucky Walters-P (14): The guy had a nice peak, fairly long career, and could hit. Best ML pitcher of 1939 (extremely close in 1940). Best NL pitcher of 1940 and 1944.

13) George Sisler-1B (14): Great player at his peak, but unquestionably a mediocre (at best) player after 1922, which didn't add much to his overall value. Best AL first baseman for 1916 and 1922. Best ML first baseman for 1917, 1919, and 1920 (very close in 1916 and 1922).</b>

14) Vic Willis-P (n/e): Like the Phoenix, Vic is reborn on my ballot. Willis pitched a ton of innings at an above-average rate for a long enough time for his era. Best major league pitcher for 1899. Best NL pitcher for 1901.

15) Dobie Moore-SS (13): Takes a little hit due to Chris' reevaluation, but hangs on to my ballot. Terrific peak; wished he had a little more career. I give him credit for his pre-NeL seasons. Probably would have been the best shortstop in the majors in 1919, 1921, 1922, and 1924.

Redding and Mendez all exist in my top-35, but they just fall short.

BTW, It's been many decades since I have had only two candidates from a preceding election's top-ten not make my ballot. Maybe I'm finally catching up to the consensus. Yahoo! :-D

1976

Only my #15 got elected so not much movement here. Top of my backlog is Clark Griffith and Edd Roush, so they go PHoM. No newbies in top 100.

1. Dobie Moore (1 last year-3-1, PHoM 1942)—Still a very mighty peak

2. Ralph Kiner (2-7-6, PHoM 1964)—moved up in recent re-eval., based on the same old virtues

3. Rube Waddell (3-5-4, PHoM 1932)—second highest ERA+ available, and his UER were not outside the norm (exactly equal to Addie Joss)

4. George Sisler (4-4-2, PHoM 1938)—when people say his peak or prime wasn’t long enough, the truth is that nobody on this ballot peaks for any longer; no, he wasn’t Babe Ruth…but don’t forget to adjust 1918 and 1919 to 154 games

5. Larry Doyle (5-21-17, PHoM 1975)—15 years of 15+ WS, I don’t see another eligible “glove” who did that, plus same OPS+ as Edd Roush (5 points more than Hugh Duffy), and also gets adjustment to 1918 and 1919 season lengths

6. Addie Joss (6-8-7, PHoM 1967)—best ERA+ available

7. Charley Jones (7-16-15, PHoM 1921)—I have added in 2 blacklist years’ worth of MLEs. He made my PHoM without them, but moves up with…

8. Pete Browning (8-6-5, PHoM 1961)—essentially equivalent to Charley Jones if you give Jones the two blacklist years

9. Joe Gordon (9-15-14, PHoM 1973)—moved up just a bit in my last re-eval.

10. Willard Brown (10-12-11, PHoM 1966)—still looks like the real deal to me

(10a. Clark Griffith [10a-18-14b, PHoM 1976] but this is not to say he isn’t pretty interchangeable with Vic Willis and Eddie Cicotte)

11. Edd Roush (11-29-26, PHoM 1976)—really belongs ahead of Averill and Duffy, on reconsideration, so he goes PHoM and not the Earl of Snohomish

12. Vic Willis (12-x-x)—how did I miss this guy? Oh, yeah, he came eligible the same year as Waddell and didn’t quite measure up. Great peak (though not consecutive) and a huge workhorse. Check him out!

(12a. Earl Averill [12a-17-14a]—Roush? Averill? Averill? Roush?)

13. Jose Mendez (13-10-9, PHoM 1957)—this is with essentially no credit at all for his hitting and his SS years

14. Minnie Minoso (14-13-12)—I give 2 NeL seasons but at well below peak level

(14a. Stan Hack [14a-19-14b])

(15a. Don Drysdale [15-new])

15. Alejandro Oms (16-37-34)—big winner in recent eval., first time on my ballot

Drops out: None

Close but no cigar

(15a. Bobby Doerr [17-18-22])
16. Hugh Duffy (17-19-16)
17. Phil Rizzuto (17-x-x)—one of the big winners but still not on ballot
18. Nellie Fox (19-11-10)
19. Charlie Keller (20-24-21-25)
20. Joe Sewell (21-31-28)

(20a. Richie Ashburn [21a-x-x])
21. Jim McCormick (22-x-x)
22. Hack Wilson (23-x-x)
23. Elston Howard (24-new)—new #1 catcher, much better than I had thought
24. Dick Redding (25-14-13, PHoM 1971)
25. Tommy Bond (26-9-8, PHoM 1929)
26. Wally Berger (27-x-x)
27. Mickey Welch (28-x-x)
28. Ken Boyer (29-new)—new #1 3B, not overwhelming however
29. Dizzy Dean (30-25-22)
30. Dick Lundy (31-36-33)

They also ran

31. Chuck Klein (32-27-24)
32. Al Rosen (33-x-x)
33. Frank Chance (34-x-x)
34. Hilton Smith (35-x-x)
35. Pie Traynor (36-x-x)
36. Tony Mullane (37-x-x)
37. Quincy Trouppe (38-28-25)—no longer the best catcher around
38. Ed Williamson (39-22-19, PHoM 1924)
(38a. Early Wynn [39a-39-35)
39. Gavvy Cravath (40-30-27)
40. Vern Stephens (41-27-23)

41. Mike Tiernan (42-29-y)
42. Cupid Childs (43-31-y, PHoM 1925)
43. Bill Monroe (44-32-y)
44. Bob Johnson (45-40-36)
45. Bob Elliott (46-41-37)
46. Roger Bresnahan (47-42-38)
47. Bucky Walters (48-x-x)
(47a. Biz Mackey [49-y-y]
(47b. Red Faber [49a-y-y])
(47c. Wes Ferrell [49b-y-y])
(47d. Willie Keeler {49c-y-y])
48. Lefty Gomez (50-x-x)
49. Dave Bancroft (51-x-x)
(49a. Jimmy Sheckard [51a-y-y])
50. Burleigh Grimes (52-x-x)
(50a. Cool Papa Bell [52b-y-y])

1976 ballot
after many years and even more arguments George Davis and Jimmy Collins make my PHOM

1. George Sisler <u>please elect him this year</u> (made my personal HoM in 1936)
2. Pie Traynor most 3B putouts 7 times (made my personal HoM in 1942)
3. Mickey Welch please see his thread (made my personal HoM all the way back in 1898)
4. Joe Sewell love the strikeouts (made my personal HoM in 1939)
5. Nellie Fox led his league in putouts a record 10 years in a row (made my personal HoM in 1971)
6. Chuck Klein 4 hr titles (made my personal HoM in 1951)
7. Sam Rice if he got 13 more hits would he make the HoM? (made my personal HoM in 1940)
8. Pete Browning 13th in career batting avg. (made my personal HoM in 1906)
9. Jake Beckley 30th in hits (made my personal HoM in 1915)
10. Rube Waddell most Ks/9IP 7 times in a row tying with Vance for the record led in it 1 more time (made my personal HoM in 1917)
11. Hack Wilson 4 hr titles (made my personal HoM in 1940)
12. Ralph Kiner 7 HR titles (made my personal HoM in 1961)
13. Hugh Duffy had 100 runs or RBIs every full year he played (made my personal HoM in 1908)
14. Addie Joss 2nd in era (made my personal HoM in 1918)
15. George Kell He now loses a place on my team very good hitter and fielder at important and under elected position (made my personal HoM in 1963)
16. Harvey Kuenn led AL shortsops in putouts twice assists once (made my personal HoM in 1972)
17. Heinie Manush 330 batting avg. (made my personal HoM in 1957)
18. Edd Roush 323 batting avg (made my personal HoM in 1937)
19. Hilton Smith see his thread (made my personal HoM in 1964)
20. Ray Schalk the best catcher ever (made my personal HoM in 1938)
21. George Van Haltren 31st in runs (made my personal HoM in 1925)
22. Jimmy Ryan 30th in runs (made my personal HoM in 1926)
23. Rabbit Maranville best shortstop before Ozzie (made my personal HoM in 1939)
24. Jake Daubert 29th in triples (made my personal HoM in 1930)
25. Bobby Veach most doubles twice (made my personal HoM in 1931)
26. Gavvy Cravath most active HRs 1918, 1919 and 1920 (made my personal HoM in 1928)
27. Kiki Cuyler 2299 hits (made my personal HoM in 1968)
28. Lloyd Waner had the most OF putouts 4 times, finished 2nd once and finished 3rd twice (made my personal HoM in 1968)
29. Ginger Beaumont 1902 batting title (made my personal HoM in 1932)
30. John McGraw 3rd in on base percentage (made my personal HoM in 1930)
31. Jim Bottomley 2313 hits (made my personal HoM in 1968)
32. George J. Burns most walks 5 times (made my personal HoM in 1932)
33. Levi Meyerle best rate season ever (made my personal HoM in 1975)

explanation for players not on my ballot
Joe Gordon would need a real lot of war credit to even approach my ballot (and no discounts)
Willard Brown, Dick Redding, Dobie Moore and Jose Mendez barring new evidence not one will make my ballot (the HoF vote has absolutely no bearing on my vote )
Minnie Minoso would have been on my ballot with the addition of a few good seasons which his Negroe Leaudge stats seem to show he lacked

If voting closed right now, yest's top two picks would be elected. Considering we're talking backloggers here, how rare would that be, yest? ('Course I s'pose none of us tends to get two of our favorite backloggers elected at the same time. I sure can't remember it happening to me.)

now all I need is some freak thing preventing everyone else from voting

I used the lack of new serious candidates to reexamine some of the backlog, especially the Negro League players. Willard Brown and Ben Taylor benefitted greatly from the examination, moving up to mid-ballot each. Biz Mackey, he I had in the mid 30's last time, also moves up my backlog. Oms dropped down, as did Minoso, but he still ballots. Tommy Bridges and Dizzy Dean flip-flopped. Everything else pretty much stays the same. My PHOM notations are only regarding elections since I joined the project. I will respect the consesus of past elections, creating my own backlog as I go along. Joe Sewell and Lefty Gomez are PHom'ed this year.

1)Hugh Duffy - Super peak, wonderful prime. Amazing bat, super glove. (PHOM)
2)Rube Waddell - Nothing in his resume tells me he wasn't a dominant pitcher (PHOM)
3)Gavvy Cravath - Very possibly the worst fielder in my top 120 candidates. Likely the best hitter in that group, too. (PHOM)
4)Joe Sewell (PHOM)
5)Lefty Gomez - looking at him in any single way hurts him. Looking at him kaleidoscopically has him behind only Waddell as far as pitchers go in my eyes (PHOM)
5a) Robin Roberts - outrageous ink. Where's the ERA+?
6)George Sisler - He actually dropped a bit on my ballot when reconsidering his down years. Peak keeps him up here.
6a)Cool Papa Bell
7)Jose Mendez
8)Willard Brown - I had been underestimating him severely. His reputation enhances his numbers.
9)Ben Taylor - reevaluation gets him on the ballot. Can't find the peak, but a better prime and glove than Beckley.
10)Jake Beckley - Always excellent. No peak, all prime.
11)Vern Stephens - Will we look at Nomar down the road like we look at Vern now?
12)Ralph Kiner - So much black ink, so little time.
13)Edd Roush - I don't think I could find it in me to rank him higher, but he was exceptional
14)Quincy Trouppe - Not an easy call, but I think he's the best available catcher
14a)Biz Mackey - I was really underestimating both his offense and his reputation
15) Minnie Minoso - still very good. Maybe a wee bit overrated.
16)Tommy Bridges - I may need to compare him with Dean again
16a)Don Drysdale - Not yet, DD
17)Nellie Fox - Low OPS+, but he is an exception to that measurement. SLG is negligible for him, he did quite well with the rest
18)Ken Boyer - so close, maybe next year
19)Wally Berger - super-underrated
20)Dizzy Dean - Diet Sandy Koufax. 0 calories (career), no sugar (prime).
21)Ernie Lombardi - deense was below average, but not quite horrible
22)Roger Bresnahan
23)Al Rosen - One more season in prime, and he is top 10
24)Dick Redding - One of the toughest for me to accurately place (PHOM)
25)Chuck Klein
26)Joe Gordon - neither here nor there. War credit obviously helps him, but not enough for me.
27)Billy Pierce - don't see him as being better than Bridges
28)Addie Joss - ERA/+ and WHIP are great, but why so little black ink?
29)Pete Browning
30)Charley Jones - he got the shaft - I'd be happier if I knew what he did in that one MiL season ( and what competition level) and why he waited so long to play. I can't give him much blacklist credit until I know more. No points for mystery. So here he is.
31)Fred Carroll - I give him around 1.5 seasons prime MiL credit
32)Cupid Childs
33)Phil Rizzuto
34)Charlie Keller - 2nd all time in extra credit
35)John McGraw
36)Jimmy Ryan
37)Alejandro Oms
38)Luke Easter
39)Johnny Evers
40)Pete Reiser
41)George Kell
42)Bobby Veach
43)Bob Elliott
44)Bucky Walters
45)Ray Chapman - I think his case deserves some credit.
46)Fred Dunlap
47)Jim Bottomley
48)Bob Johnson
49)Joe Wood - f he had one more really good year as a pitcher, he'd be balloted
50)Dobie Moore
51)Tony Lazerri
52)Dolf Camilli
53)Walker Cooper - some days, he reminds me of Quincey Trouppe
54)Johnny Pesky
55)Hippo Vaughn
56)Tip O'Neill
57)Rocky Colavito
58)Denny Lyons
59)Cecil Travis - holds the all-time record for most war credit. 4 years is a lot of credit.
60)George Van Haltren - a nice player, but there were always others who were better. Much better.
61)Lon Warneke
62)Don Newcombe
63)Jack Clements
64)Cy Williams
65)Roger Maris
66)Pie Traynor
67)Frank Chance
68)Kiki Cuyler
69)Red Schoendienst
70)John Clapp
71)Larry Doyle
72)Bill Joyce
73)Benny Kauff
74)Bill Nicholson
75)Urban Shocker

So close to helping yest out with Traynor.

Copying the now extant Gadfly, I have instituted a Grade ranking of my candidates. As and Bs would make my version of a Smaller Hall. B minuses and C plusses are borderline. Cs and below, including the five on my ballot, are not worthy.

I have Gordon, Minoso and Moore at 20 thru 22. Brown, Arlett, Roush, Cravath and Duffy are 25 thru 29. Duffy was on my ballot in the teens. The others never have been.

1. Mickey Welch (A) – 300 wins, lots of grey ink. RSI data shows those wins are real. Compares fairly well to Keefe. I like his dominating record against HoMers.

2. Burleigh Grimes (B+) – as a career voter, I have difficulty seeing the vast difference others see between Rixey and Faber (both now elected) and Grimes.

3. Jake Beckley (B+) -- ~3000 hits but no peak at all. Crawford (HOMer) and Wheat (HOMer) are two of his three most similars. 3200+ hits adjusted to 162 games. After voting for him at the very top of my ballot for 50 years, I have come to realize that his peakless career is rarer than I thought and also less deserving (yet in this deep backlog year, he is close to the top again).

4. Dick Redding (B) – probably the 6th best blackball pitcher of all-time (behind, at least, Williams and Paige and likely behind the Fosters and Brown), and that is good enough for me.

5. Nellie Fox (B) -- I like the great defense, the 12 all star appearances, the MVP and the 2600 hits from a fielding position.

6. George Sisler (B) – I like the hits, the OPS+ and the batting average. Could be his year.

7. Ralph Kiner (B-)– He is my highest peak/prime only candidate. I cannot ignore seven consecutive home run titles and a 149 career OPS+.

8. Rube Waddell (B-) -- I like the three times ERA+ lead, the career 134 ERA+, the .574 winning percentage, the 46 black ink points, and, of course, all those strikeouts (plus the 1905 Triple Crown).

9. George Van Haltren (C+) – 40 wins, 2500 hits, never dominated. Pretty good adjusted win shares.

10. Addie Joss (C+) – I don’t like short careers much, but I cannot ignore the best WHIP of all-time, the second best all-time ERA, the 12th best ERA+ and the nice winning percentage.

11. Roger Bresnahan (C) – Great OBP, arguably the best catcher in baseball for a six year period. Counting stats, like all catchers of this time and earlier, are really poor. I like him better than Schang because he compared better to his contemporaries, if you count him as a catcher.

12. Jose Mendez (C) – His hitting makes a difference for me. Looks like he was the 7th best blackball pitcher. He is barely better than (this is an unordered list of unelected candidates) Pierce, Harder, Warneke, Smith, Bridges, Gomez, Hoyt, Dean, Luque, Pennock, Trucks, Matthews, Quinn, McCormick, Cicotte, Willis, Walters, Bender, Mays, Cooper, Shocker, Mullane, Byrd and Mullin, the best of whom is at 23 on my ballot.

13. Jimmy Ryan ( C) – 2500 hits, good speed, lots of runs. Hurt by timelining. I used to have Duffy close to Ryan and GVH and then decided he was not as worthy. I may reconsider that.

14. Sam Rice ( C)-- 2987 hits speaks to me.

15. Pete Browning (C-) – Joe Jackson’s most similar player, and they are pretty close – I have him as about 4/5ths of Jackson, who was 2nd on my ballot when elected.

Like Brother Derek and Lawyer Ron, they also ran

16. Pie Traynor (C-)-- I think he would have been a multiple time all-star.
17. Ken Boyer (C-) – nice glove – pretty indistinguishable from Gordon, Sewell and Leach.
18. Joe Sewell (C-) – I’m assuming he was pretty good on defense.
19. Tommy Leach (C-) – 300+ WS has to mean something.
20. Joe Gordon (C-) -- in a pick 'em, he finishes fifth in this cohort of throwing infielders.

1) Billy Pierce - comparable to the quickly elected Drysdale and Ford
2) Bob Johnson - A top 5 outfielder for his entire career.
3) Ralph Kiner - One more season of that production and he'd already be in.
4) Ken Boyer - My favorite available 3B, a little better than Elliott
5) Tommy Bridges - We're missing a wartime pitcher and I think it's Bridges, not Walters.
6) Charlie Keller - another "prime" outfielder
7) Joe Gordon - Wartime is certainly not overrepresented
8) Minnie Minoso - Top AL LF for the 50s.
9) Virgil Trucks - Earns a boost from war credit
10) Quincy Trouppe - Less certain about this placement than others on the ballot but he was a top Mexican league hitter and had a long career.
11) Dutch Leonard - Another war era pitcher I like better than Bucky Walters
12) Bob Elliott - Top 3B for a long stretch of time
13) Joe Sewell - Top SS in the 20s. The electors can't decide between Sewell and Dobie Moore
14) Jake Beckley - Very good for a long time and there are relatively few contemporaries elected. Having a long career at that point in history makes him an outlier.
15) Dick Bartell - this placement is without war credit. I like Rowdy Dick better than Scooter.
16) Chuck Klein
17) Gavy Cravath
18) Dobie Moore - moves up based on comparison to Ernie Banks truncated to age 30
19) Rube Waddell
20) Jose Mendez
21-25) Willard Brown, Urban Shocker, George Sisler, Tommy Leach, Edd Roush
26-30) Wally Berger, Alejandro Oms, Dizzy Trout, Rocky Colavito, Fielder Jones
31-34) Jimmy Ryan, Cupid Childs, Pete Browning, George Van Haltren
35-36) Vic Willis, Dick Redding

My evaluation of Spotswood Poles puts him at 40 after George Burns. I haven't worked up Ben Taylor yet but he is likely between 25 and 45.

DL from MN is my anti-voter -- only 2 common votes. OCF, didn't you used to post most similar and least similar ballots? After this pure backlog election, that would be interesting.

1976 Ballot –I use a little of WS, WARP, RCAA, OPS+, and traditional stats, as well as reputation.

1. Dick Redding May be more similar to Spahn/Roberts than we realize.

2. Pete Browning There were two better hitters through the 1880’s, Brouthers and Connor.

3. Larry Doyle I think the 1910’s NL is getting penalized more than the 1950’s AL. Second basemen with most career batting WS, through 1974 eligibles: (1) Eddie Collins 463.6. (2) Rogers Hornsby 443.7. (3) Nap Lajoie 398.8. (4) Charlie Gehringer 295.3. (5) Frankie Frisch 258.0. (6) Larry Doyle 237.5. (7) Billy Herman 219.0.

4. Dobie Moore Such a high peak that less PT not really an issue.

5. Bob Elliott I think that everyone has been penalizing him for mediocre wartime seasons, and are not carefully looking at 1947-1951. Third basemen with most career batting WS, through 1974 eligibles: (1) Eddie Mathews 387.4. (2) Jud Wilson (est) 320.1. (3) John Beckwith (est) 263.0. (4) Stan Hack 250.5. (4) Bob Elliott 237.5. (5) Frank Baker 235.0. (6) Tommy Leach 232.5.

6. John McGraw Yes, he was injured, yes, he didn’t have a long career, but when he played, he played exceptionally well.

7. Roger Bresnahan Best available major league catcher, by a good margin.

8. Jose Mendez I think that I can’t ignore Mendez, who was probably the pitcher that Ferrell was, and may have been as good a hitter. Was he Koufax-good though?

9. Willard Brown New numbers boosted him, not the HOF vote.

10. George Van Haltren Has gotten an elect-me vote on my ballot before.

11. Bill Monroe The ultimate overlooked candidate.

12. Cupid Childs Less of a hitter than Doyle, but seems to have been better than Gordon, in my opinion.

13. Minnie Minoso In the Slaughter mold.

14. George Sisler Once he is elected, who will be our most surprising omission?

15. Ben Taylor Hey, look who’s back! I'm just returning from vacation, and haven't read the discussion thread. Has there been new data on Ben?


LAST YEAR TOP TEN/NEW NOTABLES


16. Alejandro Oms

17. Rube Waddell

18. Billy Pierce

19. Jake Beckley

20. Tommy Leach

Missing top 10

Joe Gordon – He really wasn’t a better hitter than Johnny Evers, even with a couple of years’ extra credit. (Evers 198.1 BWS in 1784 G. Gordon 172.8 BWS in 1566 G. Evers 18.0 BWS/162 G, Gordon 17.9 BWS/162G.)

Ralph Kiner – War credit would bring him to Bob Johnson. Unfortunately, I don’t give him much. Keller leapfrogs Kiner with war credit.

Hugh Duffy – I like Van Haltren and Ryan a little more.


Some of the Newbies

Bob Allison – A fine career.

John Roseboro – Similar hitting value to Spud Davis.

Once he is elected, who will be our most surprising omission?
Kiner, Traynor or Dean

RW:Once he is elected, who will be our most surprising omission?
Y:Kiner, Traynor or Dean

Well, anyone following the project should understand why we've left these guys out. For those seeing the project for the first time? Perhaps Mickey Welch and his 307 victories.

No significant newbies – Allison would be OK if about twice the career, Roseboro just off bottom of consideration set.

1. (N/A-9-9-10-7-7-5-5-4-3-5-6-5-3-4-3-4-4-3-2-2-1-1-2-6-4-4-2-1-1-1-3-
1-2-2-1-1-2-2-1-1-2-2-3-1-1-1-1-2-1-3-1-1-2-1-1-2-1-1-2-1-2-1-1-3-1) Jake Beckley. Paul Waner is a very close comp (it was 37 years till we found one) and it thus makes no sense to have Waner far above Beckley. Adjust his 2930 hits to full seasons and he's up there with Nap, above Babe, over 3200 hits, and OPS+ of 125 better than Van Haltren and slightly short of Wheat’s 129. Isolated power .127 vs “slugger” Wheat .135, in a less power-centered era. Marginally ahead of Welch, as we have seen more 307-win pitchers (now 10 others among currently HOM-eligible) than 2930-hit hitters (now 8 others). TB+BB/PA .455, TB+BB/Outs .707. Played for un-famous teams. Better than Keeler, almost as good as Crawford. More than a borderline HOMer, somewhere in the reaches well above the border but below the immortals. Should have been elected 40 “years” ago.

2. (15-14-11-12-10-9-6-8-7-7-6-7-6-3-3-3-2-3-2-2-3-2-4-5-4-2-3-2-3-3-
2-3-3-2-2-3-7-5-5-3-2-2-2-4-2-3-3-2-2-4-3-2-2-3-3-4-2-3-2-2-3-2-4-2-2-
3-2-2-3-2-2-4-2-3-2-2-4-2) Mickey Welch. 307-210 comes to impress me more and more, particularly as we get more and more of the 1920s and 1930s pitcher glut – 7 more wins than Lefty Grove! 1885 looks like a pretty good peak too; 44-11 with a 1.67 ERA is pretty impressive, compared for example to Clarkson’s 49-19 at 2.73 in 1889. With 4802 IP, OK at an ERA+of 113 (but he never heard of ERA) he was far better than most of the 00s and 20s pitchers under consideration, none of whom (other than Young, Matty and Alex) got near 300 wins, and many of whom had ERA+s little better than Welch.

3. (N/A-7-7-6-8-6-6-7-7-6-7-7-7-9-8-7-7-4-5-3) Addie Joss. I’m now even more convinced I missed him earlier, and that adjusting innings down for dead ball pitchers is illegitimate. 2327 IP at an ERA+ of 142. 160-97 by age 30. If you assume the rest of his career would have been 1800 IP, 120-90 with an ERA+ of 110 (somewhat conservative, assuming you boost his last sick season, though pitchers didn’t last as long as they did later) then 50% credit would put him at 3227IP, 220-142, with ERA+ of 130. 25% credit puts him at 2777 IP, 190-120, with ERA+ of 136. Substantially better than Koufax.

4. (N/A-6-4-3-3-3-5-3-4-4-3-3-5-5-3-4-4-5-6-4-4-3-3-4-3-5-3-3-4-3-
3-4-3-3-5-4-4-4-5-6-4) George Sisler. 2812 hits, OPS+ 124 puts him just below Beckley and Welch. TB+BB/PA .482, TB+BB/Outs .748. Better singles hitter than Ichiro!, his record having been set in a 154 game season. And he had power too. Undervalued by sabermetricians.

5. (N/A-10-8-7-6-4-3-3-5-9-7-8-6-4-4-4-6-4-5-6-5-4-6-7-6-5-5-6-7-5-5-4-
4-5-4-6-4-4-5-4-4-5-4-4-6-5-5-5-6-7-5) Eddie Cicotte. Only 208-149 and an ERA+ of 123, but 3223 IP, more than Waddell and should get about 25% of the bonus for the 300-win career he should have had (he was, after all, a knuckleballer, who tend to peak late.) Much better than the 20s glut – only loses to Welch on longevity – Newhouser a close comp, but Cicotte had a longer career. Successfully cursed Red Sox AND White Sox for over 8 decades!

6. (N/A-15-N/A-5-4-4-6-10-8-9-7-5-5-5-7-5-6-7-6-6-7-8-7-6-6-7-8-6-6-5-
5-6-5-7-5-5-6-6-5-6-5-5-7-6-6-6-7-8-6) Pete Browning. Recalculating, to adjust ’82 as well as ’83-’92, he had 2,177 “normalized” hits, with no AA discount. However, TB+BB/PA .511, TB+BB/Outs .855. the same as Tiernan, not quite as good as Thompson, but he got no significant boost from the 1893-94 run explosion. Career OPS+162 vs. 146 Thompson and 138 Tiernan, but you have to discount a bit for AA

7. (N/A-10-9-8-11-N/A-15-15-14-10-10-11-12-10-12-11-9-8-9-10-10-9-
8-9-10-9-8-7-9-9-8-10-9-8-10-9-8-9-8-8-10-9-8-8-8-9-7) Charley Jones. Short career – only 1,780 normalized hits, even when adjusted to nominal 130-game-played season (but that’s more than Pike, with much less of an adjustment, and Jones too missed two prime seasons.) But OPS+ 149, TB+BB/PA .473, TB+BB/Outs .722, so above Pike and non-CF 90s OF.

8. (N/A-12-10-12-10-11-10-7-7-8-9-7-9-13-11-10-11-12-12-11-11-11-
12-12-11-11-12-13-12-15-14-12-14-11-10-11-11-10-12-11-10-9-9-
10-8) Sam Leever. Pity he wasn’t able to start at the normal time; 2 more years would have made him a NB. Only 2660 innings, but was blocked till 27 by the one-league 1890s and having a steady job as a schoolteacher. Believe he needs to be looked at seriously by others, and included in pitcher analysis. Mild plus for high level of moral probity.

9. (N/A-10-9-8-10-11-10-13-12-14-N/A-15-14-13-12-11-10-10-11-9) Ernie Lombardi. Up a bit when compared with the closely comparable Berra. 2137 hits, normalized to a 130 game season, and an OPS+ of 125 makes him a little better than Schang, but some of it was during the war years and he fielded badly. TB+BB/PA .492, TB+BB/Outs .719., the ratio between the two very low because of strikeouts, I assume. Plus a great nickname!

10. (N/A-9-8-8-9-10-8-10-9-8-7-8-11-11-10-10-10-11-11-10-9-11-12-
11-14-13-11-13-13-13-13-12-11-14-13-12-11-11-12-10) Wally Schang. When you normalize his career to 130 game seasons for the first 18 years, as I do for catchers, he gets to 1941 hits, more than Groh at an OPS+ of 117, very similar. Furthermore, TB+BB/PA=.455, TB+BB/Outs=.728, also significantly better than Groh, over very close to the same period. And he was a catcher, more difficult than 3B.

11. (N/A-8-7-8-14-13-14-13-9-9-10-11-9-11-10-13-13-15-N/A-15-N/A-
15-N/A-15-15-14-13-N/A-15-14-13-12-13-11) Cupid Childs. OPS+119, almost the same as the 90s trio, and TB+BB/PA .470, TB+BB/Outs .797 highly competitive with them. Main negative is only 1720 hits, or about 1780 even if you normalize him to a 130 games played season. Nevertheless, he was a 2B.

12. (N/A-11-14-N/A-15-13-14-12) Rube Waddell Given Joss’s new elevation, he’d dropped a bit too far at 32. Only 193-143, and only 2961 IP but 134 ERA+, although lots of UER. Back on ballot to replace Griffith after almost 40 years – he fell off it in 1934.

13. (N/A-14-15-14) Vern Stephens. Short career – only 1859 hits, but comparing him to Reese he was much better, and not far short of Doerr. TB+BB/PA .508, TB+BB/Outs .756. Best season 1944, however.

14. (N/A-10-12-N/A-15-N/A-15-14-15-N/A-15) Ralph Kiner Only 1451 hits, but an OPS+ of 149. Doesn’t really deserve war years bonus (too young.) TB+BB/PA .617, TB+BB/Outs .991. Closest comp is Hack Wilson, but Kiner was a little better. Down a bit because of short career.

15. (N/A-7-13-11-13-14-14-14-N/A-15-15-15-N/A-14-15-15-15-N/A-
14-N/A-15-15-N/A) Hack Wilson TB+BB/PA = .588, TB+BB/Outs = .954, OPS+ 144. (he does appear to have known about BB, unlike some others.) Very short career, but quality too good to ignore. OPS+ slightly below Jones, so here he goes.

OFF BALLOT

16. (N/A) Quincy Trouppe. Not quite as good as Lombardi or Schang, but will be on ballot in quiet years. OPS+118, about 1900 adjusted hits. Much better than Mackey.

17. (N/A-14-14-N/A) Chuck Klein. Shortish career but very good one. Similar player to Beckwith, beats Hack on career length, but Hack was better. TB+BB/PA .575, TB+BB/Outs .909, but only 2076 hits. OPS+137.

18. Indian Bob Johnson. Very similar career to Klein but infinitesimally less good. TB+BB/PA .569, TB+BB/Outs .890., only 2051 hits. OPS+138

19. (N/A-15-N/A) Alejandro Oms. New MLE OPS+ of 125 moves him down a bit. Shorter career than Beckley, and not quite as valuable, but he was a darn good player nonetheless.

20. Willard Brown. If he’d been a SS for the whole of his career he’d be close to Doerr or even a little above, but he was mostly a CF.

21. Minnie Minoso. Even if you add extra years, he’s a shorter career than Oms, and not as good as Johnson. 1963 ML hits at OPS+ of 130, TB+BB/PA .498 , TB+BB/Outs .759
22. (N/A-11-12-11-11-12-13-14-12-15-15-15-15-N/A) Carl Mays
23. Ben Taylor. Not all that far below Beckley and better than Van Haltren. Put him above Suttles – he’s better, so will be on ballot in weak years.
24. (N/A-6-5-9-8-9-8-7-10-11-8-9-7-7-6-6-9-9-8-6-6-6-5-4-8-7-9-12-
N/A-14-13-15-N/A) Hugh Duffy. Up a little after looking at Ashburn
25. (N/A-12-12-14-N/A) Tony Lazzeri
26. (N/A-14-N/A-15-N/A) Sam Rice
27. (N/A) Mickey Vernon
28. (N/A-13-15-N/A-15-15-N/A) Vic Willis
29. Billy Pierce.
30. Sal Maglie.
31. (N/A) Burleigh Grimes.
32. (N/A) Heinie Manush
33. (N/A-9-10-10-13-N/A) Mike Tiernan
34. Joe Gordon. OPS+120, but only 1530 hits. Short and only moderately impressive career; missed 2 war years, but had one easy one. Played for Yankees, so others softened up the pitchers for him – would be more plausible if he hadn’t had a lousy 1946. Have moved him up a bit on comparison with Stephens, but Stephens was better.
35. (N/A-11-12-15-14-N/A) Joe Sewell. Down a bit on Gordon comparison.
36. Bob Elliott
37. Ken Boyer. Just a hair short of Elliott, so slots here.
38. (N/A) Dick Lundy
39. (N/A-9-12-11-14-13-14-12-11-12-13-11-11-9-9-13-14-12-14-14-N/A) Levi Meyerle.
40. (12-15-N/A-11-10-12-10-10-9-8-11-12-10-10-8-8-14-15-13-15-15-N/A) Harry Wright.
41. (N/A-10-9-8-7-6-7-8-5-12-10-10-N/A-10-8-11-11-N/A) Jimmy Ryan
42. (N/A-13-12-13-13-12-14-15-12-13-11-11-N/A-11-9-12-12-N/A) George van Haltren. TB+BB/PA .469, TB+BB/Outs .765, not overwhelming for the 90s.
43. Kiki Cuyler
44. Deacon McGuire
45. Jack Quinn
46. Tony Mullane
47. Pye Traynor
48. Jim McCormick
49. Dick Redding. My punt is 3200 innings at 114 ERA+ for a record of 207-159, i.e. same quality as Chris but a little shorter. About here looks right – a little below Grimes (longer career) and Maglie (better quality.)
50. Joe Judge
51. Edd Roush
52. Spotswood Poles.
53. Larry Doyle
54. Curt Simmons
55. Roger Bresnahan.
56. Wayte Hoyt.
57. Harry Hooper.
58. Gil Hodges
59. Jules Thomas.
60. Wilbur Cooper
61. Bruce Petway.
62. Jack Clements
63. Bill Monroe
64. Jose Mendez
65. Herb Pennock
66. Chief Bender
67. Ed Konetchy
68. Jesse Tannehill
69. Bobby Veach
70. Lave Cross
71. Tommy Leach.
72. Tom York

Hey gang--

Just wanted to pop my head in and say that I'm sorry about missing last year's vote (especially due to the tightness of the ballot). Despite my regrets, I have likely hit the end of the road for my participation. I'm not dying, no one said anything to offend me, no real problems that I have to drop everything for, but I am having trouble making this project a consistent priority at this point.

The irony is that I muddled through years and years of players I've only read about, only to drop out before being able to comment on the guys that I grew up watching.

Now, go elect someone worthy of my birth year.

dolf

I'm only sorry we never elected Dolf Luque for you. Keep lurking amd spot-posting if you have the time.

I’m an extreme peak voter; career numbers matter very little to me, except as a tiebreaker. I rely heavily on WS for hitters, with OPS+ and some WARP thrown in as well. For pitchers, it’s PRAA, with some WS and ERA+ adjustments for good measure. And some other stuff.

The ballot discussions this past week definitely had an effect on my ballot, dropping Dobie Moore a bit (though his peak still blows me away, it apparently wasn’t quite as high as I thought), and raising Charlie Keller a bit. The by-era lists also made me give another bump to '50s pitching candidates; it didn’t get any of them on-ballot, but a couple might end up making my pHOM eventually who wouldn’t have otherwise.

Charley Jones and Elston Howard make my pHOM this time around.

1975 ballot:

1. José Méndez (pHOM 1960). Simply the best eligible pitcher out there, IMO. With Moore’s slight demotion, he takes over the top spot.

2. Rube Waddell (pHOM 1919). The one-place bump may make me his best friend again. Love his PRAA, love his strikeouts, and the unearned runs don’t bug me that much.

3. Hugh Duffy (pHOM 1930). I’ve read all the pro and con arguments, and I have to say I keep ending up in the same place on Duffy: He belongs, at least to anyone with as much of a peak emphasis as I have.

4. Dobie Moore (pHOM 1932). Just enough to satisfy my (admittedly small) minimum requirements. Fantastic peak, even if it’s not quite what we thought before the new MLEs.

5. Cupid Childs (pHOM 1938). Another infielder with a great peak, from an underrepresented era.

6. Ralph Kiner (pHOM 1964). He still looks pretty good to a peak voter.

7. Dizzy Dean (pHOM 1967). He’s risen with each reevaluation I’ve done. It’s a really short peak (which is why he’s not even higher), but he was inarguably dominant during it.

8. Willard Brown (pHOM 1964). Looks like a great hitter to me, even if he didn’t walk much.

9. Vic Willis (pHOM 1961). Perhaps not quite as good as I’d thought for several elections there. Still, impressive by any of my favorite measures.

10. Ed Williamson (pHOM 1931). A lost cause, but the best of the remaining 3Bs, for my taste. And, hey, from that underrepresented era again!

11. Quincy Trouppe (pHOM 1967). All the hard evidence makes him the best of the remaining eligible catchers.

12. Joe Gordon (pHOM 1971). My recent 2B reevaluation gave him a decent boost; I like him quite a bit better than the recently elected Doerr. With war credit, he’s clearly worthy.

13. Charlie Keller (pHOM 1973). He jumps over a few guys—jschmeagol finally convinced me I had him a bit too low.

14. Eddie Cicotte (pHOM 1972). Clear enough dominance for long enough, in my book.

15. Bucky Walters (pHOM 1968). Another underrated pitcher with a solid peak.

16-20: Sisler (1939), Rosen (1968), Bresnahan (1973), Redding (1975), C. Jones (1976)
21-25: E. Howard (1976), Browning, Joss, [Reese], Pierce, Fox
26-30: Leach, [W. Ford], [Slaughter], Doyle, Berger, McGraw, H. Wilson
31-35: Oms, [Doerr], Minoso, Gomez, Chance, [Wynn], Cravath
36-40: [Lyons], Poles, K. Boyer, [Ashburn], Roush, McCormick, J. Ryan
41-45: Elliott, [Lemon], G. Burns, Pesky, [Rixey], Colavito, Welch
46-50: Van Haltren, Trout, Veach, Rizzuto, B. Johnson

Required Explanations and Newbies:

•Sisler. After a demotion some years back, he’s crept back to just off the edge of my ballot. Presently #16 and long in my pHOM; I’ll be happy to see him elected if it happens.

•Minoso. Kind of the rich man’s Van Haltren, very good for a long time, but he doesn’t really have the kind of peak I’m looking for. Midpack at #32.

•Redding. Not quite the peak of my favorite unelected eligible pitchers, but he’s close (and in my pHOM). At #19.

•Allison. He’s not even Maris, and Maris wasn’t close. And he’s the only newbie this “year” even approaching the consideration set.

Keep lurking amd spot-posting if you have the time.

Good luck with whatever you're doing, Mark! Your HoM pass will always be good if you decide to join us again,

BTW, thanks for notifying us. At least we know you're OK or not cursing one of us all day. :-D

(sigh of relief) I checked -- he wasn't voting for Beckley :-). Seriously Dolf, even though you don't vote for Beckley you've been a huge contributor to this project, don't give up now. You can always do what I do and keep the same comments -- and players!) for 4 or 5 decades, then it takes very little time indeed....

Boyer and Lombardi PHoM. Bob Allison was very good, but not close to the ballot.

1)Fox--The man had 2663 hits (#61 all time) and was a great fielder. If you’re going to take one of the second basemen he should be the one. PHoM in 1970.
2)Gordon--Fixed my war credit, he and Doerr moved up. PHoM in 1958.
3)Sewell--109 OPS+, reasonably long career, good shortstop (A- Win Shares). Yes, I am allowing for his switch to 3B at the end of his career. PHoM in 1939.
4)Stephens-- PHoM in 1961. Looks underrated to me.
5)Elliott--I like him better than Hack. Second greatest 3B to date, after Baker. PHoM in 1960.
6)Schang--His rate stats would put him in the HoM, but a look at each individual year isn’t impressive. Still, a hitting catcher with his career length isn’t common...Bill James rates him a C+ fielder in Win Shares, but says he was a good catcher in the NHBA. PHoM in 1938.
7)Schoendienst--PHoM in 1968. Compare to Julian Javier, his hitting was way above replacement.
8)Bob Johnson--A very underrated player. Usually I'm a WS guy but this time I think Warp has it right. PHoM in 1970.
9)Doyle— His hitting is legitimately outstanding, he played 2nd base, and a C+ defender by Win Shares. 126 career OPS+, compare to contemporary George Cutshaw, who was a regular 2B for 11 years with an OPS+ of 86. #19 all time in innings at 2B. WS Gold Glove in 1917. Top 10 in Win Shares 1909-12, 1915. PHoM in 1926.
10)Minoso--I gave full ML credit for two+ years. 44 Win Shares to be precise, half of the MLEs. PHoM 1972.
11)Lombardi-- A long career as a catcher with a big bat. Almost 2000 games caught including PCL. PHoM 1976.
12)Elston Howard--war, segregation, stuck behind Yogi. The peak is there and the obstacles were out of his control. PHoM 1975
13)Willard Brown-- I’m still concerned about the terrible plate discipline and terrible ML flop. PHoM 1973.
14)Tommy Bridges—fixed his war credit. 10 top 10 seasons in AL ERA+. PHoM 1975.
15)Ken Boyer--PHoM 1976.

Sisler--#89, his peak was not long enough to merit election, though he certainly was a great hitter for a few years. See also Jack Fournier.
Mendez--#31, I rate him right below Joss. PHoM in 1932.
Redding--#44.
Moore--#33, I didn’t vote for Jennings either.
Hugh Duffy—#76. Good hitter, great fielder. Duffy, Van Haltren, and Ryan are even in my estimation, but off the ballot.
Kiner--#20

OCF, didn't you used to post most similar and least similar ballots? After this pure backlog election, that would be interesting.

Last week of classes this week, finals next, so no promises. I will if I have time.

Here's a record I wonder about: what is the least number of points received by newly eligible candidates? We're 10 ballots in, and there have been a couple of votes for already eligible players who got no votes last year (Kell, Bartell) but so far none for Allison, Roseboro, Earl Wilson et al.

what is the least number of points received by newly eligible candidates?

0 in 1924: Wildfire Schulte anyone?
Bond, Tiernan, and Mullane returned from the missing.

0 in 1967: Ned Garver, Ted Kluszewski, et al.
Old friends included Dom DiMaggio, Vargas, Gomez,
Berger, Maranville, Vernon, and Arlett.

1976 ballot, our 79th

I reread the threads on the top-5 guys I haven't been voting for - in my case, Mendez and WBrown. I hope all are doing the same. Both were worth reading.

Voting style: I tend to be mostly prime-oriented with hitters, prime and career with pitchers. But a huge peak sometimes catches my eye.
Overall, I think there is too much emphasis on WARP3 and WS, which are intriguing tools but which are not yet sufficiently mature.
So my preference for ERA+ and OPS+ helps, I think, as a reality check on the newfangled toys.

1. JAKE BECKLEY - Heads a contingent of four guys whom I have concluded are definitely HOMers.
Beckley's OPS+s as a regular: 152 44 38 33 31 28 27 27 26 26 26 24 22 12 12 05 02
His fielding had value, he played every day, he hit well - there's nothing remotely like this career among the unelected hitters from 1875-1935. 13 OPS+s of 120 or better (even Eddie Mathews had 'only' 12). Rivals came and went; it's only Beckley who lasted.
2. JOE GORDON - Wow, top 10 in HRs in each of his first 10 MLB seasons. Nine-time All-Star. Six top 10s in Total Bases. And all of that is WITHOUT his due war credit. Yeah, it looks weird that his career has no head - and no tail. But the body of work is outstanding, and not many players of his era were better. Seven OPS+s of at least 117, and a great fielder too. Nice combo.

3. DICK REDDING - This is the missing Negro League pitcher in our experiment. Too bad the HOF didn't feel the same way, and I now worry that the HOM won't, either. A little bit caught between peak/career types, and of course parts of his career are shrouded by history. A rare Negro League pitcher who lasted.
4. RALPH KINER - Is getting underrated by the electorate, but that may finally be changing. More extreme slugging version of Gordon. How many runs did he really cost his teams in the OF? Enough to keep him two spots lower. But I think both he and Gordon would have better shots with a few extra seasons of what I would consider relatively meaningless results. In both cases, the primes are there.
5. CUPID CHILDS - A full-length career for this brutal and underrepresented era is darn impressive. Even discounting 1890 AA, you'll find seven other 120 OPS+ seasons here. Matches up well against 2Bs in all eras. Not sure I understand why he hasn't gotten more support.
6. BILLY PIERCE - Top white pitcher on the board. I still think he'll move up in the rankings overall as people see how few pitchers of his era can beat him out (beyond the already-elected Spahn-Roberts-Ford trio). Keep him on your radar.
7. GEORGE SISLER - Got back ahead of Cravath last year off reconsideration of his fielding reputation (I consider pre-1930 fielding stats to be problematic). Not much in that 2nd half of career, I'll admit. But the first half was something to see. A slight pitching boost, too.
8. BOB ELLIOTT - I've mulled him vs McGraw, which is a difficult comparison, but Bob wins it. Better than HOMer Hack, Elliott has returned to my ballot in recent years. Six seasons of at least 134 OPS+, ALL of them as a 3B! Wish he'd played all 3B and not so much OF, but c'est le vie. Beats out Boyer (see Boyer thread for details).
9. GAVVY CRAVATH - The key for me is the half-season opportunity in 1908; even then he clearly was a quality major league hitter, so there's little reason not to significantly credit either 1907 or 1909-11. His work in his 30s is just outstanding. Comparison to Kiner is fascinating.
10. BURLEIGH GRIMES - Landed back on my radar nearly a decade ago. Compare to Ruffing, Rixey, Wynn and other such HOM pitchers. I dismissed him as short of Rixey and Ruffing, and he was. But he's just one 130 ERA+ year short of climbing a lot higher on this ballot.
11. MINNIE MINOSO - Sexond time voting for him. Eight OPS+s over 130 is pretty nice, and could field his position, too, but disappointed to see such negligible Negro Leagues credit.
12. BOB JOHNSON - Moves up three spots after I see he out-OPS+s Minoso (who wins only via fielding bonus). Sort of the Joe Gordon of OFs in career shape. I am quite bothered by 1944 being his highest OPS+; seems like he took advantage of the weak competition. But has a decade's worth of excellent hitting, for a prime that I like better than Van Haltren's.
13. RUBE WADDELL - I've been kicking Rube around for decades, but the Drysdale thread helped his cause a bit. I still think he had more direct impact in costing his team wins with his 'personality quirks,' but his overall effectiveness is impressive. Only 8 to 10 seasons of any note at all, and never led his league in IP and only top 9 on three occasions - a major negative in an 8-team league. But I'll give him this spot, at least.
14. KEN BOYER - Climbs onto ballot this year. Seven OPS+s over 120, and an excellent fielder, too. Good endurance, seven times in the top 8 in ribbys.
15. PETE BROWNING - An old favorite clings barely to the ballot. He's slipped a bit behind the Kiner/Cravath doppelgangers. Seven OPS+s above 163. 10 regular seasons, a good number for the era. If only he fielded a little better. He stunk at it, sometimes, but played some 16 pct of his career in the infield. Was OF fielding hugely important in this era? I doubt it.

TOP 10 RETURNEES SNUBBED

WILLARD BROWN - Wow, even a weaker case than I thought. Mediocre OBP - never drew a damn walk and played in a weak league (only other stud hitter was an aging Turkey Stearnes). Deserves some significant war credit, but his odd, nomadic career for once got the best of our MLE experts. Seems like a Cecil Cooper-level career. The HOF blew it here. Goes 12 for 67 with NO walks at age 32 for the St Louis Browns. That ain't ALL racism. Oms, for one, was better.
JOSE MENDEZ - I reread his thread (it's long). I am satisfied as to Mendez being able to pitch to a level of a HOMer - but a long-career one, not a pure-peak one. Still better than most pitchers available, and could someday grab a No. 15 spot, but he doesn't quite rate with me right now. Sorry, Jose.
DOBIE MOORE - The MLEs on his thread underline how stumped I'll be if anyone votes for him over Gordon. An excellent player, but not for nearly long enough, and I'm not even satisfied that he was a big contributor with the glove at SS.
HUGH DUFFY - Win Shares gets him all wrong, and eventually they'll fix it. Excellent fielder, but geesh, he's not Ozzie Smith. As noted on the discussion thread, a non-WS look at the numbers leaves you wondering how he gets so many votes.
JOE SEWELL - I prefer great-hitting SSs, long-career ones, or great fielding ones at least. Sewell is a HOVG SS-3B.

OTHER JUST MISSED
MICKEY WELCH - Bounced of late by Waddell. The Ws are great, but he hovered in the 3 to 5 ranking in IP when only a dozen or so guys were hurling serious innings. One outstanding, one excellent, one very good year ERA+-wise. The category is not a perfect tool out of that era, but the dominance also wasn't quite there.
GEORGE VAN HALTREN - I dismissed him long ago, but when the ballot thins it's inevitable that he would sneak back into my top 15 at times.
ROGER BRESNAHAN - Slips from 14th 5 yrs ago, is the 3rd NY Giant still in the mix. I could use a few more innings at C and not OF, but he was great in OF some years. Had not been on my ballot in many years before recently. Better pick than Mackey.

Goes 12 for 67 with NO walks at age 32 for the St Louis Browns. That ain't ALL racism.

No, it's making the jump from a league somewhere between AA and AAA in quality to the majors, PLUS racism.

For comparison, consider the performance of another hitter who jumped immediately from the NeL to the majors in 1947:

Larry Doby, 1947, 5-32, 1 bb 1 2b.

That performance was sure an excellent predictor of Doby's future in the major leagues . . .

Read Bill James discussion of Willard Brown's so-called trial with the Browns (it's in thge Jeff Heath entry), and then say it ain't racism.

If you don't have TNBJHBA, here's the gist. The Browns told Brown not to bring his bats, they would supply them. Well, Brown used a heavy bat and there was nobody on the Browns who used anywhere near as heavy a bat. Heath used the heaviest bat on the team but refused to allow Brown to use one. Brown finally found one of Heath's bats, busted, in a trash bin, the knob was knocked off. Brown taped the knob back on and used the bat one day, and hit his only ML HR. Heath retrieved the bat and smashed it into pieces.

Howie, it WAS ALL RACISM.

How funny would it be if Dolf was actually sitting around all day cursing one of us?

Dolf: Damn that Magnus!

Lurker interjection:

I know you guys debate military service credit, but could/should there also be "life experiences credit"? Take, for instance, my boy George Sisler. From what I read "peak" George gets "poisonous sinusitis" and concomitant double vision and becomes "far from peak" George. Or Ed Delahanty "falling" off the train at Niagara Falls. Does Ed get "life experience credit" for that? Does he get more for being drunk and falling off a train than George gets for having suffered from poor medical treatment? I understand the numbers put Ed slightly ahead of George, albeit George had more hits, but I wonder about it all.

You guys have a tough job.

This week, my comments are a tiny bit truncated. I've been busy with a bunch of college transfer and financial aid paperwork. I'm laying the groundwork for a likely move to San Francisco in August.

1976 Hall of Merit Ballot

1. Charlie Keller - Showed that, at the age of 20, he was able to walk from his college graduation straight to the high minors and dominate. With minor-league credit and war credit, he was an MVP-level player for a decade. No one else on the ballot can make that claim.
2. Dick Redding - I'm constructing my own short-form Win Shares-based evaluations for pitchers with the ERA translations that I use. Good peak plus (previously unrecognized by me) war credit puts him right behind Rube Foster in the all-time rankings.
3. Jose Mendez - Phenomenal stretch from 1910-1914; my projections have him winning 23 games per season.
4. Dobie Moore - New MLE Win Shares from Chris Cobb hurt him slightly, but I'm eager to see the California Winter League data worked into projections somehow.
5. Quincy Trouppe - Mackey's election has made me think about something: how much is defensive reputation overrated in how casual fans perceive a catcher's value? It makes sense that it is, considering how the catcher is at the center of attention in the field (along with the pitcher). But most of a position player's overall value is with the bat.

6. Rube Waddell - With guys like Mendez, Mays and Bridges, he is part of a family of pitchers on the HOM borderline. The difference between pitchers like Mendez and Waddell in comparison to Mays and Bridges is about 30-40 points of adjusted ERA (the actual number, not the percentage) and support-neutral winning percentage.
7. Nellie Fox - In a tightly-grouped ballot such as this, I tend to favor the "up-the-middle" guys.
8. Willard Brown - Value pattern and skill set is highly comparable to Al Kaline, Dave Winfield and comparable to Andre Dawson.
9. Minnie Minoso - See Alejandro Oms comment.
10. Alejandro Oms - Minoso and Oms might be the most tightly-matched pair of players on this ballot. Both had a broad base of skills which helped their teams. Both didn't really have any standout, MVP-type seasons, but played at an All-Star level for about eight seasons. Both were black Cubans. Minoso gets the edge because his shoulder seasons were better.

11. Tommy Leach - Similar in value pattern and skill set to the two players above him, trading some offense for defense.
12. Joe Gordon - A well-deserved All-Star at second base for about a decade. I'm happy to find room for him on my ballot.
13. Edd Roush - Two MVP-level seasons (1919, 1920) and three more that would have been at that level if he didn't miss quite as much time (1917, 1918, 1923).
14. Burleigh Grimes - Three great seasons (1920, 1921, 1928) anchor a long career. Hitting ability a plus.
15. Dizzy Dean - Gets nailed on a shift to a Win Shares-based evaluation system. Five-season peak is very similar to Jose Mendez, though a tiny bit worse. Slightly better shoulder seasons and more "hang-around value" is the difference between third and fifteenth on a tight ballot.

Top Ten Returnees Off Ballot
George Sisler - His 1920 season was great, but some durability issues in other peak/prime seasons keep him from rating higher. In integrated all-time rankings (MLB and NeL), he barely ranks among the top 35 at first base. Albert Pujols has already had four seasons that equal or far surpass Sisler's best and he'd probably fall on the wrong side of the HOM borderline if a truck driven by a deranged Cubs fan ran him over tomorrow.
Hugh Duffy - Nice little player who lingers just off my ballot.
Ralph Kiner - 1949 and 1951 were monster seasons with the bat. 1947 and 1948 were MVP-level, too. But those four seasons are all there really is to recommend him. Using OPS+ to argue that he and Keller are inseparable is misleading. More of Keller's OPS+ value is in the OBP portion. Furthermore, Keller's OBP is driven more by his batting average. These two advantages are small but very important.
Joe Sewell - Solid player who had a few All-Star level seasons, but stands out in comparison to his contemporaries only because of a drought in top-line talent at shortstop in the white majors. Lloyd, Wells, Moore and Lundy were all better than him. Appling and Cronin came into the league just as Sewell was finishing up his career at the hot corner for the Yankees. He rates in a virtual tie with Bancroft, far, far off my ballot.

I'm sure no one seriously wants to compare Brown's MLB failure at age 32 to a player who was about decade younger when he failed on a first try (32 AB vs 67 is a real difference, as well). And if Brown wasn't ready to face major league pitching at age 32, when was he going to be ready?
If Brown had played in the 'real' Negro League and dominated, I'd be more inclined to partially overlook this failed trial. But I already had reason to be skeptical of his numbers before, and this just reinforces that.

And let's assume for a moment that the story about Brown being told not to bring his bats is true.
He gets there, and there is no appropriate bat for him.
At that point, what? He couldn't find a bat on his own for an entire month?
So the 12 for 67 with no walks is all racism?
You know, as badly as all of these players got screwed in real life, finally here's a payback for one of them: No matter how poorly Brown does in this trial at age 32, he gets zero deduction. Yet if he did well, it's a huge bonus, no doubt.

James obviously is more accurate than most researchers, but he's listed a few doozies in his day. What is the sourcing for this "taped knob" "Heath broke the bat" stuff? I'm not saying it's definitely not true, I'm just saying we shouldn't just assume it so.

A good portion of the entire Brown thread reads to me like a predisposition to elect the guy, and then numerical gymnastics to make it happen. I also feel like we were properly skeptical of legendary tales about players from the turn of the century. We need be no less diligent in examining later tales.

No offense meant, but no one gets a free pass here, I'm sure you all agree. Jump my hurdles regarding Brown, and I could even wind up voting for him.

Apologies for not realizing this is the ballot thread; please post replies (or insults!) under this comment on the ballot discussion thread, thanks.

>And if Brown wasn't ready to face major league pitching at age 32, when was he going to be ready?

What Brown wasn't ready to do was to face major league pitching in a clubhouse and dugout that was hostile to him, and without the type of bat he had used his entire career (a big heavy hot dog).

It is true that James does not cite a source for his story. He clearly believed it to be true and it is hardly inconsistent with what we know of guys like Jeff Heath.

Basically the Browns saw Brown as the second coming of Eddie Gaedel, nothing more.

PHoM: Lou Boudreau & Jimmy Collins

1. Willard Brown (1,3,1)
2. George Van Haltren (2,4,2)

My pet causes.

3. Jake Beckley (5,7,5)
4. Mickey Welch (6,8,6)
5. Dobie Moore (4,6,8)
6. George Sisler (7,9,9)
7. Hugh Duffy (8,11,11)
8. Tommy Leach (9,12,7)
9. Nellie Fox (10,10,12)
10. Edd Roush (11,13,10)
11. Minnie Minoso (14,x,15)
12. Sam Rice (15,x,x)
13. Quincy Trouppe (12,15,14)
14. Tony Mullane (13,14,13)
15. Cupid Childs (x,x,x)

Every one of them is already in my PHoM.

16-20. Ryan, White, Elliott, Redding, Smith
21-25. Streeter, Grimes, Kiner, Sewell, Johnson
26-30. Willis, Boyer, Strong, Gleason, Greene

frannyzoo,

I don't think anyone gives out what you are calling 'life experience credit', these things happen in life.

And Ed Delahanty was a MUCH better player than George Sisler. Delahanty gets no extra credit for falling off a bridge while drunk. There is a myth that Sisler is hurt by members of this group becaue his last seven years were not much better than average. However, I don't think this is the case. Many voters (especially peak guys who don't care about filler seasons) simply dont' think they add to his case but they certainly don't take anything away from it. Sure, there is a good chance that without the sinusitis Sisler would have put together a few more very good seaons and would be in the HOM already, but he didn't. Tough.Plus, chances are he is getting in soon.

And by mentioning 'hits' I must ask, are you yest or karl in disguise?

Rusty,

Even brief comments?

1. Jose Mendez - Ed Walsh-lite, probably more criminally underrated than Moore, because his comp, unlike Moore's comp, sailed in. I'll also put forth the comparison to Koufax: His peak was higher (because he actually owned a bat) and longer than Sandy's.
2. Dobie Moore - Hughie-lite, a monster player for not as short as you might think. Chris's new numbers knock him down a touch, but I have Mendez and Moore so far above the pack that it's only a one-slot fall.
3. Joe Gordon - As good as Doerr with the stick, not as much with the glove. Flaming out early didn't help, but still a great 2B. Moves up a bit upon re-examination of his war credit.
4. Joe Sewell - The ultimate all-prime career.
5. Ken Boyer - Big prime candidate. Very good hitter, great fielder adds up to a pretty clear HOMer to me.
6. Bucky Walters - I am not quite as alone as I used to be on Bucky. He has the Faber career shape going for him (couple huge years with a long enough career), and I liked Faber.
7. Willard Brown - All the man did was hit; I think he's better than Suttles, who had similar OBP issues, high SLG, but was much less valuable defensively than Brown.
8. Minnie Minoso - Moves up quite a bit with the new MLEs. Are these new numbers a huge change in his case? Not really...but everyone at this point in the ballot is clumped together, and 2 more prime years does nothing but help.
9. Quincy Trouppe - I'm willing to look at him again, but I see all positives from his case, even if he wasn't fabulous with the glove (no evidence he was anything worse than average, though).
10. George Sisler - I only hope Medwick's induction means good things for Sisler's candidacy, because they have similar career shapes, and Sisler is clearly better, IMO. I wrote this comment when Medwick went in, and Sisler's been on a steady rise since. Well deserved.
11. Bob Johnson - Sewell-esque career, though as a corner OF vs. an infielder, thus the difference in their placements.
12. Dick Redding - I don't see the evidence of a super-long career or a super-high peak, but I see more than enough evidence of a long career and a very good peak.
13. Fred Dunlap - One of the 5 best players in baseball for 6 out of 7 years. I'd take him over quite a few people currently in the HOM.
14. Pete Browning - Fielding questions, AA questions are what keep him this low. The man could still hit.
15. Billy Pierce - A little better (less peak, more prime) than Dizzy Trout. As compared to Walters, the peak really hurts him (and the prime is not much better; the career obviously is).

16. Fielder Jones
17. Dizzy Trout
18. Bob Elliot
19. Urban Shocker
20. Bill Monroe

21-25: Rizzuto, Oms, Bond, Howard, Luque
26-30: Van Haltren, Matlock, Williamson, D. Dimaggio, Uhle
31-35: Grimes, Scales, Kiner, B. Taylor, Lundy
36-40: King, Veach, Buffinton, Poles, Harder
41-45: Dean, H. Smith, Mays, Clift, Childs
46-50: Bartell, Klein, Cross, Garver, Lazzeri


Vargas - I still have zero feel for him. I suspect he would fit into my top 50, but I don't feel I have the numbers at all with which to make an accurate ranking of him. Is there more discussion yet aside from the one post in his thread? (Leaving this on my ballot and switching to bold till I get some more information, dammit! :D )

Duffy - Haven't had to comment on him in a while. Not in my top 50, (though not far out of it) because he had the one big yeah, but the rest of his career was un-special. I see GVH as clearly superior.

Kiner - #33. Hitting prime/peak was not long enough to overcome the complete zero he was with the glove. Heilmann, as an example, was as bad with the glove or worse, but hit for quite a bit longer than did Kiner.

Michael,

I don't have much information for you about Tetelo Vargas.

Some Tetelo Vargas Info
I was reading through McNeil's <u>Baseball's Other All-Stars</u> and found some info about Vargas.

He comments: Vargas was an outstanding all-around player. He covered “acres” of ground. He was a consistent .300 hitter. He was very fast and would leg out extra-base hits. He is a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame in Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic.
Puerto Rican Winter League (PRWL): 1938-1953
Vargas led the PRWL in:
<u>runs</u>: 4 times
<u>stolen bases</u>: 3 times
<u>triples</u>: 2 times
His <u>career PRWL AVG</u> of .320 is 6th best all-time. Behind Brown .350, Coimbre .337, Perucha Cepeda .325, Orlando Cepeda .323, Roberto Clemente .323. Per 550 AB, averaged 176 hits and 5 HR.
Dominican Leagues:
Vargas was a regular in the Dominican Leagues from the 1937 to the mid-50s, but statistics were not kept and league was informal, except for 4 years in the 50s when the Dominican Summer League was in existence. His career average in the DSL was .322. Not bad for playing from 45-49 years of age.
Negro Leagues:
Played 1927 to 1944. Career Avg. of .342. Per 550 AB, 188 hits and 1 HR.

I have no idea of the accuracy of the NeL play, but McNeil's numbers for other NeL'ers have matched the generally accepted ones I have seen. I'll post comments from Riley and Holway's Complete Negro League Book later.

1976

1. Pete Browning (1)--If he played in the PCL in the 00s or the Negro Leagues in the 30s, would he be a HOMer by now? Same as with the Negro Leaguers, the league translations inordinately underrate his peak. Besides, it isn’t like the AA wasn’t a major league. Keep hope alive! (1927)

2. Charley Jones (2)--Jones, Shoeless Joe Jackson and Browning look pretty interchangeable to me. (1929)

3. Cupid Childs (3)--Where has the love for Cupid gone? (1938)

4. Tommy Leach (4)--May be the most underrated candidate out there. (1942)

5. Larry Doyle (5)--Another underrated infielder. Sisler-esque peak , according to win shares.(1945)

6. George Sisler (6)--Good peak, good career value, underrepresented position.(1958)

7. Hugh Duffy (7)--High peak, medium length career, the best of a large group of borderline OF candidates.(1964)

8. George Van Haltren (8)--Almost a HOMer not too long ago, will make it eventually. (1966)

9. Jose Mendez (9)--Koufax forced a reevaluation of short career/high peak players. Subsequently, Mendez, Walters, Berger and Redding moved up my ballot. (1972)

10. Carl Mays (11)--Big peak, but a bit more career value than Ferrell. (1968)

11. Willard Brown (13)--The most anonymous player on my ballot. (1971)

12. Ken Boyer (14)--The borderline infielders are a mess. Elliott, Boyer, Sewell, Doyle, Gordon, Fox, Sisler, they are all essentially the same, all are about equally deserving of being in or out of the HOM. But the nature of the project requires us to exaggerate the very small differences between them all and put them in some kind of rank order. This isn’t nearly the exact science we sometimes like to think it is. Anyway, I think Boyer’s defense trumps Elliott’s bat. (1975)

13. Joe Sewell (15)--From almost elected to weirdly underrated, but he'll get in eventually. Finally makes my PHOM this year, along with Dazzy Vance. Congrats!

14. Edd Roush (16)--Starts a run of three solid all-around outfielders. Roush’s just a little bit better than each of them though.

15. Minnie Minoso (17)--A slight career-value advantage over Oms, but they are very close.

16. Alejandro Oms (18)
17. Ralph Kiner (19)
18. Nellie Fox (20)
19. Quincy Trouppe (21)
20. Bob Elliott (22)
21. Joe Gordon (23)
22. Bucky Walters (24)
23. Wally Berger (25)
24. Dick Redding (26)
25. Ed Williamson (27)
26. Dobie Moore (40)
27. Vern Stephens (28)
28. Roger Bresnahan (29)
29. Dave Bancroft (30)
30. Jimmy Ryan (31)

Interesting things going on in my PHOM. There's a four-way tie for first in number of caps between the Giants, Braves, Indians and Cubs.

PHOM
Bob Lemon
Roger Bresnahan

1976 Ballot
1.Charley Jones – Truly great hitter who missed 2 years in his prime. Elected PHOM in 1921.
2.Dobie Moore – Impressive peak. Giving him more credit for army years. 10+ year prime at important position. Elected PHOM in 1939.
3.Pete Browning – Great hitter. Elected PHOM in 1925
4.Jose Mendez – Looking at the Negro League pitchers thread shows I may be underrating him. Jumps over Averill. Elected PHOM in 1942.
5.Vic Willis – Very good pitcher. I like him better than Waddell. Elected PHOM in 1945.
6.Dick Redding – Error in spreadsheet moves him up. Elected PHOM in 1968
7.Ed Williamson – He’s back. I was talked into the idea that I overestimated him in the past, but decided I was right the first time. Elected PHOM in 1958
8.Cupid Childs – Good hitter. Elected PHOM in 1960.
9.Burleigh Grimes – Higher peak than Rixey. Elected PHOM in 1961
10.Willard Brown – Big jump up for Brown. I tend to start conservatively w/ Negro league players and other players who need MLE credit. I guess I just need time to digest the information. Elected PHOM in 1966.
11.Hugh Duffy – Finally elected to my PHOM. Been on the fringes forever. Great defender Elected PHOM in 1970
12.Ralph Kiner – These high peak, short career players are the hardest for me to evaluate. Incredible peak and enough prime value to make my ballot. Elected PHOM in 1971.
13.Bucky Walters – Peak pitchers get a big boost in reevaluation. Elected PHOM in 1972
14.Dizzy Dean – Moves up due to big years bonus. Elected PHOM in 1973.
15.Edd Roush – Forgot to give him some credit for his holdouts. I’m giving credit to C. Jones blacklist years and plan to give credit for strikes, so I should give credit for holdouts. Elected PHOM in 1975.

Required Disclosures
Sisler Moves up slightly this week and just misses my ballot
Minoso Also just misses my ballot
Gordon Better than Doerr

Off the ballot
16-20 Minoso,Sisler,Monroe,Oms,Leach
21-25 Waddell,Cravath,Gordon,Howard,Mays
26-30 Fox,McGraw,Johnson,W.Cooper,Elliott
31-35 Trouppe,Doyle,F.Jones,Matlock,Keller
36-40 H.Wilson,Stephens,Rizzuto,Poles,H.Smith
41-45 Newcombe,Tiernan,Winters,Rosen,Bond
46-50 Schang,A.Cooper,Van Haltren,Ryan,Easter
51-55 Sewell,Pesky,Traynor,Clarkson,Taylor
56-60 Dunlap,Scales,Chance,Pierce,Byrd,Boyer

PHOM
Bob Lemon
Roger Bresnahan

Bresnahan goes into your PHOM but isn't one of your top 60 candidates? I don't understand.

If Roush made his backlog PHOM last year and was in 15th, Bresnahan would slot in at either 15 or 16, depending where Rick A. had Mackey and/or Drysdale last time. Wouldn't change the ballot points, but would make some sense.

1976 Ballot
None of the new guys make my Top 100.

1) Pete Browning
With the readjusted WARP discount, the Louisville Slugger is #1 among eligible players on my ballot by a wide margin.

2) Ben Taylor
Interesting revival of his thread. I’m not changing my ranking of him just yet. The lack of data from his prime years makes all of this highly speculative, but I’m ranking him as if he was Keith Hernandez with a little less peak and more career (Career totals of around 105 WARP3 and 320 Win Shares; with top 5s of 46 and 135, respectively).

3) Ken Boyer
52.9 WARP3 in top 5 seasons is best out there among hitters.

4) Joe Gordon
50.3 WARP3 in top 5 seasons is not far behind Boyer for peak and adding 2 years of war credit closes the gap even more.

5) Dick Redding
6) Jose Mendez
These two are nearly inseparable. The shape of their careers is different, but I see the cumulative value as equivalent.

7) Bucky Walters
Similar to Trout, but thanks to 300 extra IP and an OPS+ advantage of 13 points Bucky wins out.

8) Joe Sewell
His top 5 WARP come in a close second to Boyer (52.4), but his 5-yr. consecutive Win Shares are a little below Boyer (and Gordon). Overall, both uberstats have them as very similar.

9) Charley Jones
Seems like poor man’s Browning, or perhaps an old-timer’s Ralph Kiner. Blackball years credit gets him on the ballot.

10) Willard Brown
I consider the Andre Dawson comparison to be rather complimentary, as Dawson was a classic “5-tool” player, at least early on in his career. As much as Brown’s lack of walks seem to confound analysis of his career, he put up some impressive numbers and is worthy of a ballot spot.

11) Charlie Keller
Tied with Kiner for best top 3 seasons in Win Shares. I guess it’s just the extra war credit I’m giving Keller that gets him a spot above Kiner.

12) Bill Monroe
Probably in the Doerr-Gordon 2B range…cautiously ranked a little lower.

13) Dobie Moore
Perhaps the Black Hughie Jennings, but I think he’s got a more career value so he makes my ballot (Jennings would be ranked in the 40s).

14) Minnie Minoso
I had been missing the 0.3 WARP3 from his time with Cleveland in 1951 in my calculations of his 5-yr. peak. Fixing that, he’s scraped by Kiner for the 14 slot.

15) Ralph Kiner—149 OPS+ is pretty impressive, but his Relatively short 10 year career makes it hard to rank him much higher. I have given him a small bonus for playing time missed at the beginning of his career due to WWII service.

The Rest of the Top 50.

16) Dizzy Trout
17) Jake Beckley—Oh so close to the ballot due to career value, still, 37.6 in his top 5 WARP3 seasons is pretty low.
18) Tommy Leach
19) Jimmy Ryan
20) Bob Johnson
21) Billy Pierce
22) George Van Haltren
23) Harry Hooper
24) Rabbit Maranville
25) Fred Dunlap
26) Sam Rice
27) Gavy Cravath
28) Bob Elliott
29) Fielder Jones
30) Burleigh Grimes
31) Phil Rizzuto
32) Nellie Fox
33) Alejandro Oms
34) Cy Seymour
35) Vern Stephens
36) Quincy Trouppe
37) Dick Bartell
38) Hugh Duffy—In a dead-heat with Sisler. Win Shares likes Duffy more, WARP3 likes Sisler, I’m kinda splitting the difference.
39) George Sisler—Was not quite great enough for not quite long enough.
40) Dom DiMaggio
41) Spotswood Poles
42) Gil Hodges
43) George Burns
44) Johnny Pesky
45) Bobby Veach
46) Dave Bancroft
47) Edd Roush
48) Cupid Childs
49) Mickey Vernon
50) Tommy Henrich

Everyone moves up at least 1 spot, the top 3 moved up 2.

1. Mickey Welch - 300 wins should not be an automatic stat to get you in. Everyone says wins were easier to come by back then. Pitchers were used more, and thus able to win more. I guess the pitchers back then weren't aware of this since not many of them won 300 games. Welch may have pitched against worse teams...wasn't Welch and Keefe (who got elected) on the same team, pitching against the same teams for quite awhile? Top 10 pitcher in almost all major pitching categories from 1880-1889. Was never "the" best, but was consistently one of the best over and over.

2. George Sisler - Even during his "bad" years he could still get a ton of hits. Kiner like peak with some solid years to tack on for career voters.

3. Jake Beckley - not quite the peak, but plenty of career.

4. Burleigh Grimes - Between 1918-1931 he was pretty durable. A couple bad seasons mixed in, but all in all a dependable pitcher and I'm a career type of guy for the most part.

5. Joe Sewell - You couldn't strike the guy out! I absolutely love that about his career.

6. Nellie Fox - very close to Sewell in my rankings

7. Sam Rice - Top 10 in hits 12 of the years between 1917 and 1930, 8 times top 10 in Batting Average.

8. Gavvy Cravath - I looked long and hard at him, and decided I really needed to put more stock into his minor league years. With proper minor league credit now given, Gavvy has enough career to merit a spot on my ballot.

9. George Van Haltren - I welcome George back to my ballot after a long time away.

10. Joe Gordon - If his peak had been higher, or his career had been longer, I'd like him a lot more. I do give him war credit to get him this high.

11. Pie Traynor - I can understand why everyone didn't fall head over heals for him, but I didn't imagine that he would recieve so little support.

12. Minnie Minoso - Initially thought he'd crack my top 10, then reading some discussion I didn't think he'd be top 30, but I've finally settled on him here. He still has plenty of room to move on my ballot though. Spots 14-20 are all easily exchangeable on my ballot.

13. Roger Bresnahan - if he had only caught more games, I'd have him a lot higher.

14. Wally Schang - Lots of extra credit for being a durable catcher.

15. Dick Redding - Finally has some room to move into my top 20.

16. Ernie Lombardi - I've said it before, I'll say it again, I love catchers, especially one with good career value. Ernie even has some peak to mix in. He didn't strike out, he hit for average, and SOMEHOW he got 27 triples in his career!

17. Bucky Walters - Been iffy on him for awhile. He has been more of a favorite for the peak voters, and not so much for the career voters, but another look at him shows me that he had a bit more career value than I was giving him credit for. Moving him up this high on my ballot is going to help Kiner out on mine too when there is room.

18. Ralph Kiner - Kiner finally breaks into the lower ranks of my ballot. If he could've had 2 more good (not even necassarily great) years, he could've moved up to the top 3 or 4 spots on my ballot. As is, not enough career value for me.

19. Billy Pierce - been thinking about putting him on since the last ballot, and now he finally has room to make it.

20. Cupid Childs - Extremley good 2nd baseman for his time. Not as much career as McPhee or I would've liked him better. Still not 100% sure I even want him this high.

Talk about a deep but not singularly impressive backlog - my #1 man this ballot is overall 121st in my rankings to date; clearly in the bottom 20% of my HoM. I only have 16 HoM electees to date rated behind him, which, given we've elected about 140 guys, is pretty incredible.

In other words, for all of my whining :) , there's no one on the board that I really really love, and the difference between 1st and 50th is not big. Still, I confidently put forth the following:

1976 Ballot
Review of Hanrahan’s value system: career value with a fairly high replacement level (slightly below average). Something like WARP3 minus 2.5 wins per full year, or WS minus 11 per year adjusted for league quality, or RCAP adjusted for defense and timeline. No real credit for “peak”. Some subjective estimating of ability across time and place. I rank the long primes (or value above average) higher than most, hence my support for Sewell, Bob Johnson, McGraw, & Chance.

(x) indicates where I voted for them last ballot
[y] indicates their consensus rank from last ballot

1-Joe Gordon (1) [5]
Super prime. Larry Doyle with a much better glove.
2-Joe Sewell (2) [12]
Great hitter for a shortstop, AND very good defense. We will ignore Alan Trammell and Barry Larkin?
3-Bucky Walters (7) [24]
Faced strong opponents, pitched real well, hit well too, played in strong league. His perceived great peak in ‘39-‘40 is aided by the Reds’ gold glove defense.
4-Willard Brown (5) [3]
The recent HoF vote gave him a small boost.
5-Jake Beckley (8) [16]
Very fine career. Quite understated by Win Shares.
6-John McGraw (9) [ignored]
Great RCAP. The HoM is short of 3Bmen and especially 1890s infielders. He was a brilliant tactician as well.
7-Ken Boyer (4) [19]
Good stick, fine glove, durable, tough league. Could’ve used another productive year or two. League quality puts him well above Elliot.
8-George Van Haltren (11) [14]
Quite a career; 380 WS when translated to a full schedule.
9-Billy Pierce (13) [18]
Similar to Bucky Walters. Good value out of the bullpen helps him some.
10-Minnie Minoso (6) [7]
Looks an awful lot like Bob Johnson, don’t he?
11-Frank Chance (12) [really ignored]
Every ballot I howl at the moon.
12-Bob Johnson (14) [29]
Very good long prime. Underrated by ultra peak-ists and ultra career-ists.
13-Cupid Childs (15) [15]
Being an 1890s infielder, short career not held much against him.
14-Ralph Kiner (off) [11]
As a youngster (1970s) I listened to "Kiner’s Korner". Never really knew who he was. Essentially tied with Keller, who is just off my ballot at #16.
15-Dick Redding (off) [8]
First time for the Cannon Ball on my ballot.

I have three Top 10 disclosures: G Sisler #17, J Mendez #18, Duffy around #50.

Hugh Duffy was not a great hitter, nor even a very good one. He had one great year, and a bunch of decent ones. He will never make my ballot unless we find consensus that his defense was fabulous.

1976 Ballot

Joe Gordon and Early Wynn make my PHOM.

Eppa Rixey and Bobby Doerr are next in line.

With as close an election as this is gearing up to be, I feel that I have a lot of power right now. Last week I moved George Sisler to a just-off ballot position and he lost by the number of points that I dropped him (form 12th to 16th). This year it is a decision between Jose Mendez and George Sisler for my last ballot spot and it coudl make a difference. So who is it, wait and find out...

1. Charlie Keller (1, PHOM) - I have finally taken the plunge and shofted Charlie Keller to #1 on my ballot over Cupid Childs. I belive that Keller had more MVP level seasons with war and one seasons of MiL creadit than any other player on the ballot so I see no reason why he shouldn't be my top guy. I also think that I wasn't taking into consideration the fact that 2B wasn't as important a defensive position in Childs day.

2. Cupid Childs (2, PHOM) - Best 2B of the 19th century. Had a nice peak and decent career length for a player of his position and era.

3. Hugh Duffy (4, PHOM) - Very nice peak puts him at the top of the 1890's CF trio. Very good defensive OFer who could hit.

4. Dick Redding (5, PHOM) - 2nd best NeL pitcher of the dead ball era after Smokey Joe Williams and that ain't bad. Very good cheese.

5. Ralph Kiner (7, PHOM) - 7 straight NL home run totals are impressive no matter which way to cut it. Just below Keller as I believe that Keller's combination of OBP and defense slightly outweighs Kiner's power advantage.

6. Dobie Moore (6, PHOM) - Stays where he is as the new MLE's don't give him quite as impressive of a peak as I had thought. He may not have been the black Hughie Jennings, but he at least had the good part of Ernie Banks career. He, and not Joe Sewell, was the best SS of the 1920's.

7. Bucky Walters (8, PHOM) - High peak pitcher who was also a fine hitter. I think he is the best war time pitcher we have yet to elect.

8. Pete Browning (9, PHOM) - Probably the best all-around batsmen on the board. Worries about the quality of the AA keep him below Keller and Kiner.

9. Joe Gordon (10, PHOM) - Newest PHOM inductee. I think he was slightly better than Doerr, higher peak, a littel less career, more war time to fill in. However, if one of the is a HOMer, and Doerr is, then they both should be.

10. Quincey Trouppe (11) - I like him much more than Mackey, he was a better hitter and a better player in his prime than Mackey was.

11. Dizzy Dean (12) - The poor man's Sandy Koufax, right down to the fact that neither could hit. He was funnier, however.

12. Rube Waddell (13) - If there was a HOM for baseball characters he and Dean would have been unanimous inductees. Great pitcher when at his best with a ton of K's. Also, the best firetruck chaser in MLB history. I have him slightly above Mendez, whom I find comparable, as I am not as worried about the UER issue as I was previously.

13. Elston Howard (14) - The more I look at him the more I think we are looking at Quincey Trouppe. Both were very good hitter, with short careers and nice peaks who played significant amounts of time at other positions. Troupps time at 3B is more impressive than Elston's time in the OF, however.

14. Ken Boyer (15) - Great fielding 3B who coudl hit a little. 3B will most likely be underrepresented in the HOM when all is said and done. If we dont' want that to happen we need to look at players like Boyer, Rosen, and Bob Elliot.

15. George Sisler (16) - I chose him barely over Mendez as I just feel more comfortable supporting him at this moment. Very nice peak, bu tnot historic, a few more All-Star level season and he would have been inducted already. The Don Mattingly of the 1920's?

16-20 Mendez, Rosen, Oms, GVH, Cravath
21-25 Bresnahan, Pierce, Fox, Brown, Berger
26-30 Elliot, Willis, Lundy, Newcombe, Roush
31-35 Rizzuto, Monroe, Minoso, Burns, Veach
36-40 Doyle, Sewell, Shocker, Wilson, Johnson
41-45 Bancroft, Leach, Thomas, McGraw, Stephens
46-50 Chance, Traynor, Cicotte, C. Jones, Ryan

Newbies

Allison and Roseboro jsut dont' float my boat.

Required Disclosures

16. Mendez - I have him just behind Waddel and have for a long time. They are similar pitchers though Waddell has the ERA+ advantage.

24. Willard Brown - I am beginning to get a picture of Andre Dawson when I look at him. However, ou rMLE's give him a higher peak than Hawk. Moved down a few spots.

34. Minnie Minoso - Not a bad candidate but I can't see why he is any more worthy than about 5 outher corner OF candidates, even if he is slightly better than the likes of Veach and Burns.

My #6 was elected. This year opens up a couple new spots on many ballots (there are no newbies worth considering); we’ll elect a couple from the backlog in 1976. Ernie Banks and Jim Bunning look strong for 1977. Clemente and Wilhelm figure to dominate the balloting in 1978.

1) George Van Haltren (1,3,2) – I was going to write “pass” again for the #1 spot, since there is nobody I’m really hot to elect. As the ballot thins out he climbs up again. Now in his 68th year eligible. His day will come, eventually. Pennants Added study shows him well. He excelled in the contraction years 1892-1900; he had high SB totals (usually 35-40 in his prime years), which I believe was more important pre-1920; he was a mainly a centerfielder (~71.7% of his non-pitching games vs. ~47.6% for Ryan), Ryan (and Duffy) actually played more corner outfield. Players with most stolen bases 1891-1900:
1—660 B. Hamilton
2—443 G. Van Haltren

2) George Sisler (3,5,4) – Bumping him to an Elect-Me slot; 41 years is enough. The problem I have with Terry’s election is that nearly every system or ranking I see has Sisler slightly higher. This should eventually take care of itself, but not for several decades. In the mean time, Terry looks like an accident of ballot timing. I think George is still among the top 230 players in history, which is HoMer territory. This may not be the case for Beckley. OPS+ is only half the story: excellent runner (4 SB crowns), great rep as a fielder, great peak, long career (+9000 PA). Does WARP penalize him for the high quality of firstbasemen in his era? Firstbasemen with 2500+ hits through 1980:

1—3418 C. Anson
2—2930 J. Beckley
3—2812 G. Sisler
4—2721 L. Gehrig
5—2646 J. Foxx

3) Tommy Leach (2,4,3) – Holding steady, finished 25th for the third straight year. I think it’s what Bill James once said, that all-around players get overlooked, while specialists get overrated; voters like that one area of dominance. Modern comp to, but just a bit behind, Craig Biggio, he could beat you in many ways. Longevity, defense and speed, more important in that era, rate him above Groh. Versatility is a plus; it should not be assumed that any typical thirdbaseman of the era could have successfully handled CF. Had a better peak than Bobby Wallace, but his career was a couple years shorter and he had just a little less defensive value. Among OFers with 750 games 1905-14, he is 2nd in PO/G (behind Speaker) and 2nd in FA (behind Clarke). I like guys who play; longevity is a hallmark of quality. Of the players with the most games played, 1891-1923, 13 of the top 14 are HoMers:
1—2792 H. Wagner
2—2517 S. Crawford
3—2480 N. Lajoie
4—2450 T. Cobb
5—2443 B. Dahlen
6—2383 B. Wallace
7—2307 E. Collins
8—2242 F. Clarke
9—2232 G. Davis
10-2182 T. Speaker
11-2156 T. Leach
12-2123 W. Keeler
13-2122 J. Sheckard
14-2087 S. Magee

4) Edd Roush (4,6,6) – The dude could mash, while playing a stellar centerfield. Trying to avoid Lost Cause status, he gained ground again last year, with his best standing since 1952 when he was still a Shiny New Toy. Pennants Added likes him a lot. Players with OPS of .850+, 1917-25, minimum 3800 PA:
1—1.193 B. Ruth
2—1.037 R. Hornsby
3—.975 T. Speaker
4—.961 T. Cobb
5—.931 H. Heilmann
6—.918 G. Sisler
7—.865 Z. Wheat
8—.864 E. Roush

5) Minnie Minoso (5,7,7) - A kind of player I like more than most voters, a durable, five-tool talent. By win shares, he’s very similar to Hack and Grich. Long prime, fine peak (3 years +30 WS, adjusted to 162 G). Career total 356 AWS. I figure he gets an extra three full years of credit (~60 WS), not simply due to the years he was denied opportunity, but also due to the retardant effects his skin color and his war service had on his development. YMMV.

6) Roger Bresnahan (7,9,9) – Only about eight voters have much regard for The Duke of Tralee. Versatility should be a bonus, not a demerit. How many other catchers could have been pulled out from behind the plate to be an all-star in centerfield? Could move higher, but I really like guys who play. Played half his teams’ games in only 11 seasons, averaging 71% of team games in those years. Still, his offensive production towers over other catchers of his era, so he deserves a vote. Defense only C+. Catchers with highest OPS+, 1876-1930 (minimum 3500 PA):
1—130 B. Ewing
2—126 R. Bresnahan
3—118 C. Bennett

7) Jimmy Ryan (8,10,10) – As a SNT he finished ahead of six HoMers; the order in the teens was Duffy-Ryan-GVH-Beckley. Usually trailing those guys were Caruthers-Pearce-Pike-Jennings-Griffith. To those 12 voters who had GVH in their top ten last ballot, how do you justify snubbing Ryan? Players averaging more than 45 extra-base hits per season 1888-98:
1—549 E. Delahanty
2—507 J. Ryan
3—502 J. Beckley
4—497 S. Thompson
Most outfielder Assists, 1876-1918
1—375 J. Ryan
2—348 G. VanHaltren
3—348 Tom Brown
4—307 J. Sheckard
5—289 O. Shaffer
6—285 K. Kelly
7—283 S. Thompson

8) Jake Beckley (9,11,11) - He’s Joe Start, but without a peak and retired four years sooner. Grade B fielder, won four WS GG. The many triples may be a product of a strange park in Pittsburgh, as his other stats do not suggest good foot speed. Players who compiled a BA over .290, from seasonal age 30 on, 1876-1920, minimum 4500 PA after age 30:
1—.324 C. Anson
2—.320 H. Wagner
3—.320 N. Lajoie
4—.310 J. Beckley
5—.308 J. O’Rourke
6—.306 J. Ryan
7—.306 R. Connor
8—.304 P. Donovan
9—.297 F. Clarke
10- .296 D. White
11- .292 P. Hines

9) Wally Schang (10,12,12) – There’s not a dime’s worth of difference between him and Bresnahan. He’s still on the radar. Players with OBP of .380+, 1915-29, 5600+ PA:
1—.475 B. Ruth
2—.439 T. Cobb
3—.436 R. Hornsby
4—.435 T. Speaker
5—.427 E. Collins
6—.412 H. Heilmann
7—.399 J. Sewell
8—.398 W. Schang
9—.393 K. Williams
10-.381 G. Sisler

10) Joe Gordon (11,13,13) – I have him with an even 300 career win shares, with credit for WW2 and adjusted to 162-game seasons. He had the MVP year of 32 AWS and gets credit for seven other seasons of 25+.

11) Burleigh Grimes (12,14,14) – Comparable to Wynn. Has the heft I like in a career. Before 1968, he was previously on my ballot in 1945.

12) Dobie Moore (13,15,15) – Might be as good as Vaughan; if there is one overlooked Negro leaguer that still haunts me it’s him. I don’t think the HOF seriously considered his pre NeL play.

13) Willard Brown (14,--,--) – New to my ballot last time. Recent discussion shows me he was truly dominant in his time and place. I’m not concerned with what he may have been, how his weak plate discipline might have affected him in MLB; he was an elite player in his time and place, his actual performance was of great value to his teams -- that’s what matters.

14) Charlie Keller (15,--,--) - New to my ballot last time. Recent discussion highlights how he had a long, really high prime. I give full credit for missed war time. His last minor league year was also of great value, he gets credit there, too.

15) Cupid Childs – I’ve voted for him three times previously: 1914, 1915 and 1942. The backlog added since then has finally played itself out.

Top tenners off ballot: Redding, Mendez. As you may know, I have always been a bit skeptical of NeLers translated numbers; I am not so quick to assume superstardom from them as most voters. Duffy was a regular on my ballot until 30 years ago and may return someday.

jschmeagol:
With as close an election as this is gearing up to be, I feel that I have a lot of power right now.

I need a power trip. Should I vote?
I suppose almost everyone has a lot of power, typically wielded in ignorance by voting or not voting.

TomH Posted: May 10, 2006 at 01:33 PM (#2012877)
Talk about a deep but not singularly impressive backlog - my #1 man this ballot is overall 121st in my rankings to date; clearly in the bottom 20% of my HoM. I only have 16 HoM electees to date rated behind him, which, given we've elected about 140 guys, is pretty incredible.

That 121 is one new statistic by Tom Hanrahan. Let me identify another, perhaps 130 of his PHOM in the HOM to date. For yest, those two stats may be 50 (rank of his 1976 #1 on his all-time list to date) and 100 (of his PHOM in the HOM to date). These two stats may both be called "aggregate consensus scores" pertaining to the project in aggregate rather than to a single election.

PHOM
Bob Lemon
Roger Bresnahan

Bresnahan goes into your PHOM but isn't one of your top 60 candidates? I don't understand.

Sorry, I accidently removed his name. I have him at #16. When I write my list, I remove any players that have been elected to the HOM, but haven't been elected to my PHOM. For example, Lemon also made my PHOM, but isn't listed even though he is on my list. I removed his name since he is not eligible for a vote. I just mistakenly removed Bresnahan too.

Paul,

I meant that I moved Sisler off my ballot last year where if he would have stayed in his original spot he would have been tied for second AND this year, Sisler and Mendez were fighting for my 15th spot, the winner getting six points on the loser when both were in the top four returnees last year.

The Don Mattingly of the 1920's?

Sisler had 7 seasons where I'd consider him to be an All-Star (WARP 7.0 or better); i.e a positive contributor to a championship team, would expect to be one of the top two players on an average team.

Mattingly has four such seasons. There's a huge difference between 7 and 4, unless Mattingly was Lou Gehrig during Don's 4 prime seasons, which he wasn't. (Don's best in 1986 might be confused with one of Gehrig's lesser seasons.)

4 seasons? I have him at an All-star level according to win shares from 1984-1989 and 1992-1994 once you adjust 1994 to 162 games. That is 9 such years with at least 20 WS (what James calls an All-Star season), as opposed to 7 for Sisler (though Sisler did have 19 WS in 1925, which would make it essentially 8). Also, Bill James himself seems to believe that WS underrates Mattingly's defense. Mattingly's five best are 34,32,29,27,26 while Sisler's five best are 33,29,29,27,25 (though he had 24 WS in a shortened 1919). I say small advantage Mattingly in WS, though they are close enough that there could be a question. Anyone who timelines or wants to take league strength into consideration would obviously like Mattingly more.

There are other similarities like how they both had great defensive reputations yet a number of stats disagree (though I think FRAA or FRAR likes Mattingly) and they both suffered injuries that they never recovered from but still played a number of years with them. Neither walked a ton, both had good power for their era and both hit for a lot of average. Both led in hits twice and their OPS+'s are 125 for Sisler and 128 for Mattingly, though Sisler had more AB's.

While this argument is still some 25 'years' away I am not so sure that there is that much between them. I guess I am just warming up.

Wait, Sisler's top 5 WS seasons should be 34,30,30,28,26, I forgot to adjust to 162 games. That puts them even in top 5 years with Mattingly having an extra 'all-star' seasons. They are very close.

Good comp.

Matingly 14 years (11 of ?100 games but one strike year) 1,785 games, ~ 8000 PA
Sisler 15 years (14 of ?100 games) 2,055 games, ~ 8,750 PA

This is without normalizing season length which would work to Sisler's advantage, though the strike year of 1994 would negate some of that difference. Both were superstars, in most people's eyes, but then had injury problems. But just based on playing time, Mattingly would have to be better to be, well, better.

OPS+ ?100 in ?100 games (+ Mattingly's strike year)

Mattingly 128/163-59-59-47-34-29-21-14-8-8-3 (11 years)
Sisler 124/179-69-63-59-53-37-33-19-9-0 (10 years but with an 11th year at 98)

At this point I'd say advantage Sisler (better OPS+ through year 9), though he had 4 years ?100 and Mattingly only 2, so Mattingly ends up with the better career OPS+. Clearly in the same ballpark.

There are other similarities like how they both had great defensive reputations yet a number of stats disagree (though I think FRAA or FRAR likes Mattingly)

Mattingly does get an A- from WS, so that's not too bad.

That 121 is one new statistic by Tom Hanrahan. Let me identify another, perhaps 130 of his PHOM in the HOM to date..... These two stats may both be called "aggregate consensus scores" pertaining to the project in aggregate rather than to a single election.

Paul, another way I considered looking at it was this: if I could swap 8 elected men out of the HoM and replace them with 8 of my choice, the HoM would be perfectly aligned with my rankings. I suspect that my number of "8" would be smaller than most voters, thus giving me a high 'aggregate consensus score' as you suggested. Interestingly, I think my wife says I can be very aggregating at times, so I have consensus on the home front too :)

Yeah, but I read somewhere that the reason James ranks Mattingly as high as he does (#12 ahead of Palmeiro and Clark) is that he belives that WS didnt' fully capture his fielding ability. Of course he dosen't mention that in the player comment, 100% ballplayer 0% bullshit.

1976 ballot. Bi-centennial baby! Oh, and another election to the Hall of Merit. Nail biting time for the backlog – it is extremely close. Anyways, onto the good stuff.

1. Dick Redding (1). So the HOF missed him – doesn’t take away from the fact he could pitch well. Career was long – decent peak along the way.

2. Bob Johnson (2). Let’s get the Win Shares issue out of the way first. The system don’t like him, that’s not the death blow for me. Therefore…

His peak might not be as high as others but at the same time for 13 years he has the highest floor of anyone. By floor I mean what can we reasonably expect from him in terms of performance. During those 13 years you knew exactly what you got with Bob Johnson – nothing less, rarely more. I guess my system rewards consistency as well as greatness. WARP numbers like him, WS not so much. Over his career his teams underperformed Pythag W-L by 15 games so he loses some there.

I’m afraid he’s between the two voting factions. He doesn’t have the peak but was effective longer that the high peak, short career players. He doesn’t have the career but was at a higher production level than the low peak, long career players. Either way, he stacks up nicely compared to the other LFs hanging around.

Indian Bob got a late start, played on bad teams in ballparks that favored pitchers, and got left out of post-war ML baseball while he was still doing well at age 39. 10 years of top 10 performances in OPS+, 107.1 WARP1 for 13 years with no padding on the front or back end.

I guess they were right. While others shot to stardom, collected an MVP, and faded from sight, along rolled Bob Johnson, punching the time clock with excellence far from the spotlight. Forgotten while playing, lost in history. Somewhere Joe Medwick laughs at the fact he got in while his contemporary remains in limbo.

3. Rube Waddell (3). They don’t make ‘em like this anymore. Hard thrower, dominated strikeout categories wherever he went. Rube was the traveling circus coming to town – people came to see him pitch.

4. Edd Roush (4). Star of the 1910s. Another CF which doesn’t seem to hurt in my rankings.

5. Tommy Leach (6). Combination hot corner/centerfielder could field a little, hit a little.

6. Hugh Duffy (8). Constant little tweaks to my system lead to players bubbling up toward the end of the ballot. He’s got that nice little peak in the early 1890s.

7. Billy Pierce (9). Consistently good, sometimes a little better than that.

8. Joe Sewell (10). I’ve come around a little bit on the ironman. His work at SS was excellent, lacked a little in length but not enough to dismiss as a candidate as we delve into the backlog.

9. Dobie Moore (11). Dobie returns, with his high peak. Some credit given for the military years. Hughie Jennings probably a fair comparison for similar shaped career.

10. Pete Browning (12). I think I had timelined him a bit in recent elections. Or else I’m to the point where as a pure hitter its hard to argue the man was something special.

11. Alejandro Oms (13). Sweet-swinging outfielder, probably have a harder time projecting him since he got to the States more rarely than some other foreign-born players.

12. Jimmy Ryan (14). Started playing during two league system (AA, NL), ended during two league system (AL, NL).

13. Tony Mullane (15). Count in the house! Apollo of the Box shows up every 15 years or so on the ballot, maybe a bit longer this time as the ballot thins. Have him higher than Welch for the era despite playing in the AA.

14. Minnie Minoso (16). The numbers aren’t bad, a little credit before the majors, added a speed element to his game. Still not Bob Johnson to me.

15. Ralph Kiner (17). Seven-time HR champions don’t grow on trees.

16-20: Childs, Mays, Mendez, Chance, Shocker
21-25: Berger, Poles, Keller, F Jones, Walters
26-30: Boyer, Easter, Gordon, Byrd, Willard Brown
31-35: Welch, C Jones, Sisler, Ben Taylor, Lundy
36-40: Joss, Roy Thomas, Bresnahan, Doyle, Luque
41-45: Beckley, Stephens, Trouppe, Bridges, Willis
46-50: Elliott, McGraw, Cicotte, Gomez, George Burns

Top 10 Returnees: They include Mendez (#18), Willard Brown (#30), Gordon (#28), Sisler (#33). Nice options, not overly upset if people put them on the ballot.

New guys: (crickets chirping)

4 seasons? I have him at an All-star level according to win shares from 1984-1989 and 1992-1994 once you adjust 1994 to 162 games. That is 9 such years with at least 20 WS (what James calls an All-Star season),

It's very early to be debating this, but why not.

You and I have different standards for All-Stars. Post 1900, I take the top 2*N, where N is the number of teams. I haven't done the 1990's yet, but unless standards drop noticeably, his 1992-1994 won't make that cut (though they're likely to make the "almost" list.)

1988 and 1989? Well, WARP and WS have very different views of those seasons. WARP likes Mattingly 1984-7 even more than WS (more defensive credit), but not 1988-89. This looks like a difference of opinion on his batting value. WARP has his 1988 season at about 50% of 1986 while WS has him at about 70%.

Plenty of time for Mattingly in 2001. He certainly wouldn't go ahead of Sisler on my ballot. Sisler's election would be a good precedent for Don though.

I'm on a family vaction far from home (and far from my information/research) so I'm mostly re-posting my previous ballot (with a few modifications based on who actually got elected).

1. Cannonball Dick Redding, P (1). The best pitcher on the ballot, according to his MLEs. I also like that his own winning percentage was better than his team’s by 100 points. I originally had Redding halfway between Whitey Ford and Billy Pierce, which has allowed Dick to move up to first as the guys ahead of him keep getting elected.

2. Jose Mendez, P (2). His MLEs are slightly lower than Redding’s and slightly better than Pierce’s actual numbers. With Drysdale on the ballot, I re-examined both Redding and Mendez which resulted in Mendez leap-frogging Willard Brown.

3. Willard Brown, OF (3). I give Willard Brown war credit for 2 ½ years which brings his career value up into the neighborhood of a Goose Goslin. I still like his peak numbers but his career rate stats in both OBP and SLG are a little low for a player of his caliber which is why I have the two pitchers ahead of him.

4. Nellie Fox, 2B (4). Fox was an outstanding defensive second basemen- winning three gold gloves- and an ideal top of the line-up hitter- routinely landing in top ten lists for Runs (7 times), AVG (8), Hits (10) and Triples (11). Plus he has a long prime during which he was acknowledged as the best at his position, picking up MVP votes in 10 seasons and being named an All-Star 12 times.

5. Quincy Trouppe, C (5). I think he’s the best catcher on the ballot with more great years than anybody else at his position. I continued to tweak my positional bonus which resulted in all three catchers moving up, including Trouppe.

6. Billy Pierce, P (6). The best Major League pitcher on the ballot. An All-Star 7 times between 1953 and 1961, TSN named him AL Pitcher of the Year for 1956 and 1957 so he’s got both the peak and the prime. During that prime, Pierce also made the adjustment from being a strikeout pitcher- leading the league in Ks in 1953 and Ks per 9 IP in ’53 and ’55- to an innings eater –leading the league in Complete Games from 1956-’58- demonstrating that he’s smart as well as talented.

7. Minnie Minoso, OF (7). He was an All-Star as soon as he entered the Major Leagues, getting named to the actual team 7 times and picking up MVP votes 8 times. He was routinely among the league leaders, finishing in the top ten eight or nine times each for AVG, OBP, Runs, Hits, Total Bases, 2Bs and Stolen Bases. A little bit of Negro League credit at the beginning of his career gives him the added boost to offset the lack of black ink.

8. Hugh Duffy, OF (8). I’m a big fan of what guys actually do and Duffy’s actual numbers are very impressive. There’s a reason why he was considered one of the best players of the 1890s. He had peak years in 1890, ’91, ’94 and ’97 and was an All-Star caliber player from 1890 to ’97.

9. Ernie Lombardi, C (9). Lombardi was a solid All-Star 8 times between 1936 and 1945 and the MVP in 1938. He was top ten in the league 5 times in Home Runs, 7 times in AVG and 8 times in SLG.

10. George Sisler, 1B (11). His peak isn't quite as long as Duffy's as Sisler was only among the very best for a three-year period from 1920-22. However, he had a longer prime, picking up top ten slots in average, stolen bases, total bases and hits 8, 9, 9 and 11 times. Also, the career numbers aren't as bad as the Hall of Merit discussion led me to believe.

11. Joe Gordon, 2B (12). I give Gordon 2 and ½ years of war credit. I like the slugging numbers, picking up top ten slots in SLG, Runs, RBIs, Total Bases and Home Runs 5, 5, 5, 6 and 9 times.

12. Mickey Welch, P (13). Mickey Welch was never among the very best in the game and he lacks the black ink that I tend to admire. But he was among the very good for such a long time that he has the best career numbers of anyone on the ballot.

13. Ralph Kiner OF (15). Led the league in Home Runs 7 straight seasons and finished fifth one more time. But Kiner was more than just a one-dimensional player. Fans of both OPS and Adjusted OPS+ should be impressed by his league-leading numbers in those categories in 1947, ’49 and ’51. Kiner nearly fell off of my ballot as I moved some of the career-oriented candidates up but I just couldn’t justify that big of a drop.

14. Alejandro Oms, OF (n/a). The last time that Oms made my ballot, he was right behind Kiner. With no new candidates worth discussing, he moves back onto the ballot, right behind Kiner again.

15. Ken Boyer, 3B (n/a). The best third baseman on the ballot is good enough to leapfrog a few outfielders and onto my ballot for this election.

I'm on a family vaction far from home (and far from my information/research) so I'm mostly re-posting my previous ballot (with a few modifications based on who actually got elected).

1. Cannonball Dick Redding, P (1). The best pitcher on the ballot, according to his MLEs. I also like that his own winning percentage was better than his team’s by 100 points. I originally had Redding halfway between Whitey Ford and Billy Pierce, which has allowed Dick to move up to first as the guys ahead of him keep getting elected.

2. Jose Mendez, P (2). His MLEs are slightly lower than Redding’s and slightly better than Pierce’s actual numbers. With Drysdale on the ballot, I re-examined both Redding and Mendez which resulted in Mendez leap-frogging Willard Brown.

3. Willard Brown, OF (3). I give Willard Brown war credit for 2 ½ years which brings his career value up into the neighborhood of a Goose Goslin. I still like his peak numbers but his career rate stats in both OBP and SLG are a little low for a player of his caliber which is why I have the two pitchers ahead of him.

4. Nellie Fox, 2B (4). Fox was an outstanding defensive second basemen- winning three gold gloves- and an ideal top of the line-up hitter- routinely landing in top ten lists for Runs (7 times), AVG (8), Hits (10) and Triples (11). Plus he has a long prime during which he was acknowledged as the best at his position, picking up MVP votes in 10 seasons and being named an All-Star 12 times.

5. Quincy Trouppe, C (5). I think he’s the best catcher on the ballot with more great years than anybody else at his position. I continued to tweak my positional bonus which resulted in all three catchers moving up, including Trouppe.

6. Billy Pierce, P (6). The best Major League pitcher on the ballot. An All-Star 7 times between 1953 and 1961, TSN named him AL Pitcher of the Year for 1956 and 1957 so he’s got both the peak and the prime. During that prime, Pierce also made the adjustment from being a strikeout pitcher- leading the league in Ks in 1953 and Ks per 9 IP in ’53 and ’55- to an innings eater –leading the league in Complete Games from 1956-’58- demonstrating that he’s smart as well as talented.

7. Minnie Minoso, OF (7). He was an All-Star as soon as he entered the Major Leagues, getting named to the actual team 7 times and picking up MVP votes 8 times. He was routinely among the league leaders, finishing in the top ten eight or nine times each for AVG, OBP, Runs, Hits, Total Bases, 2Bs and Stolen Bases. A little bit of Negro League credit at the beginning of his career gives him the added boost to offset the lack of black ink.

8. Hugh Duffy, OF (8). I’m a big fan of what guys actually do and Duffy’s actual numbers are very impressive. There’s a reason why he was considered one of the best players of the 1890s. He had peak years in 1890, ’91, ’94 and ’97 and was an All-Star caliber player from 1890 to ’97.

9. Ernie Lombardi, C (9). Lombardi was a solid All-Star 8 times between 1936 and 1945 and the MVP in 1938. He was top ten in the league 5 times in Home Runs, 7 times in AVG and 8 times in SLG.

10. George Sisler, 1B (11). His peak isn't quite as long as Duffy's as Sisler was only among the very best for a three-year period from 1920-22. However, he had a longer prime, picking up top ten slots in average, stolen bases, total bases and hits 8, 9, 9 and 11 times. Also, the career numbers aren't as bad as the Hall of Merit discussion led me to believe.

11. Joe Gordon, 2B (12). I give Gordon 2 and ½ years of war credit. I like the slugging numbers, picking up top ten slots in SLG, Runs, RBIs, Total Bases and Home Runs 5, 5, 5, 6 and 9 times.

12. Mickey Welch, P (13). Mickey Welch was never among the very best in the game and he lacks the black ink that I tend to admire. But he was among the very good for such a long time that he has the best career numbers of anyone on the ballot.

13. Ralph Kiner OF (15). Led the league in Home Runs 7 straight seasons and finished fifth one more time. But Kiner was more than just a one-dimensional player. Fans of both OPS and Adjusted OPS+ should be impressed by his league-leading numbers in those categories in 1947, ’49 and ’51. Kiner nearly fell off of my ballot as I moved some of the career-oriented candidates up but I just couldn’t justify that big of a drop.

14. Alejandro Oms, OF (n/a). The last time that Oms made my ballot, he was right behind Kiner. With no new candidates worth discussing, he moves back onto the ballot, right behind Kiner again.

15. Ken Boyer, 3B (n/a). The best third baseman on the ballot is good enough to leapfrog a few outfielders and onto my ballot for this election.

Oops, sorry 'bout the double post.

Of course among Mattingly's contemporaries at 1B in the early nineties are Bagwell, Thomas, Palmeiro, Clark, and McGwire, and a late career Eddie Murray, that is 4 likely HOMers and two more guys who could get in. Sisler didn't have a HOM level contemporary until Lou Gehrig and they aren't really contemporaries. Should he be punished for that? Some say yes, some say no. It's just that I would rather set 'all-star' at a certain level so as not to hurt players who happen to play in eras that are deep at their position.

We can argue between Sisler and Mattingly all day, I just think they are very comparable players, kinda like Gordon and Doerr but in different eras instead of being contemporaries.

My definition of All-Star has nothing to do with positional competition (except insofar as it impacts WS or WARP ratings of the player). I just doubt that 20 WS will be sufficient to crack the top 52-56 players in those early 90's seasons with 26-28 teams. I could be wrong.

I also see the similarities. I just see Sisler as better at first glance, though that could change.

Ballot for 1976

Read previous ballots if you want more depth on my reasons for all but the latest eligibles.

I am a peak/prime/career voter. Prime tends to dominate the ballot as Career has an easier time of it in HOM elections, and unsupported Peak doesn't get too far in my system.

1) J. SEWELL -- Nice combination of WARP peak and career. Clearly the best MLB SS of the 1920's. Prime 1921-29. 1st-team MLB All-Star (SS) in 1923, 1924, 1925, 1926, and 1928; WS adds 1929, at 3rd. Other star seasons include 1921 and 1927. Honorable Mention (HM) in 1922.

2) J. GORDON -- Re-evaluated the second-tier guys of the WWII generation; Gordon belongs also. Prime 1938-48. 1st-team MLB All-Star (2B) in 1939, 1940, 1941, 1942, 1943; WS adds 1947. Other star seasons include 1948. HM in 1938. WWII in 1944-45.

3) F. JONES -- Still an all-star player when he walked away. I still think he rates ahead of Ashburn, but it's close. Prime 1900-08. 1st-team MLB All-Star (CF) in 1908; WARP adds 1902 and 1907. Other star seasons include 1900, 1901, 1903, 1904, 1905, 1906.

4) G. VAN HALTREN -- Not much more to say. Prime 1889-1901. 1st-team MLB All-Star (CF) in 1896 and 1897 (WARP). Other star seasons include 1895, 1898, 1900, 1901. HM in 1889, 1890, 1891, 1893, 1894, 1899.

5) C. CHILDS -- Best offensive 2b of the 90's. Prime 1890-98. 1st-team MLB All-Star (2B) in 1890, 1892, and 1896; WS adds 1893, 1894, 1895, WARP adds 1897. Other star seasons include 1891. HM in 1898.

6) M. MINOSO -- Marginal candidate, but aren't they all. Prime 1951-61. 1st-team MLB All-Star (LF) in 1954, 1959, 1960; WS adds 1956. Other star seasons include 1953, 1955, 1957, and 1958. HM in 1952 and 1961.

7) K. BOYER -- Joins my ballot of good defensive primes. Prime 1956-64. 1st-team MLB All-Star (3B) in 1958; WARP adds 1960, 1961. Other star seasons include 1956, 1959, 1962, 1963, 1964.

8) G. SISLER -- Overrated but still good. Prime 1916-22. 1st-team MLB All-Star (1B) in 1917, 1919, 1920, 1921, 1922; WARP adds 1916 and 1918.

9) B. VEACH -- Good peak relative to great competition. Was an all-star OF longer than Medwick, Averill, etc. Prime 1914-1922. 1st-team MLB All-Star (LF) in 1915; WARP adds 1916, 1917. Other star seasons include 1919, 1920, 1921, 1922. HM in 1914 and 1918.

10) F. DUNLAP -- Great two-way player; bypassed for some reason. Prime 1880-86. Best Player candidate 1880-81 (WARP). 1st-team MLB All-Star (2B) in 1880, 1881; WARP adds 1882, 1883, and 1885. 1884 in the UA is hard to evaluate but may also be #1. Other star seasons include 1886.

11) D. MOORE -- Reevaluated him after the discussions of this past election.

12) R. MARANVILLE -- Better WARP career than Beckley. Where's the luv from the career voters? Prime 1913-22. 1st-team MLB All-Star (SS) in 1914 and 1916 by WS. Other star seasons include 1913, 1915, 1917, 1919, 1921, 1922, and 1929.

13) B. WALTERS -- Reevaluated his peak; he's ballot-worthy. Prime 1939-44. Best player in 1939; candidate in 1940 by WS. 1st-team MLB All-Star (SP) in 1939, 1941, 1944; WS adds 1940. Other star seasons include 1936 and 1942.

14) E. HOWARD -- Very different from Mackey. Prime 1961-64. 1st-team MLB All-Star (Ca) in 1961, 1963, 1964. Other star seasons include 1962. HM in 1958.

15) D. REDDING -- Just short last time, but not now.

16) D. DEAN -- He's almost ballot-worthy. Prime 1932-36. Best player candidate 1934. 1st-team MLB All-Star in 1934, 1935, 1936; WARP adds 1932. Other star seasons include 1933.

17) J. MENDEZ -- Reevaluated after HOF election.

18) J. TINKER -- Not quite. Long prime but never the best. Prime 1902-1913. Star seasons include 1904, 1905, 1906, 1908, 1909, 1911, 1912, 1913. HM in 1902, 1903, 1910.

19) W. BROWN -- These guys are all close together.

20) R. KINER -- If he was the best during those prime years, or very close to it, he'd be high on the ballot.

Just missing the cut are:
21-22) Dizzy Trout, Jake Beckley, Ralph Kiner,
23-24) Bill Hutchison, Nellie Fox,
25-26) Harry Hooper, Tommy Leach,
27-28) Edd Roush, Lave Cross,
29-30) Billy Pierce, Mickey Welch,

1976 ballot: For the first time ever for me (I think), the previous election's winners did not appear on my ballot.
And none of the newbies comes close to my ballot this time around. Meaning that I am virtually submitting the same
ballot as last year with only a few minor changes.

1. Jake Beckley - luv the career value, especially for a deadball era first baseman
2. Joe Gordon - great fielding second baseman of the 1940s
3. George Van Haltren - star center fielder of the underrepresented 1890s
4. Ken Boyer - I cannot believe he is not on more ballots
5. Bob Johnson - best corner outfielder on the ballot
6. Willard Brown - slugging negro leaguer star
7. Ralph Kiner - great peak ballot-deserving
8. Cupid Childs - very good second baseman of the 1890s
9. Nellie Fox - great fielding second baseman of the 1950s
10. George Sisler - hope he makes it soonest
11. Bob Elliott - slightly behind Boyer among third basemen
12. Dobie Moore - very good all-around negro league player
13. Joe Sewell - all-around very good shortstop
14. Tommy Bridges - great curve ballist with wwii and pcl credit
15. Edd Roush - glad to put him back on my ballot

My next five would be: Pie Traynor, Chuck Klein, Hack Wilson, Tommy Leach, and Minnie Minoso.

Not voting for group top ten: Jose Mendez (maybe around 50), Minnie Minoso (20), Dick Redding (around 75),
and Hugh Duffy (way down the list).

1976 Ballot:

This year my personal hall of merit inductees are from the dead-ball era — Cravath and Redding.

1. Willard Brown – “A slugger who was exceptionally fast in the field, a good base runner, and an excellent gloveman with a great arm.” —James A. Riley. (PHoM 1971)

2. Orestes Miñoso – A fine, consistent player. He hit for average and with power, ran with speed, and won three Gold Gloves even though the award wasn’t offered until he was age 31. 8 seasons with 25+ WS (adjusting to 162 gm schedule). (PHoM 1970)

3. Hugh Duffy – 8 seasons with 26+ WS, with a high of 41 (adjusting to 162 gm schedule); A+ defensive outfielder. (PHoM 1931)

4. Phil Rizzuto – My “glove” candidate. MVP for 1950, runner up for 1949; World Series MVP for 1951; age 25-27 seasons in military service. (PHoM 1967)

5. José de la Caridad Méndez – Over his first 7 Cuban League seasons (1908-14) he went 62-17, 16.3 wins above team. (PHoM 1938)

6. Ken Boyer – 8 seasons with 22+ WS, with a high of 33 (adjusting to 162 gm schedule); MVP for 1964. (PHoM 1975)

7. Mickey Welch – Over 7 seasons (1880, 84-85, 87-90) he averaged 30-17, 4.3 wins above team, 437 IP, 119 DERA+. (PHoM 1966)

8. Gavy Cravath – My “bat” candidate. From ages 32-36 his OPS+ stats were 172-160-171-147-153. However, he was just continuing what he’d been doing for years, while he was with Los Angeles at age 26 and with Minneapolis from ages 28-30. (PHoM 1976)

9. Alejandro Oms – According to the MLEs, 8 seasons with 27+ WS (adjusting to 162 gm schedule). (PHoM 1967)

10. Bucky Walters – Over 7 seasons (1936, 39-42, 44-45) he averaged 18-13, 2.0 wins above team, 270 IP, 122 DERA+, 72 OPS+. MVP for 1939. (PHoM 1958)

11. Dizzy Dean – Over 6 seasons (1932-37) he averaged 22-13, 3.6 wins above team, 288 IP, 129 DERA+, 182 SO, 67 BB. MVP for 1934, runner up in 1935 and ‘36. (PHoM 1958)

12. Dick Redding – “One of the great pitchers of black baseball” —James A. Riley. (PHoM 1976)

13. Elston Howard – Howard’s record from 1961-64 leaves little doubt in my mind that he was a great catcher. MVP for 1963; placed 3rd in 1964.

14. Dobie Moore – “A superb fielder with outstanding range and a terrific arm...An outstanding hitter, he hit for average and could also hit the long ball.” —James A. Riley.

15. Nellie Fox – 9 seasons with 22+ WS, with a high of 34 (adjusting to 162 gm schedule); MVP for 1959. He won three Gold Gloves even though the award wasn’t offered until he was age 29.

Near misses:

16–20. Grimes (PHoM 1940), Newcombe, Keller, Arlett, Easter
21–25. Bresnahan, Leach (PHoM 1932), Gordon, Rosen, Kiner

Other consensus top 10:

23. Joe Gordon – Better than Doerr, but I prefer Rizzuto, Moore, and Fox.

47 George Sisler – Career value was hurt by a lot of throwaway seasons; peak and prime were not as impressive as those of other hitters such as Cravath, Keller, and Kiner.

Other new arrivals:

Johnny Roseboro was a fine catcher, but doesn’t make my top 100. He was my brother’s favorite player when we were kids.

George Sisler – Career value was hurt by a lot of throwaway seasons;

Just asking, but are you saying that he would rank higher if he never came back from his sinusitis?

Busy week with a busy weekend coming up. Getting this in now just in case Monday’s busy too.

1976 ballot:

1. George Sisler: I’ve been saying for decades that the sharp break in performance may have doomed his chances. Could it finally be his time? The HOF got this one right; he’s been in since ’39. (eligible 1936, PHOM 1938)

2. Minnie Minoso: Outstanding player throughout the ‘50s, but no knockout seasons. The more analysis there is, the better he looks, and he looked really good already. (eligible 1970, PHOM 1972)

3. Roger Bresnahan: Great player whose versatility illustrates his quality. (eligible 1921, PHOM 1929)

4. Burleigh Grimes: 270 wins, .560 W%, Retro-Cy, 5 STATS AS, 9 all-star quality seasons. (eligible 1940, PHOM 1942)

5. Rube Waddell: Great ERA+, struck out tons of people when others weren’t. Yeah, he gave up a lot of unearned runs, but it’s not like he was alone…. In the core of his career, 1900-1909, 33% of the runs he allowed were unearned. Cherry-picking the same period, we have 3-F Brown 36%, Ed Walsh & Addie Joss 34%, Christy Mathewson, 31%, Cy Young 30%. (eligible 1916, PHOM 1968)

6. Joe Sewell: Ten all-star caliber seasons in a 14-year career, A- defender, very good offense for a middle infielder. Made my PHOM as a shiny new toy in ’39, now becoming a teddy bear. (eligible 1939, PHOM 1939)

7. Dick Redding: Long career flame-thrower, top 5(?) Negro League pitcher. (eligible 1937, PHOM 1966)

8. Ralph Kiner: 7 homer titles. A latter-day Pete Browning. (eligible 1961)

9. Carl Mays: Good peak candidate, pretty good hitter. (eligible 1935)

10. Lefty Gomez: Low innings total, but a terrific peak, more career than Dean, good black & gray ink, HOFS, HOFM, W-L, ERA+. Yes, he pitched for a lot of good teams. I think he had something to do with them being good. (eligible 1948)

11. Nellie Fox: 94 OPS+ is a little off-putting, but he was a top-notch defender, durable, very valuable to the White Sox offensively and defensively. 8 all-star caliber seasons. (eligible 1971)

12. Pete Browning: Monster hitter, pretty monstrous on defense. (eligible 1899, PHOM 1927)

13. Billy Pierce: The epitome of the “crafty lefthander.” (eligible 1970)

14. Ken Boyer: Best 3b candidate by a nose over Elliott & Traynor. (eligible 1975)

15. Willard Brown: Must have been a great bad-ball hitter. Why would anyone throw him a strike? His being elected to the HOF helps him make it on, but I’m reluctant to push him very high. Dominant in the weaker league. (eligible 1958)


Required comments:
Joe Gordon, Jose Mendez: Creep ever closer to the ballot as the crowd thins out.
Dobie Moore: High quality, but short career hurts.
Hugh Duffy: Wow, back in the top 10 and even ahead of GVH! Hugh made my PHOM in ’40, but the field’s much deeper now. Near the bottom of my top 30.

Just asking, but are you saying that he would rank higher if he never came back from his sinusitis?

No, I'm saying Sisler's post-1922 career gets very little credit from me. My system assigns him 107 "points" through 1922, compared to 113 "points" for his full career, so the last few seasons don't help him much. (Under my system, a player generally needs about 140 "points" to make the ballot.)

Working on those five-year cohorts highlighted some eras and positions which are underrepresented. I think this is important voting criteria, as we do want some semblance of balance in the Hall. Therefore, I have made some major changes on my ballot. Seven guys who were not on my ballot last year have now earned spots (five of whom had previously been in my top 25).

I consider myself a prime voter, using a combination of OPS+/PA, ERA+/IP, and WS.

1.Dobie Moore
2.Charley Jones
3.Rube Waddell

I am probably the only voter who has moved Moore *up* since Chris issued his new MLEs. Admittedly, he doesn’t look like Hugh Jennings anymore. But he’s still the best SS from 1922-25, and the best from 1919-1925 with two years of army credit (and he may deserve more; he was 24 in 1919). What moves him to the top spot for me is how he stacks up against more recent shortstops. He has been the best SS on the ballot since we elected Reese in ’64, has had the best peak at SS on the ballot since we elected Vaughan in ’54, and will continue to be the best available SS for the foreseeable future, except when Banks comes on the ballot. He is, in fact, very comparable to Banks without the mediocre years at 1B, and I’m guessing Ernie isn’t going to have any difficulties getting elected.

From 1876-1880 Charley Jones had OPS+ of 183, 169, 158, 156, and 154. He was the best LF of the 1870s, and one the top 3 outfielders of that decade—and that does NOT include his two blacklisted years of 1881-2. I’ve basically ignored him for years, which was a big mistake on my part. Take a look at him again if it’s been a while.

Waddell has eight seasons with an ERA+ above 120, with a top four seasons of 179, 179, 165, and 153--and he was striking out between seven and eight guys per nine as he was posting those. Didn’t pitch a lot of innings compared to his contemporaries but, as dolflucky (used to) say, the man was dominant.

4.George Sisler
5.Jake Beckley

At the moment, the Hall has no one at 1B from 1897 until 1923, when Jud Wilson played a couple of seasons at first. Beckley moves down a bit after a re-eval, with Sisler moving ahead because of his peak years. I’m trying to do my part, yest.

6.Joe Gordon
7.Bob Elliott
8.Ken Boyer

Gordon showed before and after the war that he was a significantly better hitter than Bobby Doerr, and a better hitter and fielder than Billy Herman. Elliott and Boyer make their first appearance on my ballot. Elliott fills a hole at 3B from 1945 until Mathews arrives; we are also short on ‘50s infielders (and, of course, 3B in general). Like other voters, I see the two as very close, but give Elliott’s bat the edge over Boyer’s glove.

9.Billy Pierce
10.Ralph Kiner

The 1951-55 period is underrepresented, including at pitcher. Pierce is the best pitcher left from the era, with five seasons with an ERA+ over 130: 201, 148, 141, 136, 133, and a sixth season at 124. That’s a great prime for a pitcher, though he did play for a lot of teams with excellent defenses. By my definition, anyway, Kiner’s prime is only one year shorter than Minoso’s, and his peak is a lot higher.

11.Vic Willis
12.Nellie Fox
13.Roger Bresnahan

All three make the ballot for the first time—well, it’s been at least a few decades for Bresnahan. We only have five pitchers in the Hall from 1896-1900. Willis pitched from 1898-00, so he’d give us another hurler in that era. More importantly, he had 4000 IP with an ERA+ of 118 (and seasons of 167, 155, and 154), so we’ve elected most of the guys like him.

At the moment, Banks and Reese are the only middle infielders slated for induction who played between 1956-1960, and Reese was well past his prime in those years. Fox’s career—over 2600 hits and 300 WS—gets him on the ballot.

We also have no one at catcher from 1891-1910. Bresnahan would not only help fill that gap, but also (a possible) one at CF from 1901-5, depending on what position you assign Pete Hill.

14.Bucky Walters
15.Orestes Minoso

We’re also very short on ‘40s pitchers. Walters has a great peak in ’39-40, followed by some very good prime years until ’46. Minoso is similar to Beckley, in some respects; very good defense, not a particularly high peak, but a long prime. In fact, if you add in Dr. C’s MLE’s, Minoso’s career stats start looking a lot like Beckley’s 125 OPS+ in 10, 470 plate appearances. It doesn’t make much sense to me to have a lot of distance between the two.

16-20: Gavvy Cravath, Jose Mendez, Wally Schang, Cupid Childs, Pete Browning


Jose Mendez: It kills me to drop him from the ballot, where’s he had settled for many years, particularly when he is *this close* to induction. But other pitchers looked better in my re-evaluation, and I have to respect that.

Dick Redding: He and Smokey Joe Williams were considered the best the best Nel pitchers of the teens, which gives me pause in keeping him off the ballot. His projections aren’t that impressive, however, and I like Mendez more. The fact that the HoF committee did not pick him doesn’t encourage me to move him up.

Willard Brown: Often compared to Andre Dawson, whom I’m not a huge fan of.

Hugh Duffy: Only one big year, and I question his WS A+ fielding grade. There is also no dearth of centerfielders in the Hall of Merit.

If there are 3 HOM worthy guys on my ballot, then there are probably 50 guys that are HOM worthy eligible for this election.

1)EDD ROUSH – 300 + Win Shares, 3 MVP type seasons, 5 All-Star type seasons, excellent defender at a key position. Seems to be moving up the backlog as people re-asses him.
2)TOMMY LEACH – 300+ wins shares, big peak, excellent defensive player at third and in centerfield.
3)JOE GORDON - 5 times in top 10 of MVP voting, in the all-star game every year from 1939 to 1949 except his two war seasons.
4)NELLIE FOX –300 Win share, good Black Ink and Gray Ink scores. Good defender at a key defensive slot.
5)RALPH KINER – Despite a shorter career (unadjusted) than most of my top 15, Kiner’s peak moves him up the ballot.
6)MINNIE MINOSO – Will keep him behind Kiner, career vs. peak argument.
7)BOB ELLIOT – Recent re-evaluation makes him my top pick at third base.
8)GEORGE VAN HALTREN – Too many win shares to ignore, but you do have to let some of the air out of his19th century pitching win shares. Even so, his career totals keep him ahead Duffy and the 19th century guys.
9)CARL MAYS – Strong peak, good career value. Similar value to Drysdale, but Don has the black/gray ink numbers on his side.
10)ROGER BRESNAHAN – best catcher not in, Roger, Elston Howard, and Schang are ahead of Mackey on my list.
11)PHIL RIZZUTO – with a conservative 60 or so win shares during the war, I move him ahead of Sewell. I wish he had some black ink though.
12)HUGH DUFFY – Good combination of career and peak value.
13)GEORGE SISLER – enough career value and peak value to make the ballot.
14)KEN BOYER – Not sure about this, but more comfortable with him on the ballot than off. His peak nudges him ahead of Traynor.
15)VIC WILLIS - An old favorite of mine sneaks into the last ballot spot, his combo of big seasons and 293 career Win Shares sway my vote.

Disclosures – Jose Mendez and Dick Redding – Hard to rank, and not clearly better than the pitching glut.

When Buck O’Neil was essentially selecting one Negro Leaguer a year to the HOF, I wonder why he passed on Willard Brown. Maybe those 67 gawd-awful ML at-bats made him a hard sell? Maybe his reputation of taking a magazine with him to the outfield?

Dobie Moore – Looking at his value pattern closely this week, I think it is a big stretch to assume that his career before 25 was likely to have cemented his candidacy. I believe Al Rosen is his best comp, and I see Rosen as no better than the fourth best third baseman on the ballot.

Favre,

'[Moore] has had the best peak at SS on the ballot since we elected Vaughan in ’54,'

I know that this is nitpicking but Hughie Jennings was elected in 1960, Don't you think he had a better peak than Moore?

1976 ballot. It feels like I should start my ballot at about #3 or #4, but someone has to be #1. The main changes: I cooled a little on Mendez, and realized I had Bridges too low.

1. Billy Pierce (4, 4, 4, 5, 1) IMO, better than Drysdale. One thing to note: he had significant relief usage throughout his career (the old Grove/Johnson/3F Brown pattern), presumably at high leverage.
2. Ralph Kiner (5, 5, 3, 4, 3) His career may not have lasted very long, but during it he played every day and he hit a LOT of home runs.
3. Larry Doyle (2, 2, 5, 6, 4) Big hitter in low scoring times - nearly as good a hitter as the backlog outfielders. Mediocre defense, but occupied the position for a long time. And no, I don't try to understand WARP.
4. José Méndez (10, 10, 2, 3, 2) Could easily be as good as Koufax.
5. Quincy Trouppe (8, 8, 6, 7, 5) As with all Negro Leaguers, a lot of this is guesswork.
6. George Van Haltren (3, 3, 7, 8, 6) He did accomplish quite a bit in his career.
7. Bucky Walters (18, 19, 8, 9, 8) Offense-adjusted RA+ PythPat 197-148, with a peak that nearly rivals Ferrell's. We elected Lemon - why not Walters?
8. Joe Sewell (7, 7, 10, 11, 10) If only he'd had 2 or 3 more good years - then he'd be an easy choice.
9. Dick Redding (11, 12, 12, 13, 12) A career-value pitching candidate.
10. Orestes Miñoso (6, 6, 9, 10, 9) This presumes at least a little pre-MLB value.
11. Jake Beckley (12, 13, 13, 14, 13) Not much peak, long career. Was he really better than Vernon? Maybe defense, maybe a position-scarcity argument. Offensively, I don't see it.
12. Bob Elliott (13, 14, 14, 15, 14) Roughly the equivalent of Dixie Walker as a hitter, plus 1300+ games of pretty good 3B.
13. Tommy Bridges (23, 24, 23, 23, 22) RA+ PythPat 190-124. Ferrell had a higher peak, but Bridges was a terrific pitcher.
14. Ken Boyer (----, 15) Compared to Elliot, less bat, more glove. The issue I haven't come to grips with yet, and I don't think the electorate has come to grips with: the NL of the 50's-60's was supposed to be a very high quality league, better than the AL at the same time. Part of the reason for that is some not-yet-eligible monster candidates like Mays, Aaron, and Robinson. But if it really was the better league, that should boost some marginal candidates into electability - who were they?
15. Hugh Duffy (16, 17, 15, 16, 16) Nothing new to say after all these years.
16. Mickey Vernon (14, 15, 16, 17, 17) Another loooong career 1st baseman, searching for a peak.
17. Willard Brown (15, 16, 17, 18, 18) If he really could hit for that batting average, he's Kirby Puckett. If not, he's Juan Gonzalez. Worth a look in any case.
18. Nellie Fox (17, 18, 19, 19, 19) I'll be a supporter of Ozzie Smith when the time comes, and Fox has some of the same virtues. Nearly 2300 games at 2B, with extreme in-season durability. When I run his adjusted RCAA, a 10-year stretch in the middle of his career outshines his career as a whole, and even that 10-year stretch is only in the neighborhood of Stanky, Huggins, and Myer. All he really has over the likes of Doerr, Gordon, and Rizzuto is career length.
19. Phil Rizzuto (20, 21, 20, 20, 20) A glove-first SS candidate. Not a great offensive player, but at least useful on offense in an OBP-first shape, with good baserunning. But even with war credit, his career's not particularly long.
20. Cupid Childs (21, 22, 21, 21, 20) Like a lot of people, his career is too short. Not the offensive peak of Doyle, but it is a real peak.
21. Joe Gordon (23, 22, 22, 22) Not much to choose from between him and Billy Herman.
22. Edd Roush (24, 24, 24, 24, 24) Nearly the same offensive value as the leftover 1890's guys; better hitter than Carey.
23. George Sisler (25, 26, 25, 25, 25) My peak-heavy offensive evaluation system likes Chance ahead of Sisler, and Sisler ahead of Beckley. The order gets reversed because of playing time.
24. Vern Stephens (26, 27, 26, 26, 26)
25. Dobie Moore (28, 29, 27, 27, 27) Short career, high peak.
26. Bob Johnson (29, 30, 28, 28, 28)
27. Rocky Colavito (---, 29, 29) I like Colavito's actual major league career a hair better than Johnson's, including a better peak. Johnson stays ahead of Colavito in recognition of his minor league value. A big hitter at a "bat" position is a tremendously valuable asset. As much as I enjoyed what was unconventional about the '85 and '87 "Whiteyball" Cardinals, they needed Jack Clark in the middle of that lineup. So these guys are valuable - but historically, there have been quite a few of them. This is about where I'd rank Sam Thompson were he still eligible (yes, I consider Thompson's election a mistake.) Chuck Klein isn't too far away.
28. Frank Chance (30, -, 30, 30, 30)
29. Rube Waddell (--, 30, --)
30. Jimmy Ryan

I know that this is nitpicking but Hughie Jennings was elected in 1960, Don't you think he had a better peak than Moore?


I forgot that we elected Hugh in '60. Yes, his peak was higher than Moore's, or at least higher than what we have. My mistake.

That should read "than the numbers we have for Moore."

.
Working on those five-year cohorts highlighted some eras and positions which are underrepresented. I think this is important voting criteria, as we do want some semblance of balance in the Hall. Therefore, I have made some major changes on my ballot.

I agree, sort of, and the qualification probably amounts to disagreement. Five years seems to me much too shot. I would begin to pay attention when there seems to be imbalance for fifteen years, three cohorte favre in a rowe.

Man, no Mackey, no Bell...I can barely recognize my own ballot anymore. At least Burleigh will always be there to jog my memory.

<u>1976 Ballot</u>
1)Burleigh Arland Grimes – “Ol’ Stubblebeard”
Nothing like leading off with a hopeless cause. Are guys like Rixey, Ruffing, and Wynn – electees all – really so much better as candidates than Grimes? I don’t think so. I am, however, quite delighted to see that, for the second year running, I’m not the only one placing Burleigh in an elect-me spot this year. Thanks for the comradeship, Daryn. 54th on Maury Allen Top 100. Ritter & Honig Top 100.
2)George Harold Sisler – “Gorgeous George”
Chris Cobb asks if we’re ready to elect Sisler. I say we are. A tremendous high with decent career filler. As a HOM member, he would follow in the footsteps of guys like Medwick and Averill. 33rd on Sporting News Top 100. 45th on McGuire & Gormley Top 100. 55th on SABR Top 100. 55th on Ken Shouler Top 100. 16th on Maury Allen Top 100. New York Times Top 100. Ritter & Honig Top 100.
3)Saturnino Orestes Armas Minoso Arrieta – “Minnie”
The reconsideration of his Negro League performance helped a little, but another look at his major league numbers helped even more. Eight times in the Top 10 in AL Win Shares is very impressive. Definitely the best left fielder on the ballot. 85th on Bill James Top 100.
4)Jacob Nelson Fox – “Nellie”
I have him at the head of a pack of very good second basemen, including recent inductee Doerr. Slight edge for six Top 10 WS appearances and very good Standards and Monitor scores. It’s close, though.
5)Edd J Roush
Long career, good peaks...all the things I admire in a candidate. Really no fuss at all with Edd.
6)Hugh Duffy
Fun fact: Duffy hasn’t finished in the Top 10 since 1932. A very peaky centerfielder, which is a tough sell when we have so many who are consistently great. Kind of in the Sisler mode, although the peak is a lot sharper. I do like me some center fielders.
7)Willard Jessie Brown – “Home Run”
Great numbers, and you have to admire a guy who decides that he’s better off barnstorming than playing for the St. Louis Browns. The new plaque in upstate New York is reassuring, but not a factor in his placement here.
8)Joseph Lowell Gordon
Demonstrates what may be the harshest effect of the war of any strong candidate for election. His numbers suffer so significantly upon his return. His outstanding prime, plus five years along the ten best in WS in the AL, keep him this high, although I had ranked Doerr higher. 92nd on Maury Allen Top 100.
9)Lawrence Joseph Doyle - “Laughing Larry”
The best second baseman in the National League for several years running. I suppose he suffers due to the quality of his competition. A worthy candidate, though.
10)Kenton Lloyd Boyer
Really a pleasant surprise. Mathews signaled the vanguard of a new age for third basemen, and Boyer is certainly worthy. I think he’s the second best newcomer to the ballot, and I rank him ahead of Leach, so this placement didn’t require too much thought.
11)Richard Redding – “Cannonball Dick”
To my surprise, I discovered that I had ratty data in my spreadsheet, giving me a faulty perception of Redding’s prime. Boy, was my face red. With the corrections made, I’m finding it a little easier to value Cannonball above Mendez. 22nd on SABR Negro League poll. 2nd Team, Pittsburgh Courier 1952 poll.
12)Thomas William Leach – “The Wee”
A tribute to my belief in Win Shares. Andrew Siegel calls him “the rich man’s Sam Rice.” I know it wasn’t meant as a compliment, but Rice is a perennial contender for my ballot (as you'll see shortly), so I’m okay backing Leach. Stronger prime sets him apart, plus he excelled at two positions, which is interesting.
13)Carl William Mays
Carl has bounced on and off my ballot over the years, which I will assume is Ray Chapman’s karmic revenge. A gentler career arc than that of Ferrell or Lemon, higher highs than Willis. Frankly, I think the only reason more people voted for Lemon is the black ink. Mays is higher in career WS, peak, WS, prime WS, and they’re practically even in gray ink.
14)José de la Caridad Mendez y Baez
I too a closer look at the leading Negro League pitchers on the ballot (it’s how I discovered the faulty math), and my concern about the pure peak-ness of Mendez’ career has me worried anew. He’s still got a place on the ballot. Just not as high as before. 4th Team, Pittsburgh Courier 1952 poll (as a utility player, not pitcher).
15)Edgar Charles Rice – “Sam”
If we’d cut the ballot to 14 names this year, I'm not sure how much I would have objected. Great career numbers, and consistently the best position player on a very bad team for a very long time. The utter flatness of his career arc is Beckley-esque, which I’m not thrilled about.

To give you an idea of how conflicted I am, I’m going to list my next 5 candidates, completely unsolicited. Any one of them could land on a future ballot, and probably will.
16)Vern Stephens
17)Joe Sewell
18)Chuck Klein
19)Ralph Kiner
20)Alejandro Oms

<u>Other Top 10 Finishers</u>
Walter Moore – “Dobie”
Strong similarities to Hughie Jennings, whose candidacy I ultimately did not endorse. Possibly would have won some MVPs in a more just universe (or at least not gotten shot), but the short career he had in this life does not get my vote.

Getting this one in early this week . . . can't believe I missed last week.

1. Jake Beckley 1B (1) - A smidge below Rafael Palmeiro, they were basically the same player, though Palmeiro was a little bit better with the stick, 1B was much tougher in Beckley's day. The Ted Lyons, Red Faber or Red Ruffing of 1B. There's just so much career value here. Too much to ignore.
2. Gavy Cravath RF (2) - Either he was a freak of nature, or there's a lot missing. I vote for the latter. Check out his thread for deeper discussion of the specifics, including a great analysis from Gadfly. He's the kind of guy we were hoping to catch when we started this project.
3. Luke Easter 1B (3) - I realize there is a lot of projecting going on here, but I think this is fair, as those ahead of him could reasonably be ranked ahead of Easter even with the extensive projections. I see him as extremely similar to Cravath, and he really did mash from 1937-54.
4. Billy Pierce SP (5) - What's not to like. He played for good teams, and behind good defenses, but he also faced the toughest opposition as was custom for an ace in his era. A forgotten star historically. I could see Mike Mussina ending up like Pierce historically. He's first among the eligibles in RSAR (using DERA and Translated IP). And that's using a fairly high replacement level, of .404 WPct.
5. Ralph Kiner LF (6) - Was Harmon Killebrew a Hall of Famer through 1968? Reggie through 1978? How about Albert Belle? He should be. All are comparable to Kiner, the Albert Belle of the late 1940s and early 1950s. I'm not normally a peak guy, but his peak is astronomical. I'm not convinced his D was as bad as some say either. His defensive WS numbers aren't terrible.
6. Charley Jones LF (7) - The Albert Belle/Ralph Kiner of the early NL - can you tell I like this type of player?
7. Joe Gordon 2B (8) - Lost two prime years, was cranking out 9-11 WARP1 seasons annually (1939-43) before military service. Gets a bump this week, as I'm more comfortable with his peak.
8. George Van Haltren CF (9) - He could rank anywhere from 1 to 19, very tough to evaluate. Placing him in the middle :-)
9. Elston Howard C (11) - I wouldn't have expected him to be this high. One of the things I love about working on this is that you get to take a look at a guy like Howard and realize he was a much better player than you ever realized. Schang, Dickey, Berra, Howard, Munson, Posada. Everyone talks about CF in Yankee Stadium, but behind the plate has a pretty solid history there too.
10. Nellie Fox 2B (12) - Very good peak. Great defense. Relatively long career at a key defensive position. I'm a big fan of this kind of player.
11. Dave Bancroft SS (13) - Inexplicably dropped off my consideration set. Upon further review, very similar to Rizzuto and Fox. I like him better than Sewell career wise. While Sewell had the better peak, Bancroft's is nothing to sneeze at, 4 WARP1's 9.4+, with a high of 11.5 in 1921, as the Giants won it all.
12. Virgil Trucks SP (14) - I urge everyone to take a closer look at him. We've got a hidden gem here, I didn't even notice it until I threw his numbers in my spreadsheet. I give him two full years of war credit for 1944-45, at an average of his 1942-43-46 level (after adjusting 1943 down a smidge for the war). He had some peak (I have him equivalent to Pierce and Plank on my 'peak' score, would have won the 1953 AL Cy Young if it existed) and there's a lot of career value here once you give him a couple of 15-11 years for the war. That would be enough to at least get him looked at by everyone. But the two missing years put him only in the 170s in wins, instead of the 200s, so he slips off the radar completely. Take a look at him.
13. Tommy Leach 3B/CF (15) - It is so easy to underrate the guys that do everything well and nothing spectacularly.
14. Joe Sewell SS/3B (19) - Very glad he wasn't rushed in. However, after comparing him to Bancroft and Rizzuto, I realize I've been underrating him. Major jump this week.
15. Minnie Minoso LF (16) - Still not sure what to make of his extra credit. I can't see him being lower than this. Career track somewhat similar to Will Clark. Great player from the start of his career, very good player for the rest, and career ends rather early. Those guys tend to be underrated.

Honorable Mention:

16. Wally Schang C (17) - Looking over WARP for catchers with Howard coming on the ballot, he's way ahead of everyone else that's eligible. I didn't realize that. I wonder if one of the recalcs bumped him.
17. Tommy Bridges SP (18) - Unspectacular peak, but a lot of career value. War credit helps nudge him above Trout and Leonard. He could obviously still pitch when he left for the war, and was still good when he returned for a short time. I give him 2 years of credit at his 1941-43 level.
18. Phil Rizzuto SS (10) - War credit has him right about 300 WS and 95 WARP, great defensive SS and hurt by his park enormously. After a deeper look that included comparing Rizzuto to other shortstops with their age 25-27 seasons missing, I think Bancroft and Sewell deserve to rank ahead of the Scooter.
19. Dobie Moore SS (26) - Great peak, short career, even with military team credit. Mike Webber's list that showed the age 21-24 record of players with similar performance from age 25-31 as Moore doesn't convince me that he should get a lot of credit for those years, but I do think he should get credit for about 50 or so WS for those years.
20. Ken Boyer 3B (20) - Very good player. I like him better than Elliott, better peak, a little more career. Elliott was a better hitter, but Boyer was a great fielder, which was more enough to make up for the hitting.

21. Vern Stephens SS (21) - I love shortstops that can hit like outfielders and play above average defense, call me crazy :-) Better than Doerr IMO.
22. Dutch Leonard SP (22) - Pretty underrated when you look at his W-L record. Prospectus loves him, and Win Shares likes him a lot. A ton of career value and the 4th most saves of any pitcher in my consideration set. Bumping him further this week.
23. Willard Brown LF (23) - Moving him up some after reconsidering him based on the recent Negro League Hall of Fame election.
24. Bucky Walters SP (24) - According to RSI he pitched against amazingly tough competition, and pitched well against it. He was a great hitter (for a pitcher) too, which further understates his record. His record is similar to Ferrell's (201-157 vs. 190-131), longer career though not quite the quality - on the surface. Ferrell was a better hitter, but he doesn't get nearly the edge that he does over other pitchers. And when you throw in a MOWP of .526 vs. .497, it makes a close call. Nonetheless, I'm dropping him some this week. I revised my system a bit, and he didn't do as well. I was probably overrating his peak.
25. Bob Johnson LF (25) - After looking at Colavito, I finally realized I had him too low. One powerful hitter. I really don't see how Sisler could be ranked ahead of Indian Bob.
26. Bill Monroe 2B (27) - Been on my ballot forever, haven't been convinced that this is a mistake.
27. Ernie Lombardi C (28) - I was convinced that his OPS+ overstates his offense due to the DPs, and his lack of peak somewhat dilutes the impact. However, I was looking over the DMB all-time disk, and they gave him a fair range rating (not poor), and also a very good arm. Are the reports of his awful defense greatly exagerrated? Are 1500 games at C and a 125 career OPS+ more common than I realize? I'm still a big fan.
28. Dizzy Trout SP (29) - Great pitcher from 1943-46. Best peak of any pitcher on the ballot this week.
29. Ben Taylor 1B (31) - Creeping up the ballot.
30. Jimmy Ryan OF (32) - Could easily be as high as Van Haltren, why did he fade so much?

31. Charlie Keller LF (33) - God could he hit. But his career makes Kiner's look long. Still I think I underrated just how good he was. Moving up this week. I think there's a very strong case he's better than Sisler. I'll be really disappointed if we induct Sisler any time soon.
32. Dick Bartell SS (34) - Win Shares doesn't love him, but WARP does. More than Bancroft actually. Longer career than Bancroft, and WARP sees him as better defensively, even in WARP1, before the all-time adjustments. This is a conservative ranking as he re-enters the consideration set. I could be moving him higher.
33. Rube Waddell SP (35) - Another one that I shouldn't have dropped. Moving up significantly this week. I actually see him as between McGinnity and Brown (who I think we may have overrated, I was guilty too) at this point.
34. Jose Mendez SP (36) - Putting him back on the ballot after his recent election to the Hall of Fame caused me to reconsider his case. He was a better than Dolf Luque, but I don't think he was better than Waddell anymore.
35. George Sisler 1B (37) - I think he is somewhat overrated by the consensus. His peak was great, but has been overstated.
36. Bob Elliott 3B (38) - Not very far behind Hack, who I would place between Monroe and Medwick. I cannot see how one could rank Childs or Doyle ahead of Elliott (2B pre-1920 being equivalent to 3B post 1935).
37. Quincy Trouppe C (39) - Good player, a smidge below Mackey and Schang.
38. Burleigh Grimes SP (40) - Like Walters, faced pretty steep competition (.520 RSI), so his 256-226 RSI and 107 ERA+ understates his record somewhat. I see him as Shocker +1500 innings of replacement level pitching. I like him, but just a bit short of the Hall of Merit right now.
39. Cupid Childs 2B (41) - Good hitter, but 2B was a hitter's position in his time. Very similar to Stan Hack, much shorter career though. He gets a bump this week, Chris Cobb's Sisler analysis showed Childs pretty favorably. I still like Bob Elliott better though.
40. Urban Shocker SP (42) - He was one heckuva pitcher. Never had a bad year, ultra consistent with a nice peak.

41. Don Newcombe SP (43) - Now that I've quantified his extra credit, almost 5 seasons worth, I'm comfortable moving him ahead of Harder (and Newsom, and Willis, and Redding). He's close to them pitching, but moves ahead because of the hitting. He's closer to going higher than lower too.
42. Dick Redding SP (44) - I see him just a little behind Grimes.
43. Roger Bresnahan C/CF (45) - Great OBP and gets a career value boost for being a catcher.
44. Dom DiMaggio CF (46) - With war credit he has enough career value and a solid peak. As was mentioned in his thread, a poor man's Richie Ashburn.
45. Ed Williamson 3B (47) - Still on the board after nearly 80 years.
46. Johnny Pesky SS/3B (48) - Basically the same player as Sewell but not as good defensively.
47. Walker Cooper C (49) - Great hitter for a catcher, just a smidge below Bresnahan and Schang.
48. Lave Cross 3B (50) - Also caught some. See Traynor for the reason he's back on the board. Enormous career value. Superb defender at important position(s).
49. Mike Griffin CF (51) - Great defensive player, could hit too. Keeping his memory alive . . .
50. Hugh Duffy OF (52) - Has to be behind Jimmy Ryan. I just don't see why some people like him so much. What makes him any better than Griffin? Griffin was on base more, and was a better fielder. Griffin had almost as much power. I just don't see it. If Duffy didn't have about 2 seasons on Griffin, he wouldn't be this close.

51. Edd Roush CF (53) - Weak league hurts him.
52. John McGraw 3B (54) - One helluva player - when he could stay on the field. More in-season durability would have significantly raised his ranking.
53. Pie Traynor 3B (55) - Back on the board. I think we are all seriously underrating 3B defense from the mid-30s back. Basically even with Larry Gardner, same player, different generation.
54. Larry Gardner 3B (56) - I see him as a tad behind Traynor, about equal to Childs after bumping for 3B D in his era.
55. Red Schoendienst 2B (57) - Good player, very nice peak from 1952-54. About equal as a hitter to someone like Concepcion or Campaneris, but they played SS, not 2B. Can't see any way to rank him ahead of someone like Larry Gardner, Billy Nash, Pie Traynor, Cupid Childs, etc.. So I bumped the others, since I don't think Schoendienst should be lower than this.
56. Buddy Myer 2B (58) - Sure could hit for a 2B. Had trouble staying in the lineup, but shouldn't have dropped off the board.
57. Rocky Colavito RF (59) - Not as good as Indian Bob, but a definite Hall of Very Gooder.
58. Mel Harder SP (60) - Forgotten everywhere but Cleveland it seems like, but he was a really good pitcher. With Grove hurt, he was arguably (Hubbell?) the best pitcher in baseball from 1933-35.
59. Billy Nash 3B (61) - Similar to Traynor, better glove, less pop.
60. Ed Cicotte SP (62) - Should be on the ballot if Willis is. I don't see him as being a real candidate, but in the interest of thoroughness he should be listed. Very nice peak.

61. Vic Willis SP (63) - I think I should have him higher, but I can't place him ahead of any of these guys.
62. Dick Groat SS (64) - Better than I would have thought. 2 years of military service help too. He basically had the same career length as Schoendienst. Wasn't quite as good of a hitter, but he was SS as opposed to being a 2B.
63. Bobo Newsom SP (65) - Similar to Leonard, kind of flies under the radar, but had a good career while he was bouncing all over the place, not much in terms of peak.
64. Dick Lundy SS (66) - Back on the radar, not as good as Sewell IMO.
65. Bobby Avila 2B (67) - Gives him some credit for pre-major league play. Had a couple of really big years in the early 1950s.
66. Dizzy Dean SP (68) - Great pitcher for a couple years. Too bad his career was cut short.
67. Lefty Gomez SP (69) - Quite comparable to Dean. Similar career value, Dean had the higher peak.
68. Mickey Welch SP (70) - I should not have completely dropped him from consideration. I think he was a good pitcher, not a great one. Not close to the pitchers from his generation that we did honor.
69. Tommy Henrich RF (71) - Don't forget to give him 3 years of war credit. I think Moises Alou is a very good modern comp.
70. Alvin Dark SS (72) - Shortstops that can hit league average are a valuable commodity.

71. Alejandro Oms OF (73) - Convince me if you think this is too low, I'm listening.
72. George Scales SS (74) - I'll side with those who say he was similar to, but not as good as Sewell or Moore. Is it wrong to have him behind Lundy?
73. Mickey Vernon 1B (75) - Good player, long valuable career, not nearly the hitter Beckley or Taylor were.
74. Dolf Luque SP (76) - Deserves this spot much more than Joss did.
75. Pete Browning CF (77) - He's on the board again. I just don't think the AA was all that good when Browning dominated it, he was a good player, but his stats need serious deflation. The bat was great, the D was awful and the career was short.
76. Gil Hodges 1B (78) - I don't see how he can be ranked above Vernon.
77. Larry Doyle 2B (79) - Another good pre-Ruth 2B, but he wasn't very good defensively, and the position wasn't even difficult at the time. I see him as similar as a hitter to Bob Elliott through 1950. He should be compared to post-war 3B, not 2B. He wasn't as good as Elliott defensively either.
78. Eddie Yost 3B (80) - Very good player, that OBP was amazing, +.051 vs. league average, despite hitting just .254 for his career. Bad D at 3B though, and not much power.
79. Sherm Lollar C (81) - Good player, somewhat forgotten by history. Catcher bonus gets him on the ballot.
80. Eddie Yost 3B (80) - Very good player, that OBP was amazing, +.051 vs. league average, despite hitting just .254 for his career. Bad D at 3B though, and not much power.
81. Sherm Lollar C (81) - Good player, somewhat forgotten by history. Catcher bonus gets him on the ballot.

I did look into Allison and Roseboro, but I don't see them as top 80 . . .

Five years seems to me much too shot. I would begin to pay attention when there seems to be imbalance for fifteen years

Any temporal grouping--five, ten, fifteen--is of course an artificial construct with limitations. I think there are advantages to smaller groupings, but a lot of the players I'm advocating would also fill gaps of fifteen years or more. We have no 1B from 1897-1923 (Beckley and Sisler), no C from 1891-1911 (Bresnahan), we're low on pitchers from 1941-1955 (Pierce, Walters) and on 3B in general (Elliott, Boyer). We're also very low on 1870s OF (Jones), which I guess I could extend back into the 1860s, although that seems kind of lame.

51. Edd Roush CF (53) - Weak league hurts him.

Joe, did you happen to see the Davenport presentation at the Milwaukee SABR convention about league translations? He converted the Orioles of the 1920's to the AL of the same period.

It may have been the presentation, but I'd say if you sat through it you would realize that league translations and quantifying league strengths is not an exact science. I'm fairly certain had the voters of the HOM sat through the presentation, that they would never use WARP 3 again.

I'll happily agree that the Federal League was weak, but I don't think that the NL of the teens and twenties was that much different than any NL league between 1905 and 1943. I also don't think there is a way you could accurately measure it. As a final salvo, I'll say the Negro Leagues of that era get a ton of respect, and they are almost certainly weren't the same caliber of play as the NL.

> I'm fairly certain had the voters of the HOM sat through the presentation, that they would never use WARP 3 again.

Not me, I woudn't *stop* using WARP3 if I had seen the presentation ;-)




(Stopped 100 years ago.)

1.Duffy PHoM in 1912. 1890’s underrepresented. I’ve been looking at how players on the ballot compare with the median level of already enshrined HoMers whose credentials are post 1893 MLB using WS. Duffy would be in the top half using 5 consecutive seasons and also 10 consecutive seasons
2.Kiner PHoM 1966. Ignore the überstats and pay homage to seven consecutive HR titles. Above the HoM median in 3 and 5 year peaks.
3.Waddell PHoM 1926 and returned to my ballot for the first time since 1939 in 1964. Closest thing on ballot to Koufax.
4.Cravath PHoM 1967. Would have been in my PHoM 35 years sooner had the mle’s been available.
5.Brown, Willard PHoM 1975. A closer look moves him up.
6.Gordon PHoM 1976. 1975 reevaluation of middle infielders puts Gordon on ballot for first time.
7.Leach PHoM 1926. Favorite teddy bear.
8.Bresnahan PHoM 1928. SABR Dead ball era committee has him #1. No major league catchers between Ewing and Hartnett is not being fair to all eras.
9.Dean PHoM 1976. 1975 reevaluation of great pitching peaks puts Diz on my ballot for the first time.
10.Keller PHoM 1967. James puts just ahead of Kiner, and he may be right. Dropping a few spots in 1975 – too many corner OF near top of my ballot.
11.Roush PHoM 1942. Arnold Hano, in his 1955 “A Day In The Bleachers”, called Willie Mays “the finest player employed by the National League since Eddie Roush.” Using WS to compare to Ashburn:
·3 year peak - Roush 36, 33, 30; Ashburn 29, 28, 28
·5 year peak (consecutive)– Roush 144; Ashburn 138
·8 best years – Roush 218, Ashburn 216
·WS/162 – Roush 25.9; Ashburn 24.4
·OPS+ - Roush 126; Ashburn 111
·NHBA Rank – Roush 15, Ashburn 16
·HoM Support – Roush slowly coming around? Ashburn – elected as shiny new toy! That’s a shame.
12.Minoso PHoM 1972.
13.Sisler 1975 reevaluation puts him on ballot for first time in 30 years.
14.Walters PHoM 1968. Preferring his peak to Wynn’s career.
15.Browning PHoM 1906 and returned to my ballot in 1960 for the first time since 1933.
16.Fox Do we need a 2B to bridge the Jackie to Joe gap?
17.Cooper, W. Doesn’t look like the HoM will have any pitchers wearing a Pirates cap either. By WS one of top 2 pitchers in NL 1920, 1921, 1922, 1924. PHoM 1942. HoF just admitted the wrong Cooper.
18. Pierce Could move up, by WS, best in AL 1955 and 1958, 2nd best 1953.
19.C. Mays
20.Chance

Nobody new worth noting for the first time in a while.

1. Ken Boyer (4), St.L (N), 3B (’55-’68) (1975) – Better than Gordon. More confident in Boyer's greatness than Brown's - but both are in.
2. Willard Brown (2), KC (--), 1B (‘34-‘48) (1966) – I have decided that the consensus is correct: Brown’s career trumps Oms’ peak advantage.
3. Billy Pierce (6), Chic. (A) SP (’49-’64) (1971) – With the pitchers this closely together, I’m stepping back from total value, and sorting them by pitching value for the ballot.
4. Joe Gordon (7), N.Y. (A), SS (’38-’50) (1968) – Compares favorably to Doerr. Better bat, shorter career, lesser defender (though not according to Win Shares), more war credit. Weighing it all together, I think Doerr was more valuable. .
5. Alejandro Oms (5), Cuba (--), CF (‘21-‘37) (1965) – It sure looks like both Brown and Oms are gonna screw with my consensus scores from here on out on this project. Drops a little because the resume is so heavily non-US.
6. Dutch Leonard (8), Wash. (A) SP (’34-’53) (1972) – Amazing how valuable he was before and after the war, the lost time to injury in ’42 and the apparent effects of recovery in ’43-’44 keep him from the 15-18 votes that all his equals seem to be getting. Penalize one guy for playing too good during the war, penalize another for not playing good enough...
7. Dizzy Trout (9), Detr. (A) SP (’39-’52) (1967) – Bob Lemon was better than Dizzy Trout, but Lemon on the cusp while Trout isn’t even the best Dizzy according to the voters is too steep a drop IMO. It would take a war discount of close to 50% to drop him from my ballot, which is about 35-40% below what the quality drop-off actually was. Don’t penalize the players for being in their prime in ’42-’45.
8. Bucky Walters (10), Cinc. – Phila. (N) SP (’33-’47) (1961) – I can’t think of the reason why I had developed space on the ballot between Dizzy and Bucky, they seem nearly equal in career value.
9. Phil Rizzuto (11), N.Y. (A), SS (’41-’56) (1972) – If you don’t like Gordon or Doerr, I’m not gonna convince you to like Rizzuto.
10. George Van Haltren (12), NY(N), CF / LF (’87-’03) (1926) – Would already be in but for the fluke scheduling quirk in ’31. Here’s hoping it won’t take much longer.
--. Stan Hack, Chic. (N), 3B (’32-’47) (1976) – Elected way too early, but the results are the same in the end.
--. Joe Medwick, St.L (N), LF (’32-’47) (1976) –
11. Dom DiMaggio (13), Bost. (A), CF (’40-’52) – 2nd best OF to date for FRAR (Speaker), and Dom’s rate is much better than Tris. That, along with the fact that he’s not Marion with the bat, gets him on the ballot. 4th highest war credit bonus to date (Pesky, Greenberg, Feller) I have measured this by pct. of career above actual career, so he beats out Ted. Adding up the total credit would be a different story of course.
12. Bob Johnson (14), Phila. (A), LF (’33-’45) – Late start to his career, but every season a quality one, and 0.304 EQA always looks good on the resume.
--. Heinie Groh, Cinc. (N), 3B (’12-’27) –
13. Joe Sewell (15), Clev. (A), SS / 3B (’20-’33) (1939) – Might deserve the spot over Rizzuto, but not this year.
14. Ben Taylor (--), Ind. (--), 1B (’10-’26) (1938) – Similar to Beckley and Beckley’s in the P-Hall.
15. Minnie Minoso (--), Chic. (A), LF (’49-’63) – Numbers say he’s on the happy side of the in/out line of the HOM right now (i.e. one of the top 200+ players of all time), but I see him as a victim of the timeline to ensure earlier eras were properly represented. Having said that, he is 4th on the backlog for P-Hall entry, so I could be wrong…

George Sisler – Makes Jennings seem ballot-worthy by comparison.
Dick Redding – The bar for NeL pitchers has been set higher than this, IMO. The jump from Ray Brown to Bill Foster, Mendez and Redding will keep them all out of my Hall.
Jose Mendez – Would rank as the worst pitcher elected on my list, if that comes to pass.
Dobie Moore – Well now you’re really scraping the bottom of the peak barrel. In no particular order, I have Moore below a host of peak players: Waddell, Cicotte, Dean, Klein, Nicholson, Kiner, Garver, …
Hugh Duffy – This seems like we’re just pulling names out of the hat at random. 65 years later, still not better than Ryan or Van Haltren.


A lot of players were in last year’s top ten, but not in my top 15 this year.

1976 Ballot
(Bicentennial Edition)

1. (1) Dobie Moore. The new material presented on his thread confirms that he was a great player for at least 5 years. There’s a lot about his career we may never know, but with a few years' credit for his time playing in army, his career could be seen as being of comparable length and quality to Boudreau’s.

2. (2) Edd Roush. There are some odd things about his career, but to me he combines both peak and career values better than the other eligible OFs. Roush was one of the best players in the NL for a decade, which included a couple of MVP type seasons, and ended up above 100 WARP and 300 WS. I think Bill James has him ranked about right (15-CF).

3. (3) Nellie Fox. Fox was durable, consistent, got on base a lot, and an was excellent fielder at an important defensive position for more than 2300 games. To me, that adds up to a player far more valuable than might be suggested by his 94 OPS+.

4. (4) George Sisler. Sisler was an outstanding player, both offensively and defensively, between 1916-1922. The remainder of his career doesn’t add much value, but I give him more credit for playing than I would if he had simply retired.

5. (6) Larry Doyle. His defensive stats are just odd. If BP’s assessment is to be trusted, Doyle began as a terrible fielder and became a better than average fielder as his career was winding down. Also, it seems strange that he wouldn’t have been at least tried at some other position. There’s no question about his offensive abilities, however. Doyle has a career OPS+ of 126, and he was consistently in the NL top 10 in HRs and slugging pct. He also won an MVP award and was an 8-time STATS NL all-star.

6. (7) Cupid Childs. Best 2B of the early-mid 1890s. Maybe the best eligible 2B, period. Given the relative brevity of his career, it is hard for me to put him above Moore, whose peak seems higher, but I like him better than I like the three 1890s OFs.

7. (9) Billy Pierce. I don’t see much difference between Pierce and Drysdale except for maybe a small peak advantage for DD. Pierce is neither a peak candidate nor a career candidate, but he was one of the best pitchers in the AL for almost a decade, with perhaps one year (1955) when there was no one better.

8. (10) Rube Waddell. I have long thought that Rube probably deserves more respect regardless of how troubled he may have been. Top 10 finishes in fewest hits per 9 innings for 8 years, shutouts for 9 years, Ks per 9 innings for 9 years. Career ERA+ of 134 (with two years at 179), DERA of 3.67/3.76, 248 PRAA. Even factoring in concerns about unearned runs and durability, those are some impressive numbers.

9. (11) Joe Gordon. Another big-hitting middle IF. Considering both his bat and his glove, I understand the arguments that put him ahead of the other 2B.

10. (12) Tommy Bridges. Like Pierce, he’s not really a peak or career candidate. His top ERA+ season is 147, but he had six seasons between 140 and 147—and ten seasons in which he was in the top 10 in the AL. And while he wasn’t an much of a workhorse, he did finish in the top 10 in innings five times. A very solid pitcher who seems easy to overlook, much like his former teammates Trout and Trucks.

11. (13) Geo. Van Haltren. I’ve never been sure where to put GVH. I don’t sense he was ever an elite player, but he did everything well for a long time during a difficult era. He even pitched decently. Some measures (e.g. Win Shares) make him look like a clear HoM-er; other measures make a less compelling argument.

12. (14) Ralph Kiner. 149 OPS+/.319 EQA in over 6,000 PAs seems impressive enough to look past his defensive shortcomings or short-ish career.

13. (5) Minnie Minoso. I had him too high last ballot. He played in a tough league and NeL credit bumps up his career value. Like Sisler, we’ve elected several players he seems comparable to.

14. (15) Ken Boyer. His peak years (1958-1964) are better than I had previously realized, though looking at him and Bob Elliott has made me wonder once again if I am not seriously overlooking Tommie Leach.

15. (new) Willard Brown. OK, I’m sold. 67 at bats for the Browns doesn’t seem like enough to draw any meaningful conclusions about the player he was or might have been.

Next 5
16. Bucky Walters
17. Charlie Keller
18. Quincy Trouppe
19. George J. Burns
20. Phil Rizzuto

Required disclosures:
Dick Redding, Jose Mendez, Hugh Duffy. I like Redding the best of these guys and would like to find a place for him on the ballot. Mendez strikes me as a peak candidate whose peak isn’t quite enough. Duffy (who I have voted for in the past) is buried in the OF glut.

1776 Ballot
1. Washington, Va.
2. Jefferson, Va.
3. J. Adams, Mass.
4. Franklin, Pa.
5. Hamilton, NY
6. S. Adams, Mass.
7. Henry, Va.
8. Paine, UK/Pa.
9. Hancock, Mass.
10. Jay, NY
11. Mason, Va.
12. G. Morris, Pa.
13. R. Sherman, Conn.
14. R.H. Lee, Va.
15. Revere, Mass.

Mike W - No, Milwaukee was the last convention I missed - I've been to all of them since. Bummer.

This year, promise to fill me in on it.

As far as Roush goes, that's not a major thing - I gave him a slight demerit for playing in what is generally regarded as the weaker league - it wasn't a WARP3 thing - I don't use WARP3 very much any more - I only use it when docking guys for war credit, or leagues like the Federal League and AA. I haven't used it for AL/NL as anything other than a guide.

And when using it for wars and other leagues, all I do is look at the players WARP1-WARP3 for surrounding years, and then look and see how it changed for the weak league year - then I take the difference in the difference (if that makes sense) and adjust his WARP1 (or WS) based on that.

BTW, I won the bet I made with myself - that Mike W would see "51. Edd Roush" and ask me about it.

1976 Ballot

1. Larry Doyle (1) -- I think the electorate is underrating him, his support is waning. Fine second baseman for great Giants teams. Solid peak. Fielding was mediocre, but not as bad as WARP suggests.
2. John McGraw (2) -- 135 OPS+ is aided by the fact that its OBP heavy. In fact, his OBP is 3rd all time. Playing time issues keeping him out of the HOM so far...
3. Cupid Childs (3) -- Very comparable to Doyle. OPS+ is OBP heavy. Fielding was good, but not A-level.
4. Dick Redding (4) -- "Cannonball" had the 2nd best fastball of the 10's according to Neyer/James.
5. Ralph Kiner (5) -- Top-notch peak, career sputtered out a bit too early. Still, 149 OPS+ in 6256 PA with a healthy peak on top of that is pretty darn good.
6. Gavvy Cravath (7) -- Cravath has a monster peak that is holding up against new eligibles.
7. Charley Jones (8) -- Unfairly blacklisted. Appears to be a hybrid or Pike/Stovey/Thompson, guys I've ranked fairly highly. Returning to my ballot after a sizeable absence. He is not from an underrepresented era which is making me a bit apprehensive about his future on my ballots.
8. George Sisler (10) -- Peak candidate... before the injury (184 RC+) was a top-tier hitter.
9. Joe Gordon (11) -- Tossing some love out for the fine 2B for some great Yankees/Indians clubs. Short career has me worried, but a little war credit puts him on the ballot.
10. Roger Bresnahan (12) -- Great five year peak at C. 126 OPS+ is OBP-heavy. Didn't appear to play full-time outside his peak though... getting a small subjective boost due to catcher shortage from his era.
11. Joe Sewell (13) -- Top SS of the 1920s. High OBP, excellent glove. Decent peak, but a peak that warrants a longer career for a slam dunk induction. Still better than most. New candidates have pushed him off of many ballots and it will be interesting to watch to what degree his support returns as we dip deeper into the backlog.
12. Bob Elliott (14) -- Great hitter for five years... not as great as Al Rosen, but much more meat to his career making him more ballot-worthy.
13. Willard Brown (15) -- I like him better than Minoso.
14. Billy Pierce (nr) -- Fine mid-size career candidate. Scores well in RSAA.
15. Bob Johnson (nr) -- The OF glut is percolating up onto my ballot. Indian Bob hit well with fine OBP's for poor Athletics teams.

16-20. Keller, Rosen, Browning, Chance, Lombardi,
21-25. Fox, Beckley, Welch, Trouppe, DMoore,
26-30. Minoso, Leach, Waddell, Roush, KBoyer,
31-33. Newcombe, TBridges, BWalters

With the new estimates for my leading candidate in the upcoming backlog election of '76, I felt it was time to re-evaluate not only Dobie Moore but the rest of the serious ballot contenders as well. In doing so, I was reminded just how insanely close the competition is for the top 35 spots. For the most part, the changes reflect greater attention to peak (Kiner & Keller just miss my ballot), and balance (although their are limits to the length I'll go in that regard) both in terms of position, era, and uber-stats.

1. p Jose Mendez (4)—Dominated Negro era ball from 1910 to 1914, Mendez was similar in value to Rube Waddell except with more IP and without the flaky personality. His performance as a hitter and fielder in the ‘20s adds to his career value a bit as well.
2. 2b Cupid Childs (5)—One of the best infielders of the 1890s. Childs had a great peak, while his career was not overly short considering the rigors of playing infield at that time.
3. cf/rf Alejandro Oms (6)—The Cuban Enos Slaughter: only one season over 30 WS, but 8 over 25; considering the effects of regression, had a nice peak as well as a real good career (340 WS).
4. p Bucky Walters (7)—When at his best he was not only excellent pitcher but an inning eater as well. More career value than Ferrell but less peak value, especially considering the decreased competition during the war.
5. rf/cf Willard Brown (8)—Similar value to Alejandro Oms. His peak is slightly better (3 30+ WS seasons to 1) and he missed two years due to WWII, but Oms had a better, more consistent prime and receives some credit for early play.
6. cf Hugh Duffy (3)—Excellent peak puts Duffy among the top of the outfield glut, and considering that his peak makes up 48.8% of his total WS, Duffy’s career value isn’t too shabby, either.
7. 2b Joe Gordon (9)—Three 2b make my ballot this year and four make my top twenty; however, while the HoM isn’t lacking in 2b, the peak value for Childs, Gordon, and Doyle are to good for me to ignore. Besides, considering the offensive orientation at the position before 1920, I’ll consider such 2b to be half 3b as well!
8. ss Dobie Moore (2)—Drops a bit with Chris Cobb’s new WS estimates; however, since his candidacy is based on his stellar peak (as well as pre-1920 credit) his numbers are underrated due to regression. Receives credit for his play with the 25th Infantry Wreckers from 1917 to 1920.
9. p Dizzy Dean (10)—Only five full seasons, but what seasons those were—the best peak among eligible pitching candidates.
10. rf Gavy Cravath (14)—"He played ball, and lived his life, with a minimum amount of effort and nervous energy." Cravath gets extra credit for his minor league performance, obviously, especially as the star of the Minneapolis Millers.
11. rf Buzz Arlett (ob)—Similarly strong peak and poor defensive value to Cravath, he provided definite value to an independent PCL in a time when Branch Rickey and TV hadn’t completely corrupted the minors, when talented ballplayers could still win notoriety for their accomplishments without stepping foot in the majors.
12. p Rube Waddell (ob)—While a real good player at his peak, his character created interesting issues for his teams, evidenced by his disappointing IP totals during that time and his UERA totals over his career.
13. 2b Larry Doyle (ob)—When I started, I saw Doyle and Childs joined at the hip; in the intervening “years,” Doyle has a fallen as I’ve come to accept WARP’s rating of his defense and the NL of the teens. Despite that, still a strong candidate, providing a solid bat on some killer Giants clubs.
14. c Roger Bresnahan (ob)—The best catcher eligible (excluding Quincy Trouppe, who I have yet to get a handle on for a variety of reasons); I find the position to be the second hardest to compare to others. Bresnahan’s play in the outfield further obfuscates the issue, but his solid peak and 126 OPS+ ties him in my mind to Laughing Larry.
15. p Billy Pierce (13)—Takes Eppa Rixey’s old spot on my ballot; while never great (according to the uber-stats), was always solid. Rixey had more career value, but Pierce’s peak was better, squeezing more into a shorter career. Very similar to Whitey Ford, and is also underrated due to usage patterns.

Required Disclosures:
22. 1b George Sisler (12)—Roush and Sisler were the two biggest casualties in my re-evaluation. The top 8 spots among 1b/of are very close, IMO. In the end, while their peaks are quite good, they don't quite equal the other 6 contenders.
25. p Dick Redding (ob)—A pre-1920s Negro League candidate about whom little is known. Going by the translations on his thread, Cannonball would be much lower then this; I give him a boost considering the nature of the numbers in his era, but he is still primarily a career candidate.
27. lf Minnie Minoso (ob)—Negro League years help him stand out from a large crowd very good outfield candidates, but his five-year peak isn't enough IMO to push him into ballot territory. Hovers around 30 with Jimmy Ryan.

1976 ballot.

1. Wally Schang - Long consistent career with very good bat in the 1910s-1920s AL, an era when catchers did not catch as many games year in and year out as later.
2. Joe Sewell - Best ML SS of the 1920s, in the strong AL.
3. Joe Gordon - Significant WWII credit. I have him above Doerr.
4. Tommy Bridges - 2nd most runs saved above average of all unelected Cooperstown eligible pitchers, behind Blyleven.
5. Jose Mendez - Evidence of a HoM worthy peak; perhaps a slightly better version of Lefty Gomez.
6. Nellie Fox - WS likes him, WARP doesn't. My system rates IF highly; he jumped when I starting using less extreme league factors.
7. Gil Hodges - For strength of the 1950s NL and for being the best or among the best 1B throughout his prime.
8. Bob Friend - I might be his only friend. Maybe I'm still favoring later pitchers too much, but not as extreme as before. In any case, a lot of quality innings in a relatively strong league.
9. Orestes Minoso - Not an extereme career, but a little credit for ML time missed and a fine prime put him on the ballot.
10. Lefty Gomez - Peak-season bonus for his two Cy-Young type seasons boosted him back onto the ballot.
11. Dutch Leonard (Emil)- Not one outstanding quality, but lots of very good in a long career.
12. Billy Pierce - Many very good seasons.
13. Curt Simmons - A suprise in my system. Similar case to Pierce. Helped by my league factors which suggest that pitching was stronger in the NL during his time.
14. Sam Rice - WWI credit gets him to around 3180 career hits in spite of not playing until age 25 and not being a regular until age 27.
15. Bob Elliott Glove position, NL strength, one of best 3B of his time, if not the best.

Van Haltren and Beckley are the best unelected 1890s OF and IF.

Sisler was a good player, but because of his injury, his prime wasn't quite long/strong enough for me.

Duffy had an excellent peak/prime by some measures. Like Sisler, it wasn't long/strong enough for me.

Willard Brown was one of the top NeL hitters of the 1940s. I look forward to the coming NeL statistical encyclopedia to see whether I may be underrating him.

Redding was a fine player, but I'd elect NeL pitchers Mendez and Byrd before Redding.

Moore was at least all-star quality, but Jennings wasn't making my ballot either.

38 ballots so far. Still missing one from: andrew siegel, Jeff M, Dr. Chaleeko, Gadfly, Kelly in SD, Trevor P., Chris Cobb, Ken Fischer, Devin McCullen, Esteban Rivera, Max Parkinson, KJOK, Ardo, caspian88, and AJM.

As you can expect, we have another close one so make sure your ballot is in on time (8 PM EST).

Charley Jones He is not from an underrepresented era which is making me a bit apprehensive about his future on my ballots.


I think it's hard to tell whether the 1870s are over or underrepresented as a whole. What we do know is that we have no left fielders from that decade *at all*--Cap Anson's 1876 season is the only season by a LF represented in the HoM during the entire 1870s. So Charely Jones would fill a significant gap.

(1)Roush (1st)—WS, WARP, HoM, and OPS+ all agree; why don’t we?
(2)Keller (5th)—With full war credit and one season of minor league credit, his prime easily beats the Kiner/Berger/Sisler/Moore set.
(3)Minoso (6th)—Has the prime; extra credit gives him the career. Be wary of cross-era comparisons--he was a much more important player in his era than Bob Johnson in his.
(4) Mendez (4th)--Someone has to rank here. Looks like Rube Waddell without the issues and with an excellent bat. Bob Lemon with a slightly better peak.
(5)Duffy (2nd)—-I fully understand the arguments against him, but he was a five-tool player and a real leader for a great and overachieving team. Thus, most of the extra WS represent something real.
(6)Joe Sewell (7th)—SS offense in his league so anemic that his bat was super valuable.
(7)Joe Gordon (8th)—Very similar to Sewell.
(8)Leach (10th)—Tons of defensive value.
(9) Moore (3rd)--Drops some on Chris's evaluation. I had his 7-year prime at about 205 WS. Bringing it down into the low 190's, puts him in Sisler/Kiner territory.
(10) Van Haltren (12th)--Still hard to get a handle on.
(11)Sisler (11th)—Similar to but a little behind Keller and Moore.
(12)Pierce (13th)—Either right behind or right ahead of Drysdale depending on how you adjust for league, park, and decade.
(13)Trouppe (14th)—Best Catcher available.
(14)Oms (15th)—Subjectively and objectively qualified, but not overly so.
(15)Beckley (unranked/16th)--Ranks right with GVH and Oms.

Brown (low OBP) is in the 20s; Redding (Wilbur Cooperish numbers) is in the 30s.

Next 5 are Childs, Elliot, Charley Jones, Bob Johnson, and Ken Boyer.

1976 Ballot:

1. Pete Browning - Was a heck of a hitter and did it under tremendous duress. I buy the "greatness can't take full advantage off lower competition" idea. Proved he could hold his own in the Player's League.

2. Hugh Duffy - His credentials are that he was for a time one of the best players and he produced during the 90's. Was an outstanding defensive outfielder.

3. Rube Waddell - Was a special pitcher. I buy the run support analysis and also believe in the higher value of being a phenomenal K artist in his time and place. His career record isn't that impressive but you have to remember that there were some stretches where he was playing elsewhere.

4. Dobie Moore - Fantastic peak with just enough career at shortstop.

5. Jose Mendez – Great peak pitcher with some hitting credentials added.

6. George Sisler - Put up enough career with a very good to great peak that he goes above Beckley.

7. Mickey Welch - The 300 game winner. The discussion of the past couple of “years” has made me realize that Welch should be a HOMer. Is not that far behind Keefe.

8. Ralph Kiner – His peak is enough to land him on my ballot.

9. Bill Monroe - Seems to be one of the best second basemen of his time.

10. Jake Beckley - The career man. What he accomplished during his career is enough to offset the lack of peak, so to speak.

11. Charley Jones – Fantastic hitter from the 19th century. Gets some credit for blacklisting from me.

12. Roger Bresnahan - I believe his versatility is a major plus in his case. I can understand not giving him credit if you think his playing time at other positions was worthless but when he was an outfielder he was one of the best ones in the league. Not many players in history would be able to pull that of.

13. Cupid Childs – Very good offensive force at a time were careers were shortened because of the roughhouse style played.

14. Joe Gordon – Very worthy player. With war credit ranks ahead of Doerr on my second baseman list. Should join him soon.

15. Edd Roush – Vaults up from the nether regions of my consideration set. The arguments on his behalf made me look and realize that I had goofed. Playing time issues still hold him back somewhat.

16. Billy Pierce – The comparison with Drysdale makes me realize that I had him too low. Looks worthy when compared to his peers.

17. Willard Brown – Has the hitting I’m looking for, with a slight demerit for the walks. However, I see him as a good enshrinee.

18. Nellie Fox – Outstanding defense and hitting production for a good length of time. Seems we have a lot of second sackers hanging out in the foyer.

19. Vic Willis – Jumps into the top 20. Blame the cohort analysis for making me take another look at Vic.

20. Minnie Minoso –I suspect the study turned up about the same information we did in regards to his pre-major league years.

Not on ballot but made Top 10:

Dick Redding - Not out of consideration but at this stage I have him behind Mendez. However, he could be helped by the new study that will be released at some point.

1976 ballot. A tooth-and-nail struggle for the final spot this year - will it make a difference in deciding the 1976 HOM enshrinee?

1) George Van Haltren (2). Consolidated league, long career, scads of win shares, and a pretty decent late-career prime. Don’t be swayed by the latest WARP translations (or, if you are, make sure you vote for Bob Johnson!) - GVH belongs.
2) Jake Beckley (3). 125 OPS+ in over 10,000 adjusted AB is quite a lot of value, even though I've moved slowly towards valuing a 9-year prime over a strict career.
3) Quincy Trouppe (4). More appearances per season than Schang, and a much better hitter than Mackey. Probably Hartnett-lite. It's been bandied about on the Negro League induction thread that Trouppe wasn't even nominated for consideration, which unless our evaluations are way off is quite a shame.
4) Cupid Childs (5). Coming into the 1970s, I'd thought I might have been overrating Childs's contributions, but my 2B reevaluation in 1971 underscored how impressive his peak really was.
5) Billy Pierce (6). Whether he was a better overall player than Bob Lemon is up for debate, but my initial study of Pierce definitely suggests he was a better pitcher. Defense-adjusted ERA and PRAA both seem to bear that assertion out. Sort of like Bucky Walters without a war discount.
6) Edd Roush (8). Hurt by the discount to WARP3. Comparable to the now-elected Richie Ashburn.
7) Burleigh Grimes (15). Substantial movement after comparing his case with Eppa Rixey, whom I had as high as #2. His extreme highs are enough to balance out his scary lows; if he’d grouped them all together, instead of vacillating between the two extremes, we might have the pitching equivalent of George Sisler.
8) Willard Brown (9). If Brown had never posted that 12-for-67 in 1947, I think I would've had less trouble placing him all these years. Recent discussion has shown that such patterns are normal for NgL players adjusting to the ML; wish I’d considered that sooner.
9) Bob Elliott (12). Boing! After dropping two spots in 1975, jumps three for 1976. Not as good as Stan Hack, but quite similar. Severe lack in quality 3B during Elliott’s era.
10) Dick Redding (7). No longer do I see him as better than Grimes.
11) George Sisler (11). Now on the verge of election. Top OPS+ scores are comparable to Kiner, and even his marginal seasons had some value.
12) Bob Johnson. BP’s translations has Johnson hitting 500 home runs. Beats Minoso in career EQA, WARP, and OPS+. Probably one of the top five or six OF of the 1930s.
13) Alejandro Oms (10). Estimated 125 OPS+ in about 9,000 PA. Bit of a positional glut during his time, though.
14) Jimmy Ryan (–). Returns to ballot. All the GVH comparisons are valid; I just think Van Haltren’s a tad better.
15 Joe Sewell (–). First appearance on the ballot. Just wins the final spot ahead of Joe Gordon. Along with Dobie Moore, Sewell dominated the SS position in the 20s. Steady, solid prime from 1923-1928.

Disclosures:

Hugh Duffy - Win Shares might like his fielding, but WARP declares him to be average. His 1894 doesn’t impress me as much when league strength is taken into account.
Joe Gordon – Once again, just off the ballot.
Minnie Minoso – Also just off. I prefer Johnson, but with NgL credit it’s close.
Ralph Kiner – In a second tier of short-career corner outfielders like Charlie Keller and Pete Browning, around #26.
Jose Mendez – I didn’t particularly care for Koufax, and Mendez is below him.
Dobie Moore - If you took Al Rosen’s bat and combined it with five years of Rabbit Maranville-level defense, you’d have Dobie Moore. An excellent peak, no argument there, but five years plus change isn’t enough to crack my top 40.

1976 Ballot

<u>Only newcomers and Top 20 outfielders have comments.</u> For my opinion on catchers, infielders, and pitchers, see posts 88-90 and 94-95 in the 1973 Ballot Discussion thread.

Each player has their 73-74-75 ballot placement in parentheses. Last year, we elected Don Drysdale (4) and Biz Mackey (13).

1. Jose Mendez (2-3-1)
2. Joe Gordon (3-4-2)
3. Quincy Trouppe (4-5-3)
4. Billy Pierce (6-6-6)
5. Ken Boyer (new-8)
6. Wally Schang (8-9-7)
7. Alejandro Oms (5-7-5) - falls due to era adjustments for the glut of 20s-30s OFs already elected.
8. Dick Redding (7-8-9)
9. Nellie Fox (9-10-11)
10. Orestes Minoso (12-14-12)
11. Joe Sewell (13-13-15)
12. Ralph Kiner (14-12-14)
13. Jake Beckley (off-off-off) - shoots onto the ballot due to those same era adjustments.
14. George Sisler (11-11-10) - Beckley's career outweighs Sisler's prime.
15. Phil Rizzuto (off-off-off) - debuts out of the backlog.

16-20: Gavvy Cravath, Tommy Leach, Willard Brown, Edd Roush, Dave Bancroft.
21-25: Adolfo Luque, Elston Howard, Vic Willis, Charley Jones, Tommy Bridges.

1. Ken Boyer - Very good defender, good hitter as a third baseman.

2. George Van Haltren - Good hitter, good defender, long career.

3. Don Drysdale - Nice peak, 3000 IP, 121 ERA+.

4. Jose Mendez - Not a long career, but an outstanding peak.

5. Bob Johnson - Great hitter who moves up this high with minor league credit.

6. Willard Brown - Great hitter who played centerfield and shortstop for half his career.

7. Minnie Minoso - Like Johnson gets this high due to minor league credit, wasn't as good a hitter as Indian Bob.

8. Fielder Jones - Great centerfield, great OBP.

9. Bucky Walters - Similar to Mendez, but peak wasn't as good.

10. Joe Sewell - Great shortstop, good hitter. Done at age 34.

11. George Sisler - Very good peak. Could have been great w/o injury.

12. Jimmy Ryan - Similar value to Sisler, but not as big a peak.

13. Bob Elliot - Good defender, very good hitter.

14. Ralph Kiner - Short career, but 7 home run titles and a 149 OPS+.

15. Gavvy Cravath - Great hitter, fantastic peak, not much D

16. Wally Berger
17. Nellie Fox
18. Edd Roush
19. Buzz Arlett
20. Dizzy Trout

22. Joe Gordon - Short career keeps him lower.

Hugh Duffy - In the top 30.

Dobie Moore - Great peak, but not much career.

Cannonball Dick Redding - Other than his 3 year peak he doesn't impress me too much.

D'oh, Drysdale was elected already, that's what I get for copying and pasting. Just move everyone up one.

To recap my balloting:
Career totals adjusted for season length, WWI and II, minor leagues (rare), and blacklisting. Peak totals - 3 straight years for hitters and a 50/50 combo of 3 straight and best any 3 years for pitchers. Prime totals - best any 7 years. Seasonal average - per 648 PA for hitters and 275 innings for pitchers. Bonus for being a league all-star by STATS or Win Shares. Bonus for being the best pitcher in a league. Positional bonus for catcher. These numbers are weighted, combined and compared to theoretical maximums. Pitchers are adjusted for changes in the game (Pre 60', pre-Lively Ball, and current.) I try to have a fair mix of positions and time periods on my ballots. I also consider place in the decade.

1976 Ballot

PHOM Inductees: <u>Joe Gordon</u> and <u>Enos Slaughter</u>. Also, <u>Biz Mackey</u> goes in with Ford in <u>1973</u> and <u>Wilbur Cooper</u> goes in with Drysdale in <u>1975</u>. Top 10 personal backlog are Frank Chance, Dick Redding, Early Wynn, John Beckwith, Ralph Kiner, Minnie Minoso, Gavy Cravath, Red Ruffing, Roger Bresnahan, and Larry Doyle.

1. Mickey Welch: PHOM 1901: Wrongfully ignored at the beginning of balloting. The weight of the evidence: record against other HoMers, number of innings pitched, similarity to other HoMers.

2. Charley Jones: PHOM 1906: Fantastic hitter from 1876-1885. I believe some voters are not taking into account that he was blacklisted for 2.16 seasons. Please see the Keltner List I posted on the Charley Jones/Lip Pike Thread for my reasoning. The weight of the evidence – best player on his teams every year, top 10 or top 5 among position players every year. Great OPS+. A dominant player from 1876 to 1886.

3. Pete Browning: PHOM 1921: Fantastic hitter.

4. Charlie Keller: PHOM 1957: Great power and on-base skills. Credit for WWII - 1.75 seasons. 6 years where only Williams, DiMaggio, and Musial were better. Better than Kelley, Sheckard, Goslin, Wheat, Medwick, and Irvin. One of the biggest surprises in this whole experiment. One of the top 10 players of the 1940s.

5. Willard Brown: PHOM 1970: One of the top power hitters in NeL history. He moves up because I finally incorporated the newest translations into my spreadsheets. He was fantastic in Puerto Rico Winter League. He probably has the best career of any player in its history. One of the top 10 players of the 1940s.

6. Hugh Duffy: PHOM 1919: Very good hitter and fantastic defender. He is 5th among position players in the 1890s by my system. Best position player of the first half of the 1890s. I trust the win shares evaluation of the 1890s Boston team. Conventional numbers do not explain Boston’s success so I am okay with apportioning credit for the team outperforming its numbers. The team was outstanding defensively and Duffy was a key reason.

Yes, I have my Olde-Timey Teddy Bears.
But Jones ranks ahead of the following HoMer LFs in my system: Stovey, Magee, Kelley, Sheckard, Goslin, Wheat, Medwick, and Irvin.
Browning ranks ahead of the following HoMer CFs: Averill, Doby, and Ashburn and is comparable in peak, prime, and seasonal to Gore, Snider, Hines, and Hamilton.
Duffy is right behind Browning and I feel people have disregarded the fact his A+ outfield grade is made from less than half time in CF.

7. Quincy Troupe: PHOM 1960: Good hitting catcher who took walks and played forever at a high level. James says he was an All-Star in 23 different leagues, but gives no source. Cut that in half and that is still 11.5 times. Wow.

8. Jose Mendez: PHOM 1967: see Vic Willis comment

9. Bucky Walters: PHOM 1958: see Vic Willis comment

10. Alejandro Ohms: PHOM 1964:
Ohms had a career that my system loves – great high-all-star level play for 7 or more years with many other surrounding years.

11. Cupid Childs: PHOM 1932: Dominant second baseman of the 1890s. There is no real competition. He was better than HoMer Bid McPhee most every year. There were very few infielders to do well with WS in the 1890s.

12. Vic Willis: PHOM 1942.
Ranking in League / Majors by win shares:
Walters: 1, 1, 1, 2, 5, / 1, 2, 3, 4, 8
Willis: 1, 1, 2, 2, 5, 8, 9, 9, 9 / 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 9, 18, 20, 20+
Mendez had a Koufax-ian peak 5 years from 1910 to 1914 with his performances against white teams as a bonus.
1910: 28 win shares would be 7th in the majors, 3rd in NL or 5th in AL behind: Jack Coombs 37, Walter Johnson and Ed Walsh 36, Ford 35, Mathewson 30, Three Finger Brown 29.
1911: 31 win shares would be tied for 3rd in the majors, tied for 3rd in the NL and tied for 1st in the AL behind: GC Alexander 34, Mathewson 32 and tied with Rucker, Johnson, and Walsh
1912: 40+ win shares would be 3rd in the majors, 1st in the NL and 3rd in the AL behind: Johnson 47 and Joe Wood 44 and tied with Walsh 40.
1913: 31 win shares would be 3rd in the majors, 1st in the NL and 3rd in the AL behind: Johnson 54 and Russel 32.
1914: 36 win shares would be tied for 2nd in majors, tied for 1st in NL and 2nd in AL behind: Johnson 38 and tied with Bill James 36.
1923: 21 win shares would be tied for 13th in majors, 5th in NL and 8th in AL.
These numbers could be increased by 1 or 2 each year for batting contributions if you wish.