I mean, if someone wanted to go deep on NgL, Bill Pettus, Newt Allen, Marvin Williams, Augustin Berejano, Bunny Serrell, Bobby Avila, Fats Jenkins, Leon Kellman, Howard Easterling, and Harry Salmon round out the players that Dr C's MLEs have caused me to identify as being at a minimum worthy of tracking.

I see five guys with decent arguments for the HoM. In order: Heavy Johnson, Luke Easter, George Scales, Ben Taylor, and Leon Day. Anyone I'm missing? Any disagreements?

I like Bus Clarkson as much as any of them. He out-hit Willard Brown in similar leagues and played shortstop.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/c/clarkbu01.shtml

https://www.baseballthinkfactory.org/hall_of_merit/discussion/bus_clarkson/

I mean, if someone wanted to go deep on NgL, Bill Pettus, Newt Allen, Marvin Williams, Augustin Berejano, Bunny Serrell, Bobby Avila, Fats Jenkins, Leon Kellman, Howard Easterling, and Harry Salmon round out the players that Dr C's MLEs have caused me to identify as being at a minimum worthy of tracking.

I have all of these guys in my system (and the ones others have suggested). But the five I shared are the only ones that rate well. Of course, it's all heavily dependent on Dr. C's work, and none outside of Johnson are slam dunks right now (and again, that could change if I deduct about 15 wins from his projection for defense)

His career is literally all-peak, but if you're a peak-oriented voter like myself, I would add in Charlie Smith, who was most likely the best hitter in the Negro Leagues in the late 1920's, but died early (He's just off-ballot for me this year and might sneak on next year depending upon this year's electees).

Regarding HAWK's ballot, I made almost the same comment about the Negro Leagues in the first year that I tried to join the voting, specific to Ben Taylor I remember. I'm sympathetic because it happened to me, and also because it's a ton of info to try and track down when new to HOM, and honestly not that easy to track down unless you know some of the places to look. I think his ballot is OK, but of course he does need to consider NgL to have a legitimate ballot. Didn't post to discussion either.

Cookie, I think -15 wins is too big a chunk to take out of Heavy. See post 356 for more detail on why I say that. The sample we have for for Johnson’s defense is not very big, and putting him in Sheffield territory seems too harsh. At least in my opinion. I could certainly be proven wrong as more data comes to light.

from the Ballot thread (which, ironically, I can't get in at the moment)

Chris Cobb has a point of order on a slightly-flawed ballot: "I've just taken a look at Mark's ballot, and I am not sure it works."

point being that a voter had 2 already-elected players on his prelim, and only fully clarified one of the substitutes (Barry Bonds). I would advocate for counting the ballot even without a 15th slot, but it's also indicated there that we believe we know who it is (David Wright).

my sentiment is that a ballot that has a clear top 14 slots would be okay, and here it seems like we have all 15.

Jaack and Howie have it right: I missed the substitution of Wright for Jones. As revised, it looks like a valid ballot.

Mark A Shirk's apparent ballot:

1) Alex Rodriguez
2) David Wright
3) Sammy Sosa
4) Lance Berkman
5) Sal Bando
6) Thurman Munson
7) Rap Dixon
8) Jorge Posada
9) Al Rosen
10) Elston Howard
11) Brian Giles
12) Cesar Cedeno
13) Robin Ventura
14) Nomar Garciaparra
15) Bobby Bonds

Pieced together from posts 275 and 281 in discussion thread, which also contain all required commentary. If Mark doesn't have any alterations or post it in the ballot thread, I think we are good to count this.

our beloved founder Joe Dimino checks in with his ballot !

Hi guys, I'm going to post this as my prelim and move it over later today to the ballot thread (in case someone has an observation). I basically look at pretty much all of the systems that are out there and try to work a consensus from there based on weighing peak, prime and career. Have made some adjustments due to the segregation penalty discussion (it makes sense to me in terms of trying to find a rank order). Here goes my best attempt for now.

1. Alex Rodriguez – Clear top of the ballot newcomer.

2. Sammy Sosa – Drops one spot from last year.

3. Thurman Munson – Tops my catcher consideration list and with adjustments makes it onto the ballot.

4. Sal Bando – The top third basemen by this year’s assessment.

5. Don Newcombe – After going over and reworking the different types of credit I give to the players in my consideration set, Newcombe slots here.

6. Vic Willis –Falls a bit this year taking note of the discussions about the segregation penalty but still see him as ballot worthy.

7. Tommy Bond – His dominance during his time places him on the ballot, falls a bit this year as well due to the segregation penalty discussion.

8. Bernie Williams- Still going with Bernie as my top centerfielder and makes my top 15.

9. Andy Pettitte – Have him as the best candidate of the Pettitte-Hudson-Buehrle trio.

10. Tony Perez – Perez tends to do better on most of the other systems that are not rWAR and is also a peak/prime third basemen. In the end, still feel more comfortable placing Perez on top of my first base pile.

11. Phil Rizzuto – Adjustments for war credit get him here.

12. David Ortiz – Surprised me but this is where he ends up after the assessment.

13. Urban Shocker – Even with a slight downgrade due to segregation penalty discussion, edges ahead of other candidates when adjusting for WW1 seasons.

14. Bobby Bonds – Finally cracks my ballot after being just under for a few years.

15. Bob Johnson – Even with a segregation penalty, PCL credit gets him over the others for the last ballot spot.

Required comments:

Bobby Abreu – Have him behind Sosa and Bonds in my right field order, just misses my ballot this time.

Wally Schang – Still a viable candidate for me but adding peak and prime does lower his placement a bit for me and is off ballot for now.

Buddy Bell – What holds me up on voting for Bell is that his best seasons are his age 27 to 32 seasons and all coincide with his run with the Rangers. These are driven by Rfield values that are all higher than his highest value in prior seasons with Cleveland and those values immediately drop once he leaves Texas (although that may also be related with age but in his age 33 split season where he leaves Texas he is 7 with Tx and -5 in Cincinnati). It could be he just was even better as a fielder while in Texas, but if this were offensive value one would think that a park effect may be in play. Until I reconcile this, I don’t feel comfortable putting him on my ballot yet.

Lance Berkman – Just behind Bob Johnson in my left field pecking order and may make my ballot next time.

Ben Taylor – Still a viable candidate for me but for now is off ballot.

David Wright – He’s a viable candidate and just may be the second 3B in my pecking order.

I mean, if someone wanted to go deep on NgL, Bill Pettus, Newt Allen, Marvin Williams, Augustin Berejano, Bunny Serrell, Bobby Avila, Fats Jenkins, Leon Kellman, Howard Easterling, and Harry Salmon round out the players that Dr C's MLEs have caused me to identify as being at a minimum worthy of tracking.

Thanks, kcgard. I've evaluated a number of those players and had them in my consideration list but hadn't tracked some of the Cuban or integration players you listed. I'll definitely have to spend time looking at Bejerano, Kellman and Salmon.

Here's my preliminary ballot. My final ballot will look different from this, as I'm still adding data to finalize the adjustments mentioned below for all of the players in my consideration set. When I post my final ballot, I'll have commentary for my top 15 players and top 10 returnees.

2022 Hall of Merit Preliminary Ballot

Data
My ballot is based on Matthew Cornwell's summary of his PARCS-D ratings at Baseball-Fever. At its core, PARCS-D is a score based on adding B-Ref career WAR, career WAA, and all seasonal WAA accrued above 3 in a given year, as well as a cap of -5 WAA that can be accumulated in negative-WAA seasons. Since I think the pennant impact of marginal WAA increases non-linearly, I consider the bonus for seasonal WAA above 3 a quick-and-dirty way of approximating this impact.

From this core, PARCS-D incorporates a variety of adjustments that I agree with, including credit for postseason play and missed time due to military service and labor stoppages. It also includes Negro and Cuban League players based on Eric Chalek's MLEs.

Players with a PARCS-D of 100 or above are personal Hall-of-Famers, according to Cornwell.

My consideration set includes every player who appeared on a ballot in the 2021 HOM election and newly eligible players for 2022.

Adjustments to PARCS-D
1. I replace PARCS-D postseason credit with championship WPA (cWPA) in playoff games, multiplied by 20 to scale it to regular-season WAA. This multiplier is based on simulated data from a theoretical MLB where 16 true-talent .500 teams are divided in two leagues and the regular-season pennant winners advance to the World Series. In this format, my simulations find that 1 cWPA is equivalent to adding *at least* 20 regular-season WAA to a random team before the season. The multiplier for pre-1947 White players is 11 (compared to 9 for theoretical cWPA in Negro League championship games) because I believe segregation prevented the World Series from definitively determining the best team in professional baseball.
2. For pre-1947 play, I remove PARCS-D league quality adjustments and add Eric's segregation adjustment of -10 RAA/600 PA or 200 IP simplified to -1 WAR/WAA per 600 PA/200 IP.
3. In cases where Negro and Cuban League players have lower PARCS-D than implied by Eric's MLEs, I use the latter rating instead.
4. For pitchers, I add their career B-Ref WAAadj.
5. I adjust the 59/41 batting/pitching B-Ref WAR split to correspond to the 57/43 split proposed by Tom Tango. To incorporate this, players are given +1 WAR/WAA per 2150 IP and -1 WAR/WAA per 9250 PA.
6. I remove WPA Clutch from PARCS-D in favor of the Inter-Game and Intra-Game Win Adjustments from Tom Thress' Baseball Player Won-Loss Records.
7. In cases where a player lacks data for computing an adjustment, they are credited with the average score for that adjustment.
8. In keeping with Cornwell, I also incorporate a subjective adjustment with a 16-point range (though mine is +/-8). Where I make a subjective adjustment, I will offer my reasoning for it.

Preliminary Ballot
1. Alex Rodriguez (249 points)
2. Thurman Munson (129)
3. Lance Berkman (125)
4. David Ortiz (120)
5. Willie Davis (118)
6. Sal Bando (118)
7. Andy Pettitte (116)
8. John Olerud (114)
9. Buddy Bell (113)
10. Tommy John (111)
11. Orel Hershiser (110)
12. Jose Cruz (108)
13. Jim Sundberg (107)
14. Sammy Sosa (106)
15. Bobby Bonds (106)

19. Bobby Abreu (103)
57. Wally Schang (89) - segregation adjustment
73. Vic Willis (82) - segregation adjustment
98. Ben Taylor (74) - segregation adjustment

I posted my ballot on the official ballot thread so no need to move it over.

James, keep in mind that the deadline is in less than two hours, so if your prelim is not final you need to post your final ballot by 5pm eastern. Hopefully you see this before the deadline.

Buddy Bell – What holds me up on voting for Bell is that his best seasons are his age 27 to 32 seasons and all coincide with his run with the Rangers. These are driven by Rfield values that are all higher than his highest value in prior seasons with Cleveland and those values immediately drop once he leaves Texas (although that may also be related with age but in his age 33 split season where he leaves Texas he is 7 with Tx and -5 in Cincinnati). It could be he just was even better as a fielder while in Texas, but if this were offensive value one would think that a park effect may be in play. Until I reconcile this, I don’t feel comfortable putting him on my ballot yet.

So I decided to look at this a bit. Looking at his 1973-78 seasons with the Indians, and his 1979-1984 seasons with the Rangers. On a per 1000 innings basis, his double plays(25 to 23) and putouts(101 to 98) went down slightly with Texas, but so did his errors (15 to 12). Where he had the biggest improvement is in assists - he increased by 30 A/1000 innings going from the Indians to the Rangers. Now I don't think this would have anything to do with the home parks. Looking at his teammates, I did notice two things. He had significantly better first basemen with the Rangers (namely Pete O'Brien/Pat Putnam vs. Andre Thornton/Boog Powell) and a significantly worse shortstop (Bucky Dent/Nelson Norman vs. a legit defensive beast in Frank Duffy). Perhaps a combination of these differences gave him more opportunities to contribute defensively with the Rangers?

So I decided to look at this a bit. Looking at his 1973-78 seasons with the Indians, and his 1979-1984 seasons with the Rangers. On a per 1000 innings basis, his double plays(25 to 23) and putouts(101 to 98) went down slightly with Texas, but so did his errors (15 to 12). Where he had the biggest improvement is in assists - he increased by 30 A/1000 innings going from the Indians to the Rangers. Now I don't think this would have anything to do with the home parks. Looking at his teammates, I did notice two things. He had significantly better first basemen with the Rangers (namely Pete O'Brien/Pat Putnam vs. Andre Thornton/Boog Powell) and a significantly worse shortstop (Bucky Dent/Nelson Norman vs. a legit defensive beast in Frank Duffy). Perhaps a combination of these differences gave him more opportunities to contribute defensively with the Rangers?

That's something I noticed as well, a difference in his Rangers run vs Cleveland and Cincinnati is that he has a consistent shortstop throughout those two tenures (Duffy and Concepcion respectively), while in Texas its almost a new SS every year (and not exactly standouts). Your mention of O'Brien is interesting to think about, if having a great fielding (or at the least a sure handed) first basemen will result in defensive value improvements for the other infielders.

Just a little while left until this election is over. Thanks to everyone for participating. It is great that people come back to add a ballot year after year.

DL, are we counting James's preliminary if it isn't transferred over?

One thing I was thinking about the MLEs - we tend to fill in missing seasons for whatever reason (segregation and war credit mostly). This makes sense when comparing careers across era to account for the circumstances that led to shorter careers through no fault of the player. I am a career voter so I tend to use these MLEs. If I was a peak voter (best 5 seasons) I don't think I would include a season that is calculated based on data that is solely from surrounding seasons. I would probably stick to the best 5 seasons translated from stats where the player actually played. That's not going to necessarily help someone like Phil Rizzuto or Heavy Johnson.

DL, I think that's a very sound idea. It's what I do for WW1/2 guys.