BBTF has elected Bonds and Clemens every year since 2015, Schilling since 2016, Rolen since 2019, Manny since 2020.

This is the first time we have elected Todd Helton.

6 players represents a new low for number of players elected by us, we have elected 7+ in the past.

Helton was at 50% last year. Other carryovers 2020 results:

Gary Sheffield 30 71%
Todd Helton 21 50%
Sammy Sosa 18 43%
Andruw Jones 16 38%
Jeff Kent 16 38%
Andy Pettitte 11 26%
Bobby Abreu 8 19%
Billy Wagner 3 7%
Omar Vizquel 1 2%

If Jeff Kent and andruw Jones can’t sniff 75% with this crowd, they are doomed

Jaffe had a good write-up on Jones and introduced a new defensive metric that says he wasn’t anywhere near as elite as the stats we use say he was. Who knows what’s right but I’ve always been very suspicious of defensive stats for outfielders

If Jeff Kent and andruw Jones can’t sniff 75% with this crowd, they are doomed

Jeff Kent finished 10th but we elected 6 which means he is fighting amongst Jones, Sosa, Pettite, etc for that final ballot slot.

I was surprised to see Helton leapfrog over Sheffield.

If Jeff Kent and andruw Jones can’t sniff 75% with this crowd, they are doomed

Interestingly, the Hall of Merit elected Andruw Jones last year. The Hall of Merit has elected the top 7 vote-getters above plus Jones and has mostly ignored everyone from Wagner down. Which leaves six interesting HOM candidates in the middle of the ballot. And since HOM ballots require folks to list 15 names, that opens up a lot of opportunities for really old (Hugh Duffy, George Van Haltren) and really idiosyncratic candidates (Vern Stephens, Roy Oswalt) to show up on HOM ballots this year - and probably the next few going forward. Fun opportunity to get involved in that if you're so inclined!

Very happy to see Helton get this level of support. Stunned and saddened Wagner clears the 5% threshold. Kidding, sort of.

I was surprised to see Helton leapfrog over Sheffield.

Perhaps more people see Helton as a "complete" player. Defensive metrics are pretty damning for Sheffield, though I still see him as a HOF. It is interesting in light of all the discussion we had on whether Jones is worthy coming down to his defensive metrics. Should we put so much faith in Sheffield's numbers that he's penalized for HOF discussion? I honestly don't know, but I think it's interesting when looking at them on B-R he's terrible in the OF every season except for 2000 and 2002 when Rtot has him as just a bit below average, then in 2003 for Rtot/DRS he has a very strange pattern: 3/-2, -10/-9, -7/-14, 3/-1 but that was just 165 innings. So after six seasons of being well below average, at 31 years of age, he's average twice in three seasons by Rtot, and again the next year by both Rtot and DRS at 34 years old. I don't know if there's anything to be made of that, but it does seem odd.

Stunned and saddened Wagner clears the 5% threshold.

if it helps any, BBTF can't knock Wagner off subsequent BBTF ballot lists - only BBWAA can