At Last

The third straight Red Sox LF from 1939-1987 (Williams, Yasztremski, Rice) headed into the Hall. It only took 15 years to get him in. Only nine other guys have as many home runs and a higher career average. Those names read like a who's who of the best the game has to offer: Aaron, Foxx, Gehrig, Mantle, Mays, Musial, Ott, Ruth and Williams. Rice, despite the wait and despite this being his last HOF ballot, undoubtedly deserves his place among them. The ONLY player with three straight seasons batting .315 or higher, 39+ HRs, 100+ RBIs and 200+ hits. He was straight dominant for 12 seasons in the AL, as the ONLY player of his generation (1975-1986) to hit over .300 while clubbing 350+ HR. During the same span he amassed 6 Top-5 finishes in AL MVP voting, and, in 1978, he was the first AL player since Joe DiMaggio in 1937 to accumulate more than 400 TB in a single season (even in the steroid era, no ALer has done it since). And did we mention the broken bat check swings? There's no stat for that, but...

ESPN noted that he joins Bobby Doerr, Ted Williams, and Carl Yasztremski as the only members of the Hall of Fame to spend their entire career with the Red Sox. "That's, I think, one of the biggest accomplishments," Rice said.

One other interesting note: Joe Gordon got in on the Veterans Commitee ballot. This is well deserved and I only bring Joe Gordon's name up, because of the 1942 MVP voting in 1942. Ted Williams hits for the fucking Triple Crown and they give it to Joe Gordon? Granted this was decades ago and Ted was how he was with the press, but you have to be kidding me. The same goes for the 2 morons that voted for Jay Bell on this HOF ballot, and the 5 that didn't vote for Rickey Henderson...Outrageous. We're going to vote for a guy (Jay Bell) with less than 200 career HRs and a sub-.270 career BA and leave the guy with the 5th highest mark in career Ks out in the cold (Bert Blyleven)? My only rationale for the 2 Jay Bell votes is that someone is rubbing it in with Blyleven...Bell was part of a three player package that sent Blyleven to the Twins in 1986. Abstract yes, but there really is no defense for the votes that Jesse Orosco, Mo Vaughn, Jay Bell and Matt Williams received. None.

The system is officially broke.

Jim Ed 63 Shy of the Hall

Photo Credit: [Boston Dirt Dogs]

From ESPN.com:

NEW YORK -- Mark McGwire fell far short in his first try for the Hall of Fame, picked by 23.5 percent of voters while Tony Gwynn and Cal Ripken Jr. easily gained baseball's highest honor.

Tarnished by accusations of steroid use, McGwire appeared on 128 of a record 545 ballots in voting released Tuesday by the Baseball Writers' Association of America.

Ripken was picked by 537 voters, appearing on 98.5 percent of ballots, falling just short of the record percentage of 98.84 set by Tom Seaver when he was selected on 425 of 430 ballots in 1992.

Gwynn was just behind with 532 votes, 97.6 percent.

Goose Gossage finished third with 388 votes, falling 21 shy of the necessary 409 for election. Jim Rice was fourth with 346, followed by Andre Dawson (309), Bert Blyleven (260), Lee Smith (217) and Jack Morris (202).

Jim Rice was an absolute menace to opposing pitchers for 12 straight years. He is the only player to ever have three straight seasons with over 200 hits and 35 home runs (go ahead, look it up, no A-Rod, no Gehrig, no Ruth, no Mantle, no Williams, etc.). All-Star 8 times, 100+ RBI 8 times, .300 BA 7 times. Oh, and about those 12 years, this from the NY Daily News:

"Twenty M.L. players have hit .300+ with 350+ HR over a 12-season stretch (Ruth was the first, from 1915-1926), but Jim Rice stands alone in his dozen years (1975-86). He is the only M.L. player of his generation who accomplished the feat (linking 1974, when Aaron became the career HR leader, to 2001, when Bonds became the single-season HR leader). All players [achieving this mark] who have been on the Hall of Fame ballot have been elected – except for Jim Rice."

While certainly not a stat worth discussing in Hall of Fame talk, I would be remiss if I didn't mention Rice's penchant for breaking bats on check swings. That's right, check swings.

Rice is now at the point, in terms of votes, that he should eventually get in. McGwire, on the other hand, will most likely never be enshrined. If this attitude towards possible steroid/performace enhancing offenders continues, we will be saying the same thing about Rafeal Palmeiro and Sammy Sosa. If Palmeiro, Sosa and McGwire never make it into the Hall they will be the only members of the once elite "500 Club" to be left out. Here's hoping that Barry Bonds will serve the same sentence of exclusion.