The invention of Twitter is either the best or worst thing that ever happened to me as a baseball fan.

As many of you know, I have been preparing mock hall of fame ballots for at least the last dozen or so years. This started as maybe a fun launching point of debate at work or with my fellow Triumph member community but has now turned into something completely different. Mrs. Taxman has even made me my own site (you can see some past ballots that I was able to find) and I have even received requests waiting for my ballot. With the ease of access to information, Twitter, voter columns, opinions, and personal Hall of Fame pilgrimages, I have too much information available and thus have significantly expanded the word count over the years to the point that I am not sure anyone reads anymore.

I am however somewhat glad that I don’t really understand these new advanced metric stats that all the kids are using today. All I know is that I can use them to advance my argument and ignore them when I see fit. I think that’s what everyone does anyway.

For those of you who have read my ballot the last number of years know where I stand on the steroid issue. You also know and understand my love of Cooperstown, the Hall of Fame and baseball. Last summer I again ventured down to those hallowed grounds staying at my favourite (or at least usual) stomping ground near the corner of Chestnut and Main. It marked the third time in four years that we made it down for induction weekend. Every year at this time I say I am not going to go anymore because I am so mad at the process, but I just can’t help myself. Even leading up to the weekend itself, I think that it won’t be that good. As soon as I get there, I forget everything I was upset about and start stalking my former heroes, collecting autographed baseballs and debating whether I should pay the extra $75 to get Rickey Henderson to inscribe “Man of Steal” beside the autograph I just purchased for $90. The answer is no I didn’t do it and yes I regret it.

However,  if I have to listen to Jane Forbes Clark, chairwoman of the Hall, stand up and spew out the words “honour” and “integrity” one more time, I will scream. She reminds me how wrong the process has become. The way she stood there again last year and lectured on integrity and then shook the hand of Tony La Russa made me sick. The hypocrisy of the last two summers almost killed me.

Last year, just hours before the ceremony, I received notification (on Twitter of course) that the Hall had reduced the number of years a player can remain on the ballot from 15 to 10 years. This was done presumably to remove the debate and “stench” of the steroid era players from the ballot earlier. It’s smart. I have always said that the way to take this debate away was to simply put Clemens and Bonds in the Hall, where they belong, and then we can focus on baseball arguments and not a Sarah Koenig-style analysis as to who may or may not have used steroids. With the new rules we can continue this nonsense debate for only the next 7 years, not the next 12.

I am not going to rehash my full steroid rant from the last two years. For that, you can read my ballots from those years. What I am going to focus on today are what the effects of the steroid divide has done to our “esteemed” voters who have been put in charge of making a morality decision for us as opposed to preserving history and honoring the true people who make baseball successful: the ones who actually pay for tickets. Me.

Let’s start with Buster Olney. I like Buster Olney. He generally makes sense. And for the most part, his ballots have been bang on. This year, he decided he wasn’t going to vote. Huh? Not vote? Why? You know what I would do for an actual vote? That’s the generally part. His rationale was essentially that because the ballot has become so crowded with “steroid players” not being elected into the Hall, he is forced to decide between players to come up with his 10 maximum players to vote on. Oh yeah. In case you didn’t know, voters are only permitted to vote for 10 players. Buster’s problem is that to come up with 10, he’d be excluding certain players that he feels should otherwise be hall of famers. Ergo, by excluding his ballot from the denominator (players are required to appear on 75% of all ballots to be elected), he wouldn’t be penalizing players that he feels deserve to be in the Hall. Make sense? I don’t get it. I realize that I am not the best at mathematics, but that argument makes zero sense to me whatsoever.

I do agree that it is not ideal to have to decide on the 10 best as opposed to analyzing each player on their own merits. But then again, a hall of fame is by its very nature a comparison of different players, so I don’t necessarily agree with that argument. This has caused many writers to appeal for what they call the “binary” voting system. This system merely involves saying “yea” or “nay” beside each name. That actually makes sense. The binary name really doesn’t, but that’s a whole mathematical argument that I will let my dad make. Is the “yes” a one and “no” a zero? Whatever. The point is, now we have a debate amongst writers as to whether the 10-player limit should be abolished or changed. Lynn Henning of the Detroit Free Press is using a similar argument to not send in a ballot. Personally, I don’t think the number is as big an issue as they make it out. I wouldn’t classify myself as a “small hall” guy, but I also wouldn’t classify myself as a “big hall” guy. I think baseball has actually found the right balance – save for the era of my childhood. I read somewhere that the writers have requested the 10-player limit be increased to 12. I assume the Hall will deny this request and keep the status quo for the sake of keeping the status quo. After all, that would be the hypocritical thing to do (i.e., change the rules only when it’s convenient for their argument) and we know the Hall is all about hypocrisy. Truth be told, while I do feel that this ballot has more than 10 deserving candidates, next year’s influx of players only yields one automatic entry: Ken Griffey Jr. He was never suspected or caught using steroids. So, his back-to-back 56 homer seasons in the heart of the steroid era was that much more impressive…and he never reached totals that neared that in other years.  Hmm… I don’t actually believe Griffey ever juiced, nor do I actually care, but my point is, well I don’t know what my point is. My point is that Griffey Jr is a hall of famer as is Barry Bonds and next year, assuming we get a decent clearing of the backlog, we can go back to debating the merits of Edgar Martinez and Allan Trammell – who clearly in my mind are not the top 10 on this year’s ballot and fall within the next tier of players I didn’t discuss.

One unfortunate side effect that this year’s ballot brings is with the backlog, there are many candidates that will not meet the 5% minimum quota to remain on the ballot another year. Maybe this was also part of the Hall’s master plan as there is a great chance that McGwire, Sheffield and Sosa – admitted and suspected steroid users – will fall off the ballot. However, my bigger fear is that Larry Walker and Carlos Delgado will fall off. Carlos is almost assuredly going to fall below the 5% mark. Larry is not trending well.

Trending well? What does that mean?  Thanks to Ryan Thibs (@notmrtibbs), I have on auto-refresh a collection at my fingertips all the ballots submitted and published by various writers. It’s amazing and terrible all at the same time. Gone is a lot of the mystery from the day of the announcement (tomorrow), but who needs mystery. According to his projection, there are three sure things (Pedro, Randy and Smoltz), one likely (Biggio) and one on the cusp (Piazza). Everyone else is in serious trouble. This includes Carlos Delgado who presently has 2 votes out of the 154 published (1.3%). You need about 427 to get elected, so he is mathematically eliminated with only about 416 ballots not accounted for. He needs to pick up 30 votes from somewhere just to stay on the ballot (7% of remaining).

The other troubling side-effect from both the aforementioned backlog, the 10-player limit and @notmrtibbs is that writers have enough information to actually consider “gaming the system.” What does that mean? Well, writers are debating not voting for clear Hall of Famers like Pedro and Randy (sitting at 152 and 151 out of 154 voters) because they will definitely make it in and use those votes on other guys. Amazing! It’s actually smart, but definitely not what you should be doing with your ballot. In fact, Mike Berardino (Twins writer) did exactly that. The only drawback that I can see is that you become known as “the guy who didn’t vote for Randy.” But you know what? Who cares.

Anyway, this might be a record introduction (1500 words-ish) and I have to tell you that I strongly considered “gaming” my ballot and not voting for Pedro and Randy. But then I remembered that I don’t actually have a ballot.

So, without further ado, I present my own personal ballot, had I had one, picking 10 candidates out of my count the 13 who are Hall of Fame worthy.

I have put in parenthesis their current vote percentage according to @notmrtibbs.

Pedro Martinez (98.22%): I don’t even have to look up the stats. I know what I am getting here. I am getting one of the most dominant pitchers that I have ever seen. It’s weird that my most memorable Pedro moments are not the 3000 strikeouts, the career sub-3 ERA in a hitters’ era, the years on the Mets and Phillies….ok, I truly have no memory of the Philly and Met years, it’s obviously the “who’s your daddy” playoff game against the Yankees, the WWE wrestling move on 100-year-old Don Zimmer and parading around a little person throughout 2004. I learned just now from a little bit of Googling that Nelson De la Rosa (that’s his name) actually died in 2006. RIP Nelson.

Randy Johnson (98.82%): Like Pedro, Randy spent part of his career with the Expos, just not nearly as long to make his mark there. He was in Montreal long enough to be a cornerstone in a Mark Langston deal that many Expo fans still kick themselves over.  This year will be a bit of a somber reminder of the Expos as these two guys might be the last Expos to ever grace the Hall. I really should have read Jonah Keri’s book that has been sitting on my shelf for the last year to better prepare for this post, but I did not. (You can read about my 2014 books in a separate blog post.) It is arguable that Randy Johnson is the best left handed pitcher of all time. He certainly is the best I have ever seen. He had a great nickname (who calls themselves “big unit”?) and has all the requisite stats (303 wins, 4875!! Strike outs, 4 Cy Youngs (in a row) and a 3 and a quarter career ERA) that spanned 22 seasons

Tim Raines (65.09%): My ballot isn’t in any order, unless you consider the fact that I was on a bit of an Expos theme.  Why this guy lingers around 50-65% baffles me. Had Rickey Henderson not been in baseball at the same time, Tim, or the “Rock” would have been in the Hall years ago. Next year will be his 9th and second last year on the ballot. Player votes generally increase as they get closer to their final eligibility year. I think the partial backlog clearing next year will help him finally get over the hump. He is trending well. As you know, his year at the plate last year was worthy of more hall of fame votes. That’s obviously another example of the  joke of the voting process, and remains one aspect that I will never understand. How can players trend upwards? You either are a hall of famer or you are not! Anyway, it looks like another crime against Mr. Raines will be committed this year and he will be forced to wait. After armed with more facts from reading Jonah Keri’s book, my ballot next year will focus on getting the Rock over the hump.

Roger Clemens (45.29%): Even though I can’t really stand Roger Clemens as an athlete or from what I can see and read about him as a human being, I can’t deny that he is one of the top 5 greatest pitchers of all time. Maybe the second best pitcher I have ever seen pitch (behind Maddux) and possibly the best I have ever seen live. Those two years he pitched for the Jays were an event.  The interesting thing is that it appears that he is trending upwards. The steroid debate is so divided that I don’t know if he will ever get enough support to get all the way to 75, but who knows.

Barry Bonds (45.29%): Amazingly, they aren’t the same 45.29% of writers and some actually who voted for one didn’t vote for the other. Absent the steroid argument there is no possible debate for Bonds (or Clemens). I’ve written enough not to waste any more words about Barry. He was and still is the greatest of all time. Period. He was also never caught juicing, so he was dominant at that as well.

Mike Piazza (77.06%): The only drama tomorrow will be whether he’s in or out. I think he just misses. Of course, the greatest hitting catcher of all time should spend at least four years on the ballot. It doesn’t make any sense. Oh yes it does. Remember all the bacne! That’s code for steroids and that means votes are withheld and he is forced to wait.

Jeff Bagwell (63.53%): Here is another guy who is forced to wait yet another year even though he did things at the first base position that are accomplished by few others. He hit home runs, he walked, he stole bases, he spent 15 years on one team. Well, that last stat doesn’t make someone hall worthy, but in the era where we are valuing integrity and honour, why not throw in loyalty? His statistics consists of 450 homers (with no “crazy” season within the steroid era), 1500+ rbi, 200+ steals,  and .297 career batting average. Throw in a bunch of gold gloves and a rookie of the year accolade and you have the formula for a hall of famer in my book.

Craig Biggio (82.94%): Craig missed the cut by one vote last year. It may have been mine. Well, it couldn’t have actually been mine, but the theory of why I left him off the ballot is what cost him. He likely fell victim to at least one voters 10 person limit. Craig also has the statistics to be a hall of famer. He has his 3000 hits, which to me is automatic entry. He also did it at a premium position. There aren’t that many second basemen who put up the statistics that he did. According to Baseball reference, his six most comparable players are all hall of famers. His JAWS is actually not that great with guys like Lou Whittaker and Chase Utley ahead of him. But, I don’t know what that means so it can’t be that important. Bottom line is that Biggio is a hall of famer and he will likely be recognized as such. I’m still a bit bitter they didn’t put him in the year we went and they voted nobody in aside from three dead guys from before the World Wars.  It would have been nice to have a living member there that weekend. It would also be nice to have him go in with Jeff Bagwell, as Craig was a career Astro during the same era.

We now come down to the final two spots and I have four names. How can I possibly figure this out. Screw it. I am gaming the system.

Larry Walker (7.60%): I know that this is my most controversial entry and I believe that he is a borderline hall of famer. I think there are many worse players in the Hall and when you look back at his statistics, I believe that Larry is a prime candidate for the veterans committee to elect one day. Larry may not even survive past this ballot as he is sitting tenuously close to the cut line. He has homer totals which are borderline (383) and may be admittedly a touch light, but his other stats make up for it. He is a career .313 hitter. Career!  1300 rbi, over 2000 hits, and 230 steals. He has an MVP award, 5 gold gloves and 5 all star appearances. Yes, he is borderline, and a sure-fire hall of famer in any other sport. My Hall is big enough to include him and it’s not because he is Canadian and yet another Expo (you’d think I was a fan by this post). And, I’m sure the advanced statistics would make him seem better. And if they don’t, then my advanced statistics do.

This leaves three players and one spot; John Smoltz (87.13%), Curt Schilling (51.46%) and Mike Mussina (34.50%)

I honestly, can’t tell the difference between these three players. Two (Smoltz and Schilling) spent the majority of their careers facing pitchers hit every night, while Mussina faced a career grinding it out in the AL East, when the AL East was insane. They all have their prerequisite win totals with Mussina and Schilling above 250 and Smoltz who would have been there had he not spent three years in the bullpen being a dominant closer. Mussina just fell short of reaching the magical 3000 strike out total (177 away) with the other two eclipsing it. Mussina’s last season was a 20 game winning one. Who does that?

I guess if you are going to game the system, you might as well go all the way. So, for my final spot, I have decided to give it to the Moose, Mike Mussina. He has been overlooked by too many throughout his career and he is getting my respect this time through. I fully expect Smoltz to sail into the Hall this year and Curt to make it within the next few. I think all three of these guys deserve a spot in my Hall and you will see two of them back on my ballot next year.

Thank you for reading. Until next year….