Goose Gossage, Jim Rice and Jack Morris need to go into the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame right now! I’m going to keep the explanations brief for tonight, but here’s my list on who is Hall Worthy, who is not and who I’m not sure about at this late hour:
Why Aren’t These Guys in Already?
Goose Gossage - I grew up hating the New York Yankees and the Goose personally made the late 70s very tough for me. He lasted longer and was better that Sutter or Fingers.
Jim Rice – Most feared hitter in the AL for a good long time even though his career was shorter than some would have liked. Plus nobody hit into a double play like him (kidding Jim! Still love ya!).
Jack Morris – The ace of about a thousand World Series winners and so very clutch. Sure his ERA is a bit high, but so is his win total which if memory serves led the majors in the 80s.
Why Do We Talk About These Guys & The Hall at All?
Mark McGwire – I bought it all at the time. The super human home run rate, the Paul Bunyan body and his grace toward the Maris Family. Too bad it all seems to have been a sham. He got his millions. He shouldn’t get into the Hall of Fame, but remains a shoe in for the Hall of Fake.
Don Mattingly – Shoulda, woulda, coulda. He ended up being a lot better than Darryl Strawberry who came up around the same time as him, but a back injury robbed him of his power. It’s a sad thing but a fact that Donnie Baseball just didn’t put enough good years together to make the HOF cut. And I don’t buy the Kirby Puckett comparisons, but that’s for another day.
And Finally Some I Need To Think More About:
Andre Dawson – Never struck me a HOFer, but many disagree. Love the cool Hawk nickname though.
Dave Parker – Coke will mess up your life and HOF chances.
Tim Raines – Should get some serious consideration.
Bert Blyleven - Never seemed like he was on the Seaver or Carlton level, but there are some strong numbers there and he’s oh so close to 300 wins despite playing on mostly bad teams.
Alan Trammel – Do not understand how this guy is so undervalued. You have to compare his stats to other shortstops of his day.
Harold Baines – Where’s that one moment of greatness or super fantastic season?
Lee Smith – Saves are cheap. Get Gossage in there first and then we’ll talk.
6 Comments
January 9, 2008 at 12:20 am
What about Dale Murphy?
January 9, 2008 at 3:09 am
Good question. The answer is that he was on his way to a HOF career and then never had another decent season after he turned 32.
Seriously, he was one of the best. Right there with Mike Schmidt in the NL having HOF years. But then along came his 32nd birthday & something wacky happened. He started batting in the .220 range with regularly. At 31, his OBP was .417. A year later it was about a hundred points lower and never got much better for the rest of his career.
Bottomline: 5 or 6 truly crappy years soiled his legacy. I wouldn’t be devastated if he got in, but I’m in no rush to get him his bust.
January 9, 2008 at 4:20 am
My thing with Murphy is that he has one of the highest career home run totals of those not in the Hall (pre-steroid era). I think Dave Kingman had more dingers, but that’s all he could do. Murphy was solid defensively and offensively until the end of his career. But I don’t think a poor end should disqualify him or negate his earlier success.
January 10, 2008 at 3:11 am
You’re absolutely right that Kingman was a one dimentional player. Murphy was more than that. But I do think part of a HOF career is consistent excellence. For me, the drop off is too severe even though his best 5 years are excellent.
That said, let’s get Rice in & then we can re-visit Murphy.
January 10, 2008 at 3:27 am
I just went back and looked at the ballot. All of the players who received 5% except Baines spent some time in my “HOF shoebox” as a kid. Some were taken out eventually, but they were all there at some point.
Rice only has one more chance with the writers next year, and if he doesn’t make it (I think he finally will), it’s off to the Veterans Committee.
January 10, 2008 at 3:39 am
I’m keeping my fingers crossed. And frankly it’s starting to hurt…