Rickey, Rice, and The Hall of Fame Election

Monday's Hall of Fame election will surely bring glee to the city of Boston while stirring outrage from many of the Sabermetric types who write and post on the Internet. The candidacy of Jim Rice, which has been hotly debated for years by Sabermetricians and mainstream writers, finally concluded on Monday afternoon with the announcement that Rice will join Rickey Henderson on the Cooperstown dais this July.

Stepping aside from the controversy for a moment, my predictions about a Hall of Fame election--for once--actually came true. (Perhaps that makes up for my hunch that Ron Santo and Gil Hodges were going to win election last month.) I felt Rice would barely squeeze by, and that's exactly what he did, gaining 76.4 per cent of the vote. I'll have to do some checking, but that may be the smallest margin by which anybody has won election to the Hall through the Baseball Writers' Association of America. The election of Rice not only means a victory for Rice, the city of Boston, and Red Sox Nation, but a victory for those mainstream writers who have supported his candidacy for years, based on the belief that his high RBI totals, high batting average, and peak period of performance meant more than his lack of walks, his tendency to ground into double plays, and his lack of longevity. It's an argument I support; I've felt that it's fair to regard Rice as a borderline candidate, but I've also considered him worthy because of his sheer dominance as a professional power hitter during the late seventies and early eighties.

In regards to Henderson, there was never any doubt that he would win election in his first year of elegibility. The only question involved the final percentage of the vote that he would receive. Henderson checked in at 94.8 per cent, about where I thought he'd be, and just a bit short of the Tom Seaver-Cal Ripken stratospere of voting percentage. Somewhat remarkably, 32 writers felt Henderson, the greatest leadoff man the game has ever seen and arguably one of the top five left fielders of all time, was not worthy of the Hall of Fame. I'm guessing that some of those no-votes decided to penalize Henderson for his occasional lack of hustle, his repeated late entries to spring training, and some of the general nuisance he caused most of his managers (at least not those named Billy Martin, who absolutely loved Rickey). If there are any other reasons for leaving Henderson off the ballot, I'd love to hear them. Hopefully, it's not the inane first-ballot nonsense that we sometimes hear, or some contrived argument that Henderson somehow was not a Hall of Fame performer. Anybody offering those lame arguments will have some serious explaining to do.

Then there is the case of Andre Dawson. I felt he'd come in at about 70 per cent, but I overestimated his total, as "The Hawk" finished at 67 per cent. That doesn't bode well for Dawson next year, even in a year when there are overwhelming first-year candidates and no holdovers that appear close to Hall of Fame inspection. It's probably too much to expect an eight per cent jump for Dawson in 2010, which could result in a very empty Hall of Fame class for the Baseball Writers one year from now.

Finally, the injustice of Bert Blyleven needs to be addressed. Blyleven has been the subject of some wonderful Sabermetric articles on the Internet, pieces that make a compelling case for "The Dutchman." Given the number of shutouts and complete games that he posted, given the lack of run support he received in all those 1-0 and 2-1 losses, and given his superior performance in World Series play (for both the Pirates and the Twins), Blyleven deserves the call to the Hall. Yet, his vote total actually remained virtually the same, going from 61.8 to 62 per cent of the vote. Unfortunately, too many of the mainstream writers just don't get it when it comes to Blyleven's dominance in both the regular season and the postseason. Even with average luck and average run support, Blyleven would have won more than 300 games, a total that becomes even more impressive considering how mediocre-to-bad the Twins were during his early major league career.

So, with the good news comes some bad news. Rice makes it, which brings the added bonus of larger crowds that will travel from Boston to Cooperstown this summer. Blyleven doesn't, with his candidacy seemingly hitting a plateau and perhaps even taking steps backward.

I guess it's one battle at a time when it comes to the Hall of Fame election--and how the writers evaluate what is truly greatness.