Every year, the Baseball Writers Association of America (BBWAA) releases a ballot of former players and managers worthy of being enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York. I then looked at the ballot the writers released and came up with votes of my own. Let’s get a few things out of the way, the players I voted for are just that, my vote if I were to have one, and as a result many of my choices may not get in. And secondly, there is no such thing as a “right” or “wrong” ballot, it’s all open to debate.
My 2015 Hall of Fame Ballot, Part 1 (Pitchers)
Now for the elephant in the room-steroids. I made eight selections of players who I believed are worthy of entry into Cooperstown. However, I did not vote in players like Roger Clemens or Barry Bonds, not because I know for a fact they took steroids, and not because they are not talented- there will never be another Barry Bonds or Roger Clemens. I did not vote for either one because if by chance they did take steroids and got inducted, I could not forgive myself for voting. Also, just because I did not vote for them this year, does not mean I wouldn’t vote for them in the future, in fact I more than likely would.
With that in mind, the Hall of Fame isn’t perfect, there are players who admittedly took Greenies (amphetamines) or players who sharpened their cleats or used pine tar on their bats. Now the number of supposedly dirty players in the Hall of Fame is substantially lower than clean players, but that isn’t to say there are no dirty ones.
I chose my eight selections based on their conventional statistics, certain Sabermetric statistics, and my personal opinion(s). With all that out of the way, let’s get to the picks.
1.) Randy “Big Unit” Johnson, starting pitcher (1988-2009)
There aren’t many words to describe Randy Johnson’s career. So I’ll speak in numbers. 22 seasons. Five Cy Young Awards, including four consecutive. 4875 strikeouts, second all-time only to Nolan Ryan. Ten All-Star appearances. a 104.3 WAR, 9th all-time amongst pitchers and nearly seven wins higher than the next closest pitcher. Johnson is also the last pitcher to strikeout 300 or more batters, doing so in 2002, when he struck out 334. Over his 22 year career, Johnson recorded 303 wins and did it faster than Phil Niekro (23 seasons) and Nolan Ryan (25 seasons). Randy Johnson, if not for one writer, may have been the first unanimous selection in history, and deservingly so.
2.) Pedro Martinez, starting pitcher (1992-2009)
Pedro Martinez is another pitcher with a remarkable career. He has a career 2.93 Earned Run Average as well as five ERA titles, including a season where he pitched to a 1.74 ERA en route to his third of three Cy Young Awards. Speaking of Cy Young Awards, Martinez was nominated for a Cy Young Award seven times and never finished worse than 4th. Martinez also led the league in WHIP six times with a career best 0.737 and in that same season, he had a stupidly good 8.88 K/BB recording a league best 284 Ks compared to just 32 BBs. In 18 seasons, Martinez lost 100 games, that’s an average of 5.56 losses per season. In the 14 seasons in which he started more than 18 games, he struck out less than 137 batters just once, and only twice in 18 seasons did his ERA go above 4.00.
3.) John Smotlz, starting pitcher/relief pitcher (1988-2009)
John Smoltz and Dennis Eckersley are the only pitchers in MLB history to record 150+ wins and 150+ saves in their career, and John Smoltz recorded a league leading 55 saves in 2002. He also led the league in wins twice as well as strikeouts twice and finished with 3084 strikeouts in 3473 innings pitched. Smoltz won the 1996 NL Cy Young Award after leading the league in wins (24), Innings (253.2) and Strikeouts (276)
The 2015 Ballot is filled with plenty of talented players, or else they wouldn’t be there. But, these three exemplified what it means to be a Hall of Famer by dominating the sport and the record books for years to come.
Honorable Mention(s): Roger Clemens, Mike Mussina, Curt Schilling
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