hall of fame, next vote...

Enjoyed watching him pitch -- fond memory of watching his no-hitter -- but I don't recall ever thinking he was a potential Hall candidate. Don't recall any media chatter about his chances, either. It was all Whitaker and Trammell. Even the bullshit stats can be used against him. "Winningest pitcher of the '80s" but I think he was second-losingest too. Career ERA nearly 4.00.

All-time sucker for "I don't talk to women when I'm naked unless they're on top of me or I'm on top of them."

Posnanski should have something good on this. He's written approximately 700,000 words on Morris and the HOF the past decade.

Radio report by a non-sports guy this morning was priceless. He said that Morris will "likely go in wearing a Tigers hat"--yeah, I would think so--and that Trammell would also "likely go in wearing a Tigers hat"; that's an even better bet, unless he opts for one of his minor league teams. He then said that Bonds and Clemens missed again, seemingly oblivious to the context.

Even the bullshit stats can be used against him. "Winningest pitcher of the '80s" but I think he was second-losingest too.

Not that it matters, but I wonder if he'd still be the winningest if you shift that one year either way, say '79-88 or '81-90. That distinction may be extra dubious.

(Meaning someone like Spahn or Clemens is going to hold that 10-year-window lead for a long period of time; Morris may just be in sync with the calendar.)

Bartolo Colon and Brad Radke for HOF

not while Kevin Tapani is on the outside looking in, amigo

i'm not as mad about morris as most people are. he does have a point that much (though certainly not all) of the case against him is based on ways of understanding the game that were not around during his time. furthermore, it seems as though current HOFers want him in their club. obviously he shouldn't be in (and there are others who didn't get in who have better cases), but given that he was elected by people in the game rather than the writers, it's not the end of the world to me

I see, so it's a smoking club now.

This badly needs a Cooperstown rewrite... "Blow it up before ANDY PETTITTE makes a speech!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5oLI9JH5v-E

i don't really have a good perspective on a lot of these guys but it's insane to me that marvin miller still didn't get in

when i was growing up as a huge baseball fan, i never thought of Jack Morris as a top tier pitcher and i was OBSESSED with baseball. like the players who were the best were pretty clear to me: Schmidt, Henderson, Raines, Murphy, Boggs, Sandberg, Winfield, Ripken, Murray, etc. the pitchers i remember were guys like the ones i mentioned upthread, i mean Dave Stieb towered above Morris as a pitcher, he just didn't have those pesky wins.

esp passing up the opportunity to put his plaque opposite BOWIE FUCKING KUHN'S xp

zero expectations, the HOF is a shitshow

Don't disagree with anyone that Jack Morris shouldn't be in the HOF--he shouldn't--but I do have a different recollection of his career: my memory is that he was usually, back then, discussed as a viable candidate (the reevaluation came later). And I agree entirely with Kevin's post: I'd rather be happy for the deserving people who get in than make a big deal out of the (more and more) occasional undeserving players who sneak through. In general, the Hall is getting better, not worse--not immediately, but that is happening.

Who would be today's Jack Morris? I am thinking of Cole Hamels.

john lackey

ah yes, good one.

I'd say CC Sabathia. CC's better--he starts his career in the PED era, and hits his peak coming out of that--but if he does hang around long enough to go in, it'll be with a lot of wins, a comparatively high ERA (again, needs to be adjusted), and a reputation as an inning-eater who was never (or rarely) among the top half-dozen starters in the game, but was among the Top 10-15 for many years.

There is a 5 year period between (2007-2011), that I would consider to be Sabathia's peak, in which he was second only to Halladay in fWAR. On top of that, he was arguably the best left-handed pitcher of that period.

you are doing CC a disservice

i know this isn't the best comparison to morris, but just for fun

bartolo colon

actually, maybe it's a decent comp?

https://i.imgur.com/aGxXEKh.png
https://i.imgur.com/0xnyo2d.png

and of course, the most important information of all:

https://i.imgur.com/I7pujkO.png

(xposts) Probably, yeah--in terms of peak, anyway. For their careers, their ERA+ is more comparable (117-105 for CC), but still a decent margin for CC.

I noticed Colon on Morris's Similarity Score list.

OK, Morris was the THIRD-losingest pitcher of the '80s. Clancy (126), Tanana (122), Morris (119).

Wins '77-'86: Guidry. '78-'87 through '83-'92: all Morris. '84-'93: Clemens/Viola

Morris never placed higher than fifth in AL ERA. Where he placed during qualifying seasons: 5th, 41st, 15th, 33rd, 10th, 20th, 9th, 6th, 5th, 26th, 37th, 34th, 16th, 27th. And of course his last two seasons, both non-qualifying, were flat-out terrible.

Morris never finished higher than third for the Cy Young.

Maybe if there had been something like a Hefty Cinch-Sak Durability Award during these years, Morris would've been considered recognized enough.

You never know with the Veteran's Committee, but I think he may be the last pitcher of his kind to go in. You'll need to have at least a reasonable sabermetric case from now on--"narrative" and all that will still factor in (Bumgarner), but you'll need both.

CC won a Cy Young and finished in the top five another four times. Outside of five (or maybe six) seasons, he wasn't a *great* pitcher and I could see that counting against his HOF candidacy. But he was/is a much better pitcher than Morris.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DQ2QHcOX0AAY0Ha.jpg

LOL

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DQ2QHcOX0AAY0Ha.jpg

I played in the Freehan and Kaline leagues when I was a teenager. The conference (or whatever) recently added Morris and Trammell leagues. I don’t know anything about baseball statistics but it makes sense from a little league perspective.

I realize that’s likely only interesting to Andy K.

Cliff Lee nearly equaled Morris' WAR in ~1700 fewer innings

do we have a roster of this year's Vets Committee?

Each year's Committee is different and is selected by the Hall Board of Directors. This year's panel includes six Hall of Fame players: George Brett, Rod Carew, Dennis Eckersley, Don Sutton, Dave Winfield and Robin Yount in addition to Hall of Fame manager Bobby Cox and Hall of Fame executive John Schuerholz, both of the Braves.

Mets general manager Sandy Alderson, former Blue Jays president Paul Beeston, Reds president Bob Castellini, Cardinals chairman Bill DeWitt, Royals chairman David Glass, veteran BBWAA members Bob Elliott and Jayson Stark and historian Steve Hirdt of the Elias Sport Bureau make up the remainder of the group.

https://www.mlb.com/news/modern-era-committee-prepares-for-hall-vote/c-263109628

I played in the Freehan and Kaline leagues when I was a teenager. The conference (or whatever) recently added Morris and Trammell leagues. I don’t know anything about baseball statistics but it makes sense from a little league perspective.

Kids born around 2025 will play in the Inge league.

Frick award to Costas

His stirring speech in that Space Ghost episode cemented it.

If you're appalled by Jack Morris, be happy they're not inducting the baseball equivalent of Bon Jovi, Dire Straits, or the Moody Blues. (If you count Morris as worse than any of those three, we either hear music or evaluate baseball players very differently.)

y'know, jack morris and dire straits isn't the woooorst baseball to music comp...

Bon Jovi is Trevor Hoffman, he comes into the game when the team is halfway there to a victory.

yeah sort of feel like those are pretty good morris/garvey analogs....

And you can throw the Cars in there too--didn't realize they were in.

On the HOF tracker it's interesting to see the net gain votes. Edgar and vlad are doing well enough that induction seems solid for both of them, but Walker has picked up 18 votes already from only small portion of ballots. Still only around 42% but that's huge.

Very surprised that Thome's holding at 97%. That's great, I'm all for it. I assumed he was going to be this year's Bagwell/Piazza, made to wait a couple of extra years because of suspicion. That gray area may have vanished permanently.

as Morbs said, no smoking needle (also no actual suspicion cast his way, iirc.)

My own recollection is that he was always mentioned on the list of suspected users, but when I do a search of "Jim Thome steroids," the first page of results are all about how he was clean. So I guess I'm misremembering.

Not helpful if you're of the belief he should be in:

http://www.12up.com/posts/5932863-curt-schilling-caught-praising-white-supremacist-during-radio-show?a_aid=36534

curt schilling should be elected into the hall of fame and then thrown into the bottom of the ocean

good plan imho

Edgar is currently at 80% on the HOF tracker. not sure how it'll play out the rest of the way but he seems like a safe bet for induction next year at least.

Larry Walker is at 40%, he's got two more years on the ballot, I could see a major push the next couple years. people seem to be coming around on him.

Emphatic Yes for both of them.

andruw jones is at 5.7%. hope he doesn't get jim edmonds'd