Is it harder to make the hall now than in the earlier years?

[dominik]

I'm not talking league quality here but about the fact that you have to beat out the old time legends AND today's players. the longer the game exists the more great players have played. of course also the size of the hall increases but I think this still doesn't compensate completely the bigger pool of players. every year new great player emerge and the size of the hall is only so big.

imagine the game in 100 years. then there will be probably 600 great players in the history of the game but will the hall get that big?

I'm of course not talking about williams or cobb here. those guys are the best of the best in any time. but I believe that it used to be easier to make the hall as a "mistake" for the lower level HOFers.

what do you think?

[StanTheMan]

Generally speaking.... agreed.

[GiambiJuice]

Considering that Jimmie Foxx and Joe Dimaggio weren't elected on the first ballot....

Considering that Duke Snider had to wait a decade and Kirby Puckett was elected in his first year of eligibility....

Considering that 7 time home run champ Ralph Kiner had to wait about 15 years....

I think it was much harder back in the old days.

[Honus Wagner Rules]

Considering that Jimmie Foxx and Joe Dimaggio weren't elected on the first ballot....

Considering that Duke Snider had to wait a decade and Kirby Puckett was elected in his first year of eligibility....

Considering that 7 time home run champ Ralph Kiner had to wait about 15 years....

I think it was much harder back in the old days.

The voting sytem was different in the "old days". It's hard to compare the two. In the 1940's they didn't even vote every year. For many years there wasn't even a five year wating period after retirement. DiMaggio actually got one vote while still active in 1945. More modern players like Ryne Sandberg, Gary Carter, and several others had to wait as well. Puckett's election doesn't suggest that it's easier to get elected today IMO. Puckett got in on because his eye problems were perceived as a non-baseball playing injury, was a hugely popular player, and he got the sympathy vote. Not too dissimilar to great players dying young who got in very quickly.

[jalbright]

It is easier for the greats now than in the past, as we’ve cleared away almost all players at this level. On the other hand, I think it is tougher for the borderline or poor choices than in the past, as 1) we won’t have another Frankie Frisch VC again, and 2) picks are held up to modern modes of analysis, which are making deeper and deeper inroads into the game.

The pool of borderline and below players is larger given that the number of players is larger. I don’t think the pool of truly great players playing at one time has changed much over the years—and that’s who the Hall should be honoring. Looked at one way, we have inducted about two players a year for the history of the game once we exclude players who aren’t eligible. We probably should continue that approximate pace. It may be more difficult at times to identify which candidates are most deserving because of a larger pool of candidates—but I’d say the modern metrics should at least compensate or even work to make the selections easier despite the larger pool of candidates.

[Tyrus4189Cobb]

I'm a Hall of Fame extremist, but If I was king of baseball I would completely redo it. Without touching any of the actual museum, I would re-establish which players are enshrined. Not only are there some completely boggling selections/omissions, there's also my fear of a Hall that is too large. I wouldn't want to see 500+ players fifty years from now. Doing so simply undermines the Hall's prestige. Sure, maybe Joe Tinker was a decent choice in 1946 when segregated leagues still existed and modern play was decades away. In 1946, I suppose you could consider him a top 10 all-time shortstop. The game has changed since then. I believe the Hall of Fame would be better served if we started from scratch and reselected. I'd say 16 players per decade is good, giving us 255 players by 2050, making the Hall of Fame elite, presitigous, and avoiding a "Hall of very good" status.

[jalbright]

I'm a Hall of Fame extremist, but If I was king of baseball I would completely redo it. Without touching any of the actual museum, I would re-establish which players are enshrined. Not only are there some completely boggling selections/omissions, there's also my fear of a Hall that is too large. I wouldn't want to see 500+ players fifty years from now. Doing so simply undermines the Hall's prestige. Sure, maybe Joe Tinker was a decent choice in 1946 when segregated leagues still existed and modern play was decades away. In 1946, I suppose you could consider him a top 10 all-time shortstop. The game has changed since then. I believe the Hall of Fame would be better served if we started from scratch and reselected. I'd say 16 players per decade is good, giving us 255 players by 2050, making the Hall of Fame elite, presitigous, and avoiding a "Hall of very good" status.

While I understand your concerns, I don't think you could work with the existing hall and not harm it by attempting what you suggest. Maybe a new hall could become a solid competitor, but it would take a lot of money and time to overcome the advantages Cooperstown has amassed by this point. Whether we like it or not, I think the practical impact is we have to take the current Hall warts and all and just try to patch in the worst omissions and go forth in a way which limits the extent and number of additional future problems.

[Tyrus4189Cobb]

While I understand your concerns, I don't think you could work with the existing hall and not harm it by attempting what you suggest. Maybe a new hall could become a solid competitor, but it would take a lot of money and time to overcome the advantages Cooperstown has amassed by this point. Whether we like it or not, I think the practical impact is we have to take the current Hall warts and all and just try to patch in the worst omissions and go forth in a way which limits the extent and number of additional future problems.

Certainly. I was only shooting forth my plan should I ever be crowned baseball's king.

Though the least we could do is elect Minnie Minoso....

[jalbright]

Certainly. I was only shooting forth my plan should I ever be crowned baseball's king.

Though the least we could do is elect Minnie Minoso....

I'm with you on Minoso, and would add it would be a shame to wait for his death to induct him. They didn't find a way to honor Buck O'Neill before he died, and Ron Santo was six feet under before he was honored.

I'm not sure even the king of baseball could avoid damaging the hall with the harm that would come from the course you suggested. In fact, I think it about as unlikely as your being appointed to that role

[GiambiJuice]

I'm with you on Minoso, and would add it would be a shame to wait for his death to induct him. They didn't find a way to honor Buck O'Neill before he died, and Ron Santo was six feet under before he was honored.

I'm not sure even the king of baseball could avoid damaging the hall with the harm that would come from the course you suggested. In fact, I think it about as unlikely as your being appointed to that role

Please forgive my ignorance, but what's with all the love for Minoso? I never saw him play so maybe I'm missing something, but from looking at his player page on Baseball-Reference, there is nothing on that page that screams "hall of famer". He was a good hitter, but not great. Had a decent power, but nothing special. He was one of the worst high-volume base stealers of all-time (does anyone with at least 200 SB have a lower success rate than his 61%?), and he retired with fewer than 2,000 hits. I just can't see anyone with less than 2,000 hits being deserving unless he was a catcher, or someone with prodigious HR and walks totals (McGwire).

What am I missing?

[leecemark]

--The missed time at the front of his career due to segregation, his pioneering role for Latin American blacks (he was the guy Clemente somehow gets credit for being) and his being a great ambassador for the game.

[J W]

I'd say that Minoso is one of the key members of baseball integration and was good enough to deserve election every bit as much as Larry Doby.

His most similar batter by age for nine consecutive years (28-36) is Enos Slaughter, and both were respectable defenders. To my knowledge, Slaughter is regarded as as towards the bottom of the "solid HOFer" list and is hardly ever considered a mistake.

I just noticed that Minoso led the league in HBP ten times. Was that a function of his stance, his race, or both?

[CandlestickBum]

What am I missing?

His alliterative name is not enough for you?
Okay then.
Besides leading the leagues in hit by pitch for 10 years running? You want more? He played professionally in 7 different decades.

And he has a cool song.

[willshad]

Please forgive my ignorance, but what's with all the love for Minoso? I never saw him play so maybe I'm missing something, but from looking at his player page on Baseball-Reference, there is nothing on that page that screams "hall of famer". He was a good hitter, but not great. Had a decent power, but nothing special. He was one of the worst high-volume base stealers of all-time (does anyone with at least 200 SB have a lower success rate than his 61%?), and he retired with fewer than 2,000 hits. I just can't see anyone with less than 2,000 hits being deserving unless he was a catcher, or someone with prodigious HR and walks totals (McGwire).

What am I missing?

Looking at the stats, it seems Minoso is one of those guys who was good at a lot of things, but not really exceptional at any....that would cause his value to not really 'jump out at you'. Good batting average (but never led the league), good on base percentage, pretty good power, apparently good speed (nickname 'cuban comet', and a lot of triples) even if the stolen base percentages didn't show it, good in the field. Kind of reminds me of Bobby Abreau. He averaged 5.5 WAR a season in his 9 year prime, which is hall of fame production. Like Abreau, however, his problem is lack of any kind of longevity or value outside of his prime, and thus doesn't really have the counting stats he needs. Also like Abreau, didn't really have any 'wow' type of seasons, and was overshadowed by much better hitters (Mantle, Williams).

[davewashere]

Considering that Jimmie Foxx and Joe Dimaggio weren't elected on the first ballot....

Considering that Duke Snider had to wait a decade and Kirby Puckett was elected in his first year of eligibility....

Considering that 7 time home run champ Ralph Kiner had to wait about 15 years....

I think it was much harder back in the old days.

There also seemed to be a bias among some voters for the first 20 years or so of HOF voting against recently retired players and in favor of players from the previous generation. In some cases, retired players were also competing for votes with players who were still active. It was a confused system and yes, it was harder for the legendary players (like DiMaggio and Foxx) to make it on the first ballot, but they had no trouble getting in soon after that. Even with the Old Timer's Committee there were still some backlog issues. Those early years of HOF voting also gave us many mediocre HOFers like Rabbit Maranville, while the Old Timer's Committee gave us guys like Tinker, Evers, and Chance because they were fond of a poem from a newspaper. That's not to say that Tinker, Evers, and Chance were terrible players, just that it seems clear the motivation for selecting them was not playing ability.

Kirby Puckett got a huge sympathy vote because of the suddenness of his career-ending ailment and the fact that he was still a star player.

Ralph Kiner was great, but he also had one of the shortest careers of anyone elected to the HOF as a player. Modern metrics that were not used by voters back then, such as OPS+ and WAR, show how good Kiner was, but to those voters he was a sub-.280 hitter who only played 10 seasons. They had to weigh that against his home run totals, and for many years he came up short.

I think it's harder for borderline players to make the HOF today than it was back then. Those players seen as superstars get in on the first ballot with greater ease than ever before (as long as they don't have PED suspicions), but in most cases they aren't competing for votes with other superstars unless they happened to retire in the same year (think Ripken and Gwynn). The scrutiny of HOF voting in the Internet era has made it harder for borderline players to sneak in, although I think it still happens (I was very much opposed to both Jim Rice and Bruce Sutter getting in). Fans now expect voters to be able to defend their votes, and writers who make unwise choices (like voting for David Segui) will have people questioning how they could have a career writing about baseball and still be so ignorant.

I really don't think there are many players left from the beginning of the live ball era until the end of the golden era who are deserving of the HOF but are not yet in. I would hope that 70 years from now people will be able to say the same thing about the modern era, but I'm not so sure. Dick Allen could never muster more than 20% support and Dwight Evans was dismissed on his third ballot, and both of them rank better than many golden era and earlier HOFers using sabermetric stats. The writers who mostly ignored Lou Whitaker's value during his playing days also ignored his career when he showed up on the HOF ballot. He was a multiple-Gold Glove winning second baseman with over 700 extra-base hits and multiple Silver Slugger awards, yet only 2.9% of voters considered that HOF worthy.

Modern HOF voting is a mix of name recognition and detailed statistics. In the old days I feel it was mostly just about name recognition. A solid nickname was probably worth a few dozen extra votes in those days. Even having the same nickname as another candidate could influence vote totals. Lefty Grove received 2.2% of the vote in 1960, most likely from voters who mistakenly put his name down instead of Lefty Gomez. Grove had been inducted into the Hall 13 years earlier. The VC decided to let Lloyd Waner in the Hall in 1967, because god knows you can't have a Hall of Fame with Big Poison and not Little Poison. The voters (and the fans) take the process more seriously these days, and I can't imagine novelty selections getting enough support to actually get in.