Maddux, Glavine, Thomas elected to Baseball Hall of Fame; Biggio just misses

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

Because the people who leave those guys off their ballots almost never reveal their ballots. So far every ballot that has been made public (about three percent of last year's total) has both Maddux and Glavine on it. I'd be shocked if in the leadup to the announcement and whatever ballots the BBWAA releases that Maddux isn't on one.

 

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

Here's an interesting analysis (I find it interesting, anyway) of the number of votes per ballot for each BBWAA election back to 1936.

E = number of players elected
V = total votes
B = total ballots
V/B = votes per ballot

Code:

Year  E     V    B     V/B  Other    E     V    B    V/B  Players Elected
1936  5  2231  226   9.872                                Cobb, W. Johnson, Mathewson, Ruth, Wagner
1937  3  1919  201   9.547                                Lajoie, Speaker, Young
1938  1  2475  262   9.447                                Alexander
1939  3  2710  274   9.891  Special  1     ?    ?  1.000  E. Collins, Gehrig (S), Keeler, Sisler
1942  1  2338  233  10.034                                Hornsby
1945  0  2496  247  10.105                                [none]
1946  0  1948  202   9.644  Runoff   0  1318  263  5.011  [none]
1947  4  1559  161   9.683                                Cochrane, Frisch, Grove, Hubbell
1948  2  1036  121   8.562                                Pennock, Traynor
1949  0  1409  153   9.209  Runoff   1   920  187  4.920  Gehringer (R)
1950  0  1481  168   8.815                                [none]
1951  2  2167  226   9.588                                Foxx, Ott
1952  2  2185  234   9.338                                Heilmann, P. Waner
1953  2  2525  264   9.564                                Dean, Simmons
1954  3  2091  252   8.298                                Dickey, Maranville, Terry
1955  4  2383  251   9.494                                DiMaggio, Hartnett, Lyons, Vance
1956  2  1599  193   8.285                                Cronin, Greenberg
1958  0  2400  266   9.023                                [none]
1960  0  2314  269   8.602                                [none]
1962  2  1092  160   6.825                                Feller, J. Robinson
1964  0  1632  201   8.119  Runoff   1   940  201  4.677  Appling (R)
1966  1  2210  302   7.318                                T. Williams
1967  0  2321  292   7.949  Runoff   1  1198  306  3.915  Ruffing (R)
1968  1  2109  283   7.452                                Medwick
1969  2  2604  340   7.659                                Campanella, Musial
1970  1  2302  300   7.673                                Boudreau
1971  0  2681  360   7.447                                [none]
1972  3  3083  396   7.785                                Berra, Koufax, Wynn
1973  1  3044  380   8.011  Special  1   393  420  0.936  Clemente (S), Spahn
1974  2  3010  365   8.247                                Ford, Mantle
1975  1  2870  362   7.928                                Kiner
1976  2  2937  388   7.570                                Lemon, Roberts
1977  1  2939  383   7.674                                Banks
1978  1  2948  379   7.778                                Mathews
1979  1  3327  432   7.701                                Mays
1980  2  2963  385   7.696                                Kaline, Snider
1981  1  3026  401   7.546                                B. Gibson
1982  2  3344  415   8.058                                Aaron, F. Robinson
1983  2  3125  374   8.356                                Marichal, B. Robinson
1984  3  2905  403   7.208                                Aparicio, Drysdale, Killebrew
1985  2  2918  395   7.387                                Brock, Wilhelm
1986  1  2992  425   7.040                                McCovey
1987  2  2730  413   6.610                                Hunter, B. Williams
1988  1  2819  427   6.602                                Stargell
1989  2  3016  447   6.747                                Bench, Yastrzemski
1990  2  3050  444   6.869                                Morgan, Palmer
1991  3  2948  443   6.655                                Carew, Jenkins, Perry
1992  2  2609  430   6.067                                Fingers, Seaver
1993  1  2451  423   5.794                                R. Jackson
1994  1  2903  456   6.366                                Carlton
1995  1  2829  460   6.150                                Schmidt
1996  0  2687  470   5.717                                [none]
1997  1  2645  473   5.592                                Niekro
1998  1  2559  473   5.410                                Sutton
1999  3  3348  497   6.736                                Brett, Ryan, Yount
2000  2  2813  499   5.637                                Fisk, Perez
2001  2  3258  515   6.326                                Puckett, Winfield
2002  1  2810  472   5.953                                O. Smith
2003  2  3272  496   6.597                                Carter, Murray
2004  2  3314  506   6.549                                Eckersley, Molitor
2005  2  3263  516   6.324                                Boggs, Sandberg
2006  1  2933  520   5.640                                Sutter
2007  2  3584  545   6.576                                Gwynn, Ripken
2008  1  2907  543   5.354                                Gossage
2009  2  2902  539   5.384                                Henderson, J. Rice
2010  1  3057  539   5.672                                Dawson
2011  2  3474  581   5.979                                Blyleven, Alomar
2012  1  2921  573   5.098                                Larkin
2013  0  3756  569   6.601                                [none]

Note that the voters have become gradually stingier over time. Not entirely sure why, though I have some theories. On the other hand, 2013 did have the greatest number of votes per ballot since 1999. Among regular elections, the fewest votes per ballot ever came in 2012, with the strongest newcomer on the ballot Bernie Williams.

Every regular election has had a limit of 10 players per ballot and every runoff a limit of 5. This leads me to wonder how there could have been more than 10 votes per ballot in 1942 and 1945 and more than 5 votes per ballot in the 1946 runoff. Either the numbers on Baseball-Reference are off a bit, or the actual tallies were incorrect.

Any thoughts on this?

 

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

I bet a lot of the really bad ballots are cast by columnists and sports editors. I was frequently shocked to find out who had a vote. There was a person within the last few years who mouthed off about casting a blank ballot. I once heard that person ask in the press box what position Mark McGwire played.

 

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

I wonder if fewer votes per ballot actually indicates greater stinginess by the voters. It could be the case that voters are more divided, in the sense that there is more disagreement among them regarding who's even in the realm of Hall-worthiness.

 

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

Of of the main trackers has given its first projection with four percent tracking:

100 percent: Maddux
100 percent: Glavine
87 percent: Biggio
82.6 percent: Thomas
78.3 percent: Piazza
73.9 percent Morris

 

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

Leaving Seaver off as an oversight is better?

 

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

To clarify: People probably accidentally left him off.

So, unequivocally, yes. It's bound to happen with that many ballots. People make mistakes. They're human.

 

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

Umpires blow calls because they don't want to take the game out of the players' hands, even though that is exactly what they are doing. That's fine.

Voters are so careless they forget about Tom Seaver? Meh.

You are very forgiving.

 

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

No, I'm not. I concede that baseball idiots get ballots. But I think it's possible that no one left off Seaver to specifically protect anonymity.

 

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

I think that anyone that stupid shouldn't have a ballot. But anyway.

 

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

Numbers are off for 1942, I think. Wiki says 2,328 votes cast, not 2,338. That makes it 9.99 votes per ballot. But 1945 is still above 10 V/B, so I'm not sure what's up with that.

Since voting was conducted every three years from 1939-45, which made nobody happy, it's possible that a couple frustrated voters selected more than 10 players on their ballots and nobody at the Hall of Fame caught it. I don't think the BBWAA or the HOF has records of every ballot, then or now, so it might be impossible to determine what happened all these years later.

As far as the steady decline in votes per ballot over the last 75 years, it's logical to assume that almost all of the worthy players from the past have been inducted by now. But for the first X years of the Hall of Fame's existence, both the BBWAA and various special old-timers' committees were asked to consider thousands of participants from the game's entire history. It wasn't until 1947, after two straight BBWAA shutouts, that the writers were limited to voting for players who had retired between 1923 and 1946 (mostly because the voting had become so fractured and nobody was quite sure whether to focus on recent players or older ones.)

Anyway, over time, we've mostly "caught up" on electing past players so it would make sense that there's fewer deserving players to vote for in any given year. Or at least there should be if voters ever put in the deserving guys from the 1980s and 1990s.

 

Re: 2014 BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot released

I have no problem with people who vote for 10 or, if the rule were changed, voted for more than 10. But I also have no problem with those who vote only for the candidates they think belong in the Hall, and typically that number is fewer than 10. Seriously, when have we ever had 10 BBWAA-elected inductees on the stage at Cooperstown in a single year? I'm wondering how many ballots ever had 10 eventual HOFers on them at the same time, even if they went in over a period of years.