My Hall of Fame Ballot

By Mike Whiteman January 19, 2025 My writing for Start Spreading the News has not yet afforded me the opportunity to participate in the Baseball Writers Association of America Hall of Fame voting. That doesn't stop me of course from expressing my views. I'm a "big hall" kind of guy, and would almost always vote for the maximum ten candidates if I could. I do grant there have been the occasional questionable selections, the recent induction of Harold Baines often cited as one . As one who visits Cooperstown frequently, seeing his plaque does nothing to diminish my personal enjoyment though, and I'm happy for Baines and his family. As many say, the "lowering of the bar" opens up consideration of other popular players, which for me makes the speculating and debating even more enjoyable. It's my hope that we see beloved Yankees like Thurman Munson and Don Mattingly inducted someday. A note on Alex Rodriguez and Manny Ramirez. I continue to keep them off my ballot. I've read some reasonable articles advocating for their inclusion on the rationale that guys like Bud Selig, Joe Torre and Tony LaRussa are in the Hall and benefited from the efforts of PED players. I get it, but have hard time getting past Ramirez and ARod, who were both known multi-offenders. My stance is always open to review, but the line in in the sand I seem to be arriving at is the exclusion of those players who cheated once and were caught, then decided to cheat yet again and were nabbed a second time. So, here's my ballot:

Bobby Abreu - I'm jumping right in with with a controversial pick! I wrote earlier here that Abreu deserves more credit than he's gotten for his career, and I'd vote for him.

Carlos Beltran - One of the best all-around players of his time. His participation in the Astros cheating scandal was bad. He kinda apologized, which was OK. Before all of this went down he was a 70+ WAR player with 435 home runs, 312 stolen bases, good for the ninth best power/speed number of all time. He was selected as an All-Star nine times, and took home two Gold Gloves in center field.

Felix Hernandez - Does not have the typical starting pitcher counting stats - only 169 total wins. His case is made by his prime, which was impressive, with a seven-year peak of 136 ERA+, six All-Star selections, a Cy Young award, and two second-place finishes.

Andruw Jones - It's hard to quantify defensive performances, but here's an interesting measure: Total Zone Fielding Runs Above Average (Rtot). Baseball-Reference states this is a "total defensive contribution". Jones is the all-time leader in Rtot with 254. He's over 20% higher than the second best performer, Roberto Clemente. Dominant. One of the greatest fielders of all time.

Add 434 home runs, and we've got a Hall of Famer

Dustin Pedroia - Scrappy player, I couldn't stand him when the Yankees played the Red Sox. Wish he played for the Yankees though. He was the 2008 American League Most Valuable player. Also won four Gold Gloves. His 51.9 WAR is 23rd among second basemen all time. Known to play the game "the right way."

Andy Pettite - One of the best lefties of his era with 256 career wins. Was reliable (25+ starts 14 seasons) and clutch (19-11 in 44 postseason starts). Used PEDs, apologized, and by all indications never touched them again.

CC Sabathia - Perhaps the last of the aces that could put a team on his back. Sabathia's 2008 stretch run with Milwaukee was stuff of legends, going 11-2, 1.65 after being acquired from Cleveland. He then signed as a free agent with the Yankees, and immediately led a staff that went on to win the World Series. It may be a long time for his 251 career wins to be reached again, if at all.

Ichiro Suzuki - What else can be said about Ichiro? He was one of the most unique and exciting players of all time. One of only 33 players in the history of the game to reach 3000 hits, it's even more remarkable to remember that he didn't play his first MLB game until he was 27 years old. Add his Japanese League years, and he had 4367 hits.

Chase Utley - Utley's 64.5 career WAR is 15th all time among second basemen. He had seven-plus WAR in each of his first five seasons, and belted five home runs in the 2009 World Series.

Billy Wagner - Wagner was one of the hardest pitchers to hit. Ever. Many rate leaderboards require a pitcher to have thrown 1000 career innings, but if you drop it to 900, Wagner's 6.0 hits per nine innings is the best of all time. His .998 WHIP would be fourth of all time if he had the required innings. Just nasty. Wagner had 422 career saves, and retired after a 1.43 ERA and 37 save effort in 2010. Had he continued to play he could have certainly padded those career stats. Who would YOU vote for if you had the chance?