Harold Baines and Lee Smith are Hall of Famers

[djvang]

Change the name to Hall of Pretty Good.

[amjgt]

 

I'm not sure why you posted that. No one was comparing him to Martinez. Do you not understand why a 121 OPS+ over 11,000 PA is impressive? That's higher than HOFers like Bourdeaux, Dawson and Carlton Fisk. It's better than current players like Manny Machedo, Nolan Arenado and Adrian Beltre. His bat was worth about 40 WAR over his long career. That's not bad. As earlier said, I don't think he belonged in the HOF but he had a very nice career.

 

Nobody is claiming Baines wasn't a very good offensive player, but clearly the "regular" voters consider Martinez to be borderline and I was just pointing out how much better this borderline player was, offensively, than Baines was. I think comparing the 2 makes a lot of sense since Baines was a primary DH from age 28 until he retired. Martinez didn't actually become a primary DH until he was 32.

 

As a DH, I feel like he needs to do a lot better than 121 OPS+ and the voters agree since I believe the highest voter percentage Baines ever got was 6.5%

 

[beckmt]

I think most of us posters would agree that Lee Smith deserved the HOF nod,  Baines is a different issue and I rate him as marginal at best.  After this I would say that Mauer's chances of reaching the HOF are great.  Edger Martinez is now a shooin. 

[Mr. Brooks]

I think most of us posters would agree that Lee Smith deserved the HOF nod, Baines is a different issue and I rate him as marginal at best. After this I would say that Mauer's chances of reaching the HOF are great. Edger Martinez is now a shooin.

I don't agree on Smith. If Smith is a hall of famer, then so is Joe Nathan.

[beckmt]

 

I don't agree on Smith. If Smith is a hall of famer, then so is Joe Nathan.

Different era, can't compare the two like you are trying to do.  When Lee was pitching closers were doing 80-100 innings a year.  Nathen is from the specialist era, more like 60 - 70 innings.  

I think when Smith started saving games, you still needed to go about 3 innings to get a save.  Big difference.

[Bark's Lounge]

Baines was a professional hitter. Much respect for him. He's shouldn't be a HOFer, but he had some great allies on the panel that probably put him over the edge (Larussa, Reinsdorf). I'm not going to look it up but I think it was Frankie Frisch who was on a veteran's HOF committee or something of that nature who was persuasive to get a bunch of his buddies and peers into the HOF who were not deserving 50-60 years ago. That's how it goes. Crime Dog better get into the HOF now.

[amjgt]

Just looking at McGriff.

 

Other than a couple of the counting stats (Hits, RBI) where Baines has the slight advantage because of 1000 more PA, Crime Dog has the advantage across the board.

 

He also played almost exclusively in the field (not DH). 

 

Also interesting. There were 4 years that McGriff didn't make the All-Star team that he finished in the top 10 of MVP voting. How does that happen? 

[jkcarew]

When I watched these two play, Baines was more impressive than Smith...IMO. Maybe it's just that Baines was more consistently considered to be 'at/near the top' of his craft. Smith flashed big results, but had long periods, year-after-year stretches, where he really wasn't considered a top reliever. But he played forever. The biggest issue in my mind for Baines is that he was really a DH. Very good hitter for a long period, but not great, and was essentially a DH.

 

I admit I'm confused about what the HoF is trying to accomplish with these types of elections. There is an obvious gap here given the unwillingness to elect the players with big results but links to steroids. But, I'd rather have no inductions than inductions that further marginalize the standards.

[Danchat]

I'm getting a lot more confident that Mauer is going to be a Hall of Famer at some point in the future... not soon (as in not a first ballot shoo-in or anything), but if we're going to have a Baines line, Mauer's stats plus playing catcher is going to get him in.

 

I can see why Smith got in, while the stats don't look super impressive, I think he's got a much better case than Baines has.

[gil4]

 

Yeah, this is something I probably would have gotten anxious about back in the day, but it's not any more. I wouldn't have voted for either, but good for them anyway. This doesn't take anything away from the other folks enshrined. .

It's December - we can discus the minor signings the Twins have made, the Vikings' two-game losing streak, the U's Mediocrity Bowl bid (which was quite an accomplishment, considering they had to beat Wisconsin to get to it), or this. 

 

I would love for the HoF to recognize only the best to have ever played (and those who made worthy non-playing contributions), and I recognize it has fallen short in the past. The errors were especially egregious when Frankie Frisch was getting all his buddies elected, and I hate fact that we seem to be back to that after 40-50 years of mostly reasonable standards.

 

Still, I recognize what the HoF is - it's a museum run by folks in upstate NY with no real obligation to any of us except for those who make the trip and buy tickets.  The most important thing on their agenda is maintaining the relationship they have with MLB and it's players, because that is the biggest part of their marketing and exhibit acquisition plan. As long as there is no major uproar from those parties over the selections, they don't care who the writers or the veteran's committee (or whatever the new group is called) decide to put in.

[jokin]

 

I'm fine with the Smith addition, when you think of relievers between Goose and Hoffman/Rivera the only 3 that really come to your mind are Eck, Sutter, and Lee Smith. Guy pitched well for a very long time. 

 

Baines stumps me. It has to be about the longevity, right?

 

Nope.

 

It's apparently much more about the ridiculous committee compostion that voted for him.

 

How can it be possible that Baines' first paycheck-writer- Reinsdorf- Sox owner... AND his manager- LaRussa- twice- (for the White Sox and A's) were allowed to BOTH vote (and presumably) coerce the rest of the committee into voting for him?

 

"Pretty good" one-dimensional players, by definition, don't qualify for the HOF.