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2020 Baseball Hall of Fame Inductees
saucywombat
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Derek Jeter is in for sure, having appeared on every ballot revealed to this point.
Looking at the baseball hall of fame tracker, looks like Larry Walker will join him.
Likely that Curt Schilling will just miss this year (so 2021 inductee probably) and Clemens and Bonds will be close maybe as high as 70% (needing 75%). After this year Bonds and Clemens will have 2 more writer ballot years (2021 and 2022).
Ted Simmons got in this year as well via the modern era committee.
Always looking for 1993-1999 Baseball Finest Refractors and1994 Football Finest Refractors.
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The writers are softening their stance on steroids.
I think that bonds and Clemens make the hall of fame. I just think that this year they will not make 65 percent. they have two years left so then I think that they make it. I think that larry walker and schilling will come up short this year. I think that walker will have to wait for the modern committee to vote him in. it looks like jeter and ted simmons this year.
I would love a class of only Jeter and Simmons, although Schilling will probably get in this year or next and that’s fine. I don’t really buy Larry Walker as a HOFer. And I hope Bonds and Clemens never get in!
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Might be worthy, but I'm not sold on Walker. Batting average while in Colorado was 50 points higher than his years outside of Colorado. Schilling, if not for his mouth would be in and still should be.
With 28.9% of the votes in so far,Larry Walker currently sits at 84.9%. It's looking pretty good for him.
Who is it that has that spreadsheet tracker? Whoever puts that together does an outstanding job.
Personally, my list of who is in the HoF that shouldn't be is longer than my list of who isn't in that should be. That wasn't the case 10 years ago, or even 5 years ago. Not sure if that means I'm just getting older, or if I'm jus an a$$. (Its probably both.)
I don't think Walker should be in but I'd take him over Baines. This is a sentence I will likely repeat for 10 of the next 15 inductees.
Fred McGriff should be in, and I'll leave it at that.
Great article on Larry Walker and this year's HOF dynamic:
Never mind the benefits of playing in Denver: Walker’s all-around performance is worth a pass to the Hall in his final year of eligibility.
By Tyler Kepner
Dec. 27, 2019
Derek Jeter grew up beside a baseball field in Michigan, dreaming of playing shortstop for the Yankees. The fates cooperated, and Jeter lived out a fantasy that will soon earn him election to the Hall of Fame on the first try.
Life was different in British Columbia for young Larry Walker, whose high school did not have a baseball team. Walker played goaltender on hockey teams with Cam Neely, the future Boston Bruins star, and expected that sport to be his destiny.
At 17, a summer fling with a youth baseball team led to an unlikely spot on the Canadian national team and a free-agent contract with the Montreal Expos worth $1,500. Walker was so raw that, in his first summer as a pro, as a base runner for the Utica Blue Sox, he crossed the diamond from third to first — without touching second — after an outfielder unexpectedly caught a fly ball.
“He didn’t know the rule,” said Walt Weiss, a former teammate and close friend, repeating a story that is part of Walker lore. “But he ended up being the most instinctive player that I ever played with. He had a sixth sense on the field.”
That sixth sense became the sixth tool for Walker, who combined hitting, slugging, running, fielding and throwing as well as any player in his generation. But while Jeter can start making plans to be in Cooperstown, N.Y., for induction ceremonies in July, this is Walker’s 10th and final chance to be elected by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America.
Voting members must submit their ballots by Dec. 31, and the Hall of Fame will announce the results three weeks later. As recently as 2014, Walker seemed unlikely to make it; he collected just 10.2 percent of votes on a crowded ballot that included 12 players now in the Hall, plus Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens, who have been shunned for ties to performance-enhancing drugs.
But Walker’s support has risen steadily since then. He climbed to 54.6 percent last year, and this year’s public ballots suggest he will amass the necessary 75 percent. In 60 votes revealed through Wednesday, as compiled by Ryan Thibodaux — @NotMrTibbs on Twitter — Walker was polling at 85 percent.
To Weiss, who played with Walker on the Colorado Rockies from 1995 through 1997, the upward trend makes sense. Weiss shared clubhouses with the Hall of Famers Rickey Henderson, Chipper Jones and Harold Baines — and steroid-era sluggers like Jose Canseco and Mark McGwire — but calls Walker the best player on any of his teams. Yet even for Weiss, it took a while to understand Walker’s place in history.
“A few years ago I was unsure, even though I knew how great a player he was,” Weiss said. “But then, when you start to dig in and see where he ranks in some of these categories all time, it blows you away.”
Walker ranks 12th on the career list for slugging percentage, ahead of Hank Aaron, Willie Mays and Mickey Mantle. Only six players can match him in batting average (.313), on-base percentage (.400) and slugging percentage (.565) — Jimmie Foxx, Lou Gehrig, Hank Greenberg, Rogers Hornsby, Babe Ruth and Ted Williams.
Walker played in only 1,988 major league games, fewer than all but two position players elected by the writers since 1970: Mike Piazza, a catcher, and Kirby Puckett, whose career ended abruptly because of glaucoma. But Walker’s total is within a season of the recent electees Jeff Bagwell (2,150), Vladimir Guerrero (2,147) and Edgar Martinez (2,055) — and he ended strong, with an .886 on-base plus slugging percentage for the St. Louis Cardinals in 2005.
The bigger issue, for many voters, is where Walker spent his prime years: in Colorado, with the Rockies, the only existing franchise with no alumni in the Hall of Fame. Many voters dismiss the distorted offensive numbers from the fun-house mirror of Coors Field and its mile-high elevation.
“There’s such a stigma to having played there that I think we go too far when we want to penalize guys for it,” said Weiss, who also managed the Rockies from 2013 through 2016. “Yes, you get rewarded offensively, there’s no doubt about it. But there’s also some unique challenges of playing there, too.”
Switching from thin air to sea level all season takes a toll on the body, Weiss said, and the Rockies are the only team that must leave its time zone for every road game. Hitters can struggle on the road because pitches behave differently, he added; the same ball that hovers in the strike zone in Denver may break out of the zone elsewhere.
To be sure, Walker benefited from Coors Field, where he hit .381 with a .462 on-base percentage and a .710 slugging percentage. But his career road totals are excellent (.278/.370/.495), and when he won the National League’s Most Valuable Player award in 1997, Walker had a better O.P.S. on the road than at home.
His career road O.P.S., .865, is equal to or better than those of George Brett, Ken Griffey Jr., Reggie Jackson and Willie Stargell, all first-ballot Hall of Famers. Walker has more stolen bases (230) than all of those players, in addition to winning seven Gold Gloves.
“He’s one of the best base runners I ever saw, and other than Andruw Jones, he’s the best outfielder I’ve ever seen — and for sure the best corner outfielder,” Weiss said. “He did all the other things, the peripherals, and for me that’s what puts him over the top.”
Weiss compared Walker’s baseball acumen to that of another former teammate, the Hall of Fame pitcher Greg Maddux. Nobody else, he said, could so routinely surprise him with a tip or a strategy he had never considered.
“In the outfield, when the ball was hit down the line, he’d run in the general area of the ball, but he wouldn’t watch the ball — he’d be watching the runners,” Weiss said. “He always said that the hitter would tell you if it’s fair or foul, and then he wanted to know where the runners were the whole time. He just did things like that that I never heard anybody else say before.”
Advanced metrics have raised the profile of recent electees like Bert Blyleven, Tim Raines and Ted Simmons (elected by a veterans’ committee this month), and they are kind to Walker, too. Baseball Reference credits him with 72.7 wins above replacement; Jeter had 72.4, in 759 more games. Of the last four outfielders elected to the Hall of Fame — Andre Dawson, Griffey, Guerrero and Raines — only Griffey has more WAR than Walker.
WAR is an imperfect statistic, but it tries to encompass everything, including ballpark factors. Walker ranks well above the Cooperstown borderline, and voters should recognize that games in Denver — where Major League Baseball has sanctioned its product for 27 seasons — count just like all the rest, with unique complications for the players who call it home.
The writers have one last chance to recognize Walker for the all-around force that he was, without punishing him for where he played.
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Keeping out Schilling for so long just because he has political beliefs a little different from the writers. I mean the man is the Mr. October of pitching!
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Walker will probably be just out or just in. Remember-last year his final total was more than eleven percentage points less than his public total. If it happens again, he’s out.
Jeter is only one getting in.
The public ballot percentages are always higher than the final totals.
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Oh no not that time of year again where I predict Clemens and Bonds get in and Tim says no and he’s always right
4 years ago I thought this would be the year but I might end up like Charlie Brown missing the ball again. I’m predicting they get 70% this year.
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Jeter might need his own separate induction ceremony. I was there in 2007 with Ripken/Gwynn with approximately 75,000 people in attendance, which was a record crowd. Cooperstown will be bursting at the seams when Jeter goes.
At this point, I'm not sure either will hit 60%. Bonds is Net 0, Clemens is Net -2 from returning voters so far.
Jeter
Schilling
Walker
Book it.
Schilling still needs to net 53 more new voters (currently +7), Walker 68 (currently +19). Sadly, I think Schilling falls short at ~70%, but gets in next year, and Walker is going to be down to the wire.
What odds would you give?
Schilling was brilliant on the mound, I always loved watching him pitch. I remember when he had that bloody ankle and toughed it out. He was intense to watch.
99.99/.01 (just in case he murders someone in the next couple weeks)
20/80
49/51
I predict there will be one writer who is so desperate for attention that he leaves Jeter off his/her ballot.
One voter said publicly that hr considered not voting for Jeter. He wanted to vote for 12, and he knew Jeter was a shoo-in. He did vote for him though.
100%
Would love a piece of that action. They might all get in, but the odds are against it.
Not hating on Simmons, or other similarly elected more modern era players, but I'm still not ok with the committee putting them in before they finally elect Joe Jackson into the HOF.
Joe Jackson? Are you serious?
Looks like things are really firming up for Larry Walker. Polling at 85%+ with almost 40% of the vote in. He only needs a handful of the people that didn't vote for him last year to vote for him this year to insure enshrinement.
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He's +30 votes so far (Net 25 on returning voters + all 5 first time voters so far) after falling short by 87 votes last year. Assuming he continues at the same rate of pickups, he'll finish with +80-81 and be a few votes shy of induction. Still basically a coin flip w/odds slightly against.
I’m still rooting for only Jeter and Schilling to join Simmons
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Schilling is on pace to pick up 30 of the 60 additional votes needed and finishing w/~68%, I don't see much likelihood of him making it this year. But, he's in a better position than Bonds/Clemens, who are both likely to finish about 50 votes shy at ~63%
I think its just Jeter and Simmons. Walker will probably just fall short. I'm stoked to see Simmons get in. He was one of the best hitting catchers ever and tough as nails. Too bad they can't reverse the horrible Baines selection from last year. Fred McGriff is so much more deserving than Harold Baines.
Baines getting in was a joke, you could probably come up with 50 more deserving players from the 1960’s - 1980’s. How about Al Oliver? Agreed McGriff should get considered too.
I dont even see him in the top 10 (I really wanted to say 20) of hitting catchers.
Top of my head without using the internet.....
Piazza, Carter, Berra, Dickey, Bench, Fisk, Cochrane, Posey, Mauer, Campanella
I would not give up on Walker. If I were a betting man, I would say he gets in.
I don’t think it’s a slam dunk that Fisk was a better hitter than Simmons. He had more home runs, but Simmons had a 15 point higher batting average and a higher OBP. In most other areas their numbers are pretty comparable.
Simmons had a higher OPS+ than Fisk and Carter. Nowhere is it said that a person must be a top 10 hitter at his position to be in the HOF. There are 19 catchers in the HOF. At least nine of them are not among the top 10 hitting catchers in the HOF.
Eck has approximately the same WAR as Sutter and Hunter combined.
I never said a word about the HOF. Someone said he was one of the best hitting catchers ever, and I said he wasn't even in the top 10.
Anyone know why Dale Murphy keeps getting snubbed? Two NL MVP's and almost 400 home runs seems impressive to me.
Terry Bradshaw was AMAZING!!
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His pace of new votes is on a slight upswing after dropping a touch, but it's stayed pretty steady at looking like he'll pick up 80-83 votes after falling short by 87 last year. Put another way, he dropped 11.3% in the Actual vs. pre-results last year, so at 85.4% currently would look like he'd finish with 74.1%. It's going to be really, really close for Walker, whichever way it falls. I'd bet against, but wouldn't be comfortable about it.
I actually hope that Walker and Schilling make it this year which will open the gates for Clemens and Bonds next year.
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With the exception of 1981, he was a HOFer from 1980 through 1987, then fell off a cliff production-wise at the age of 31. Basically, he wasn't good enough for a long enough period of time though these days that doesn't necessarily mean you won't eventually get into the HOVG anyway.
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Votes have been coming in fast and furious on the tracker today. I'm not sure what time they announce tomorrow, but latest predictions from me today ...
Jeter - lock, but have a sneaking suspicion he doesn't quite get 100%
Walker - falls shy from 2-7 votes and waits for Vets Committee election (pick up of 80-85 votes of the 87 he was shy last year)
Schilling - picks up 30-35 of the 60 new votes he needs, likely makes it next year, if not a lock on his final ballot (barring him opening his mouth)
Clemens/Bonds - pick up of 16-18 votes of the 66-68 new votes needed, they really need to catch some steam in the next two years to have a chance
Abreu is looking like the only first year candidate who is sure to roll over to next year. I have a feeling there will be some late support to keep another 1 or 2 candidates on the ballot, but no idea who at this point (Giambi and/or Soriano most likely).
They announce at 6pm EST
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I should have time for some last minute adjustments then
He wasn’t good enough. Newhouser, Maris and Gonzalez have 2 MVPs.
One should have nothing to do with the other.
Agreed, the reason these guys aren't getting the votes has nothing to do with ballots being full of more worthy candidates and no room to add them.
Would love to see Jeff Kent and Billy Wagner get more support. Kent is one of the best offensive second baseman of all time and Wagner is one of the most dominant relievers of all time.
Todd Helton deserves for support as well. He was more than just a product of Coors. .316 career average, impressive stats across the board, doubles machine, and a great fielding first baseman,
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Larry Walker didn't do enough IMO..... injured and just short of HOF.....I don't care how much his contemporaries adored and respected him..... IT's not enough to have potential if you didn't play enough IMO.