HOT STOVE BANTER: For baseball fans looking for sustenance during the cold off-season, I heartily recommend this series of articles by the writers at BaseballPrimer.com, outlining the strengths and weaknesses of every Hall of Fame candidate this year from unlikely vote-getters Mickey Tettleton and Danny Jackson to should-be-HOFers Eddie Murray and Dave Parker.
The articles run each nominee through the Keltner List, a series of fifteen subjective questions devised by baseball analyst Bill James to determine a player's Hall-worthiness, ranging from "Was he ever regarded as the best player in baseball?" to "Are most players who have comparable statistics in the Hall of Fame?" to the deeply subjective "Did the player uphold the standards of sportsmanship and character that the Hall of Fame, in its written guidelines, instructs us to consider?"
The test is not an absolute "get ten right and you're in", but as these articles show, it's the best way to start thinking about these players.
The Hall election results will be announced at 2pm EST tomorrow. For what it's worth, I'd vote this year for Gary Carter, Andre Dawson, Eddie Murray, Jack Morris (best pitcher of the 1980s) and Dave Parker. I'd probably vote for Bruce Sutter and Ryne Sandberg some day, but I'm still not convinced of their claims on immortality. I'd predict, however, that Eddie Murray and Ryne Sandberg are this year's inductees, with Carter just barely falling short. Again.
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