Curt Schilling’s Vote Total Was Not the Biggest HOF Snub
By Thomas Lynch
While Curt Schilling’s vote total was disappointing, it wasn’t the biggest Hall of Fame snub. Credit: Howard Smith-USA TODAY Sports
For Arizona Diamondbacks’ fans, the 2015 Hall of Fame voting was mostly a positive outcome. Randy Johnson received the highest number of votes with 537 or 97.3% of ballots, one of the highest totals in history. However, fellow 2001 World Series MVP Curt Schilling couldn’t get out of the 30’s, getting only 39.2% on this, his third year of eligibility. While disappointing, there were other players who I felt received a greater slight than Schilling. While I do believe he will eventually get in, the same can not be said for the following deserving players.
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Tim Raines (55%): Perhaps if his best seasons came somewhere other than Montreal he would have been inducted already. He has 808 career stolen bases, fourth in the All-Time list perhaps never to be surpassed in that category. He was almost as much of a game-wrecker as Rickey Henderson was in his prime. Raines was a seven-time All-Star who had eight seasons of 90-plus runs scored with 11 seasons of a .380 on-base percentage or better.
Alan Trammell (25.%): When you think of premier shortstops of the 1980’s, there is Cal Ripken, Ozzie Smith, Robin Yount (before he moved to the outfield) and Trammell. The first three names are in the Hall. While Trammell’s numbers are not we are used to seeing from shortstops in later years, they were outstanding for his time. He was six-time All-Star, finished in the top ten of the MVP voting three times and was the 1984 World Series MVP. His biggest knock is that he did not lead the league in any category (except sacrifices) for any season during the course of his career.
Edgar Martinez (27%): Every player in Major League Baseball that has an award named after him is in the Hall of Fame. All of course except the great designated hitter from the Mariners. Had he played in the field, Martinez would have been elected already, probably as a first balloter. However, there still seems to be a deep bias against players who were a DH for much of their playing days. This is huge contradiction by the writers. Paul Molitor would never have been elected Cooperstown had he not been a DH during the second half of his career. The fact that one of the greatest hitters of the last 40 years can’t even come close to enshrinement might be the biggest Hall snub of all.
Jeff Kent (14%): I don’t understand this at all. I know Kent had a reputation of being difficult to deal with. I also know he was the best second baseman in the game for at least ten years, an automatic entrant for Cooperstown. He was a five-time All-Star, an MVP and finished in the top ten in the MVP race in three other seasons. I also have never heard his name in connection with PED use. All this adds up to only 14% of the vote in his second year of eligibility? This may be the most mystifying vote total of them all.