January 25, 2023 By: Mark Knudson

The Baseball Hall of Fame needs a serious Reboot

The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum needs fixing.

On the heels of the announcement that standout third baseman Scott Rolen is the only player in this class to gain induction, there remain more than a few questions about the selection process and the way the Hall itself operates.

Yes, Rolen is deserving.

He’s been deserving for the past five years, but only this time did he garner enough support from the voters to gain induction. During those five years he didn’t get a single extra hit, make any standout defensive plays or win a second World Series.

Nope.

His credentials were the same five years ago as they are today. Yet this year he’s finally deemed worthy.

That’s just one of the quirky voting issues that plague this iconic spot in Cooperstown, NY.

Why are a particular player’s credentials better/more deserving in year six, seven or eight than they are in year one or two?

Why does the Hall still stick to the stipulation that only 10-year card carrying members of the Baseball Writers Association of America have a vote?

Why do some media members who no longer cover or even watch baseball still get a vote, and others – like the highly qualified baseball journalists on the MLB Network – do not?

Then again, why do some long retired players who these writers never deemed worthy get another chance at enshrinement via one of the various veteran’s committees?

Basically, why is baseball the only sports Hall of Fame where there appears to be an actual effort to keep guys out rather than look for reasons to put guys in?

The voting members of the BBWAA take the grief when well deserving players are left on the sidelines – this year it was Todd Helton and Billy Wagner who gained significant support but still fell short – but it’s the Hall that has anointed them the voting bloc. They should fully understand who they’re in business with. There’s a decent sized faction of BBWAA member voters who remain sanctimonious and self-important, and do stupid things like sending in blank ballots. There remains a strong east coast bias from voters in places like New York and Boston who refuse to consider new information on eligible players while advanced statistical measurements continue to evolve and offer more iron-clad evidence of a player’s worthiness (See Helton, Todd.)

And this group that includes many underqualified and self-important voters continues to be allowed to play judge and jury when it comes to real and/or perceived off the field violations of the nebulous character clause – which other sports haven’t gotten locked into (See Simpson, O.J.) Frankly, those the Hall has assigned to determine who is worthy are often times not worthy themselves.

What you are left with is a special place with not so special problems. Good news. The problems are fixable.

Start here: The Hall’s mission needs to be clear: Cooperstown houses a museum and not a cathedral. Make the admission criteria more precise. Baseball’s outdated character clause – put in place back in the 1930’s – is an epic fail. Scrub it. Museum’s are designed to display a full and complete history, not a whitewashed version. Like everything else, baseball has had great players and big moments that are tainted by controversy. So be it. Show it, warts and all.

For instance, the Black Sox scandal can be detailed in full while a player like Shoeless Joe Jackson, who had a Hall worthy career, is enshrined. It’s well documented that Ty Cobb was a racist. He’s still in. In more modern times, many of us detest Curt Schilling’s politics and the way he promotes his extremist views. So what? On the field, he was a Hall of Fame worthy pitcher, but he’s not getting in for non-baseball reasons. Makes zero sense.

All-time hits leader Pete Rose (like Jackson) remains on the outside – and has almost no chance of ever getting in under the current format – even while MLB embraces lucrative partnerships with multiple sports betting entities. Hypocrite much?

Another example: While many already enshrined players were known to have used performance enhancing substances like amphetamines in the past, the self-proclaimed guardians of the game – the BBWAA – refuse to allow more modern era players like Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens – who put up Hall of Fame numbers well before they were ever connected to (legal at the time) PED use – to get off the proverbial bench.

More hypocrisy.

So after you dump the outdated and useless character clause, and make certain that everyone knows you’re operating an all-encompassing museum, they need to reconfigure the entire voting system. Dump the confusing veteran’s committees. The inconsistency is maddening. Harold Baines was elected by a veteran’s committee – the same guys who continue to ignore all-time greats like Dale Murphy, Keith Hernandez, Kenny Lofton and others. No viable explanation for that has ever been given.

Create a new voting bloc made up of full-time local and national baseball media along with select Hall member former players who can, on a yearly basis, evaluate the candidacy of newly eligible players. They could do what the Pro Football Hall does and have players nominated and promoted each year by local media and then voted on by the entire group. A simple thumbs up or thumbs down on a player.

It would then be up to the Denver media, for example, to showcase to everyone the candidacy of Helton, using all available advance metrics, etc. Make the east coast biased members stand up and explain why ballpark adjusted OPS+, for example, somehow means more when they’re evaluating a former Met/Yankee like Carlos Beltran rather than a former Colorado Rockie like Helton.

Most importantly, emphasize a desire to add worthy players rather than trying to keep deserving players out for various and inconsistent reasons. Create a museum that tells the entire story of the game, including all the game’s greats who were integral to the story.

Make these fixes and baseball will finally have a true Hall of Fame and Museum.