A 2022 Hall of Fame Ballot of Your Own – and a Schedule of Profiles
It’s Hall of Fame season, if you haven’t noticed by the multitude of Era Committee posts that have run amid the flurry of recent transactions. While my annual series on the BBWAA ballot is barely underway, it’s time to launch what’s become a yearly tradition at FanGraphs. In the spirit of our annual free agent contract crowdsourcing, we’re inviting registered users to fill out their own virtual Hall of Fame ballots using a cool gizmo that our developer, Sean Dolinar, built a few years ago. By next week, I’m also going to use this page to lay out a tentative schedule for the remainder of the series.
To participate in the crowdsourcing, you must be signed in, and you may only vote once. While you don’t have to be a Member to do so, this is a good time to mention that buying a Membership does help to fund the development of cool tools like this — and it makes a great holiday gift! To replicate the actual voting process, you may vote for anywhere from zero to 10 players; ballots with more than 10 won’t be counted. You may change your ballot until the deadline, which is December 31, 2021, the same as that of the actual BBWAA voters, who have to schlep their paper ballot to the mailbox.
The ballot is here and contains all 30 candidates (sorry, no write-ins for those fixated on Pete Rose). We’ve got tables of career stats for the ballot’s position players and pitchers, if that helps, as well as a checkbox that allows you to see the stats of those already enshrined. As with last year, I’ll write up the crowdsourcing results sometime in early January, when we’re all jonesing for Hall news in advance of the announcement of the official results on January 25.
As for the schedule, since I’ve already fallen a few days behind the extremely preliminary one I sketched out a few weeks ago due to travel and Era Committee coverage, I’ve decided to skip full re-runs of some of the candidates who won’t be getting elected this year; instead, I’ll link to last year’s profiles while limiting my updates on those guys mainly to explaining where they stand, voting-wise. This is particularly aimed at the Barry Bonds/Roger Clemens/Curt Schilling/Sammy Sosa quartet of 10th-year candidates, because for the most part fully relitigating their situations feels unnecessary, and at the Mark Buehrle/Tim Hudson/Andy Pettitte group of pitchers, whom I’ll cover in light of S-JAWS, the experimental, workload-adjusted version of starting pitcher JAWS that I introduced during the Golden Days Era Committee cycle.
Rest assured that I’ll be covering every candidate at length or in brief, in keeping with what I’ve done since the start of my JAWS-flavored coverage in 2004. I’m not about to miss any now. New profiles below are denoted with asterisks.
Nov. 22: Intro
Nov. 24: Todd Helton
Dec. 7: Scott Rolen
Dec. 8: Gary Sheffield
Dec. 9: David Ortiz
Dec. 10: Billy Wagner
Dec. 13: Andruw Jones
Dec. 14: Jimmy Rollins*
Dec. 15: Bonds/Clemens/Schilling/Sosa
Dec. 16: Omar Vizquel
Dec. 17: Bobby Abreu
Dec. 20: Joe Nathan*
Dec. 21: Jeff Kent/Manny Ramirez
Dec. 22: Mark Teixeira*
Dec. 23: Buehrle/Hudson/Pettitte
Dec. 24: (site dark)
Dec. 27: Torii Hunter
Dec. 28: Alex Rodriguez*
Dec. 30: My Ballot
Dec. 31: (site dark)
Jan. 4: Prince Fielder*
Jan. 5: Justin Morneau*
Jan. 7: Ryan Howard*
Jan. 10: A.J. Pierzynski*
Jan. 12: Carl Crawford*
Jan. 13: Jake Peavy*
Jan. 18: Tim Lincecum*
Jan. 19: Jonathan Papelbon*
Brooklyn-based Jay Jaffe is a senior writer for FanGraphs, the author of The Cooperstown Casebook (Thomas Dunne Books, 2017) and the creator of the JAWS (Jaffe WAR Score) metric for Hall of Fame analysis. He founded the Futility Infielder website (2001), was a columnist for Baseball Prospectus (2005-2012) and a contributing writer for Sports Illustrated (2012-2018). He has been a recurring guest on MLB Network and a member of the BBWAA since 2011, and a Hall of Fame voter since 2021. Follow him on BlueSky @jayjaffe.bsky.social.
I got to 10 really fast. Jay, your work on the Hall of Fame is interesting and super fun to read. You convinced me on Helton.
I got to 10 easily and wanted to add a couple more
Same – I had 3-4 “no doubter” inner circle types, 3-4 more “clear yeses”, and then probably a half dozen right on the cusp – it’s really hard for me to weigh all the factors (both on and off the field) and compare across positions too – comparing, say, an Andy Pettitte to a Todd Helton to a Sammy Sosa to a Billy Wagner. I am simultaneously very envious of the actual voters and also realizing it’s no easy feat.
I got to 10 on my ballot. I couldn’t feel that voting for any of Papelbon, Jones, Sosa, Vizquel, Bonds, Clemens, Schilling was morally acceptable. The rest either had PED suspensions or just weren’t good enough to where I would vote for them. Also, could there be a separate hall of fame crowdsource ballot for the veteran’s committees?
What are the issues with Pap and Sosa?
A domestic violence incident in the 90’s for Sosa and Papelbon trying to choke Bryce Harper out kinda made him off putting for me even though for me he’s more of a fringe candidate.
I didn’t know that about Sosa. But for Papelbon, are you related to Harper? Is he your son? I don’t think he deserves to be enshrined but that’s about the most ridiculous disqualifier I’ve ever heard. Should Randy Johnson have been excluded for killing that bird?
Agreed – I think people should apply whatever standards make sense to them as long as they are internally consistent, but man that saints HOF would probably have about eight people in it.
that bird had it coming
Indeed. There’s a clear warning given by the PA announcer at the beginning of every game about anyone entering the field of play. That the bird didn’t follow the warning is not Randy Johnson’s fault.
Since folks are complaining about reaching 10 candidates quickly, could they increase the ballots size by purchasing additional memberships? Or is it a case that with multiple memberships they could, theoretically, “stuff the ballot box”? (Will we be seeing an increase in the Fangraphs membership graph?)
I think I see the humor!
Well, I learned my leason here. Don’t try to provide light-hearted humor/sarcasm on Fangraphs. Oh well. Apparenently I misunderstood the seriousness of HoF discussions. My bad.
After submitting, I realized I fell victim to recency bias. I had recently read Jay’s take on Helton, and voted him in. With so many worthy candidates, I left off Abreu. Checking my work, I don’t see why Helton should get in before Abreu does.
I found room for both! I only had nine candidates I wanted to vote for, so just added Hudson because I’m a big fan of his.
I had previously supported Schilling as he’d managed to go a few years without being an unrepentant asshole, but openly supporting the downfall of my country makes him a no for me.
Abreu was a hard cut for me. It’s really just the “feared hitter thing,” but I have Sheffield over Abreu–sometimes the subjective part of being a fan wins out, and Sheffield just scared the crap out of me whenever he came in the box against the Mets.
Unlike everyone else, I’m only convinced on Rolen. I’ve got others I’m thinking about but I am not sure.
You are a tough cookie
I’ve decided I only support players who I can justify cognitively and make me feel good while voting for them. There’s only one guy who definitely checks both those boxes. I haven’t ruled out some others, I’m just not convinced yet.
It’s gonna be a long time until 2024 with Beltre and Utley. This list of candidates is miserable to think about.
Different perspectives are why they need a variety of voters, not just large numbers of voters
Utley breaking Tejada’s leg with that slide should get him into the “no” category for you, I would think?
Utley injuring Tejada doesn’t matter to me much, I just don’t think he has the #s to get in. He had a great 5 year run, then couldn’t stay on the field. He was arguably the best player on the Phillies ’08 championship team, and he deserves whatever honors they decide to give him. But 1885 hits and 259 homers doesn’t make the Hall of Fame.
Unfortunately, an entire generation of 2nd basemen had their careers cut short. Utley, Pedroia, Kinsler and Wright (3rd base) were elite players for a time, but their overall stats will make it difficult to make it in.
Yeah, even adding players I’m 40/60 against, I only got to 4 guys which gave me plenty of space for “tip of the cap/continue the conversation” style nods.
No matter what, any sort of ballot clog is officially over after 2021-2022 with 4 guys cycling off the ballot and only Beltran jumping in in 2022-2023. The only guys in any trouble due to people not voting for them this year are Sheffield (who really needs an public advocate) and anyone at risk of falling off the ballot. Unlike the past half decade, this seems like the sort of year that shows the wisdom in forcing people to whittle down their choices to a top 10 list if they’re a big hall fan. If every fringe HoF case made it into the hall, they wouldn’t be fringe HoF cases anymore.
How do you define “Big Hall” and “Small Hall”? For example who is the best HOF or Candidate you would not vote for, and who is the worst HOF or Candidate you would vote for? I mean irrespective of the 10 player limit. My basic metric is bWAA, with bonus points for postseason, FIP, Giant Peak, and other stuff. Anyone >35 is in for me, and anyone <30 is out. Someone like Sheffield would be the worst one in and someone like Will Clark would be the best one out.
I don’t think best/worst is helpful because they’re by definition extreme cases.
e.g. a pro-Sheffield case (for me) is mostly an exercise in pretending he was a DH. I believe he was that bad in the field but at some point I think you should give decreasing marginal weight to extreme negative values (and the opposite for positive values). So Keith Hernandez would probably be the worst sort of player (greatest [meaningful sort of player]) even if it leads to inconsistent total value rankings.
I’m really less of a small hall guy than I probably portrayed above. I’ll generally come around on the guy bandwagoning towards 75%
I’d generally use a riff on WAA (excluding below average seasons for career totals purposes). Using that, something like >40 or <30 seems like a decent rule of thumb. I'm saying yes to a lot of guys in the 35-40 range but it's through gritted teeth (though that's partially because 35-40 means something different).
Taking another look at this list, I probably should have stressed how the big/small hall stuff is secondary to steroids (at least for those who vote for all players who would be deserving if we didn't care about roid use). If I don't exclude Manny/Sammy/Clemens/Bonds/ARod then the ballot starts to look a lot more crowded even if I don't see 5 additional players that deserve my vote.
So if we assume a ballot not stuffed with steroid users, I just don't think it's a bad thing that people are being pushed to clarify if they think Torii Hunter or Justin Morneau was actually better than Jeff Kent or which of Buehrle, Hudson and Pettite get the final spot on your ballot.
Right, if you just want to take JAWS at face value you get to 10 really fast. In alphabetical order, we’ve got Bonds, Clemens, Jones, Manny, A-Rod, Rolen, Schilling, Sosa, and Wagner, with Helton, Sheffield, Ortiz, and Abreu as borderline cases. But steroids knocks out five of those guys right away and maybe seven if you count Sheffield and Ortiz, two of them have pretty serious domestic violence allegations against them, I’m skeptical of relievers as Hall of Famers in general, and Schilling is his own special case. I’m not sure how to navigate all that, but if I was a voter I would be perfectly fine deciding I didn’t want to deal with any of it.
Just based on on-field numbers I had Pettitte in and Wagner and Abreu out. Not that it matters for your point.
I’m really struggling with the PED suspect candidates. There’s so many ways to break them up to justify their inclusion or exclusion. Right now I have Bonds, Clemens, Ortiz, Sheffield in but Ramirez, Rodriguez and Sosa out. The rationale being that Ramirez and Rodriguez cheated when PED rules were being enforced and that Sosa likely didn’t have the talent to make it in without PEDs. It’s messy though and I definitely don’t think that’s the only way to approach it. What are others doing?
I ignored the issue and just went with the on field results. It is a cleaner process but still morally messy. My approach is to put the best possible case for each player.
I would love for just Clemens and Bonds (and maybe Arod) to make it this year. I think they all deserve it despite the character clause, as they are clearly inner-circle all time great players on the field. But with only their inductions among the living, it’d be easier for anyone who wanted to skip it to do so.
Did anybody else find that the exercise of voting really changes your thinking about the whole process? My ballot keeps changing as I attempt to weigh all kinds of incommensurable factors. A “pure numbers” approach doesn’t feel right at all. Neither does a “happy memories” approach, or a “looked the part” approach.
I find myself thinking about different aspects of representation: how should we evaluate the pitchers of our time? How should we account for a contemporary understanding of the defensive spectrum? How should we think about representation of players from different backgrounds? How should we think about representation of different markets? How should we assign demerits based on baseball rule-breaking and off-field conduct?
If I had no limit, I think I’d vote for 15 or more players. It would be easier for me to say, enshrine the very best on-field guys and tell the whole story, warts and all. (And the museum as a whole ought to try to do that: to tell the whole story, and hopefully, in doing that, to make space for most or all of the guys on this ballot. ) But with the 10-player limit in place, it’s a lot harder to decide whom you’d like to see honored in the plaque room.
An interesting question is going to be what happens to Beltran in 2023. I think I’d be inclined to vote him in on technicality on my interpretation of the character clause.
I think he gets in, but he has to wait a few years. I’m not sure he was a 1st ballot guy before the scandal.
This might be the most controversial ballot ever. I think I have a good 10 though.
Pretty easy for me. There were exactly 10 worthy candidates in my estimation.
Abreu, Bonds, Clemens, Andruw, Pettitte, Manny, Arod, Rolen, Schilling, Wagner.
I’m a lifelong Yankees fan and I don’t consider Pettitte a HOFer. He was clutch in some very big games but was almost never the number one pitcher on the staff and was not a dominant pitcher.
Andruw Jones is the first pick for sure. As long as he is there, I don’t care as much about the other 9. His defense was other worldly and he should be in on that alone. But adding his offensive numbers should make him a lock.
For now: in alpha order- Clemens, Helton, Jones, Kent, Nathan, Pettitte, Rolen, Schilling, Vizquel, Wagner.
Noooooooo. Not Vizquel. Not even close.
Why not close on him? And if you want to cite the off the field stuff, none of that has any bearing to me in regards to Hall voting for players.
Strictly for on-field performance Vizquel isn’t close to deserving induction. He was an awful hitter and I think his D is overrated. Whenever I see comparisons to Ozzie Smith I’m flabbergasted.
His D may have been a little overrated, but it was still very good. Not Ozzie Smith best ever good, but very good. And awful hitter? Almost 3,000 hits is a big deal. Last a long time and accumulated a lot of stats, that matters.
I’m curious why you vote for Clemens but not Bonds? I look at them as a package deal.
Clemens and Bonds I agree are evaluated the same. Both to me were Hall worthy prior to steroids. Steroids just helped them steal some records. On this list I would have Bonds 11th, honestly out of spite for the “technical” claim that he is the home run king, when it should actually still be Hank Aaron. Petty? a little. If Bonds got in I wouldn’t be upset at all. But as I’ve said, the most important one that should be in is Andruw. For me there was nothing better than watching him make centerfield look easy.
Probably, at some point, I’ll support Bonds and Clemens. Maybe even that dirtbag A-Rod someday (but I can’t even imagine that at this point). But I can’t forgive them (yet) for becoming possibly the all-time best at what they did by using steroids. Mays, Ruth, Williams, and Aaron shouldn’t be supplanted that way.
My vote: Helton, Jones, Rolen, Sheffield, and Wagner.
I don’t care that he doesn’t have a statistical case, I voted for Mark Buehrle anyway.