My Inner-Circle Hall of Fame Choices
Over at Baseball Past and Present, Graham Womack is conducting a fun and interesting survey of who his readers believe are the best of the best, regarding baseball’s Hall of Fame. He is calling it the Inner Circle project. If you click on the link, you’ll find access to a ballot which includes players currently in the Hall of Fame. Our challenge is to choose just 50 of them (and it has to be exactly 50) who theoretically make up the core of the Hall of Fame.
English: Original title: “Plenty of basehits in these bats” Original description: Washington D.C., July 7. A million dollar base-ball flesh is represented in these sluggers of the two All- Star Teams which met in the 1937 game at Griffith Stadium today. Left to right: Lou Gehrig, Joe Cronin, Bill Dickey, Joe DiMaggio, Charlie Gehringer, Jimmie Foxx, and Hank Greenberg, 7/7/37 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I submitted my ballot a couple of days ago, and decided to share it with all of you today. I have to admit that I found it very challenging to restrict my list to just 50 players. In my initial run through of the ballot, I checked off 65 names, and it was very difficult to decide which 15 players to knock off my list.
I suspect that somewhere around 30-40 players will appear on just about everyone’s ballot, but I anticipate some disagreement, perhaps a great deal, regarding the final 10 or so choices.
I decided to just list my choices without explanation, but I will be interested to hear which players you would have included or rejected compared to my ballot.
So here’s my list, as they appeared on the ballot:
1) Al Kaline
2) Babe Ruth
3) Bob Feller
4) Cal Ripkin
5) Carl Yastrzemski
6) Carlton Fisk
7) Charlie Gehringer
8) Christy Mathewson
9) Cy Young
10) Duke Snider
11) Eddie Collins
12) Eddie Mathews
13) Eddie Murray
14) Frank Robinson
15) Gary Carter
16) George Brett
17) Hank Aaron
18) Harmon Killebrew
19) Honus Wagner
20) Jackie Robinson
21) Jimmie Foxx
22) Joe DiMaggio
23) Joe Morgan
24) Johnny Bench
25) Lefty Grove
26) Lou Gehrig
27) Mel Ott
28) Mickey Mantle
29) Mike Schmidt
30) Nap Lajoie
31) Paul Waner
32) Pete Alexander
33) Reggie Jackson
34) Rickey Henderson
35) Rod Carew
36) Rogers Hornsby
37) Sandy Koufax
38) Stan Musial
39) Steve Carlton
40) Ted Williams
41) Tom Seaver
42) Tony Gwynn
43) Tris Speaker
44) Ty Cobb
45) Wade Boggs
46) Walter Johnson
47) Warren Spahn
48) Willie Mays
49) Willie McCovey
50) Yogi Berra
The On Deck Circle 
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I submitted a list as well, and we have a pretty significant overlap. One guy we agree upon who I think a lot of people overlook is Willie McCovey. That stretch from ’68 to ’70 doesn’t have any holes in it.
And hell, they named a cove after him out in San Fran bay. How many guys can say that?
Hitting 521 while playing the majority of your home games at Candlestick in an era favorable to pitchers ain’t too shabby either.
What….no Rabbit Maranville?
I voted as well but did not think to keep a list of who I picked. I would guess that at least 40 of our choices match. I do know that Al Kaline was not one of my choices.
Kevin
I was on the fence with Kaline, but ultimately went with my gut. So many great players to choose from, but yeah, the top 40 will probably be pretty consistent across the board. Looking forward to the final results.
Kaline in but Clemente out?
I really don’t see all that much difference between the two: Kaline – WAR: 87.4, OPS+: 134, Hits: 3,007, Home Runs: 399, and a large bagful of Gold Gloves. Clemente – WAR: 89.8, OPS+: 130, Hits, 3,000, Home Runs: 240, and a similarly large bagful of Gold Gloves. Kaline drove in over 100 runs 3 times, and scored over a hundred twice. Clemente drove in over a hundred runs twice, and scored over a hundred three times.
Clemente finished in the top ten in MVP voting eight times; Kaline finished in the top ten in MVP voting nine times. They were contemporaries of one another, and each played their entire careers with one team. They were each icons to their home-town fans.
To me, it basically comes down to personal preference. I guess I’m just more of a Kaline guy than a Clemente guy. But I think either one is a defensible pick.