Annual HoF Rant: Why John McGrath is Wrong

BWAA voters for Major League Baseball's Hall of Fame are now subject to the scrutiny of having to defend their ballots. Beginning this year, ballots are being released by the Hall of Fame to show just who voted for who. No more of this anonymous sanctimonious voting without being subject to defend or explain your reasoning. It probably had something to do with guys like Maddox and Griffey not getting unanimous selections. It is indefensible beyond some unspoken, unjustifiable claim that consensus players still should not get unanimous elections (or dumber yet, the notion that you should always have to wait at least one year before getting inducted).

My hate of the Hall of Fame voting process has been well documented on this blog for years. Little on that needs to be said. Today, let me focus my rant with one particular writer: John McGrath. McGrath at least filled out a full ballot (how some only thought there were 5 or so hall worthy players in ridiculous), but he was among those who for another year denied Bonds and Clemens, clearly the two best players on the ballot, and players so good they are in the conversations for best in the history of the game.

McGrath's reasoning is laid out here. To sum it up: some players never cheated to extend their careers while these guys did and that is a clear violation of the "character clause" of the ballot.

The clause he's referring to is the language of the ballot that reads "Voting shall be based upon the player’s record, playing ability, integrity, sportsmanship, character, and the contributions to the team(s) on which the player played."

Integrity, sportsmanship, character. These are the words upon which McGrath, and enough other BWAA voters hang their hat in order to deny Bonds, Clemens, and other players of a similar painting (such as Sosa). Now let me say why he's wrong.

There really is no historical proof that the clause has ever been used to not vote for a player. Pete Rose and Shoeless Joe can't count because they were never even included on a ballot for someone to use the clause to not vote for them. I mean, we have players who doctored the ball, mound chargers, racists, adulterers, etc. We have players who did things during careers, after careers, directly related to the game or not and yet never once did that clause stop any of them from being inducted but now it is going to be used against two players who literally have a better case career-wise in being in the hall?

Really I think history has shown us the opposite. Not only has history shown us that players were not excluded from the hall on the grounds of character flaws whether they affected the game or not, but I think it shows us that the clause is more there for the opposite reason: namely, to give reason to vote for a player who might otherwise not have a career case but belongs in the hall because of other impacts on the game. That is, it gave the voters grounds to vote for players who would be excluded otherwise. Instead of trying to make it some great list of objectives to be checked off (when ever has anyone shown any effort to only vote for players that were elite on every category, meeting some great formulaic bar by averaging their character with their career?), it was to give another medium by which to declare a player a hall of famer. This clause you might say nullifies the argument that say Jackie Robinson did not have a hall of fame career, which if he were judged only on numbers, in a vacuum, like if you had not his name but only awards and counting stats in front of you a person could reasonably say "great career, but not long enough" (Robinson only played 10 MLB seasons). In fact, McGrath's whole argument is accompanied by the narrative of Dale Murphy who had great numbers, but a steep falloff. He had, too short a career of success. I think there is a fair case to be made then that Robinson is proof this clause is intended for positive use. There was a reason beyond even his numbers that he is essential to the game. Although, as Buster Olney pointed out, voters have even been historically bad at using it to vote players in noting that Robinson barely got the votes needed and Larry Dobby, first black AL player never even got 4% of the BWAA votes. That is, the clause probably helped get Robinson over the threshold, and yet still many writers didn't seem to care enough about it then to use it the way it should be used. To quote Olney, "Somewhere along the way, long after Robinson's induction and death, some writers [in our time today] determined that the scant phrasing in the character clause could be used to eliminate candidates, but apparently not used to elevate them - practice which seems to violate the wording and to underscore its absurdly subjective nature."

And he's right. While all votes are to a degree subjective, this opens up subjectivity to a whole new level. While I think Schilling should be in the hall of fame, I think he is an idiot for assuming that democrats get elected in right away but he didn't because he was a Trump-supporting republican. However, the more the BWAA uses the character clause to decide who gets in the more they are fueling his argument. After all, if you don't vote for players because they did/said something you did not like rather than because you did not think they were hall of fame caliber players, then what is to stop someone who thinks Trump is so terrible and those who voted for him must be racist too (I've seen the argument out there) from deciding that is a deal-breaking character flaw? Once you open the door to character subjectivity, it is easy to see it abused and you give reason for people to start suspecting abuse. The subjective use of the character clause invites then subject judgment of the voters' character, and by extension the hall itself. This is why it has been so scantally used even to include players. There is a reason there used to be the baseline stats that guaranteed election such as 300 wins or 500 home runs or 3000 hits. It was not simply because they over-valued those stats (funny enough those are probably the most devalued stats in the modern advanced statistic era), it was because they needed some point of objectivity. Some way of saying "beyond a shadow of a doubt these guys are hall of famers". They understood that even judging statistics was a subjective art that could be a slippery slope, so there were feats considered good enough to immortalize a player because that level of career production was considered elite. Well then you had Rafael Palmeiro who crossed both the 3000 hit and 500 home run threshold and somehow was not even good enough to stay on the ballot a few years. Bonds not only crossed the threshold, he is the all-time leader in home runs!

The point is that using the clause to hold someone back is a slippery slope of subjectivity that for years the BWAA literally took steps to avoid in even the most objective part of the game: a player's actual counting stats. 

But subjectivity and the purpose of the clause aside. Let's examine the case that steroid use is good enough grounds to not vote for Bonds and Clemens. Let's ask if that was a legit case for using the clause. After all, that's what his whole case is based on. Guys like Dale Murphy faded fast and will miss the hall for (presumably) never shooting up while guys like Clemens and Bonds had amazing careers that were outlandishly lasting.

Let me provide a counter-argument.

1) Correlation does not equal causation. This classic reminder in science should be heeded here as well. The argument is, they had a longer and better career than Murphy because of steroids. How on earth can you prove that, especially if you cannot even establish when exactly or how long or how much someone was using or would have been in decline? At best, you can make the assertion that MAYBE their career would have gone the way of Dale Murphy. In fact, before the allegations came out about Clemens, it was his work ethic and workout routine, it was his addition and mastery of the splitter that was said to prolong his career. And long before there was any speculation or worry of steroids tainting the game, there were players who had great careers and hit a wall/fell off early and there were players who were able to maintain their careers into their old age. Some players get hurt more, some recover faster and it's not always PEDs. Look at one of my favorite players in history: Satchel Paige. The guy debuted in MLB at age 42! He was 59 when he made his last MLB appearance! Are we suggesting he must have been a user to have such a long Negro Leagues career and then be able to play so late in MLB. He probably put more pitches on his arm than any player in the last 75 years.

2) But let's say you don't care, this is a grievous violation. Well, the problem is of course the clause is still being used for someone who was never empirically found guilty of PED use. Yes we have the BALCO trials (and subsequent perjury conviction, although much of those records have never been available to the public to make an informed decision on its details) and the trainer who claimed Clemens used (who Clemens pursued legal action against, although that was dismissed if memory serves), I'm not saying they were never seriously implicated. But we have no failed drug tests. So to follow the line of thought, the character clause is being used for things these players have been accused of doing, what they might have done (probably). I'm sorry, but how does that argument in any way compare to what they actually have done in their careers? Whatever doubt those allegations may have cast for someone regarding the nature of those stats, the stats are still there, and far more concrete than the case that steroids tainted them when it isn't even an open and shut case that they took steroids, public opinion of the matter aside.

3) But even if you still want to say the evidence was good and damning enough, it still comes to the fact that these were not isolated incidences to these two players. Even if Bonds and Clemens did use, which certainly seems likely, it was not like they stood out as some kind of unique case of cheaters. They only stand out because they were the best of everybody, not because of the steroids. I mean, drug testing was implemented precisely because they found there was a wide-spread problem of use across baseball. The point being that steroid use was not a problem tied simply to their character alone, it was tied to a bigger issue in the character of the game. It seems hard to use something so prevalent as a case to dismiss a few, especially those who were irregardless always counted among the elite. Even if we concede the high probability of guilt, it seems hard then to isolate the guilt to their own records alone. When we have a period now being dubbed "the steroid era" it seems hard to argue that the guilt or at least character shortage rests only on a few of the elite. Even if some benefited by favoring that corruption in the game while others did not desire its place in the game or seek to benefit from it, Although, in a game where so many stats are also a team effort, how many RBIs and runs did the Dale Murphys get because of perhaps others on their team using steroids even if they stayed clean? How many homers did Clemens still surrender to the Bonds, Sosas, and McGwires then? How many roided pitchers struck out Bonds? How many of those BWAA writers wrote about their greatness and sold them to the fans? How can the effects, benefits, and question of integrity only be put upon them then?

4) As such, how do you separate the pure from impure? I've reiterated this argument before in previous years, but if this is an era defined by steroid use, and we year in year out find new people were using, then what seems more likely is we are either penalizing people who likely never used (something people argued had been happening unfairly to Jeff Bagwell prior to this year) or we are rewarding players who were better at getting away with it. Mike Piazza is a Hall of Famer (and rightly so), yet his name certainly was under suspicion and scrutiny. Let's suppose for a minute that the suspicion about him or Bagwell was correct, yet because no one ever waved a finger or their name was never leaked they are ok? I mentioned how Clemens was never suspected until his name came up from the Mitchell report. Or take Ryan Braun, whose physique in no way suggests steroid use (in fact before his scandal Bud Selig named him as an example of the cleaned up game that has purer hitters). Maybe my argument here suffers a bit of a logical fallacy, that is it may be unfair to suggest that what we don't know about some players makes it wrong to judge on what we do know about others, since that argument could technically be applied to any player on any crime always and ever. But the specifics of this argument is still quite valid, since it is particularly in reference to steroid use in the steroid era and the difficulty in really identifying how far it went and who benefited most from it. If we have already admitted now into the hall several players from the steroid era, we have by and large removed that asterisk already and moved past the case that the integrity of the hall of fame will be brought down by the admission of players on the basis of stats from that era.

5) But let's say you could separate them. Let's assume for a minute that no one inducted from that era ever used. Let's say Bonds and Clemens benefited from steroids more than any other player who suited up for a major league team. Let's decide that ultimately they are responsible for what they did, not the wider game culture. It's on them and them alone and they need to answer for these crimes. Let's make all those assertions absent any thought of the counter arguments above. Even then, does that outweigh the numbers that say they were the best in the game? Or is that they only consideration in regards to their sportsmanship and integrity? How about Curt Schilling, another hall-worthy pitcher crediting Clemens with getting his career on track after Clemens sought him out and talked to him on how he needed to change his approach to the game? Isn't that very sportsman conduct that had a huge impact on the game? How about how Bonds has a street named after him in Harvey, IL because of his work there for underprivileged children or the Giants' fan who was brutally attacked by Dodgers fans and Bonds offered to pay for his children's college tuition? I'm sure you could find a lot of good from just about any athlete. That's not the point, but rather the point is for these athletes the good elements of their character are not even put into consideration. Seems to me, if you are ultimately going to stake your argument on the character clause, more scrutinous efforts should be put into examining these players' character.

The truth is of course, it's not their character, sportsmanship, or integrity that gets them into the hall of fame. Bonds was one of my least favorite players (a view in part because I experienced him through the tenuous relationship he and the media had), and Clemens was an intense player (though one of my favorites). I'll always remember the infamous bat throwing incident between him and Piazza (although he swore he did not mean to throw it at him). But they should be in because they were never meant to make their case on character, sportsmanship, and integrity. And as fans we never really asked them to during their hall of fame careers. Sure we like to have likeable players of good integrity to look up to, but really that wasn't the contributions that made them essential to the game and in my view essential to the hall of fame. And it seems to me more diminishing to the hall's integrity that two of its most obvious entrants are not in there.

And that, John McGrath, is why you are wrong in using integrity as a reason to keep them out.