My 2022 MLB HOF Ballot

 It is that time of year again, the time where I sometimes argue with myself, now mainly my dad about who belongs (and who doesn’t) in the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame. With the future of baseball in limbo, this year seems even more difficult to sit down and ponder this incredibly difficult question. But with the spirit of spring coming soon—hopefully with Spring Training not too far behind the finches and swallows.

As much as I still feel the same way as I felt a year ago, I feel differently for one reason: I’ve reached the age where I can remember watching every member of the ballot at one point in my life. I guess I’m officially old…

Here goes nothing!

1.     Barry Bonds-We’ve reached the last year of the most controversial HOF candidate to date, I’m not counting Curt Schilling or Omar Vizquel. Bonds deserves to be in whether there is a huge asterisk across his face on the plaque or not. One of the higher-level questions I ask myself when putting together this ballot is “can you write the history of baseball without player x?”

If the answer to that question is yes, he is a Hall of Famer, no question. If Bonds doesn’t get in there will be a group of baseball purists cheering from the top of buildings across the country—but I believe it will only make putting together these ballots harder for the rest of time and that’s because there are members on this ballot that will get in the Hall of Fame who have been linked to steroids (fair or not). If you still want to die on the hill that Bonds doesn’t belong in the Hall, go right ahead, it’s a museum and he’s the best player 99% of fans has ever seen when he was in the prime(s) of his career.

2.     Roger Clemmons

Like Bonds, Clemmons is one of the best players I’ve ever seen and a type of player that you cannot write the history of the game without. He has 4,000 strike outs, over 300 wins, and seven Cy Youngs. No one has more Cy Young’s than Roger Clemmons. And everyone with 300 wins and over 3,000 strike outs are in the hall. Clemmons also has two rings. I’ll repeat it again, he gets in.  

3.     Jeff Kent

I will die on the “Jeff Kent is a HOF’er” hill.  What Kent did for the second base position as a power hitter didn’t happen before he came along. He is still the all-time leader for homers by a second baseman with 377 (Robinson Cano has 334 and counting) while also having over 1,500 RBI’s, a .290 average, and he hit over 20 homers nine consecutive seasons, won the 2000 MVP, with a career WAR of 55.5. He was the best second baseman at the plate for a decade and defined a generation of baseball. He should be celebrated.

4.     Scott Rolen

As I made a point last year, defense should also count for something and Scott Rolen is the best defensive third baseman I’ve ever seen. He also added over 300 homers, a 122 OPS+, and a career WAR of 70.1! He was a monster!!

5.     Andruw Jones

While Rolen might be the best defensive third baseman I’ve seen, Jones is the best defensive player I’ve ever seen. It’s not even close. I cannot wait for the day that defensive stats catch up (pun intended) with the offensive stats and we are able to quantify the amazement that was Andruw Jones on a nightly basis. I urge you to go on YouTube and search for Jones’ defensive highlights. It’s like if Harry Potter and Spider-Man decided they should combine their powers and play baseball. What Jones didn’t do at the plate, he did in the field, and robbing him of immortality is a crime against the game because DEFENSE WINS CHAMPIONSHIPS.

6.     Manny Ramirez

Even though Manny was apart terrorizing my childhood, he was the most feared right-handed bat in the league during his playing career. Screw the numbers with Ramirez, he was the best at picking a pitch out and absolutely destroying it. You might throw your “best pitch” by him three times, but he just tested you until he decided he had enough. When someone masters a craft to the ability that they decide when they want to do something, that is another level of greatness.  

7.     David Ortiz

Big Papi might be the one player when the game is on the line that I wouldn’t to be on the other side of. Ortiz was clutch. His picture is in place of the definition when you look it up in the dictionary. The argument between Ortiz and Edgar Martinez, as the best Designated Hitter in baseball history is a tossup. Even with his link to steroids, he was one of the faces of the game, and outside of New York, one of the most likeable people in it. Along with Manny Ramirez, David Ortiz made seven-year-old me shutter in fear when he walked to the plate regardless of time of year. Ortiz is the career leader in homers for DH’s with 541. He is in my mind a no-doubt first balloter even though as kid, I hated his guts on the baseball field.  

8.     Alex Rodriguez

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Barry Bonds 2.0. If you thought people were divisive with Bonds, it’s only going to get worse with A-Rod. Bonds went off into the sunset and in his words, doesn’t really care how he’s perceived publicly. A-Rod is the exact opposite. Rodriguez might care too much about his public persona. He is in our lives every Sunday, whether we like it or not, and will be publicly campaigning for his place in Cooperstown until he gets in. And, unlike Bonds like get louder and louder every year he isn’t in. Also, with the Veterans Committee he will definitely get in if it gets to that point.

Look, when he played, like Bonds, the greatness isn’t hard to see. His ability to do things on the field that nobody seemed to be able to do throughout every stage of his career welcomes him into the hall. His link as the first player to be suspended a full 162-games is apart of his legacy, and the games. His link as the youngest player to 600 homers is an incredible accomplishment. But, what also comes with all of this is the person that A-Rod is. The back page seeking person that more often than not was comfortable in the bright light more so off the field than on it. He is absolutely a great player and deserves to be in the hall, but the circus that will surround Alex Rodriguez getting into the Hall of Fame is something I don’t think the baseball public is truly ready for.

9.     Andy Pettitte

Playoff Pettitte. That’s it. That’s the reason. What Andy Pettitte did in the playoffs is the reason he belongs in Cooperstown. What he was able to accomplish when the games mattered the most will be some of the hardest records to break because of how often Pettitte’s teams got to the postseason and how he just seemed to not have a pulse in those games. On Pettitte’s plaque, I wouldn’t even mention anything having to do with the regular, let generations think he was some of mythical being that only pitched in October and dominated!

10.                        Billy Wagner

Do you know who has the highest strike outs per nine innings of all-time? No it’s not Nolan Ryan, or Mariano Rivera, or Randy Johnson, or even Walter Johnson or Satchel Paige. It’s Billy freakin’ Wagner. Wagner was the third best closer of his generation and that’s only because two of the greatest closers to ever play played at the same time. Wagner is a top-five closer in the game and just because he played alongside Rivera and Hoffman doesn’t mean he was lesser.

Before getting out of here, here is my Hall of Fame Baseline for players that were close but just didn’t make the cut but might find their names on my ballot in the coming years: Tim Lincecum (shout-out Nick Paradies the originator of the Even-Year-Dynasty take), Sammy Sosa, Tim Hudson, Todd Helton, Garry Sheffield, and Carl Crawford.

Fight me on the baseline, tell me that those players at the peak of their careers weren’t on pace for the hall and should be in consideration for the next few years (excluding Sosa). If you disagree with any of this, tweet me this article @notthefakejleo, I’ll be happy to have the conversation.