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Posted By: Chad

The big picture being that Ray Brown, Cristobal Torriente, Jud Wilson, Pete Hill, Biz Mackey, Louis Santop and so on are LEGITIMATE HOFers by any standard and now they are. The selections at the back end of the ballot are iffy, and yeah, maybe Lip Pike and Tony Mullane and George Van Haltren and Dummy Hoy (a personal favorite of mine because I have a deaf brother)should be in. I also have warm fuzzies for Curt Flood and Marvin Miller for sticking it to the man. I can think of a LOT more players/pioneers that could be elected. Ron Santo, Goose Gossage, Minnie Minoso, Joe Gordon, Charlie Finley, Gil Hodges, Lave Cross etc etc/ But now there are a few LESS players that need to be enshrined and a few of the obvious oversights have been fixed. This is a good thing.

Just for kicks, the MLB players I equate some of the inductees with:

Ray Brown: Warren Spahn
Torriente: Reggie Jackson with a glove made of leather instead of iron and a decent pitcher
Jud Wilson: Somewhere between Musial and Ted Williams as a hitter. A barely passable fielder.
Biz Mackey: Gabby Hartnett
Andy Cooper: Tom Glavine
Willard Brown: Andre Dawson with more power (A really close comparison, I think.)

--Chad