Quote:
Originally Posted by GeoPoto
I thought the phenomena correlated with advances in communications, media, and now social media. Over time it has gotten easier to identify the voters, shame them into revealing their votes, and shame anybody who declines to, for example, vote for Mariano Rivera on the first ballot. Once it became feasible, hounding voters became a popular internet sport. The hyper-scrutiny has virtually eliminated blank and near-blank ballots, which used to occur as a result of voter negligence, incapacity, or caprice. It used to be nobody had to reveal or explain their vote. Modern reliance on statistics makes it much easier to rebut the "I didn't vote for him because, as a sportswriter, I saw him play" explanation. Now everybody can see him play and the numbers don't lie, etc.
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Rivera got 100% of the BBWAA voters... who voted.
To your point, a few writers knew there was a lot of talk about Rivera having the potential to be the first unanimous vote getter for the HOF and they "didn't want to be the guy who blocked that". Basically these few guys didn't believe Rivera, or any closer with a limited number of innings pitched in a career relative to a starter, deserved a spot in the Hall, especially on the first ballot. But that fear of the online mob (most notably the shouting heads on ESPN and Fox Sports as well as sports radio) coming after them led them to sit out and not vote at all, different than turning in a blank ballot. Rivera got 100% of the ballots cast, but you could asterisk that percentage!