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Julie Vognarfavor. I think it's possible, as a deaf person, to observe how other people are being distracted by sound (that you cannot hear)--but you may have a point--perhaps he couldn't know it helped him. But: it's not that he was known as a great outfielder (defensive skills)--he was best known for his batting and his speed on the bases (I purposely didn't include his number of stolen bases, because for part of his playing career, that number includers extra bases taken on a hit or someone else's hit--but over 600 bases stolen, or added to the expected, indicates excellent speed and good baserunning judgement).
What intrigues me most about Hoy is that he taught teammates. whenever possible, sign language--to use bits of during the game, to fool the opposing team, and thos probably also introduced the sign language into the unpire's repetoire himself. I think that's real baseball smarts, and Lord knows where we'd be today without hand signals in baseball, with the size of the crowd, indoor stadiums, etc!
Hey, I won't be disappointed if he's voted into the Hall! I think there're plenty of less deserving people in already.