Quote:
Originally Posted by frankbmd
I'm all for the Hall of Fame, but continuing to add eighteenth century players on the basis of statistics seems a bit irrelevant.
I hear that the Fiddler's Hall of Fame is adding Nero to this year's ballot.
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It does seem that the election commitee is swirling the keg to find "just one more mug". McCormick's stats do not scream "HOF". A case could be made for his inclusion but realistically, calling him a .500 pitcher is more truth than a lie. A couple of gaudy single season stat lines do not make him a hall of famer. It is impressive to make 70-plus starts in a season in a season. Losing 40 games in a season is not. They were different times. Less was know about the long term wear and tear on a pitcher's arm. There was no data pool to dive in. Medicine was 20 years past Civil War limb amputations. Pitcher's developed "tired" arms and were finshed. That was it. If you were to adjust his numbers to reflect a 4 man rotation (let alone a five man)., he wouldn't have had more than 2 20 win seasons. Mr McCormick was a journeyman.
I have heard some of Nero's bootlegs. He WAS a "hot" picker....
