Dick Allen has baggage that very well may keep him out forever, but what he accomplished on the field was outstanding. It almost feels pointless to debate because the only thing that matters is how the voters view his off the field issues. "He's a jerk!" versus "Who cares?" turns pedantic quickly, with no one changing his or her mind.
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Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth
At a point the All Star game just became an entitlement for Yaz. He made it for example in a season where he was 12-68-.264. And the year before that he was 15-70-.254. And lest you think these were token appreciation-type votes at the end of the career, uh uh. These were at age 31 and 32.
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Yaz may be taking the brunt of it in this specific case, but you can apply this completely logical argument to so many others. All-Star appearances, Gold Gloves and the like are subjective awards given by people who quite frankly didn't know any better in a lot of cases. They are not evidence of play, but rather of reputation and should therefore hold little weight when compared to what the athletes actually did on the field. The Gold Gloves are particularly egregious with the repeated Jeter awards, Michael Young winning at Shortstop in 2008, the all-timer Palmeiro award in '99, etc.