Quote:
Originally Posted by bbcard1
An issue he has, generic name aside, is that he died before the turn of the century and was probably largely forgotten by the time of the first HOF class.
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I agree and this issue pertains to many 19th century players. As I said in my original post on this thread, 19th century players, more specifically pioneer players are underrepresented in the HOF. This will never be changed unless baseball historians/SABRites have a majority voice on the Historical Overview Committee and the final Election Committee. SABR's 19th Century Committee has chosen the Most Overlooked 19th Century Legend for the past 13 years. Only Deacon White has been elected to the HOF from this group. This shows you how well the current HOF process works and how much they consider the input of the people that know 19th century baseball better than anybody.
As an aside, I believe Mathews finished either second or third in this year's voting, which was won by Charlie Bennett. Mathews was included on my ballot.