Posted By:
steve kJay - as usual your points are excellent even if sometimes I disagree with them. I agree 100% with Jim Rice who is one of the players I had in mind when saying there are some players not in the Hall who are definitely better than some players who are in. If you were a manager and had to pick one for left field -would you take Rice or Kiner? - the answer is obvious.
As for Koufax, take another look at his career. You'll find that his performance was at its peak when he was forced to retire because of severe arm pain - you probably knew that - I just may have misinterpreted your response. One of my favorite baseball quotes, taken from Koufax's latest book, is when Koufax was pitching to Mantle in the 63 World Series. Mantle strikes out on a nasty curveball, immediately turns to the catcher and says, quote: "How the f'k is anybody supposed to hit that sh't." When you can frustrate the heck out of a Mickey Mantle who as you know was one of the greatest hitters in WS history, that is pretty impressive! I understand what you are saying about Koufax - he had only a tremendous 6 or 7 years which in my view is okay for pitchers getting in the Hall because pitchers usually have shorter careers than other positions.