Hall of Fame Ballot Announced

[ejharrington]

Schilling checks all the boxes for being a HOFer.

[jayshum]

When Ed Wade was the Phillies GM, he described Schilling something like this - He's a horse every 5th day and a horse's ass the other four. Not sure if it's a direct quote, but apparently he wasn't beloved during his playing days. However, he did come up big in the postseason.

[G1911]

Let's compare to his direct contemporaries.

Tom Glavine - 80.7 WAR - Elected first year of eligibility with 91.9% of the vote

Mike Mussina- 82.8 WAR - Elected his sixth year of eligibility.

John Smoltz - 69.0 WAR - Elected in his first year of eligibility with 82.9% of the vote.

Curt Schilling - 79.5 WAR - Not a Hall of Famer at all.


Schilling is closer to Pedro Martinez the he is John Smoltz by WAR, but Martinez is an all-peak kind of guy and generally held in a different tier. While his career overlaps significantly with Halladay, I would not consider them the same generation. Including Halladay would further bolster Schilling's case. I have cut out the roiders, Clemens and Kevin Brown as they are not looked at for statistical performance, but for an on-the-field problem. Maddux and Randy Johnson are obviously and undeniably in the top tier of HOF greatness and blow everyone else out of the water.

I can't see a reasonable case that Schilling isn't a Hall of Famer. I can see a reasonable case that the Hall shouldn't include so many players and be much smaller, and Curt shouldn't be in that small hall, but that's not the Hall that actually exists. He clearly meets the standard of his generation. I will never understand the apparently numerous people who will deny anything if it doesn't suit their favored political narrative.

[jayshum]

Glavine is a 300 game winner which is basically an automatic entry to the HoF. Mussina won 54 more games than Schilling and was considered a questionable pick by a lot of people (from what I remember) when he was elected. Smoltz had almost the same win total as Schilling but also spent time as a closer and also has 154 saves. Glavine and Smoltz also won Cy Young awards which Schilling never did. I think his low win total compared to most starters already in the HoF worked against him with a lot of older voters even though several pitchers with comparable win totals have been elected more recently. He certainly didn't help himself with some of his comments, but I don't think that's the only reason he didn't get elected by the writers.