Inducted: Tony Gwynn and Cal Ripken Jr.

It isn't surprising that Cal Ripken Jr. and Tony Gwynn were inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. It isn't surprising that Mark McGwire didn't make the Hall, and got just under 25% of the vote (which mirrored a poll done a short time back).

Both Ripken and Gwynn were ambassadors of the game and were highly accomplished players.

On the ballot for the first time, the pair will be inducted into the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown on July 29. They will be joined by any candidates elected in the Hall of Fame Veterans Committee election, the results of which will be announced on Feb. 27.

Ripken garnered 98.53 percent of the vote, the third highest in balloting history done by veteran members of the Baseball Writers' Association of America, but the most for a position player. Ripken finished behind Tom Seaver (98.83 in 1992) and Nolan Ryan (98.79 in 1999). Gwynn's percentage of 97.6 percent, based on his 532 votes, ranks seventh all-time.

Mark McGwire, also a ballot newcomer, fell well short of election, his name appearing on less than a quarter of the record 545 ballots cast, two of which were left completely blank.

There is good news and bad news for Rich "Goose" Gossage, the reliever who is creeping ever so close to his day in the Cooperstown sun. The bad news is that this time Gossage came up 21 votes shy of the 75 percent needed to ascend to the Hall. The good news is that with a much thinner ballot next year, Gossage seems to be on the cusp.

On the ballot for the eighth year, the Goose came in at 71.2 percent, an increase from his 64.6 percent a year ago. In the history of the BBWAA Hall of Fame voting, no candidate has ever received at least 70 percent in an election without eventually gaining a place in Cooperstown.

I figure that The Goose will make it in next year. Jim Rice and Andre Dawson both got more than 60% of the votes.
The full breakout of votes is as follows (545 ballots; 409 needed to gain entry):

Cal Ripken 537 98.5%
Tony Gwynn 532 97.6%
Rich "Goose" Gossage 388 71.2%
Jim Rice 346 63.5%
Andre Dawson 309 56.7%
Bert Blyleven 260 47.7%
Lee Smith 217 39.8%
Jack Morris 202 37.1%
Mark McGwire 128 23.5%
Tommy John 125 22.9%
Steve Garvey 115 21.1%
Dave Concepcion 74 13.6%
Alan Trammell 73 13.4%
Dave Parker 62 11.4%
Don Mattingly 54 9.9%
Dale Murphy 50 9.2%
Harold Baines 29 5.3%
Orel Hershiser 24 4.4%
Albert Belle 19 3.5%
Paul O'Neill 12 2.2%
Bret Saberhagen 7 1.3%
Jose Canseco 6 1.1%
Tony Fernandez 4 0.7%
Dante Bichette 3 0.6%
Eric Davis 3 0.6%
Bobby Bonilla 2 0.4%
Ken Caminiti 2 0.4%
Jay Buhner 1 0.2%
Scott Brosius 0
Wally Joyner 0
Devon White 0
Bobby Witt 0

A player who got less than 5% of the vote will be dropped from future ballots. That means Orel Hershiser, Belle, O'Neill, Saberhagen, Canseco, Fernandez, Bichette, Davis, Bonilla, Caminiti, Buhner, Brosius, Joyner, White, and Witt are out of luck. Harold Baines squeeks through for another year.

UPDATE:
I've had some additional time to analyze the HoF ballots and surrounding issues, and wonder who came up with the unwritten rule that someone shouldn't be a unanimous selection for the Hall? If there were players who everyone believes should make the Hall, what stops them from voting for them? Certainly not some silly unwritten rule? Yet, that's exactly what happens every few years as some player that everyone admits is a certain Hall of Famer gets snubbed by a small percentage of voters who thinks that if Ruth or Williams or Cy Young himself didn't get in unanimously, then the current crop shouldn't.

Frankly, that's a silly argument and one that lacks logic. Two wrongs do not make a right. Anyone who thought that Ruth wasn't a Hall of Famer needs his or her head examined. He rewrote the record books in his own name - as a pitcher and hitter. His World Series pitching exploits stood for several decades until Whitey Ford came along (and superseded by Mariano Rivera). He was that good. Yet, someone found reason not to admit him to the Hall.

Some might point to the whole matter of character, yet if that were the criteria, quite a few members of the Hall should be booted because they were the most unsavory of characters; Ty Cobb comes to mind. Yet, it is the statistics that determine who should or shouldn't make the Hall.

I know that there's at least one writer who left his ballot blank because he was protesting the steroid era, but Goose Gossage didn't play in the steroid era. Neither did Steve Garvey. Why slam them for what may have happened a decade after they left the game? As it was, Goose came very close to making the Hall, but came up 21 votes short. Did anyone who voted for Saberhagen, Canseco, Fernandez, Bichette, Davis, Bonilla, Caminiti, or Buhner, not vote for Goose? As it is, does anyone really think that those guys were HoF ready? Or were they trying to curry favor with those guys?

The balloting process is always a controversial matter, and this year was no exception. I guess most people are focusing in on McGwire's snub rather than the remarkable careers of Gwynn or Ripken, which is the way the sports talk radio shows were handling matters. More people wanted to discuss McGwire than the guys who made it.

Technorati: cal ripken jr, tony gwynn, baseball, hall of fame, mcgwire, steroids.