Unfortunately, David, the system is only as good as the people who would be using it...and in the last few years, the BBWAA has shown its astonishing ignorance in regards to objective assessment of baseball players.

Other than that, your suggested system seems to be a good one...so instead of it being all or nothing, even one writing a "3" down would improve certain players' chances of getting in; yet, as you write, it would prevent "space-filling" votes from finding their way in.

It's just so depressing that the discussion about all of this isn't a celebration of Sutter, who deserves accolades for his achievements, but rather about the idiocy of the BBWAA voting body. If nothing else, it seems time for a different cabal of voters. Let's move on from the dark ages.

This discussion reminds me of the discussions about what to do with the intentional walk back when Bonds was getting an IBB every game. Back then, I felt that the discussion was silly: the IBB pretty much worked for a long time and will continue to work for a long time. People were talking about tinkering with the rule because an outlier had presented itself, and the results were sort of silly.

I have the same opinion when it comes to the BBWAA and the Hall of Fame. The fact is, they've actually done a decent job of keeping out marginal players and enshrining only the truly great ones. (Most of the really egregiously bad hall of fame choices have come from the Veterans Committee, especially back in the 1970's, when they basically voted in everyone who played baseball in the 1920's.) Sure, you get some funny votes occasionally: Bruce Sutter over Gossage this year, for example. And we stat-heads have been trumpeting Bert Blyleven so long, I think many of us how come to view his case as the baseball version of Sacco and Vanzetti.

Truth is, the writers haven't done such a bad job, and the system the way it's set up now has by and large worked, and there's no reason to tinker with a system just because one year had a dearth of newly eligible players, and the writers made a debatable choice. I say stick with what we got, ditch the VC except for Negro League players, and don't get too worked up over Bruce Sutter. After all, the intentional walk still works.

Sutter has a Cy Young.
Gossage does not.

That alone is reason enough for some to vote Sutter and not Gossage. That isn't to say that people _should_ vote that way; just that they _did_.

The real problem with the voting system, as Dave said, is the voters. The criteria for admission into the BBWAA is absurd. The BBWAA should form a panel, comprised of its current members, whose sole purpose is to add new members who would not qualify through the traditional means. This way, writers whose work is only online, in books, or in magazines (I think BBWAA criteria requires newspaper writing?) can get a vote. This will diversify the voter pool.

Those of us, like myself, who stump for guys like Blyleven, oftentimes forget that there _is_ a reason to value things that the stats don't show. Just because many of the current voters clearly overvalue these factors is not reason to eliminate them. The better solution, as I argue above, is to add people who place value on factors that we, as Blyevians, would endorse.

Daniel: You'll see the same thing happen again in 2008 when no first-timer is really qualified.

My main beef with the system is not how it's worked in the past. It's the fact that it allows someone 13 chances to get elected to the Hall of Fame. Nothing's changed in Sutter's career. Nothing. He has the same numbers, the same legacy that he did when he retired and when he first appeared on the ballot in 1994. He isn't a pitcher whose stature has grown, and as recently as 1999, he wasn't even garnering 25 percent of the vote.

So here's my idea: Currently, the system is set up so that a player needs to get 5% of the vote in his first year of eligiblity to remain on the ballot. I say bump that waaaaaaaaay up to 50%. If half of Hall of Fame voters do not think you are eligible, then that's it. I picked the first year because that's when people are closest to your career. They supposedly have the best recollections of the player in question and can more accurately remember their true accomplishments. I would also limit the number of times you can be on the ballot to something less than 15.

Benjamin: shortening the length of eligibility would be fine with me. My point is more that while the BBWAA is rightly ripped for the MVP and Cy Young votes, their hall of fame track record is not bad. Before Sutter how many marginal guys actually got in off the writers' ballot? I can't think of many. And if 2008 is another down year, it isn't a big deal: having one down year to reexamine the careers of guys like Gossage and Blyleven may actually be a good thing.

The problem I have wiht your suggestion is that it's prone to the same biases that plague the MVP votes: going based on perceived "winners" and guys who demonstrated "leadership" and played "the right way." Allowing players longer eligibility and giving them multiple chances to get in allows writers to reexamine their careers more objectively (if they're capable of such a thing), and actually getting it right in the end. I think the history of the BBWAA demonstrates that, by and large, they've been getting it right.

Isn't Tim Raines a first timer in 2008? I think he is overqualified, but I'm sure the BBWAA will forget.

I do agree with you Benjamin that the 15 years of eligibility is slightly insane. It helps guys like Blyleven who get screwed over early on, but then with the BBWAA guys like Sutter end up making it by default, with Jim Rice coming in second place. Ugh.

First, I have to say that I really don't like systems that take ratings and then just average them. Just look at the IMDB's ratings of movies. Pretty much any movie that makes a strong impact will have a ton of people rate it a 10 and a ton of people rate it a 1. In other words, everything either RULEZZ!!! or SUCKSSSS!!! The resulting number, a 7.0, a 7.5, whatever, is largely just a measure of how many people say it rules vs. how many say it sucks.

Even if you suppose that the BBWAA is going to be more mature than the IMDB voters (bear with me here), people could easily tweak their votes just to offset how they feel the other people will vote. Let's say you know that Gossage has some support, but not support from enough people, and you really want him in. Well, you can give him a 10 to give him that extra boost even if you really feel he's just an 8.

Likewise, rating somebody a 6 is like giving somebody a "no" vote, but with the large number of voters, voting a 6 when someone's average without your vote is a 7.5 is barely going to tweak that average. It's a very weak no vote. Why would a voter vote "honestly" that way about a player he thinks is just below the HOF cutoff when to make the most difference in whether or not the guy makes it into the Hall, he could vote a 1, even if that guy's an "almost but not quite" type of fellow like Hershiser or Mattingly?

And really, what does a 1 or a 3 or a 5 mean? Any ballplayer who sticks around long enough to be eligible has to have made some contributions in there. Is a 1 just for the Greg Jefferieses of the world, or is it for somebody like Willie McGee, who won an MVP but is in no way a HOFer?

And when it boils down to it, the HOF votes do a pretty good job. It's not like the Oscars, who award lousy movies from time to time, overlook films that have become true classics, and give statuettes to veterans for their career instead of the performance they're nominated for. Or the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame, which lets in all sorts of bland mush but takes forever to let in anyone controversial.

No, the Baseball HOF may not always get it right the first time, and may let in a few marginal players, but it's one of those honors that really means something because it's so exclusive.

Even if you go by the HOF Monitor formulation listed at Baseball Reference - baseball-reference.com/about/leader_glossary.shtml#hof_monitor it still shows Gossage as likely HOFer and Sutter as falling short.

Likely HOFer is 100+ ......

Sutter is a 91.0
Gossage is a 126.0

re: HOF voting

I think Bill James has pretty much covered the waterfront on HOF issues in his excellent HOF book, but here goes anyway.

(1) More than just the writers should vote. The broadcast media and bloggers should weigh in.

(2) The veterans committee should be at least 33% Negro League vets or African Americans, 33% SABR specialists, and 33% HOF members. The Veterans Committee should be charged with increasing minority representation and correcting statistical mistakes made by the public elections.

(3) There should be subcommittees to do the Veterans Committee work.

(4) 75% is too high a bar for HOF election. It should be lowered to 60% or even 50%. I think retroactive analysis shows that this would not have diluted the HOF too much over the years.

(5) Clearly, voters should be able to vote for more than 10 players, and weighted voting should be in place.

--Arthur John Kyriazis
--Philly

Arthur: Why should voters be allowed to vote for more than 10 players? Rarely do voters even pick 10 players. Look at this year. Out of 5200 potential votes, 2900 of them were cast. Overall, that's very few full-slate votes. If anything, cut down the number of votes awarded. Then Walt Weiss won't get a ballot.

I mean: Does the guy who voted for Walt Weiss REALLY think he belongs in the Baseball Hall of Fame? Because of so, that guy should no longer have a vote.

Arthur: why would you lower the 75% limit?? if anything it should be raised. the statement "would not dilute the HOF too much" is more rereiduiculuolus than my spelling. if anything, the voters should strive to make the hall more exclusive.

i once read a proposal to give players 20 year tearms, at the end of which, their career would be reevaluated. Maybe sutter still gets in, but after his term is up he's out, and someone like gossage stays (assuming he gets in at all).

The Sports Guy (Bill Simmons) wrote a great column a few years back, basically saying the HOF should have rankings within -- the elite are on the top, and the worse players have a lower level (like 5 levels overall or something). That way, the borderline player can get in, then the committee votes on which level he should get into. Makes for more discussion, plus it gives rewards for the truly elite.