Many former Atlanta Braves on Hall ballot, but FanSided chose none

Even for fans of the sport, that 75% threshold proved too steep a hill to climb in our 2020 FanSided Hall of Fame balloting… and former Atlanta Braves were stiffed.

It’s not the real vote… the one from the Baseball Writers Association of America.  But it was perhaps a bellwether straw poll that included voters from all 30 MLB team sites in the FanSided network – yes, including this site in support of your Atlanta Braves.

Back in early December, the editors of the MLB sites were asked to weigh in on the 2020 Hall of Fame ballot… an exercise that was both interesting and humbling – even though it ultimately doesn’t count.

My own ballot was revealed and explained here above 5-1/2 weeks ago.  Today, FanSided revealed the totals from the entire process.

I have personally been critical of the BBWAA for being too stingy with their votes.  Those arguing for a ‘small Hall’ tend to use only a smattering of the allowed 10 votes annually.

This has happened despite the fact that major league baseball itself has nearly doubled in size (from 16 to 30 teams) since the Hall of Fame became a ‘thing’, and so many potential HOF’ers have fallen off the ballot that annual ‘veterans committees’ have been created to ‘right the wrongs’ that have been perpetrated because the writers seem to not quite know what they’re doing.

So naturally, our FanSided voters fixed that problem, right?

The Tally

Guess again… only Derek Jeter reached the 75% plateau… and one member of our ranks didn’t even vote for him — with an explanation that’s… curious.

As it happens, the top of the ballot is fairly closely mirroring the revealed ballot percentages we know today.

In the FanSided results, Barry Bonds (73.8%) and Roger Clemens (71.4%) are near, but not over the magic percentage; Larry Walker (69%) came in a notch further back (he’s going to be razor-close when the BBWAA results come in) and Curt Schilling was definitely dissed by our editors (57%).

The best of the former Braves is Andruw Jones, making a strong showing at 50%.  However, Billy Wagner should arguably be doing better, though he’s stuck at 38%.

Rafael Furcal?  No surprise… he failed to garner any of our votes.

Garry Sheffield is at 26%, which seems oddly low (BBWAA votes thus far have him at 37%):  if you believe he played mostly clean and swore off the PEDs (that’s the camp I find myself in), then his stats are HOF stats.  If you believe he was a more habitual user, then it’s confusing that so many voted for Bonds and yet didn’t also bring in Sheffield.

Then again, our editors gave Manny Ramirez 45%, despite the fact that he retired after getting a second suspension for steroid use after a third test failure.

There are a number of quotes from editors explaining their ballots in a well-put-together piece, including a couple of pithy ones from yours truly.

In the end, this was an exercise, and perhaps shows the varying intensity of passion from fans more than anything else.

It also suggests that the on-going controversy over Performance Enhancing Drugs and the so-called “steroid era” is not going to be settled any time soon.