{"id":167,"date":"2007-12-05T16:29:55","date_gmt":"2007-12-05T23:29:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/2007\/12\/05\/hof-election-%e2%80%9crigged%e2%80%9d\/"},"modified":"2007-12-06T20:45:47","modified_gmt":"2007-12-07T03:45:47","slug":"hof-election-%e2%80%9crigged%e2%80%9d","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/2007\/12\/05\/hof-election-%e2%80%9crigged%e2%80%9d\/","title":{"rendered":"HOF Election \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Rigged?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Marvin Miller was not elected to the Hall of Fame by the Veterans\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Committee on Dec. 3, 2007 and he was upset. <\/span>This is some of what he said (as reported by the Associated Press).<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/span>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I think it was rigged, but not to keep me out. <\/span>It was rigged to bring some of these (people) in. <\/span>It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not a pretty picture. <\/span>\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 <\/span>It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s demeaning to the Hall and demeaning to the people in it.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p>Unfortunately, Marvin appears to be correct. <\/span>The new committee elected five members: late commissioner Bowie Kuhn, former Dodgers owner Walter O\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Malley, managers Dick Williams and Billy Southworth and former Pirates owner Barney Dreyfuss. <\/span><\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/o:p>What Miller is referring to is that the voting by the Veterans Committee was changed completely this time around and these first results certainly seem to indicate that some \u00e2\u20ac\u0153rigging\u00e2\u20ac\u009d of who is eligible to vote for whom may have been involved. <\/span>The former VC did not elect anyone on the last three tries. <\/span>That was not a good situation. <\/span>But it appears that this \u00e2\u20ac\u0153solution\u00e2\u20ac\u009d may be worse.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/o:p>To elect five candidates from a group of twenty is bad enough. <\/span>The two managers were elected from a group of ten umpires and managers. <\/span>And the three executives were elected from a group of ten also. <\/span>This is simply not being discriminating enough. <\/span>Is everybody nominated going to get in eventually? <\/span>This appears to be going from one extreme to another. <\/span>From electing nobody to electing too many.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/o:p>But what is clearly worse is the following. <\/span>Earlier this year, Marvin Miller got 63% of the vote from the previous VC while Bowie Kuhn got only 17%. <\/span>Now, in the first election under the new VC, Bowie Kuhn is elected and Miller gets just three of the twelve votes cast. <\/span>Is there something suspicious here?<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/o:p>I agree with Marvin Miller that he has every right to suggest that this election certainly appears to have been \u00e2\u20ac\u0153rigged.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

And it appears that Murray Chass of the NY TIMES<\/em> would agree with Miller also. <\/span>Here are some excerpts from his article (Dec. 4, 2007).<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\n

<\/o:p><\/span><\/strong>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The National Baseball Hall of Fame has become a national joke. Its latest electoral contrivance elected three former executives to the Hall yesterday, none named Marvin Miller. Making the committee\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s decision even worse, one of the three is named Bowie Kuhn.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

<\/o:p><\/span><\/strong>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153For any committee of 12 supposedly knowledgeable baseball people to elect Kuhn, Barney Dreyfuss and Walter O\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Malley and not Miller defies reasonable and logical explanation.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

<\/o:p><\/span><\/strong>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153That only 3 of the 12 voters on the new executives committee acknowledged his contribution, and voted for him, is a sad commentary on the committee members and the Hall\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s board of directors, which concocted the committee.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

<\/o:p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The committee was weighted heavily in favor of management candidates. Seven of the 12 members were or are management figures, owners and executives. If ever a system was created for the failure of one man, this was it.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Marvin Miller was not elected to the Hall of Fame by the Veterans\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Committee on Dec. 3, 2007 and he was upset. This is some of what he said (as reported by the Associated Press). \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I think it was rigged, but not to keep me out. It was rigged to bring some of these (people) […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-167","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prof-hobans-hall-of-fame-blog"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=167"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=167"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}