Idiots Write About Sports

And with this year’s Hall of Fame ceremonies out of the way, we can move on to more pressing business. Like, who’s getting in next year?
Well, Wade Boggs certainly. He’s the only first-year guy appearing on the 2005 ballot who seems like a lock, let alone even belongs in the Hall (Sorry, fans of Jeff Blauser and Brian McRae.). Among returning candidates, Ryne Sandberg and Bruce Sutter probably have the best chance of meeting the 75 percent requirement. The guess here is that Sandberg makes it next year and Sutter just misses.
Chris Isidore of CNN/Money has his own suggestion of an ideal Hall of Fame candidate: George Steinbrenner.
My first reaction to the idea of Steinbrenner getting a plaque in Cooperstown — after the blood stopped rushing to my brain and my vision returned — was that Isidore is nuts. Isn’t the Hall of Fame supposed to recognize people with positive legacies as opposed to people who benefitted from an inherent economic advantage over his competitors? What has Steinbrenner contributed to baseball other than Yankee victory parades? And do you think they’d have room on his plaque to mention that he’s been suspended from baseball not once, but twice?
That was my first reaction. Upon further reflection, I will concede that Isidore makes an interesting, if not ultimately convincing, argument:

Steinbrenner clearly has shown a commitment to winning at all costs. Even if he’s not been the best judge of players’ talent or value, he has been willing to reinvest his team’s considerable revenues in the player personnel. He’s been an important figure as baseball learned how to cope with free agency and an era of increasing revenue.

Isidore also enlists a couple of heavy hitters to buttress his contention.

“He’s innovated baseball management. He’s shown the way to exploit a big city market by spending heavily on players,” said Andrew Zimbalist, Smith College professor and expert on the economics of baseball. …
“He helped revolutionize economics of sports,” said Donald Coffin, the interim chairman of the business of baseball committee for the Society of American Baseball Research. “It led to growth of revenue sharing and luxury tax, which wouldn’t have happened if it had not been for the Yankees. He’s the seminal figure in the last fifty years.”

Before I get to my reaction to Isidore’s suggestion — a qualified “probably not,” toned down from the original, emphatic “Dear God in heaven, no!” — let’s consider who’s gotten into the Hall of Fame under the Pioneer/Executive heading that would include a guy like George Steinbree. Those inductees, all selected via the Veteran’s Committee, include:
i Ed Barrow (1953)
i Morgan Bulkeley (1937)
i Alexander Cartwright (1938)
i Henry Chadwick (1938)
i Happy Chandler (1982)
i Charles Comiskey (1939)
i Candy Cummings (1939)
i Ford Frick (1970)
i Warren Giles (1979)
i Clark Griffith (1946)
i Will Harridge (1972)
i William Hulbert (1995)
i Ban Johnson (1937)
i Kenesaw Mountain Landis (1944)
i Lee MacPhail (1998)
i Larry MacPhail (1978)
i Branch Rickey (1967)
i Albert Spalding (1939)
i Bill Veeck (1991)
i George Weiss (1971)
i George Wright (1937)
i Harry Wright (1953)
i Tom Yawkey (1980)
Now, of that list, Chandler, Frick and Landis are all former commissioners, which is why they’re here. (We can assume that Bowie Kuhn, Bart Giamatti and possibly Peter Ueberroth will be added to that list; Spike Eckert and Fay Vincent, probably not.) Bulkeley, Giles, Harridge and Lee MacPhail were presidents of either of the two leagues at one time or another — hence their inclusion. Ban Johnson was also president of the American League, but he’s in the Hall because of his instrumental role in founding the American League; the same could be said of Hulbert and Spalding on the National side (Spalding was also a 19th century pitcher and a sporting goods magnate). Cartwright, Chadwick and Cummings are in because of lasting contributions to the sport (Cartwright for setting down the rules, Chadwick for inventing the box score, and Cummings for throwing what is believed to be the first curve ball, for all you trivial buffs out there); the Wright brothers were seminal figures on the first professional team.
I’m going to assume if you’ve stuck with this article so far, you already know why Branch Rickey might be considered a Hall of Famer. Larry MacPhail was probably just as influential, popularizing radio coverage and night baseball during his assorted tenures with the Reds, Dodgers and Yankees. Ed Barrow managed the Red Sox to their last World Series victory and then served as general manager of the Yankees in the ’20s and ’30s when that team met with some measure of success.
The leaves us with four owners — Comiskey, Griffith, Veeck and Yawkey. Comiskey, I’m going to assume, got elected for his role in forming the American League. Griffith was a part of that, too, though, according to his bio, he can also claim some scouting and administrative contributions. I think it’s safe to say Bill Veeck is in the Hall of Fame for revolutionizing both the experience of going to the ballpark as well as the way the game is promoted (not to mention signing the first black player in the American League).
And then, there’s Tom Yawkey, whose presence in the Hall of Fame has me stumped. Check out his plaque:

Gave baseball more than four decades of dedicated service as owner-president of Boston Red Sox from 1933-1976. Rated one of sport’s finest benefactors. Set precedent for A.L. in 1936 as first to have team travel by plane. His club won pennants in 1946, 1967, and 1975 — and narrowly missed in 1948, 1949 and 1972. Vice-president of the A.L. from 1965 to 1973.

That’s not a lot to hang your hat on, relatively speaking. I mean, “popularized air travel” is important, I suppose, but it seems insignificant when the other guys’ plaques mention things like “founded the American League” or “popularized radio broadcasts” or even “helped integrate baseball.” It sounds like a Lifetime Achievement Award, doesn’t it?
Anyhow, back to Steinbrenner and his Hall of Fame credentials. Since winning isn’t necessary the leading criteria (See “Yawkey, Tom” and “world championships won by”), you have to ask how his achievements and contributions stack up against the both folks already in the Hall and those on the waiting list.
Isidore advances the argument, with assists from Zimbalist and Coffin, that Steinbrenner’s Hall of Fame candidacy rests on three points.
i His teams won a lot of championships.
i He maximized cable television revenues to the point where he was able to set up his own TV channel.
i He played a part in overhauling the game’s ecconomics, including the institution of revenue sharing and a luxury tax.
I wouldn’t dispute any of those points (well, maybe the third). George Steinbrenner did do all these things. Trouble is, so did a lot of guys who would seem to be ahead of The Boos in the line for their Cooperstown plaque.
Charlie Finley’s teams won a lof of championships. And unlike Steinbrenner, who’s benefitted from a number of talented front-office personnel (Gabe Paul, Bob Watson, and Brian Cashman to name a few of the GMs), Finely put his back-to-back-to-back championship teams together himself; he was his own GM. You want an owner who set up his own television network? Try Ted Turner on for size. And as for revolutionizing the game’s economics, I’d argue that Marvin Miller, Donald Fehr, and (gulp) Bud Selig deserve a greater share of the credit for that than Steinbrenner.
If there’s a baseball executive currently sitting outside of the Hall of Fame who deserves to be in, it’s Walter O’Malley, who, as Isidore acknowledges, played a central role in expanding Major League Baseball to the West Coast. Given the reaction his induction would produce among jilted Brooklyn Dodger fans, half of whom seem to have pursued careers in writing, I expect a posthumous ceremony for O’Malley to happen just about never.
Give Isidore credit — he makes a solid case for putting Steinbrenner in Cooperstown. It’s just that you can make an even stronger case of a half-dozen other owners, commissioners and executives. Realizing that patience is not exactly one of Steinbrenner’s virtues, if The Boss hopes to make it to the Hall of Fame, he’s just going to have to wait his turn.