Carter in the Hall?, III

Here's the final tally, thanks to Clay Marston at the Canadian Baseball News, eh?

NEWLY ELECTED .....

Votes % Name

423 85.28% Eddie Murray
387 78.02% Gary Carter

REMAINDER .....

266 53.63% Bruce Sutter
259 52.22% Jim Rice
248 50.00% Andre Dawson
244 49.20% Ryne Sandberg
210 42.34% Lee Smith
209 42.14% Rich Gossage
145 29.23% Bert Blyleven
138 27.82% Steve Garvey
130 26.21% Jim Kaat [removed for 15th attempt]
116 23.39% Tommy John
113 22.78% Jack Morris
070 14.11% Alan Trammell
068 13.71% Don Mattingly
058 11.69% Dale Murphy
055 11.09% Dave Concepcion
051 10.28% Dave Parker
031 06.25% Fernando Valenzuela
030 06.05% Keith Hernandez

Taken off ballot (too few votes):

007 01.41% Darryl Kile
003 00.60% Vince Coleman
002 00.40% Brett Butler
002 00.40% Sid Fernandez
002 00.40% Rick Honeycutt
002 00.40% Tony Pena
001 00.20% Darren Daulton
001 00.20% Mark W. Davis
001 00.20% Danny Tartabull
000 00.00% Danny Jackson
000 00.00% Mickey Tettleton
000 00.00% Mitch Williams
000 00.00% Todd Worrell

I'm not a bit surprised by the sub-five-percenters, except that Darryl Kile led the group. There's not a Hall-of-Famer among them. I would be surprised if someone could make a reasonable argument for any of them. As Neyer said earlier today in his chat session, Butler is the best of the group and was far from a Hall-of-Famer (though I remember the press discussing the possibility of his enshrinement in the last couple of years of his career).

Anyway, here's what I wrote to Clay. I thought it might be of interest, at least to me:

Looking at the 5-75% guys, the "tweeners", I am starting to wonder if there are too many viable candidates for voters to choose from. I mean, none of those guys is a clear-cut Hall-of-Famer, but a decent argument can be (and seemingly has been) made for each of those guys. They are borderline cases for the most part, but they don't seem to be progressing in the process (except Kaat who shuffled of the mortal coil to Vets' Committee land). Rather they are stuck in a purgatory that seems to be getting more crowded.

It reminds me of the malaise after the initial class of two, that Bill James described in his Hall of Fame book. The no-brainers had been chosen but since the voters were given no clear standards to use, the field was too wide and the number of men who could garner the necessary votes dwindled even though there were eminently qualified candidates (by the standards that evolved). There should be a way to measure if and to what extent that is happening for a given class. I'll have to think about.

If I ever have some time, I'd like to figure at a means to do just that. I'll keep you posted.