Clemens and Bonds Inching Closer to Hall of Fame

As a way of decreasing the number of players on ballots, the Baseball Writers Association last year proposed increasing the number of former players whom they could vote into the Hall of Fame annually to 12 from the previous 10.

That proposal was turned down by the Hall, but it enacted another change that could alter outcomes of futures elections even more.

Through last year, writers with 10 straight seasons of membership in the BBWAA earned the right to cast their vote until they died.

Beginning with this year, the Hall will grant writers only a grace period of 10 years once they are no longer covering baseball, which lessens the size of voters that are not as informed as others.

Last year 549 ballots were submitted to the Hall of Fame in voting with an estimated 450 this year, close to 100 less. As of Monday night, there were 158 of the 450 that were made public.

Already this new move has changed significantly the electorate makeup and should do so on a continuing basis. On Wednesday, there may be a hint of a change in the Hall’s makeup as well.

One online tracker of the ballots that have been made public shows that there are a much higher percentage of votes this year including players such as Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds on the ballot and not supporting other specialist players such as Trevor Hoffman and Lee Smith, two closers.

The biggest indicators of a probable shift are Clemens and Bonds as statistics support their inclusion overwhelmingly yet they were never on track to be voted in.

Even prior to the change made by the Hall of Fame, the age difference amongst voters was visible. Voters who make ballots public are generally much younger, more tech savvy and more in tune with stats.

Many now feel that both Clemens and Bonds will eventually make it into the Hall of Fame, the question is how long will it take voters to make that decision.

Over the past year, the change has been big in voting for the two and they have eight more years to remain on the ballot with the voters getting younger each year.

The steroids and other drugs that were used by many players during a decade or longer stretch was part of baseball and the writers that covered those players and younger writers who now cast Hall of Fame ballots accept the Steroid era as part of the evolution of the game.