A FEW RANDOM THOUGHTS ON BASEBALL AS THE WEATHER GROWS EVER COLDER . . .

Actually, a (very) few thoughts on the Hall of Fame vote (and no links cause I'm too lazy to dig them up -- anyone who cares about this dorky shit already knows the results):

1. Jim Rice gets in. Whatever. I don't think he deserves it (relatively low OBP, numbers inflated by Fenway, hit into approximately 9,000 double plays), but he's not an egregiously bad choice. I mean, everyone keeps saying how he was such a "feared" hitter, whatever the hell that means since his IBB numbers are not all that high.

2. He deserves it more than Andre Dawson does! He of the .323 lifetime OBP should not be allowed entry into the hallowed hall unless he pays admission. I know everyone says he was such a "classy" guy, which I think means he was a Black guy who spoke "good English" and never got arrested, but I'm open to other definitions. Anyway, he didn't deserve his one MVP and the OBP is too damn low.

And why am I talking about The Hawk, you may ask, since he did not get elected? Because he got 67% of the vote, which is about 66% too many.

3. Unlike Tim Raines, who got only about 22%. Gun to my head I'd probably vote for Raines (or at least I'd tell the guy holding the gun to my skull, "Hey dude, no need to bring the heat! I'll let you count my votes for the HOF without threats. That's how I roll."). But I could be convinced not to. He wasn't really that much of a force outside his incredible 1981-1987 period.

But I'm fairly certain he was better than Rice and Dawson. Better hitter, better baserunner, better fielder. Not that those things matter in the calculus.

I guess his problem was that he was neither feared (even though he drew almost twice as many IBB as Rice did) nor "classy" (guys who dabbled in coke early in the Reagan administration when they were 22 years-old can't come to Cooperstown. Sorry, it's an exclusive club open only to whoring drunks and prescription pill-poppers).

4. Dale Murphy (who always struck me as pretty much in the Rice and Dawson mold) got about 13%. Maybe he, like the other two, doesn't deserve admission either. But the difference in votes??? Is anti-Mormonism spreading to the baseball writers?

5. And finally, the 28 fucking idots who didn't vote for Rickey should just turn in their BBWAA credentials right now, since there is no reason I can think of why they should be allowed to ever vote for the HOF again. Morons.