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 by moklerman
6 years 4 months ago
 Total posts:   7680  
 Joined:  Apr 17 2015
United States of America   Bakersfield, CA
Hall of Fame

PARAM wrote:LMAO!!! The Greatest Closer = The Greatest Punter?

If I were to use a baseball/football analogy I would equate the closer to the LT. You need to make a play to win a game and many times it's a pass, you need protection from your LT. You need to protect a lead you have built in a game and it's the 8th or 9th inning? You call on your best pitcher, your closer. If starters could go 9 innings and let's face it, few of them can, you wouldn't need a closer. The high for IP the last 14 years has only exceeded 250 innings 3 times. That number used to exceed 300 IP. So comparing a great starter to a great closer, the former seriously needs the latter.
I don't know how important a closer actually is. It's great when you have one but they are a relatively new breed to baseball. Starters, for many decades, didn't need a closer so I'm not sure they actually need one now. This inning by inning specialization is starting to cloud manager's minds IMO. If athletes are bigger, stronger and faster than they've ever been but now can't pitch past the 6th inning because there's a holder, setup man and then a closer then I question just how much is truly necessary and how much is over managing. Nolan Ryan has often questioned why starters can't pitch 9 innings.

But as I said, it isn't a perfect analogy but a closer is a luxury like a great punter is IMO. With Kershaw or Verlander you don't "need" a closer but it's nice to have one that will actually shut the door. A team needs starting pitching but it can get by with a bullpen so I still question placing the "only" unanimous inductee into the HOF on a closer. Doesn't seem appropriate.

There are some guys who are the face of baseball and have tremendous careers. Babe Ruth for example. What he did for baseball, the numbers he compiled, the championships, the fame...he is easily a step up from even the best closer there ever was.

 by PARAM
6 years 4 months ago
 Total posts:   13212  
 Joined:  Jul 15 2015
Barbados   Just far enough North of Philadelphia
Hall of Fame

moklerman wrote:I don't know how important a closer actually is. It's great when you have one but they are a relatively new breed to baseball. Starters, for many decades, didn't need a closer so I'm not sure they actually need one now. This inning by inning specialization is starting to cloud manager's minds IMO. If athletes are bigger, stronger and faster than they've ever been but now can't pitch past the 6th inning because there's a holder, setup man and then a closer then I question just how much is truly necessary and how much is over managing. Nolan Ryan has often questioned why starters can't pitch 9 innings.

But as I said, it isn't a perfect analogy but a closer is a luxury like a great punter is IMO. With Kershaw or Verlander you don't "need" a closer but it's nice to have one that will actually shut the door. A team needs starting pitching but it can get by with a bullpen so I still question placing the "only" unanimous inductee into the HOF on a closer. Doesn't seem appropriate.

There are some guys who are the face of baseball and have tremendous careers. Babe Ruth for example. What he did for baseball, the numbers he compiled, the championships, the fame...he is easily a step up from even the best closer there ever was.


Going from the bottom of your post to the top. I already agreed Ruth is the acception. He should have been the first unanimous member.

Kershaw and Verlander don't need closers? I beg to differ. Kershaw has 25 complete games in the last 9 years or about 2.5 per season. Yet he has 140 wins. I'd submit he's definately needed a closer and has had a good one. Verlander has had even less, 21 the last 10 years but more wins (158). So he averages 2 complete games per season and with more wins, he's needed a closer more than Kershaw.

Closers aren't relatively new to baseball. What's relatively new is 9th inning closers. There were plenty of great closers back in the 70's and 80's (Gossage, Fingers, Eastwick, Hrabosky, Quisenberry, Sutter, etc) but they came in the 7th, 8th or 9th. There were closers in the 50's and 60's but they doubled as starting pitchers sometimes. Pitchers can't pitch 9 innings now-a-days because they haven't been developed to do that. They've been developed to pitch 5 or 6 innings in the minors so how can we expect them to go almost double that in the bigs?

 by PARAM
6 years 4 months ago
 Total posts:   13212  
 Joined:  Jul 15 2015
Barbados   Just far enough North of Philadelphia
Hall of Fame

dieterbrock wrote:Well, the cheaters to which you speak are the ones guilty of...
Getting caught
There are “cheaters” in the hall who have have broken rules, taken stuff. They just didn’t get caught.
Ivan Rodriguez and Pedro Martinez were both on the dirty list, but they’re in the hall. So how does that work?


If you can keep your name out of the news....off the accusation lists....away from legal trouble.....then who can say what you did? Will some like IRod and Pedro slip through the cracks? Sure. So that's a good reason to let them all in? Not in my book. And still keep out a guy who may have been as good a hitter as anybody to ever play (Joe Jackson) but gambled on baseball 100 years ago? Come on now!!! Rose is famous. The most hits in history. But he's kept off the eligibility list? The guy has paid his dues and maybe he'll get in eventually (postumously?). I can only hope if McGwire, Bonds, Sosa and Clemens (et al) get in it will also be postumously. That should be the penalty for being an asshole like that.....you'll get in jackass, but you won't be alive to see it!!! Perfect!

 by dieterbrock
6 years 4 months ago
 Total posts:   11512  
 Joined:  Mar 31 2015
United States of America   New Jersey
Hall of Fame

PARAM wrote:If you can keep your name out of the news....off the accusation lists....away from legal trouble.....then who can say what you did? Will some like IRod and Pedro slip through the cracks? Sure. So that's a good reason to let them all in? Not in my book. And still keep out a guy who may have been as good a hitter as anybody to ever play (Joe Jackson) but gambled on baseball 100 years ago? Come on now!!! Rose is famous. The most hits in history. But he's kept off the eligibility list? The guy has paid his dues and maybe he'll get in eventually (postumously?). I can only hope if McGwire, Bonds, Sosa and Clemens (et al) get in it will also be postumously. That should be the penalty for being an asshole like that.....you'll get in jackass, but you won't be alive to see it!!! Perfect!

Again, using Rose as an example has no integrity. Rose chose the path, he chose to be ineligible because it allowed him to avoid prosecution. He’s not on the ballot. Never has been.

So we’ve got cheaters in, and guys who there were whispers about their use, Piazza, Biggio, Edgar Martinez etc. are getting in too.
So you are in favor of punishing the ones who only got caught, and basically persecute them despite knowing that it’s quite possible the guys being elected were guilty of the same thing.
Doesn’t fly with me.
The Mitchell report was based on samples of over 1200 players who thought they were anonymously supplying. And the “list” of 100 players who were “dirty” only came from 1 sample group. By some accounts there may have been some 300 other “dirty” players who never got outed.
So it’s not just opinion that other guys were doing it too, we know they were.
Society just loves to take down the biggest stars and looks the other way on others

 by PARAM
6 years 4 months ago
 Total posts:   13212  
 Joined:  Jul 15 2015
Barbados   Just far enough North of Philadelphia
Hall of Fame

Yeah I guess there's no good answer/solution. For my money I'd just say, if they're known abusers, screw them. If others get through the cracks, so be it.

 by dieterbrock
6 years 4 months ago
 Total posts:   11512  
 Joined:  Mar 31 2015
United States of America   New Jersey
Hall of Fame

PARAM wrote:Yeah I guess there's no good answer/solution. For my money I'd just say, if they're known abusers, screw them. If others get through the cracks, so be it.

Fair enough.
Basically you're less concerned about the "cheating" aspect, and more concerned about "getting caught for cheating"

 by PARAM
6 years 4 months ago
 Total posts:   13212  
 Joined:  Jul 15 2015
Barbados   Just far enough North of Philadelphia
Hall of Fame

dieterbrock wrote:Fair enough.
Basically you're less concerned about the "cheating" aspect, and more concerned about "getting caught for cheating"


What? No. I don't like the cheating. It takes away from the guys who did it normally (Ruth, Mantle, Gehrig, Teddy Ballgame, Aaron, Mays, etc). When you juice up because you're jealous of those other two popular cheaters (McGwire & Sosa), hit 73 homers in a year to start a 4 year run of 209 homers from age 36 to 39, get caught and then eek out 59 over the next 3 seasons to eventually pass Aaron, I don't want to honor that shit. Just like McGwire didn't pass Maris legitimately. It's bogus. Counterfeit. More than tainted.

As far as guys who never got caught, we can believe they did or didn't and address that accordingly. From 1900-1945 there were only 3 guys to hit at least 500 homers. Over the next 51 years 12 more joined that club. And then in and after the steroid era, 12 more joined in 17 years. I can't believe any of them arrived there legitimately and that's a shame for players like Griffey, Jr. or Frank Thomas. But I can't be sure they didn't juice either. The rest? I believe they all might have been dirty including Thome and Pujols.

 by dieterbrock
6 years 4 months ago
 Total posts:   11512  
 Joined:  Mar 31 2015
United States of America   New Jersey
Hall of Fame

PARAM wrote:What? No. I don't like the cheating. It takes away from the guys who did it normally (Ruth, Mantle, Gehrig, Teddy Ballgame, Aaron, Mays, etc). When you juice up because you're jealous of those other two popular cheaters (McGwire & Sosa), hit 73 homers in a year to start a 4 year run of 209 homers from age 36 to 39, get caught and then eek out 59 over the next 3 seasons to eventually pass Aaron, I don't want to honor that shit. Just like McGwire didn't pass Maris legitimately. It's bogus. Counterfeit. More than tainted.

As far as guys who never got caught, we can believe they did or didn't and address that accordingly. From 1900-1945 there were only 3 guys to hit at least 500 homers. Over the next 51 years 12 more joined that club. And then in and after the steroid era, 12 more joined in 17 years. I can't believe any of them arrived there legitimately and that's a shame for players like Griffey, Jr. or Frank Thomas. But I can't be sure they didn't juice either. The rest? I believe they all might have been dirty including Thome and Pujols.

1100 players also tested with sealed results. I have no doubt that Griffey, Thomas, maybe even Jeter did juice. And if the pitchers were using, why not make it level playing ground.
As for the HR totals, MLB juiced the ball itself, which lead to an increase in HR also.
So in todays game, they are hitting more HR than ever. Does that mean the players are juicing again?
We don't know who did it, and who didn't. So I don't think its realistic to crucify one group when the other may be just as guilty.
Pedro was in the Mitchell report and still got in the Hall with 91% votes. Just ridiculous

 by PARAM
6 years 4 months ago
 Total posts:   13212  
 Joined:  Jul 15 2015
Barbados   Just far enough North of Philadelphia
Hall of Fame

I just hope the obvious ones, the ones who benefitted the most from it don't get in until they're dead. Sosa, McGwire and Bonds, etc.. I don't care about a level field. I don't care some "might have" or even "probably did". If it's clear, too bad for you.

 by dieterbrock
6 years 4 months ago
 Total posts:   11512  
 Joined:  Mar 31 2015
United States of America   New Jersey
Hall of Fame

PARAM wrote:I just hope the obvious ones, the ones who benefitted the most from it don't get in until they're dead. Sosa, McGwire and Bonds, etc.. I don't care about a level field. I don't care some "might have" or even "probably did". If it's clear, too bad for you.

Exactly, you want to punish the ones who are guilty of getting caught. Not guilty of cheating

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37 posts Jul 01 2025