2024 Classic HOF election

[bigfanNY]

Bill White. Great Player 8x All Star 7x Gold Glove WS champ 64. Then 18 years as Broadcaster for the NY Yankees. Outstanding Broadcaster!! And First MLB Black television announcer. Then President of the National Leauge President 1989 - 1994 First Black league president. Not in Hall of Fame for calling out Baseball owners for installing One of their own as Commissioner. Just sad....

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by bigfanNY

Bill White. Great Player 8x All Star 7x Gold Glove WS champ 64. Then 18 years as Broadcaster for the NY Yankees. Outstanding Broadcaster!! And First MLB Black television announcer. Then President of the National Leauge President 1989 - 1994 First Black league president. Not in Hall of Fame for calling out Baseball owners for installing One of their own as Commissioner. Just sad....

Didn't he just not make it last year?

[bigfanNY]

Peter

Bill White was on the Ballot last year but got only 10 of 16 votes Lou Pinella got 11and Leyland got 15 and got in. Last years committe was executives managers umpires etc. With impact after 1980. So even though it took until 1989 for MLB to appoint a Black leauge President ( Bill White was the only Black Leauge President ever) last years group did not find it significant enough. I am sure as they looked around the room at the owners meetings they felt no presure to recognize the achievement. Perhaps given that Black play by play announcers are still a rarity this current group might
recognize Bill Whites breakthrough as the First Black play by play announcer in baseball when he was hired in 1971. Or perhaps his 286 lifetime average 8 all star games and 7 Gold Gloves will do it. But given recent History probably not.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by bigfanNY

Peter

Bill White was on the Ballot last year but got only 10 of 16 votes Lou Pinella got 11and Leyland got 15 and got in. Last years committe was executives managers umpires etc. With impact after 1980. So even though it took until 1989 for MLB to appoint a Black leauge President ( Bill White was the only Black Leauge President ever) last years group did not find it significant enough. I am sure as they looked around the room at the owners meetings they felt no presure to recognize the achievement. Perhaps given that Black play by play announcers are still a rarity this current group might
recognize Bill Whites breakthrough as the First Black play by play announcer in baseball when he was hired in 1971. Or perhaps his 286 lifetime average 8 all star games and 7 Gold Gloves will do it. But given recent History probably not.

Not arguing either way on the merits, but I thought as a matter of process if you didn't make it by a committee vote you had to wait several years till that committee voted again.

[G1911]

Announcers aren't inducted and his 1B statistics are not even close to HOF. What were Bill White's achievements as a league president that are HOF worthy?

[D. Bergin]

Originally Posted by G1911

Announcers aren't inducted and his 1B statistics are not even close to HOF. What were Bill White's achievements as a league president that are HOF worthy?

I think it’s silly that they refuse to induct guys based on their overall influence on the game, and insist on putting them in a specific box. Bill White is certainly worthy for his many cumulative contributions to the game.

I’d also like to see guys like Don Zimmer get in. They put umps in and executives in, but not coaches?

[BillyCoxDodgers3B]

Yes, we need sections for coaches and scouts.

As has often been brought up around here, a section for ambassadors/game changers would be nice so that Lefty O'Doul can get in. Curt Flood should be put in this category moreso than as a player, IMHO. If the HOF wanted to be really lazy, they could just expand upon their Pioneers category and lump all these guys in with Candy Cummings for all I care. They're all pioneers in their own way.

[G1911]

Originally Posted by D. Bergin

I think it’s silly that they refuse to induct guys based on their overall influence on the game, and insist on putting them in a specific box. Bill White is certainly worthy for his many cumulative contributions to the game.

I’d also like to see guys like Don Zimmer get in. They put umps in and executives in, but not coaches?

I don't entirely disagree on the philosophy (recognizing that this is not how it works right now), I just cannot really identify these achievements and contributions for White.

He's not even close as a player, using the old stats or the new. League President was a mostly powerless trophy job at that time and still is, which is why there aren't really any achievements to point to. An argument that he should be the first person inducted on the strength of his announcing would be a pretty big stretch. If being a pretty good players hanging around in the baseball world after their playing careers is enough then we need to induct another ~50 guys. Guys who are on the borderline sometimes get unofficial boosts from other things they did, but White is not even close on performance.


Curt Flood is a sensible choice to me on pioneer logic and impact on the game, as we can discern and define what his impact was.

[jayshum]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Not arguing either way on the merits, but I thought as a matter of process if you didn't make it by a committee vote you had to wait several years till that committee voted again.

Assuming the process isn't changed (which seems to happen fairly often), there are 3 different Era Committees they rotate through so it should be another 3 years before White could be voted on again.

https://baseballhall.org/hall-of-fam...era-committees

[Kutcher55]

Curt Flood.