Deja Vu All Over Again

The nominees for the Today's Game Era, or what old-timers like me persist in calling the Veteran's Committee, have been announced by the Baseball Hall of Fame. This is for players overlooked by the BBWAA, or nonplayers.

This year is deja vu all over again, as Yogi Berra once said, as seven of the men named have been on the list before: Harold Baines, Albert Belle, Will Clark, Orel Hershiser, Davey Johnson, Lou Piniella, and George Steinbrenner. Only Piniella had his vote totals revealed. The others had totals so low they weren't published, presumably for them to avoid embarrassment. This is Steinbrenner's third go-round.

Of these seven, I think Belle has the best statistics. Over his twelve-year career he averaged 40 home runs a year and 130 RBI, and finished with a .295 batting average. But his career was curtailed by injury, and perhaps more significantly, he was by all accounts a pretty rotten person. I doubt he ever gets in the Hall, at least while anyone who experienced is alive.

The others fall much shorter in my book. Baines, Clark, and Hershiser had nice careers, and Hershiser had some post-season heroics. Davey Johnson won wherever he went, but only managed one World Series title. He did take four different teams to the post-season, and won Manager of the Year twice. It wouldn't be an outrage if he got in, but it's doubtful.

Lou Piniella also won one World Series title, and with the Seattle Mariners set the all-time win record. He took three teams to the post-season, and had pretty good numbers as a hitter, collecting 1705 hits and a .291 average. Again, this wouldn't be an outrage. He got seven votes the last time he was up, but unless there is a huge shake up of voters, why would he increase?

That's what's kind of dumb about this whole exercise. If an individual can't get more than a few votes in one election, why put them back up again? Is the attitude about Steinbrenner going to change from vote to vote? Why put his family through this?

There are three new names on the ballot: Joe Carter, Charlie Manuel, and Lee Smith (pictured). Carter was a good hitter for quite a few years, getting 396 dingers in his career. But his batting average, .259, would be among the lowest of any Hall of Famer. His dramatic walk-off home run to win the World Series in 1993 has given him more cache. The only other walk-off home run in WS history was Bill Mazeroski's, and he got in, perhaps because of it. But Carter only got 3 percent of the vote in his only BBWAA appearance.

Charlie Manuel is up as a manager. Like Johnson and Piniella, he won a World Series ring, with the Phillies in 2008, and went back in 2009. He also won a division title with the Indians in 2001. Of his eleven full seasons as a manager, he never finished below .500. But he only managed eleven and a half seasons, and he wasn't exactly known as one the greatest managers of his era.

If anyone gets in from this list, it will probably be Lee Smith. When he retired, he was the all-time leader in saves, and is now third, behind HOFer Trevor Hoffman and the soon-to-be elected Mariano Rivera. He lasted through fifteen years on the BBWAA ballot, peaking at 50 percent in 2012, usually in the 40 percent range. He led the league in saves four times, but does have a sub-.500 win-loss record, although that is not paramount for a reliever. I don't quite know why he never was elected; perhaps because he moved around too much, playing for eight different teams (or, "messing up his plaque").

I have a hunch no one gets in from this list, and hope they retire those who don't get enough votes. But I expect Smith to come close enough to be nominated again.