Trammell Snubbed Again

Today, the 2012 Baseball Hall of Fame class was announced. We’ll see shortstop Barry Larkin inducted on July 22.  We will not see Alan Trammell inducted.

And as usual, most of us Tigers fans are bitter about it too. Perhaps more so than ever.

But why is he passed over? Again and again? The numbers don’t lie…

In 19 seasons, Larkin batted .295. In 20 seasons, Trammell batted .285. Larkin hit 198 HRs, Trammell hit 185. Larkin drove in 960, Trammell drove in 1003.

Larkin was an 11-time All Star, while Tram only made 6 All Star appearances. Trammell did win 4 Gold Gloves to Larkin’s 3. Both players are world champs. The numbers aren’t that different.

And if there’s to be a substantial argument over shortstops in the Hall with those career numbers, do we dare talk about the offensive prowess of Ozzie Smith? We’ll skip that part.

I’ve been under my own assumption that the Hall of Fame vote is much like high school. It’s just a big popularity contest, and the flashiest players usually get more notice. Now, I’m not calling Larkin flashy, but the Alan Trammell that I grew up was a humble character. Perhaps boring doesn’t get in, and judging by much of the ballot, any scale of cheating doesn’t work for Hall votes either (though wait until next year).

The Baseball Writers as usual have blown this for a much deserving Trammell. Sure, he got 12.5% more of the vote this year versus the last, but what makes him more of a Hall of Famer this year than the last year? His numbers aren’t different, there are no asterisks by anything, he didn’t lose any of his Gold Gloves, etc. He certainly didn’t lose his World Series MVP from the 1984 campaign.

The writers baffle me, as I ranted about a few days ago. The whole process needs to be fixed, or changed… something that allows for some fluent reason why writers vote how they vote. In all reality, there’s absolutely NO reason whatsoever that either player shouldn’t be worthy of the Hall, if those numbers are there for the taking. It just feeds into a reality that most of the writers are lazy and ignorant, excluding the proper research necessary in order to make a proper vote.

In the meantime, we’ll have to go another year of having zero players from the 1984 championship team representing the Tigers as Hall of Famers. It’s a sad reality, and a bloody shame.