Mark Buehrle gets enough votes to stay on the Hall of Fame ballot

Mark Buehrle

For the first time since 2013, nobody got elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. The votes from the Baseball Writers Association of America were revealed Tuesday, and no player received the 75% necessary to earn induction.

That doesn't mean that nobody will go into the Hall this year -- the Class of 2020, which includes Derek Jeter, Larry Walker and Ted Simmons, will get its induction ceremony this summer after COVID-19 ruined everything last July.

In this 2021 ballot, pitcher Curt Schilling came the closest. He got 71.1% of the vote, followed by outfielder Barry Bonds (61.8%) and pitcher Roger Clemens (61.1%). Schilling, Bonds and Clemens were all in their ninth year on the ballot, which means they'll get one more kick at the can in 2022. If a player isn't inducted after 10 years, he falls off the ballot.

The biggest takeaway for White Sox fans? Well, good news for Mark Buehrle. He received 44 of a possible 401 votes to lead all first-time candidates. That's 11% of the vote, so it's nowhere near enough to secure induction into the Hall, but Buehrle was comfortably above the 5% threshold needed to remain on the ballot for a second year.

I'm not prepared to say Buehrle belongs in the Hall, but I'm pleased to see him receive a decent level of support. Getting 44 votes means some people outside of Chicago noticed his name on the ballot and voted for him.

At the very least, my hope for Buehrle is that the voters give his career a fair audit in the years to come. How do we judge a starting pitcher's worthiness for the Hall anyway? Most starting pitchers in the Hall have 300 wins; 3,000 strikeouts or both. Almost nobody does that anymore, so new standards need to be applied to starting pitchers.

For Buerhle, let's start with this: Between 2000 and 2015, nobody pitched more innings, and nobody won more games. Buehrle and CC Sabathia both had 214 wins during that period. And as we've noted in the past, Buehrle had iconic moments in his career: two no-hitters, including a perfect game; five All-Star appearances, including an All-Star Game start; and a World Series championship with the Sox in 2005.

It may or may not have been a Hall of Fame career, but it was a career that should not be dismissed easily. I'm happy Buehrle's name will be on the Hall ballot again in 2022.

Hall of Fame thoughts: Derek Jeter and Larry Walker

Derek Jeter

Does it really matter who the one person is who didn't vote for Derek Jeter in this year's Hall of Fame balloting?

I am not among the righteously indignant who needs to know the answer to the question. I also don't care why that person didn't vote for Jeter. All that really matters is the former New York Yankees shortstop got 99.7 percent of the vote, easily clearing the 75 percent threshold for election, and there's certainly no shame in that.

Maybe I'm not bothered by this because I was never a huge Jeter fan. Don't get me wrong: The guy is the best offensive shortstop I've seen in my lifetime, bar none. Through the years, I simply got tired of ESPN analysts insisting that Jeter was a great defensive player, when he was merely adequate at his position.

Again, nothing wrong with being adequate. But it's not unfair or wrong to say Jeter didn't stand out for his defense.

What set him above the crowd was his bat. In the past century, Jeter's 96.3 offensive WAR is the best among shortstops by a wide margin -- Robin Yount's 83.1 is second.

Jeter had eight 200-hit seasons. No other shortstop in my lifetime has had more than four. Jeter had nine seasons of 120 OPS-plus or better. He batted .300 or better 12 times. No other shortstop in my lifetime has batted .300 more than six times. (There are three that have done it six times: Nomar Garciaparra, Alan Trammell and Alex Rodriguez.)

Jeter's career OPS-plus is 115. That's even better than Cal Ripken Jr. (112), who is the second-best offensive shortstop I've seen in my lifetime.

So, yeah, Jeter was an easy Hall pick because he was just tremendous, historically great, with a bat in his hands. Just don't try to tell me how allegedly awesome he was with the glove. I won't buy it.

Joining Jeter in the Hall is Larry Walker, the former Montreal Expos, Colorado Rockies and St. Louis Cardinals outfielder. This was Walker's 10th and final time on the ballot, and here's the thing that's so curious about his election: Only four years ago, he received just 15.5 percent of the vote.

This week, he cleared the 75 percent threshold by six votes. That's a slim margin, but it counts. It's just kind of strange how people didn't think Walker was a Hall of Fame four years ago, but now they do. He's still the same man; his career accomplishments have not changed.

Walker is a three-time batting champion who finished his career with a .313/.400/.565 slash line. He was the National League MVP with the Rockies in 1997, when he hit .366 with a league-best 49 homers and 130 RBIs. He also won the Gold Glove in right field that year, one of seven times in his career he earned that honor.

The main knock on Walker? He played a lot of his career at the offensive paradise known as Coors Field in Denver. No doubt that career .965 OPS benefited from the thin mountain air, but the thing is, Walker's .865 career OPS on the road is still higher than several notable Hall of Famers, including Ken Griffey Jr. (.860), Dave Winfield (.841), Eddie Murray (.838), Rickey Henderson (.836) and Tony Gwynn (.835), among others.

Would I have voted for Walker? Ehh, probably. I think playing in Montreal and Colorado for most of his career hurt his profile. If he had played in an East Coast media market, chances are he wouldn't have been waiting 10 years to get into the Hall.

Here is the 2020 Hall of Fame ballot

Paul Konerko

Below is a list of every player on the 2020 Hall of Fame ballot. Names are listed alphabetically:

Bobby Abreu, Josh Beckett, Heath Bell, Barry Bonds, Eric Chávez, Roger Clemens, Adam Dunn, Chone Figgins, Rafael Furcal, Jason Giambi, Todd Helton, Raúl Ibañez, Derek Jeter, Andruw Jones, Jeff Kent, Paul Konerko, Cliff Lee, Carlos Peña, Brad Penny, Andy Pettitte, J.J. Putz, Manny Ramírez, Brian Roberts, Scott Rolen, Curt Schilling, Gary Sheffield, Alfonso Soriano, Sammy Sosa, José Valverde, Omar Vizquel, Billy Wagner, Larry Walker.

Of note for White Sox fans, Konerko is on the ballot for the first time. I do not expect Konerko to make the Hall this year or any other year, but hey, I didn't expect Harold Baines to get in either, but he did.

Jeter is the only sure bet to get in among the other first-timers. Other notables making their first appearance on the ballot include Soriano, Giambi, Dunn, Lee and Abreu.

Me personally, I hope Giambi doesn't get in. He's a steroids guy, and I hold a grudge against him for cheating to win the 2000 American League MVP award. (Frank Thomas was more deserving.)

Walker is on the ballot for the final time, and we'll see if he can get the votes necessary for induction on his last kick at the can, much like Edgar Martinez did last year.

Players must appear on 75% of the ballots in order to be inducted. Last year, there were 425 ballots cast, so 319 votes were necessary to cross the 75% threshold.

Hall voters are required to submit their votes by the end of the calendar year, and this year's class will be announced Jan 21 on MLB Network. The 2020 induction will be July 26.

Pete Rose, Ichiro and other people with more than 4,000 professional hits

Ichiro Suzuki

Miami Marlins outfielder Ichiro Suzuki now has 4,257 hits in his professional career -- if you combine his numbers in the major leagues with his totals from the Japanese League.

Pete Rose, of course, holds the record for hits in the majors with 4,256. Ichiro passing that figure with his combined total has provoked plenty of discussion of late, and Baseball Digest posted a graphic on its Facebook page that I thought was interesting enough to share here.

We normally think of Rose and Ty Cobb as the only two men in the 4,000-hit club, because they are the only two to achieve that milestone in the big leagues. But what if we included all the other professional leagues -- all the minor leagues in the U.S., the Japanese League, the Mexican League, the Cuban League, the Negro Leagues, so on and so forth?

Baseball Digest's research turned up nine men who achieved 4,000 professional hits. Here they are, from highest to lowest:

Julio Franco

1. Rose
Majors: 4,256
Minors: 427
Total: 4,683

2. Cobb
Majors: 4,189
Minors: 166
Total: 4,355

3. Ichiro
Majors: 2,979
Japanese League: 1,278
Total: 4,257

4. Julio Franco
Majors: 2,586
Minors: 618
Mexican League: 316
Japanese League: 286
Dominican Winter League: 267
Korean League: 156
United Baseball League: 6
Total: 4,235

Minnie Minoso

5. Hank Aaron
Majors: 3,771
Minors: 324
Total: 4,095

6. Jigger Statz
Majors: 737
Minors: 3,356
Total: 4,093

7. Minnie Minoso
Majors 1,963
Minors: 429
Cuban League: 838
Mexican League: 715
Negro League: 128
Total: 4,073

8. Derek Jeter
Majors: 3,465
Minors: 554
Total: 4,019

9. Stan Musial
Majors: 3,630
Minors: 471
Total: 4,001

Stan Musial

The first thought that comes to mind when looking at this list is, who the hell is Jigger Statz? Well, he was born in Waukegan in 1897 and played eight big-league seasons, including four with the Cubs from 1922-25. He played his last game in the majors with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1928, but he continued to play in the minors until 1942, retiring just before his 45th birthday. I guess that's how you accumulate more than 3,000 minor league hits.

There are two players with White Sox ties on the list, the first of which is Julio Franco. I remember Franco playing shortstop with the Cleveland Indians when I was a little kid in the early 1980s. He was the designated hitter for the Sox in the ill-fated, strike-shortened season of 1994. He hit .319 with 20 home runs and 98 RBIs -- and remember, that season ended the second week of August. Franco's last game in the majors came as a 48-year-old with the Atlanta Braves in 2007. He collected six hits as a 55-year-old playing in the United Baseball League two years ago. I don't know if there's a more traveled player in the history of the game than Julio Franco.

Lastly, Minoso, aka Mr. White Sox, appears at No. 7. The only thing I can say about Minnie is this: How the hell is that man still not in the Hall of Fame? That injustice needs to be corrected. 

Myth-busting: Single-team career stars are *not* becoming more rare

You know who played 3,308 career games all with the Boston Red Sox?

YAZ!

Indeed, Ken "Hawk" Harrelson's oft-mentioned former teammate, Carl Yastrzemski, tops a list of 36 players in major league history who have played at least 2,000 career games all with the same team.

If you've watched ESPN or MLB Network at any point during the last two months, you are no doubt aware that longtime New York Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter is retiring at the end of the season. Jeter is among those 36 players, having played each of his 2,610 career games (entering Thursday) in a Yankee uniform.

On a recent MLB Network broadcast, I heard one of the commentators note that Jeter has spent his entire career in New York. They added that in this era of free agency, "you just don't see that too often anymore." That's conventional wisdom. Heck, I think I've probably said things like that myself.

But every now and then I like to research the facts behind the conventional wisdom, just to see if they are accurate. In this case, they are not.

Of the 36 players on that list, 23 are players who have played in my lifetime. For the record, I was born in 1976.

So, that means between the years of 1901 and 1976, a span of 75 years, there were only 13 players who played 2,000 games or more all with the same team. In the 38 years since 1976, 23 players have played 2,000 or more games all with the same team

Contrary to conventional wisdom, it's actually more common nowadays for a player to have a long career with the same team.

I won't bore you by listing all the players on the list, but among the 36 are some star players I recall watching during my 1980s childhood: Tony Gwynn, George Brett, Robin Yount, Mike Schmidt, Cal Ripken.

Others, like Jeter, are names familiar to fans who have followed baseball over the last 10 or 15 years: Barry Larkin, Craig Biggio, Edgar Martinez, Chipper Jones, Jeff Bagwell, Todd Helton.

Don't get me wrong: Given the sheer volume of players who make it to the major leagues, it is still uncommon for a guy to spend a career that spans more than a decade in the same city. At some point, most guys get traded, or leave their original franchise via free agency. But the conventional wisdom that says single-team career stars like Jeter are becoming more and more rare is just plain wrong.

In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if this list continues to grow over the next decade. You can find examples of players who are candidates to join the list. Boston second baseman Dustin Pedroia has played 1,025 career games (entering Thursday). He is under contract with the Red Sox until 2021, when he will be 38 years old. How about Evan Longoria? He's played 807 career games (entering Thursday) and is under contract with the Tampa Bay Rays through 2023. There's two possibilities right there. I'm sure there are others.

You see, this old-school lament that "players just don't stay in the same place anymore" is not quite right. They didn't stay in the same place all that often back in the old days either. If I ever try to tell you otherwise, remind me I'm wrong. 

Joe Girardi to the Cubs? Idiotic speculation or a real possibility?

New York Yankees manager Joe Girardi's contract is up at the end of the season. You know what that means. It is time for renewed speculation that Girardi will "come home" to manage the Cubs.

Chicago Tribune columnist Phil Rogers is leading the media charge with his piece in today's paper.

Rogers and others have reported the Cubs are open to the possibility of replacing manager Dale Sveum, who frankly has had no chance to win the last two years with the crappy rosters he has been handed. But, perhaps Cubs brass is unhappy with Sveum because supposed core players Anthony Rizzo, Starlin Castro and Jeff Samardzija have all taken a step backward this season.

My opinion on Sveum? Take him or leave him. I don't think he's anything special as a field boss, but the truth is no manager ever born could have coaxed the Cubs teams of the last two years to anything close to a .500 record, let along playoff contention.

As for Girardi, I'd be stunned if the Yankees don't offer him another contract. Even though New York will likely not make the playoffs, Girardi has done an unbelievable job of keeping a mediocre roster in contention deep into September.

Derek Jeter, Mark Teixeira and Curtis Granderson have barely played this season. Alex Rodriguez, as usual, has created a circus around that team. C.C. Sabathia has had the worst season of his career. New York's pitching, statistically, is worse than both of the woeful Chicago baseball teams this year. Despite all that, Girardi is going to squeeze 85 to 87 wins out of a team that had to give way too many at-bats to guys like Vernon Wells, Lyle Overbay and Eduardo Nunez. Girardi's a good manager. He's better than Sveum. There's no denying that.

But would he leave New York for Chicago? What would be his motivation to do that? His local roots, I suppose. He's from Peoria. He attended Northwestern, and he played seven of his 15 MLB seasons on the North Side. I can't imagine money would be a motivation. Whatever the Cubs can offer, the Yankees could surely match. I don't think the Cubs can offer Girardi a better on-field situation than what the Yankees have. New York contends every year. The Yankees will find a way next year, too, regardless of who the manager is. They'll open up their pocketbook this offseason and address their holes. They always do. The Cubs, in contrast, are at least another two years away.

Are the local ties enough to pry Girardi out of New York? I don't know, but that's really all the Cubs have to offer. And, if Girardi is sick of New York and ready for a change, he would have other options than Chicago. I hear Washington is looking for a manager, and the Nationals have a team that should be ready to win. Attractive jobs could come open in Texas and Anaheim, as well.

When it comes to the Cubs, it's always hard for me to tell whether some of the local reporting is legitimate news, or just cheerleading from the press box. When I read some of these articles, it almost strikes me as if the Cubs reporters are trying to woo Girardi to Chicago themselves. In the coming months, it will be interesting to see whether that story has legs, or if it's just another round of idiotic speculation at the end of another lost season on the North Side.