His chief argument was basically “I’m Tony La Russa and you’re not.” Maybe that was enough to flip the votes of a half dozen or more members of the Today’s Game Committee or, perhaps, the members of that group were already more open to rewarding Baines for his longevity.I have enormous respect for La Russa, as does Russo, but that doesn’t mean he can’t be wrong.Harold Baines is one of about two dozen players whose careers were significantly impacted by both of the two biggest labor stoppages in MLB history.Baines finished his career with 2,866 hits. The O’s were out of contention again, however, and traded Baines back to his second home (Chicago). This might have happened, it might not have.

Clearly La Russa saw a Hall of Famer in the making, given Baines’ election by La Russa and eleven others 28 years later.Back in the playoffs for the first time since 1983, Baines hit .357 in the ALCS against the Boston Red Sox before slumping to .143 in the World Series, which the A’s unexpectedly lost to the Cincinnati Reds.Baines had a really good first full season in Oakland. His first at bat (a flyout) and first home run (9 days later) were both against future Hall of Fame pitcher On July 26, 1980, Baines hit the first of his 10 career walk-off home runs off another future Hall of Famer, The young left-handed-hitting right fielder was well known to La Russa, who was his skipper at AA Knoxville in 1978 and AAA Iowa for most of 1979. On the surface, he upped his game to a .309 BA and 113 RBI (his career high), while also rapping out a career-best 198 hits.

The chart below looks at how the players were evaluated when they were active as well as how well they did in the statistics that were important at the time. Still, Baines was 9th in the MVP voting.The 1985 campaign was the last in which Harold Baines would receive any MVP recognition.Baines made it to the Mid-Summer Classic again in ’86, the second of his five career appearances.Harold Baines was forced to become the team’s designated hitter in 1987, due to problems with his knees. Baines spent just five years on the ballot, a span in which he never received more than 6.1 percent of the vote. In the playoffs, he hit .364 with a 1.076 OPS. This is not his doing—unless you count 12+ years of All-star level productivity—and despite our feelings you can’t put the milk back in the cow so let’s do the decent thing and let him have his moment. With 25 home runs, 105 RBI and a .469 slugging% (114 OPS+), he finished 20th in the A.L. Celebrate.I’m hatin… on the idiots who elected him.

Let the “stat pickers” select the stats the support his inclusion or omission. I have three exceptions, however.Obviously, #1 and #2 are germane only for players in the first half of the 20th century, #3 for the second half only. It will be a time to reflect on what Baines was as a baseball player, not what he wasn’t. However, I’m going to keep this section in this piece because it’s important to understand the reasons why Baines’ selection was so controversial and surprising, even to him.Let’s start with the Similarity Scores list just shared. I’ll never visit that worthless museum again.Next up, Jose Cruuuuuuuuuuuz and Cesar Cedeno and Jimmy Wynn and Billy Doran and Bobby Bonds and Toby Harrah and Buddy Bell and Wilbur Wood and Joe Niekro and Lee May and Bobby Murcer and Amos Otis and Tim Wallach…Okay I’ll stop.

Was he ever the MVP? For those who voted “yes,” consistency and longevity were qualities that sabermetrics don’t measure. Players are listed in alphabetical order. Martinez is Thanks to an additional 2,418 plate appearances in his career (about 4 full seasons worth), Baines has superior “counting” stats to Martinez but Edgar’s “rate” stats are vastly superior.

One of the common threads in the opinion pieces I read today was that, if you put Harold Baines in the Hall of Fame, then you have to put x, y and z into the Hall as well.There are already lots of players in the Hall of Fame who were not quite as good statistically as players who aren’t.

He repeated the word “shocked” when he learned last night that he had actually been elected to the Hall of Fame.The Cooperstown case for Harold Baines is based on longevity and the consistency he showed over 22 seasons.

The future Hall of Famer was promoted to manage the big club in Chicago in August ’79.Baines as a hitter was undisciplined in his early years. I can’t bitch about that selection. But since he is, it’s time to wonder how his unexpected election might benefit some of his 1980s peers whose Cooperstown candidacies could be debated at this time next year, when the Modern Baseball committee is scheduled to meet at the winter meetings.The Modern Baseball committee considers players who made their biggest impacts from 1970 through 1987.

There's no way a DH with little power like Baines gets into the Hall of Fame with 2850 hits.

He fell short of key milestones, his rate stats (while good) are not good enough for an offense-only player.Having said that, the last piece (about how the two player strikes likely cost him 3,000 hits) really bothers me. Baines barely cleared the bar for three additional ballots before dropping to 4.8% on his fifth try in 2011.It might surprise you to know that there are only 6 players who have logged more than 6,000 career plate appearances with more than half of then occurring as their team’s designated hitter. It may frustrate those of us doing hours of research to justify “yes” or “no” votes but the rules are the rules. West and with that came extra respect. I am delighted for Harold.“the longest game in MLB history, a 25-inning contest against the Milwaukee Brewers”Didn’t Boston and Brooklyn play 26 innings back in 1920?Harold Baines drove in 835 runs in the 1980s and 748 more in the 90s.

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