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Sunday, April 5, 2015

Bill Madden Shows Everything That's Wrong With Baseball Hall of Fame Voting

     Namely, that sanctimonious phonies like him get to be the only votes-it's Judge, Jury, and Executioner by a bunch of phony, puritanical twits. I've discussed this a number of times lately, and perhaps my language might seem a bit strong, but not if you see how phony this whole process is. Normally, what I object to is how dogmatic he is on the question of steroids. He claims that he would never vote anyone who ever took a single HGH pill-for some reason trying to heal from an injury quickly to help your team is 'cheating' that he thinks is on Pete Rose or Shoeless Joe Jackson's level if not worse. He claims he would never vote for anyone who did steroids-as if he would know.

     The 'proof' of who has done steroids is really quite spotty.I mean Madden, Mike Lupica, and the other steroids scolds knows that Alex Rodriguez did steroids because he failed a test right? Well, actually, of course, he never failed a test. All that we know is that based on a very sleazy investigation by Bud Selig-I'm sure he belongs in the HOF in Madden's skewed moral universe, although he was the baseball commissioner and the owner of the Milwaukee Brewers for 14 years; no doubt, such a quibble doesn't bother a Bill Madden one bit-according to the notes of Anthony Bosch he apparently used them. Talk about no due process. 

      Similarly, Madden knows that Mark McGwire did steroids because that's what Jose Canseco said in his book and in Congressional hearings McGwire took the 5th and looked like he wanted to cry. Ok, well that's proof enough for Madden. We also know some things based on a list of names from a 2003 steroid test that legally we shouldn't know as those were supposed to be anonymous. Both MLB and the player's union dropped the ball here. 

      Madden, however, is certain that no way has he ever voted for anyone that did steroids because-well, I guess he tell by looking at them who did steroids. Or the only thing in Canseco's book he chooses not to believe is that 85% of players at least then did steroids. Madden holds on to the fiction that only a small number of players did it and we know exactly who they were: the only players that did steroids did them either through BALCO, Bosch's Biogenesis company, or was on the list of wrongfully released names from the 20003 tests. Like, Madden just knows that Mike Piazza didn't do steroids and that Pudge Rodriguez didn't do them-even though Canseco claimed PR did. Basically the steroids scolds believe what they want to believe.  And the jokes on us as they're who decides who's in Cooperstown. 

      This post by Madden here shows the key elements of false sanctimony I'm talking about. In it he argues that 2 men: George Steinbrenner and Marvin Miller don't belong in the Hall. Ok, everyone is entitled to their opinion and there will always be differences. What gets me going are the reasons he decides they don't belong in the Hall. 

     He thinks the great union leader for baseball players, Marvin Miller doesn't belong there because he criticized the players for accepting steroid testing. So Miller who accomplished so much and who would have made sure the names on the 2003 tests didn't get out-assuming he allowed it at all-doesn't belong there because of a difference of opinion. He doesn't get into the Hall because you disagree with the opinion. I mean McCarthyism was all about guilt of association but this is just absurd. It's guilt by association with the wrong opinion. 

     If I criticize drug testing in the workplace does this mean I'm a heroin addict? Yet this is more or less Madden's reasoning here-he believes this is the reasoning of the other voters as well. 

     "So decreed the 16-member Expansion Era Veterans Committee, who in voting Joe Torre, Tony LaRussa and Bobby Cox into the game’s pantheon, failed to give Miller, the first executive director of the Players’ Association who transformed the game by winning free agency and salary arbitration rights for the players through hard-nosed collective bargaining, more than half the number of votes he would’ve needed to achieve election."

    "The same went for Steinbrenner, who restored the Yankee brand in the 1970s and later showed his fellow owners the way to increase the value of their franchises ten-fold and more through his record local television deals."

    "You want to know why Miller, who missed by only one vote in the last Expansion Era election three years ago, didn't come close this time? You probably need to look no further than his repeated statements prior to his death in November 2012, decrying the players union’s agreeing to drug testing."

    "Almost to a man, the Hall of Fame players have condemned the alleged steroids cheats — Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa, Roger Clemens et al, who have obliterated their records or passed many of them on the all-time lists — and Miller’s adamant stance against taking measures to clean up the game has diminished him despite all his accomplishments on their behalf."

    "And lest anyone believes this is still an owners’ conspiracy to keep Miller out of the Hall of Fame, again, there were only four owner/executives on the 16-man committee. The rest were either senior baseball writers, historians or former managers. It was not much different from the first Veterans Committee ballot Miller appeared on in 2001, which then was comprised of all the living Hall of Famers, most of them former players who were Miller’s constituents, and he fell short by more than 10% of the necessary 75%."

      http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/madden-steroids-stance-miller-hall-article-1.1542660

      Here Madden goes again making false inferences. Just because there were 'only four' executives on the 16 man committee-actually that's still 25 percent which seems pretty significant to me-does that proves there is no anti-labor bias? Please, beyond the significant 25 percent that were actually owners, most writers like Madden are absolutely clueless about respect for labor rights. I mean, how much could a Bill Madden actually care if he assumes that Miller has a flawed character just for questioning steroid testing without any ground rules or due process? Madden and Lupica can throw as many spitballs at A-Rod as they like, the reality is that that arbitration panel he faced was a joke-the arbitrator had to find him guilty-or he'd be forced to step down as had happened to the previous arbitrator back in 2010 after that one had failed to find a player guilty of what Bud Selig said they were guilty of. 

    As for Steinbrenner, I find his inclusion here with Miller as another that doesn't belong in the Hall-Madden thinks he may not because he was suspended twice from the game-ironic. I've written in the past that as a Yankee fan, our Yankees may well have been helped by both Steinbrenner's suspensions

    http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2015/04/the-yankee-dynasty-and-george.html

    but what's interesting, is that Miller actually had some rather nice things to say about George in his major book on his own life and times leading the MLB union. He preferred working with The Boss to most other owners. 

   http://www.amazon.com/Whole-Different-Ball-Game-Revolution/dp/1566635993/ref=sr_1_sc_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1428263211&sr=1-2-spell&keywords=marvin+milller

    See pgs 379-385. 

     He suggests that George was railroaded in 1990 not because Fay Vincent or the other owners cared that he had gone on a campaign to dig up dirt on Dave Winfield but because George was the one owner his other owners feared more than most as he was the one who really got the ball rolling with spending money freely on free agency back in the 70s. Miller, suggests that George was actually too trusting of his other owners and never suspected that-despite unfortunately going along with his fellow owners on collusion in the late 80s not seeing that this was actually aimed at the Yankees first and foremost-they feared him as the owner that could destroy their Socialist Paradise a salary cap, revenue sharing, and luxury taxes. 

   There is no bigger joke than the idea that revenue sharing is for competitive balance by the way. If you look at what allegedly small market teams like Selig's Brewers did after receiving more revenue sharing is that they actually contracted payroll spending markedly. 

   While Selig and his fellow owners finally accepted after 1995 that they'd never get their precious salary cap-as Miller's successor, Donald Fehr, was not as toothless as the NFL player's union-luxury taxes and revenue sharing are basically the same thing going through the back door. 

    That the teams receiving these goodies from the wealthier teams don't spend this on payroll shows that this is not about 'competitive balance' and never was. It's about capping out players' salaries. How does that help fans of small market teams for their teams to get this windfall if it isn't used to improve the team?

    UPDATE: Now this is more like it

    http://nypost.com/2013/12/09/steinbrenner-along-with-miller-belongs-in-hall/



    

    

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