Well talk about hypocrisy...he hates Selig for ignoring at roids and then votes to put roiders in the HoF.

updated: 12/17/2016 6:02 PM
Rozner: HOF voting has taken turn for the surreal

So now what?

In the wake of Bud Selig's election to the Hall of Fame, many voters are asking that question and have thrown up their hands, giving up the baseball writers' fight to uphold Rule No. 5.

You have to wonder where Vladimir is in all of this. Not Vladimir Guerrero, who's on the ballot for the first time. Maybe Vladimir Putin is responsible for Selig's election.

Brief digression aside, Rule No. 5 states, "Voting shall be based upon the player's record, playing ability, integrity, sportsmanship, character and contributions to the team."

So we should hold the players to a certain standard, while Selig -- the man who profited more from steroids in baseball than all but a few players -- gets a spot in the building with the greatest players of all time?

Excuse me while I hurl.

Selig consistently acted in the worst interests of the game and he's in the Hall of Fame.

Incredibly, some applauding Selig's election now say they won't vote for Curt Schilling, because of some disturbing post-career comments, to which Rule 5 does not apply.

So character and integrity don't apply to Selig, but character post-career applies to Schilling.

This has truly taken a turn for the surreal.

In any case, my ballot is on its way to New York and the 10 names are as follows:

Roger Clemens

This is my first time voting for Clemens, whose numbers are obviously staggering. It was never clear exactly when he started chemically-enhancing, but what difference does it make now? Put him in.

Barry Bonds

The vote here was always for Bonds, who was a Hall of Famer before his hat size started growing. He got on the stuff after the Great Steroids Race of 1998, when baseball ignored him in favor of two pharmaceutical monsters.

Ivan Rodriguez

Arguably the best defensive catcher of all time, Rodriguez is 76th all-time in WAR position players, ahead of Carlton Fisk, Eddie Murray, Ryne Sandberg, Ernie Banks, Robby Alomar and Duke Snider, to name a few Hall of Famers.

He's eighth all-time in defensive WAR and retired with the most games caught. Offensively, he's the all-time leader at catcher in RBI, hits, total bases and doubles, and is second in triples and stolen bases, and fourth in homers.

Curt Schilling

This one is so obvious it's ridiculous.

Schilling is No. 26 all-time in WAR for pitchers, was second in Cy Young voting three times, top 15 MVP voting four times, top eight WAR for pitchers 11 times (top four eight times), top 10 ERA nine times, top six in WHIP 11 times, top 10 in strikeouts-per-9 innings 10 times, top 10 strikeouts-to-walks ratio 11 times (first five times), and he is one of four pitchers with 3,000 strikeouts and fewer than 1,000 walks (Greg Maddux, Fergie Jenkins, Pedro Martinez).

His postseason record is brilliant: 11-2 with a 2.23 ERA in 19 starts and 133 innings. He was 4-1 in the World Series, won three rings and his "bloody sock" start in Game 6 of the 2004 ALCS was no myth.

He also won Game 4 of the '04 World Series with a temporarily stapled ankle tendon, leading to a medical technique known as the "Schilling Tendon Procedure." Boston won its first World Series in 86 years.

Co-MVP of the 2001 World Series, he pitched in three games as Arizona beat the Yankees in seven games.

He got 45 percent a year ago and will likely lose votes.

Mike Mussina

Horribly underrated and almost always overlooked, Mussina is 24th in WAR for pitchers, 33rd in wins, 33rd in games started, 19th in strikeouts and 21st in adjusted-pitching wins. He's 22nd in strikeout-to-walk ratio, 63rd in Cy Young shares and 12 times finished top 10 in WHIP, 10 times top five.

He's 10th all-time in base-out wins saved, 10th in win probability added and second to Schilling since 1900 in strikeout-to-walk ratio among pitchers with at least 3,000 innings.

Mussina received only 43 percent last year.

Jeff Bagwell

Fell 15 votes shy last year. Will get in this year.

Tim Raines

Missed by 23 votes last year. Final year on the ballot. Should get in this year.

Trevor Hoffman

At 67 percent, missed by 34 votes last year. Might have to wait another year. There's an award named after him. After the 2016 postseason, suddenly people like closers again.

Jeff Kent

When he got on the ballot, Kent -- only 16.6 percent last year -- was top 100 all-time offensive WAR (97th), home runs (73), RBI (51), extra-base hits (41), total bases (67), doubles (26), runs created (88) and sacrifice flies (23rd). Defense will probably keep him from ever getting in.

Lee Smith

Retired as the all-time leader in saves (478) and still ranks third in that category behind Mariano Rivera and Hoffman, both future Hall of Famers. He also retired as the all-time leader in games finished (802) and is currently third behind Rivera and Hoffman.

It's his final year on the ballot and, at 34 percent last year, Smith will have to hope for committee help in years ahead.

So there's 10 for this year. In the next 12 months, there will be time to consider the rest of the PEDs players, newcomers and those who couldn't find room on this ballot, with four or five spots opening up here.

Thanks to Bud Selig, anything's possible now.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

Mike Mussina is not a HOF pitcher. Tier below.

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Proud member of the white guy grievance committee

It aint the six minutes. Its what happens in those six minutes.

Selig did a lot of bad stuff, for sure, but he understood the value of labor peace and did insist on some red lines that I think we'll come to appreciate: all on-field caps will now have the New Era logo prominently displayed, and when Under Armour takes over the apparel contract from Majestic, they're going to have their logo on the front of the jersey, not the sleeve. Bud was enough of a traditionalist to put his foot down on that stuff.

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Who gives a shit about the jerseys? Keep the game clean and playing field level.

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And his anti Manfred campaign has begun. The article is below, but let me add some of my feed back first. I bolded some spots that drove me nuts.

1) Stop with this crap that Cubs fans are happy with the length of the game because they won the World Series. Everyone was complaining about the length of those playoff games. Sure, I'm glad they won, but I didn't appreciate long games with tons of delays.
2) Mr Bryant, the game is not same. It is ever evolving. They added games to the regular season. They have added teams. They have reworked how many teams make the playoffs. They added replay. They changed the slide rule at home plate. Teams use a 5 man rotation. They test for drug use. These are just a few examples that the game has changed many times over the year.
3) I don't give two shits what the players' union head thinks. His job is to make the players money not improve the entertainment value to the fans.
4) For fucks sake, aside from die hards, people generally think the game is slow and boring. I'd love to see the game average 2.5 hours. I am also ok with them trying different things. If the start with a 1-1 count, then I have problem


updated: 2/25/2017 8:01 PM
Rozner: MLB doesn't need change for sake of it
Barry Rozner


Change is always good when change is for the good, especially the greater good.

But change for the sake of change is seldom good.

That seems to be where Rob Manfred is right now, trying to make change for the sake of it.


It was a bad week for the baseball commissioner, who was making a national media tour while trying to sell whatever it is he's trying to sell.

He doesn't seem to be sure, throwing pace-of-play stuff against the wall and having it thrown right back at him by those who actually play the game.

Yeah, the stars of baseball think Manfred has gone 'round the bend, and there have been several times over the past few months when Manfred has quickly walked back a ridiculous idea.

Among other mistakes in recent days, Manfred attacked players association boss Tony Clark and his constituents for being slow to negotiate significant and fundamental changes to a game Manfred later admitted "does not need fixing."

While talking out of both sides of his mouth, Manfred threatened unilateral alterations next year if the union doesn't get on board and embrace whatever the commissioner floats.

It seems clear now that Manfred wants to be the star of baseball, the savior who knows what's best for the game, knows better than those who play it for a living.

That part of his personality is not endearing or healthy for the game and it's the part some feared when he got the job. They remember him testifying before Congress in March 2005 when so many MLB witnesses were embarrassed, but Manfred came off looking worst, showing contempt for the process and irritation with lawmakers.

He adopted the same annoying posture this week when he ripped Clark and the players, often including a flippant remark and condescending chuckle for anyone who doesn't agree with him.

To his credit, Clark was calm when answering Manfred in a conversation with Yahoo's Tim Brown, suggesting Manfred's idea of cooperation was blanket approval and acceptance of everything Manfred tosses in the air.

"The challenge is appreciating how any one particular change is going to affect the play on the field and … an individual's career," said Clark, whose responsibility it is to protect the players. "That's always the sensitivity there.

"You do your homework against whatever the analytics say is going to happen and the experts say is going to happen, while also reflecting on what our history has been, while also … appreciating that careers are a part of the conversation.

"And then you try to take all of those things and determine where you can go and how quickly you can go, or how slowly you have to go out of respect for everyone involved, the industry and its history.

"You will never hear me offer anything about our game and suggest, flippantly or otherwise, that it should move one way or the other and it's going to be easy."

Kris Bryant reminded reporters in Arizona last week that Cleveland's Bryan Shaw almost threw a wild pitch on an intentional walk in the 10th inning of Game 7 of the World Series, but pitchers won't have to throw four balls anymore while all of MLB saves a minute or two a week.

Congrats, Mr. Commissioner.

"I love the game the way it is," Bryant said. "The game's been the same to me since I was young, so I don't think there's anything wrong with it.

"I think that's what makes our game great. It's a long game and we play 162 games a year and there's more strategy involved with it. I think it could be a slippery slope once you start changing all these things."

Said Joe Maddon, "I don't really understand the pace-of-game issues because I don't really pay attention to that. I'm just locked into managing the game. The 9 innings go 2 hours and 15 minutes, or 3 hours and 20. As long as you win, I don't care."

Cubs fans would undoubtedly agree, especially after watching their team play very long games en route to a World Series title in 2016.

But Manfred may have shown his true motivation in an interview with ESPN Friday morning, when he touted the monumental shift in the way managers get their information in the dugout.

"I like the idea of projecting that modern view of the game," Manfred said. "We went to iPads in the dugout last year to get rid of the guys carrying out the big notebooks full of matchup information.

"I think that appearance is helpful for us with the younger audience."

Yes, that's the answer. Those notebooks were destroying interest in the game for anyone who can use a smartphone.

You'd think he was kidding, but for Manfred it's all about the "appearance" of being "modern." Managers with iPads is absolutely going to gets kids excited about baseball.

It really tells you all you need to know.

The truth is change that is good for baseball is a good thing. No one is against that. But change to be able to say you made change is pure nonsense.

And so far that's all Rob Manfred has to offer.

brozner@dailyherald.com

• Hear Barry Rozner on WSCR 670-AM and follow him @BarryRozner on Twitter.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

what's one good thing Selig ever did?

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Reality is your friend, not your enemy. -- Seacrest

Expansion in Colorado? That was on his watch I believe. I love Coors Field (and Denver for that matter), and it brought a completely different style of baseball to MLB with the thin air.

And Miller Park is fantastic.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

Absolutely nothing

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Hey are you guys aware that Barry is friends with Greg Maddux?

Rozner is awful in print and radio. If he ever writes or says something I agree with I immediately change my opinion.

I heard some of Rozner and Dan Durkin today while doing some errands. I have only heard Durkin as a guest and thought he was OK, but he was pretty poor as a host today. I have not hear anyone say "Yes", "Yeah", and "Mmm-Hmm" so much since the last time I listened to a show hosted by Terry Boers. There was also a several minute span in which Rozner said "How's that workin' out for ya'?" and Durkin said "How's that look right about now?" three or four times each. It was like Brian Hanley had been cloned and was hosting a show with himself.

Rozner was criticizing Manfred for wanting to speed up the game, saying he didn't care if a game took 4 hours to play. Durkin said he didn't care either and couldn't imagine why anyone would care.

Well, I have no intention of spending four hours watching a baseball game. I don't exactly have a rich and fulfilling life, but I do have other things to do besides that.

Everything in the game grew under Selig, income, attendance, salaries. He's arguably the greatest commissioner in baseball history. To lay steroids at his feet when you had a players' union more powerful than he was is just ridiculous. He got as many concessions as he could.

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Don't take it personally.

It would have grown under a toad.

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Reality is your friend, not your enemy. -- Seacrest

I don't know about that. He navigated a lot of rough labor waters and balanced a lot of interests.

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Don't take it personally.

Tad, you're dead on. I love baseball. It's my favorite sport. But I don't want games starting at 7:30 that end past 11:00. It's not sustainable. It doesn't flow well. Kudos to baseball to trying to change that.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

I'd give managers one mid-inning pitching change a game where the reliever gets to warm up from the mound after being brought in from the bullpen.

I love lots of things, baseball among them, but they can't go on forever.

One thing I will say for Selig is that he understood the value of labor peace. The damage of the strike (which was really forced on Donald Fehr by Jerry Reinsdorf) was so great that we see now that they'll never even think about a lockout. Meanwhile, we're already preparing for Bettman's fourth.

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My point is that Rozner is out of touch with fans. I think most of us would like the game to move along. And we all want the game to remain largely the same but with a faster pace. Who did you prefer to watch pitch, Buerhle or Trachsel?

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Hawaii (fuck) You

Here's the thing though. I don't think the hardcore fan is complaining about the length of the game. The imperative to "speed up" is driven by the casual fan. In my experience with harness racing, when you make changes to appeal to the casual fan you risk losing the hardcore fan, and then what do you have? The casual fan is just that- casual. Let him leave or turn the game off in the seventh if it's too long.

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Don't take it personally.

Even hardcore fans don't want to see Baez take 45 seconds in the stretch with no one on base. Fix that and I'm good.

Players don't call time, they ask for the umpire to call time. Remind umpires not to grant time gratuitously and you've fixed the problem without changing the rules of the game.

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Yeah, there are ways to speed up the game without radically altering the rules. They save one second a game with the IBB policy and then add a half hour with dumb challenges. And the commercials are the real culprit.

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Don't take it personally.

This is more along the way I think on this. You do not have to "shorten" the game. If a game is long for normal reasons fine but start to enforce all of the ridiculousness within the game that makes it longer unnecessarily.

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If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.

Don't grant time once the pitcher starts his motion. Call it a strike if the batter wanders out of the box like some lost child.

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all it takes is making the umpires accountable for enforcing rules that are already in the book. not to mention the new ones they were supposed to enforce last year, but ultimately did not - batters keep one foot in the box at all times, pitcher must release the ball in X amount of time. Pace of play should start with the umpires holding players accountable.

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'Your AT&T Universal Card has arrived'? Oh God, Kick-fucking-ass, I got a Master Card! I don't believe it, man. Life is kinda cool sometimes.

That is one of my biggest beefs with MLB. Umpires do whatever the fuck they want and it is called charm.

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If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.

The role of the commissioner has evolved in my lifetime from the third party keeper of the integrity of the game to the owner's agent in charge of the financial stability of the game.

Selig was fine if you look at it in that context.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Correct. The players have their own "commissioner" in the head of the Player's Union.

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Don't take it personally.

But there really is no guardian of the game any more and that ultimately damages baseball.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

That is true of every league though except maybe golf with their traditions. Why does Selig so unnecessarily get the beat down? Probably because it is viewed as the official past time I guess?

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If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.

Perhaps to some degree, but it's better than having some psychopathic martinet like Kennesaw Mountain Landis acting as a dictator. Certainly the game is much healthier from the players' perspective.

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Don't take it personally.