Replace the Hall of Fame with a modern museum in New York or Chicago.

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum 1071 Fifth Avenue New York City via Wikimedia Commons

baseballhall.org

That's the link to the baseball Hall of Fame website.  You'd hardly know it was a museum.  Buried at the bottom of the home page:

National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum

25 Main Street,

Cooperstown, NY 13326

Phone: 1-888-HALL-OF-FAME

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Note the phone number and the fact that museum is clearly secondary to the Hall of Fame part.  At the top of the home page in giant letters and promoting the San Francisco Giant baseball cap worn by Randy Johnson when he won his 300th game: ARTIFACTS TELL THE STORY OF 2015 HOF CANDIDATES.

Kill the Hall of Fame.  Friday, December 26, 2014

located in Cooperstown, NY, a place still inaccessible to public transportation ...

Kill Cooperstown!

Maybe a new form can be created in the near future.  Maybe not.  But let's just consign the current baseball Hall of Fame to the dustbin of history and let it die with what little dignity it deserves.

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Pedro Martinez: does intentionally hitting batters constitute a character flaw that eliminates him from the Hall of Fame?  Thursday, January 1, 2015

Pedro Martinez intentionally hit batters.  That's against the rules...

So why is Pedro Martinez a sure bet to be elected?  Why does no one invoke the character criteria?  Why doesn't borderline candidate Mike Mussina get any credit for having good character on this very point.  While Mussina was an active player he explicitly renounced intentionally hitting batters, even in retaliation for his teammates being hit by an opposing pitcher, who sometimes was none other than Pedro Martinez?  Mussina does not get such credit even from his supporters who concentrate exclusively on Mussina's "record" and "playing ability".

This is just another reason to kill the Hall of Fame.  I think I'll call for a boycott.

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Randy Johnson released the ball closer to home plate than at least 99.9% of pitchers.  Friday, January 2, 2015

6'10" Randy Johnson is the only pitcher taller than 6'7" (79 inches) since 1901 with at least 2,500 innings ...

Since 1901 only 12 pitchers, including Randy Johnson, have been at least 81 inches (6'9") and only one (Jon Rauch) was taller...

58 Hall of Fame pitchers since 1901 with at least 1,000 innings ...

Only Fergie Jenkins, Don Drysdale and Eppa Rixey stood as tall as 77 inches (6'5").  Only Chesbro was shorter than Whitey Ford...

That gave Randy Johnson an unfair advantage.  Why is it that the anal steroid zealots are bothered only by batters getting an advantage, and that with off field activity?

Randy Johnson deserves credit for harnessing and controlling his very tall, gangly body but not for simply being tall.  Randy Johnson did not break the rules by releasing his pitches closer to home plate but he did get an unfair advantage.  Shame on baseball officials for allowing this and shame on baseball fans for not realizing it.
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New York and Chicago are the only two remaining cities with two teams and clearly they are America's number one and number two cities generally.  Teams long ago abandoned New York, Boston, Philadelphia, St. Louis and even Los Angels where the Angels actually played at their inception in 1961.  New York or Chicago should be the site of an entirely new museum, for lack of a better word.  This new institution would be both (brick and mortar) and digital.  The one thing it should not be is a distraction from the history of baseball by over emphasising a system of selecting former players for induction into a hall of fame.

I understand that both football and basketball have halls of fame.  However, those sports have not burdened themselves with a morals clause as baseball has done with four of its six criteria:

http://baseballhall.org/hall-of-famers/bbwaa-rules-for-election

5. Voting: Voting shall be based upon

- the player's record

- playing ability

- integrity

- sportsmanship

- character

- contributions to the team(s) on which the player played.

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Hypocrisy and stupidity rule, both by the Hall itself and the writers who vote on candidates.  My next post will call for a boycott, which will highlight the irrelevance of the baseball Hal of Fame.