Who Are These Voters and Why Do They Determine Who Enters Cooperstown?

In the world of health care there is a term referred to as Scope of Practice, also known as the universal rules of conduct. It states that you can only practice what you are licensed or credentialed to produce. Which brings me to the question of how writers qualify to vote for players who deserve to be in the Hall of Fame.

When I looked at the most recent voting, that elected Barry Larkin into Cooperstown, I noticed a few players whose careers are deserving of much more than these writers are giving them credit for. Players such as Lee Smith, Dale Murphy and Rafael Palmeiro.

The writers have to first and foremost understand that it is what the player did on the field. If the player was such a criminal he would have been incarcerated. But these players were allowed to perform between the lines. Why are the writers so hellbent on the clean-as-a-whistle mentality? I'm convinced the more I hear Curt Schilling whine about how certain players cheated that he doesn't think he was doing anything he thinks was illegal.  But ethically or morally it probably was something he may get all red-faced about if this act were exposed for public viewing.

Nobody believes a word Roger Clemens speaks just like most people roll their eyes over anything that spews from the lips of Jose Canseco. But the fact is, Jose's offerings have proven to be true where Clemens pleads his un-freaking, YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING case.


The writers should be judged on who they think is capable of being enshrined in the Hall of Fame and then questioned as to how squeaky clean their lives have been. Put them through the same scrutiny for their own standard of living that they put the players through.  Then let us see how empty or cluttered their closets have been in order for the powers that be to accommodate them with their rightful place to vote.


Kevin Marquez

Baseball is Just Around the Corner

With baseball being six to eight weeks away from Spring training launching another season I thought I'd begin the 2012 season with a poem and some quotes about those attitudes-in-need of adjustment, the umpires.

The Umpire

The umpire is a lonely man
whose calls are known to every fan
Yet no one will call him Dick or Dan
In all the season's games.

They'll never call him Al or Ed
or Bill or Phil or Frank or Fred
or Jim or Tim or Tom or Ted
They'll simply call him names.
              by Milton Bracker (published in the New York Times in 1962)


"I've never questioned the integrity of an umpire.  Their eyesight, yes."  - Leo Durocher

"Baseball fits America well because it expresses our longing for the rule of law while licensing our resentment of law givers."  - A. Bartlett Giamatti

"Why is it they boo me when I call a foul ball correctly and they applaud the starting pitcher when he gets taken out of the ballgame?"      - American League ump, Jerry Neudecker



The Giants' first game:  March 3, 2012 is a split-squad exhibition game versus last year's Western Division champion Arizona Diamondbacks at Scottsdale, AZ.

Kevin Marquez