BBA Recommends Three for Hall of Fame

The votes are in!

As a longstanding member of the Baseball Bloggers Alliance (BBA), I take great pride in having been able to participate in their Hall of Fame vote each of the past five years.

This year, BBA is recommending Greg Maddux (with 94.51% of the vote), Frank Thomas (80.22%) and Tom Glavine (75.82%) be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame this July.

Here's the official word:

The Baseball Bloggers Alliance today recommends three players from the official Hall of Fame ballot to be inducted into Cooperstown this summer.  Pitchers Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine, most closely associated with the Atlanta Braves, and long-time Chicago White Sox first baseman/designated hitter Frank Thomas reached the 75% threshold when BBA members cast their ballots.

The voting of the Baseball Bloggers Alliance has often been close to what the baseball writers (BBWAA) eventually decide, though the correlation is stronger with the year-end awards.  

Now, a quick look at the past few years.

In 2010, no player reached the 75% mark in BBA voting, but the BBWAA saw it fit to elect only Andre Dawson.  A year later, both groups (seemingly) got it right, selecting Roberto Alomar and Bert Blyleven.  In 2012, the BBA recommended both Barry Larkin and Jeff Bagwell, but the national writers only took Larkin.  And last year, the bloggers again picked Bagwell, while the BBWAA couldn’t agree on a soul.

Where’s Bagwell this year?  As it turns out, he actually lost some support and came up roughly 10% shy of recommendation.

So, what ballot did The Hall of Very Good™ submit? Good question.  Since everyone else on the web is throwing their own theoretical picks out there, here are mine…Craig Biggio, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Tom Glavine, Jeff Kent, Greg Maddux, Mike Piazza, Tim Raines, Lee Smith and Frank Thomas.

Take a gander at the complete press release from the BBA and check out how all 36 players fared in the vote by clicking HERE.  Disagree with my picks (and I know some of you will)…let me read about it in the comments!