I wrote recently that the Illowa APBA League Hall of Fame ballot came out and we were going to submit our ballot at the recent league weekend. Well, the results are in. This year, Ken Griffey Jr. and Pedro Martinez were voted in unanimously and Carlos Delgado eked in with 7 votes.
My thoughts
The more I looked at Griffey’s stats, the more impressed I was, even after I voted for him. Fourth in the league in homers (582), 2nd in rbis with 1754. He was one of only three IAL players to have 1500 rbis AND runs scored.
The funny thing is that Griffey played for eight teams in his career. Contrast that to Martinez and Delgado who were traded only once between the two of them. Griffey could never find a permanent home.
I was also surprised to see Mike Mussina not get elected. He missed selection by one vote. The biggest knock on Moose was his lower Win %. He was 204-180 and Pedro was 200-130. He also had a slightly higher ERA (4.18 to 3.72). But Mussina had a longer career and really consistent. Maybe next year.
Gary Sheffield will also make a move for our Hall next year, too. His offensive contributions can’t be ignored. Impressively, only Griffey had more career runs or rbis on this year’s ballot.
Finally, in the process of doing the write-ups for the website, I got a chance to look through some of the old Hall of Fame entries we did like Joe Carter or my favorite, Mark McGwire (ok, so I’m biased).
Here is the (newly updated) IAL Hall of Fame page.
