Roberto Alomar, No IAL HOF’er???

 

Despite posting Hall of Fame statistics over his 17 year Illowa APBA League career with the Northside Hitmen, Roberto Alomar has failed for the second consecutive year to get the votes needed to get in, and there can only be one reason for keeping him out.  The Northside Hitmen finished in first place nine times, won four titles, and won 100+ games five times, with Roberto playing secondbase.  Alomar wasn’t just on the field, he was a major contributor to his team’s success, scoring more than 100 runs 6 times (including 134 in 1997), three times he hit more than 20 homers, and six times his batting average was above .300.  All of these offensive accomplishments were achieved while being the best fielding secondbaseman.

Robby ranks right up there with the IAL All Time greats in several categories.  He has 8,982 at bats (5th in IAL History), 1,503 runs scored (4th in IAL History), 2,455 hits (6th in IAL History), and 488 doubles (7th in IAL History).

The incident, which I believe, has kept Alomar out of the IAL Hall of Fame occurred, in real life, September 27, 1996.  Roberto was called out on a pitch, he alleges, was out of the strike zone, by umpire John Hirschbeck.  The two of them got into a heated argument, in which lip readers contend, Hirschbeck called Alomar a faggot.  Roberto lost his cool and spit into the face of Hirschbeck.

Alomar, and other players, contend that Hirschbeck had been on edge since losing his son to ALD and learning that another son also had it.  Roberto was suspended five games and required to donate $50,000 to ALD research, the two shook hands April 22, 1997, when Alomar apologized.  Both Hirschbeck & Alomar took the unfortunate incident as an opportunity to raise awareness and funds to research the disease, and came to regard each other as friends.  Roberto later donated an additional $252,000 to fund ALD research.

On January 5, 2011 Roberto Alomar received 90 percent of the vote required to elect him into the MLB Hall of Fame, it was his second try, after failing to get in one year ago.  It is my hope that the next time Alomar is up for vote into the IAL Hall of Fame that he gets in, he deserves to be there, he’s earned it.

One of the things I like about APBA over MLB is that it’s all about the game.  APBA excludes salary negotiations, steroids, suspensions, and all of the other nonsense that goes on in the real life world of baseball.  So, I’ll ask you, what do you think of keeping a player out of the IAL HOF based on a real life incident?  Ironically, this player was voted into the MLB HOF.  What about steroids, drugs, alcohol, or personality issues?  As I’ve said about Alomar, his cardboard APBA card didn’t spit on anybody.  I’d appreciate hearing your input on this matter.

 

YEAR CLUB G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO SB AVG SLG OBP
1989 HTMN 135 469 77 123 25 4 8 32 50 71 21 .262 .384 .333
1990 HTMN 156 588 81 143 25 2 3 59 48 88 38 .243 .308 .300
1991 HTMN 145 490 57 138 27 3 6 51 46 59 16 .282 .386 .343
1992 HTMN 159 635 105 168 40 8 7 54 39 84 57 .265 .386 .307
1993 HTMN 150 571 107 158 27 5 5 55 90 66 54 .277 .368 .375
1994 HTMN 152 584 129 182 41 6 25 78 82 71 58 .312 .531 .396
1995 HTMN 147 554 92 150 48 4 9 47 64 44 34 .271 .421 .346
1996 HTMN 142 579 89 135 14 8 14 49 56 65 35 .233 .358 .301
1997 HTMN 153 588 134 178 36 2 24 76 68 47 18 .303 .493 .375
1998 HTMN 110 412 74 124 16 6 15 52 29 52 6 .301 .478 .347
1999 HTMN 147 578 75 145 32 1 13 69 38 59 17 .251 .377 .297
2000 HTMN 153 559 125 171 46 1 19 81 96 65 22 .306 .494 .408
2001 HTMN 156 565 97 175 33 1 18 76 73 74 31 .310 .467 .389
2002 HTMN 151 571 121 173 20 6 26 70 59 94 25 .303 .496 .368
2003 HTMN 149 577 79 132 23 3 16 61 48 102 18 .229 .362 .288
2004 HTMN 140 493 48 122 29 0 3 42 53 88 10 .247 .325 .322
2005 HTMN 56 169 13 38 6 2 4 13 14 27 2 .225 .355 .288
17 Total 2401 8982 1503 2455 488 62 215 965 953 1156 462 .273 .413 .343

 

edit 1/27/11: added stats

4 Comments:

  1. Robbie was one of my favorite players of all time, so this is a no-brainer to me. He’s done some despicable things, but so have a lot of other HOFers. Vote him in.

  2. Robby was just voted into the TBL Hall of Fame, on his second try.

  3. Robby was a key contributor to the 4 championships won by the Hitmen- no doubt about that.
    He was an exemplary card and never got into any fights when I put him back in the deck. I’m pretty sure that he never spit at any of the APBA umps.
    In fact, I can’t even remember an APBA ump!
    He was also probably the best seconbaseman ever in the IAL!

  4. Here is Roberto’s TBL career. Twice the league leader in hits, twice in runs. In TBL career raking, Robbie was 5th in hits, 12th in doubles, 15th in triples, 6th in stolen bases, 5th in runs, 13th in total bases, 11th in games played, 7th in Plate appearances.

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