Friday, January 10, 2014

Just when you thought someone in the BBWAA couldn't breathe out of their mouth any harder

Professional cartoonist Jerry Dowling, who somehow gets to vote for the Hall of Fame, wrote a blog post about who he voted for and why.

Let's start with who he did vote for: Jeff Bagwell, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Tom Glavine, Greg Maddux, Mark McGwire, and Jack Morris. Notable for our purposes is why he didn't vote for Craig Biggio.

I refuse to vote for a guy who cheats, as Biggio did with all that armor on his arm, so he could get hit with pitches and trot to first base as a result. He made no attempt to avoid getting hit and actually stuck that arm our further, inducing the ball to smack him.

That, my friends, is against the rules and umpires should be calling that shit a ball, but they don't. I once asked umpire John McSherry about that, and he skirted around the question, never answering it.

Seriously. The red font? All his. We made no attempt to emphasize anything, because the font was turned red by the heavy breathing out of his mouth.

To reiterate: Barry Bonds? Roger Clemens? Mark McGwire? Hall of Famers, because they "cheated" with steroids. Biggio? Had an elbow pad. Kind of like...Barry Bonds, but without the steroids.

Jerry Dowling was a sports cartoonist for the Cincinnati Enquirer for 25 years. Yep, totally deserves a vote. Good job on letting this clown vote, BBWAA.