Baseball Hall of Fame announces changes to voting process
By Dan Zinski
It’s Hall of Fame weekend in baseball, a huge weekend for players and fans, a celebratory weekend. And a weekend for announcing huge changes to the voting process and eligibility rules.
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The Hall of Fame put out this dispatch Saturday morning announcing the changes, which go into effect immediately. The big change is that now recently-retired players will only be eligible for a ten year period rather than the original fifteen before their case is kicked to the Veterans’ Committee.
Three players who would have seen their eligibility cut off under this rule, Don Mattingly, Alan Trammell and Lee Smith, will be grandfathered in and allowed to stay on the ballot for the full fifteen years (provided they reach the minimum vote total each year).
The second big change is that, from now on, the Hall will disclose the names of voters and require them to fill out a registration form and sign a code of conduct. This move is a clear response to last year’s controversy where a voter, Dan Le Batard, sold his vote to fans as part of a Deadspin stunt.
The change in length of eligibility will be seen as a response to the glut of steroid era players currently gumming up the yearly ballots. Now it will only take ten years to completely get rid of players who have no shot, rather than fifteen.
Both changes are direct responses to situations that created bad PR for the Hall. So, they were probably necessary changes.
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