After a seesaw battle with Frank Thomas, Jeff Bagwell won induction as the second member of the Circle of Greats, joining Mike Piazza. Bagwell played his last game in 2005, completing what was then perhaps the greatest career at first base in modern National League history. After the jump, you’ll find a table of the top NL WAR totals for 1900 through 2005 by guys who played at least half their career games at first base.
[table id=87 /]
74 ballots were cast in this second round of COG voting (up from 61 in the first round). As has already been noted in the comments to the voting post, in addition to Bagwell winning induction, Frank “the Big Hurt” Thomas wins another four rounds of ballot eligibility (taking him through the 1960 round). John Smoltz appeared on exactly 50% of the ballots, winning, with not a vote to spare, four rounds of eligibility through the 1963 round). Mike Mussina fell three votes short of the 50% level, but stays alive into the next round as do Robbie Alomar, Kenny Lofton, Trevor Hoffman, Jeff Kent and Omar Vizquel. Kevin Appier, Jim Abbott, John Olerud, Sammy Sosa, Hideo Nomo and Matt Stairs all appeared on a least one ballot over the first two rounds, but did not receive enough support to remain eligible going forward. Under revised rules that will go into effect next round, Mussina and Alomar (each appearing on over 25% of the ballots this round) would have won two years of extended eligibility instead of just one, but it would not be fair to the voters to change the rules mid-round, so Moose and Robbie get only the one-year extension this time, pursuant to the rules announced at the beginning of the round.
