Henry Aaron won the voting this round by a significant margin, despite competing against several other great stars. Sort of the way he took over the career home run title with his steadily great performance from the 1950s through the 1970s, passing by other renowned stars of his era.  Hank becomes the 44th player inducted into the High Heat Stats Circle of Greats.  More on Aaron and the voting after the jump.

Baseball-reference.com has, for each hitter, a table titled “Neutralized Batting”.  In that table, the hitter’s standard batting statistics are adjusted to neutralize the run-scoring environment in which the hitter played.  A member of the Rockies in 1999 has his hitting stats adjusted downward, while a  member of the Senators in 1968 has his hitting stats adjusted upward.  Todd Helton’s 35 homers for Colorado in 1999 are adjusted down to 28, while Frank Howard’s 44 homers for Washington in 1968 are adjusted up to 53.  More detail on how the Neutralized Batting numbers are produced is here: Neutralized Stats Explanation

Below is a table of Baseball-reference’s top Neutralized Batting career home run totals. Our newest inductee remains the all-time champ in this neutral alternate universe.

[table id=172 /]

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— This ballot round was another in a group of several very talent-rich rounds arising from 1930s birth years.  Apparently, during the Great Depression inexpensive entertainment consisted of listening to the radio, going to the movies and conceiving future baseball superstars.  Al Kaline, generally acknowledged as an all-time great by most voters, nevertheless managed only fourth place in his debut on the ballot, which says something about the competition.

–All four of the guys “on the bubble”, at immediate risk of being eliminated from the ballot, received sufficient support to remain on the ballot for at least one more round.  Kenny Lofton, Eddie Murray and Dick Allen appeared on at least 10% of the ballots cast and though Ryne Sandberg fell one vote short of 10%, he was tied for the ninth-most appearances on the ballot, which also allows him to remain for the next round.

–A huge contingent of holdovers drop from the “two rounds of eligibility remaining” level down to what will be “on the bubble” status in the next round.  Craig Biggio, Bobby Grich, Edgar Martinez, Willie McCovey, Juan Marichal and Harmon Killebrew all fall into this category. The combination of these six, plus the four who will continue in bubble status, means an enormous contingent of ten players will be on the bubble in the next round.

–Ron Santo barely made it through this ballot without also falling on to the bubble — he remains in the “two rounds of eligibility remaining” category.  Sandy Koufax is in that category, too, along with a newcomer to the holdover list, Al Kaline.

–Roberto Clemente received the kind of widespread voting support in his debut on the ballot that is often sufficient for induction, but was not enough against Hank Aaron.  Clemente earned four rounds of guaranteed eligibility.

–Bob Gibson continues to receive substantial support.  He’s now accumulated three rounds of guaranteed eligibility.

–Long-time holdovers John Smoltz and Lou Whitaker continue have large caches of guaranteed eligibility built up: nine rounds for Whitaker and five for Smoltz.  Smoltz did not receive any votes at all this round, as voters focused instead on candidates in more desperate need of support.

–In summary, we will have for the next round an enormous group of 17 holdovers on the ballot, including the ten on the bubble and seven more who are not at immediate risk.

–As I’ve mentioned in comments before, I’ll be traveling the next three weeks and will largely be off the grid during that period.  I will try to poke my nose in to HHS now and then to see what’s going on if I can, but I won’t be able to do COG rounds over these next three weeks.  Doug mentioned in a recent comment that he may be able to conduct some COG voting while I’m gone, which would be more than welcome.  And in any event, spring training will soon be under way.

The full spreadsheet showing this round’s vote tally is here: COG 1934 Part 1 Vote Tally.

The vote summary for recent Circle of Greats voting rounds is here: COG Vote Summary 2 .  An archive with fuller details of the earlier, 1968 through 1939, rounds is here: COG 1968-1939 Vote Summary .  In both cases, raw vote totals for each past round appears on Sheet 1 and the percentage totals for each past round appears on Sheet 2.

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Here’s the Circle of Greats membership thus far, currently in order of date of birth, from earlier to later.
Hank Aaron
Frank Robinson
Brooks Robinson
Gaylord Perry
Phil Niekro
Carl Yastrzemski
Pete Rose
Ferguson Jenkins
Joe Morgan
Tom Seaver
Steve Carlton
Rod Carew
Jim Palmer
Reggie Jackson
Nolan Ryan
Johnny Bench
Carlton Fisk
Mike Schmidt
Bert Blyleven
George Brett
Gary Carter
Ozzie Smith
Robin Yount
Paul Molitor
Alan Trammell
Wade Boggs
Rickey Henderson
Tim Raines
Tony Gwynn
Cal Ripken
Roger Clemens
Randy Johnson
Barry Larkin
Barry Bonds
Tom Glavine
Greg Maddux
Curt Schilling
Larry Walker
Jeff Bagwell and Frank Thomas
Mike Piazza
Mike Mussina
Ken Griffey, Jr.
Mariano Rivera