COG Round 64 Results: Circle Is Your Home, Stretch |

Willie (“Stretch”) McCovey was elected to the Cooperstown Hall of Fame by the baseball writers in his first appearance on their ballot. It took McCovey a bit longer under our COG system, but in this his 27th round on the our ballot, Willie becomes the 64th inductee in the High Heat Stats Circle of Greats. More on McCovey and the voting, after the jump.

Most Home Runs By a Clean-Up Hitter in National League History:
1. Willie McCovey 360
2. Willie Stargell 357
3. Ryan Howard 265
4. Fred McGriff 258
5. Hank Aaron 245
T6. Mel Ott and Ralph Kiner 244
8. Barry Bonds 242
9. Mike Schmidt 237
10. Jeff Kent 232

Most Wins Above Replacement (“WAR”, Baseball-Reference Version) By A First Baseman, 1940-1990
(includes players who played first base in at least half their career regular season MLB games)
1. Willie McCovey 64.4
2. Eddie Murray 63.2
3. Keith Hernandez 60.0
4. Tony Perez 53.9
5. Norm Cash 52.0

Candlestick Park is about to close forever, with a final concert by Paul McCartney next month and demolition planned for next year. McCartney’s August concert has a kind of karmic appropriateness, as the Stick hosted the Beatles’ final concert of their final tour, in August 1966.

Most Home Runs at Candlestick Park (Regular Season and Post-Season)
1. Willie McCovey 238
2. Willie Mays 204
3. Barry Bonds 140
4. Matt Williams 132
5. Bobby Bonds 103

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Notes on this round’s voting:

–This round looked to be, potentially, a highly competitive one. McCovey had never received more than 24 votes in a round, and it appeared others might be equally popular (Kenny Lofton, for example, recently received 25 votes in a round). But Stretch took the lead fairly early on, and his 30 votes this round gave him a convincing win.
”
–Recently redeemed candidates Kevin Brown and Roberto Alomar fell a couple of votes short of getting off “the bubble”, as we call the state of being subject to immediately dropping off the ballot with less than 10% support. So they, along with Killebrew, Eckersley, Campanella, Kiner, Wilhelm and Eddie Murray, remain on the crowded bubble.

–But our two holdovers with the largest current stashes of eligibility, Lofton and Ford, each added another round to their collection. Every other holdover (besides McCovey, of course) remained in the status quo level of support between 10% and 25%.

–The only 1919 birth year guy on the ballot this round who received more than token support was Monte Irvin, whose four votes represent an impressive showing for a guy with fewer than 3,000 major league plate appearances. It’ll be interesting to see how he fares in redemption rounds.

–With McCovey ascending to induction status, and no one from the 1919 part 1 class reaching the 10% support level, our holdover count for next round declines to 13, with eight of that group still on the bubble.

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The full spreadsheet showing this round’s vote tally is here: COG 1919 Part 1 Vote Tally.

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

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A spreadsheet listing the full membership to date of the Circle of Greats, along with some of their stats, is here: Circle of Greats Membership . You can also find that same link any time by clicking on “Circle of Greats” at the top of the High Heats Stats home page.

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Hartvig

10 years ago

I will be one of those voting for Irvin in redemption rounds.

Dr. Doom

Here’s the updated all-time vote leaderboard! John Smoltz – 658 *Craig Biggio – 652 *Ryne Sandberg – 542 *Kenny Lofton – 509 Edgar Martinez – 507 Lou Whitaker – 493 *Roberto Alomar – 457 *Eddie Murray – 432 Bobby Grich – 376 Sandy Koufax – 375 Tony Gwynn – 346 Willie McCovey – 336 Juan Marichal – 268 Tom Glavine – 262 Alan Trammell – 239 Mike Mussina – 233 Curt Schilling – 224 Nolan Ryan – 220 Ron Santo – 217 Tim Raines – 213 Larry Walker – 197 Barry Larkin – 188 *Whitey Ford – 183 Frank Thomas… Read more »

Darien

“Most Home Runs at Candlestick Park (Regular Season and Post-Season)
1. Willie McCovey 238
2. Willie Mays 204
3. Barry Bonds 140
4. Matt Williams 132
5. Bobby Bonds 103”

I really like this. Wonderful name theming. Two Willies and a Williams, and two Bondses. To go into more detail, a breakdown of initials gives us four B, three M, and three W, and nothing else.

MikeD

Is there a running, complete list of all players elected? Apologies if it’s staring me in the face!

Reply to MikeD

More than you know Mike! Read the final paragraph of the post and you’ll see the link, which I’ll reproduce here:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AklDUJiangSrdDFITkNsa1JQR3M3czJyMnNkaUlOc0E&usp=drive_web#gid=0

It can also be found by clicking on “Circle of Greats” under the main High Heat Stats banner.

Reply to RJ

One thing jumped out at me looking at the pitchers spreadsheet that you linked to.

All but 3 of the pitchers played until they were age 39 or older. Those 3 are Jim Palmer (38), Juan Marichal (37) and finally Sandy Koufax (30).

Unless we get a wild hair and elect Dizzy Dean or Addie Joss, I’m guessing that Koufax will be the
youngest retiree by at least a couple of years (Joe Jackson) and possibly 4 (Santo & possibly Mickey Cochrane). Or am I forgetting about someone?

Is there a Ray Chapman groundswell brewing perhaps?

Richard Chester

Reply to Hartvig

Retirement ages of players with WAR greater than 50.

Bobby Doerr 33
Joe Sewell 34
Joe Jackson 32
Joe Gordon 35
Hal Newhouser 34
Christy Mathewson 35
Johann Santana 33
Ed Rommel 34
Rube Waddell 33
Vic Willis 34

Jeff

Reply to Richard Chester

So now Bobby Doerr has lived more than 62 years after playing his last game AND he is a Hall of Famer. This must be a record, no? Would it be possible to look this up?

@8
Here are the 5 guys who lived the longest after their last game. I may be off by a year.
Elmer Flick 61 years
Ralph Kiner 59 tears
Joe Sewell 57 years
Edd Roush 57 years
Stan Coveleski 56 years

I refined those numbers. Here they are in years and days.

Flick 60.189
Kiner 58.134
Roush 56.176
Sewell 56.163
Coveleski 55.230

It looks like Doerr is the record holder.

@10
I might add that Monte Irvin is at 57.293 as of today.

Doug

The oldest major-leaguer ever, Red Hoff died in 1998 at age 107, 83 years after his final game.

Bob Wright and Bill Otis died 78 years after their last game, Ike Kahdot 77 years later.

Still living players Alex Monchak and Carl Miles played their last games in 1940, 74 years ago.

So a variation on the above. What player has walked this earth the most years after being elected to the HOF? So, in other words, Koufax was elected to the HOF in 1972 at age 36, so he is at 42 years and counting.

I’m guessing that’s not a record, but he might be approaching it and certainly has a chance at the all-time record, assuming anyone would view this as a record. More trivia, I suspect.

David Horwich

Yogi Berra was elected the same year as Koufax, so he of course matches Koufax for living-HoFer longevity. Musial was elected in 1969 and lived until early 2013, so he had 43+ years. Similarly, DiMaggio was elected in 1955 and died in 1999.

The record, though, may be Bob Feller’s: elected in 1962, died late 2010, so 48 years.

Ahh, so it was staring me in the face!