Earlier, the Class of 2015 for the baseball Hall of Fame was announced. Some guys were no-brainers like Pedro Martinez and Randy Johnson, and I was pleased to see John Smoltz make it on his first try; I always assumed he’d get in, but it would be some convoluted debate on why he shouldn’t get in on his first year, but whatever.
Ultimately, the train of thought led to general happiness that John Smoltz got in, since while at the peak of my Braves fandom, John Smoltz was still the heart and the ace of the Braves pitching squad, but also looking at both sides of the debate, namely the statistics.
Long story short, I don’t hide the fact that I think baseball’s HOF criteria and process is pretty flawed and nothing is as easy as it should be as long as a bunch of entitled writers hold the keys to the Hall, so admittedly, I was a little bit surprised to see Smoltz make it on his first year. What this says to me is that the Baseball Writers Association of America (BBWAA) really love a good narrative, and really put a tremendous amount of weight into the comparison to Dennis Eckersley, another Hall of Fame pitcher.