re dave kingman for the hall of fame in article apr news yale edu steve tomassi writes hi baseball fans so what do you say don t you think he deserves it i mean heck if dave winfield ho hum is seriously being considered for it as is lee smith ha then why don t we give dave kingman a chance or darrell evans yeah yeah after the hall of fame takes in them it can take in eddie murray and jeff reardon i am trying to think how to respond to this without involving personal feeling or perceptions and i can not without having stats to back up my points however i think you approached this the wrong way i believe all of the people mentioned here deserve the hall of fame more than dave kingman does i feel they were all much better players i am not saying i fell they deserve to go but that they would deserve it more imho dave kingman definately not they guy only had a couple of years were he could hit with atleast a respectable averag the rest of his career i do not think he was very feared by pitchers i also do not think he did a lot for the game i mean really i am a met fan he was a met for part of his career and i still would not back him for the hall of fame dave winfield i think so he is feared by pitchers he has had several season where he hit for a respectable average and his production numbers are in my opinion without stats better than kingman s probably by quite a bit i also perceive him to be a leader maybe not as much as some other people but none the less a leader i think he has made substantial contributions to the game of baseball and to society examples of this are some of the charitable things he has done i know some of this from when he was with the yankees i think he the type of player that kids can look up to and while this is definately not the only criteria for the hall of fame i think it deserves some consideration lee smith maybe i would have to see his stats again but he definately would deserve to go before the likes of kingman darrell evans no eddie murray maybe he has had a very good career he is a leader although a silent one he is a good role model are the stats good enough i am not sure but i would once again believe they are much better than kingman s both the average as well as the power numbers but not as good as winfield s just think eddie did not have as much publicity for most of his great years jeff reardon my guess is no but it kind of depends on his numbers off the top of my head i would take lee smith first well in any case i am sick and tired mostly sick of everybody giving hall of fame consideration to players that are by today s standards marginal honestly ozzie smith and robin yount don t belong there they re both shortstops that just hung around for a long time big deal well i strongly disagree here both of these guys deserve it for sure i talked about leadership above both of these guys are leaders and have been instumental in leading their teams to the post season robin does have very good offensive numbers both average and power and ozzie has okay numbers offensively the difference with ozzie is that if you gave him a home run for every run he saved by making an incredible play at shortstop he would have shattered aaron s home run mark by now how many of those great plays saved games how many of those great plays motivated his team to rally and win a game while i believe both of these guys have numbers baseball is about more than numbers or at least winning at baseball is about more than numbers both of these guys are proven stars and belong in the hall of fame as does george brett who also belongs in this class of player let s be a little more selective huh stop handing out these honors so liberally save them for the guys who really deserve it face it if something isn t done there will be little prestige in the hall of fame anymore when certain individuals believe that steve garvey or jack morris are potential candidates the absurdity is apparent gee can these guys even compare to the more likely future hall of famers like kirby puckett or nolan ryan steve garvey i am not sure probably not but i guess i could see someone making a case for him jack morris once again not my first choice but i can see why someone might bring up his name kirby puckett probably the only reason i do not say definately is he still has time left in his career if he continues doing what he has been then my probably will turn into a definately nolan ryan is there really any doubt i think i heard something about him having some records maybe they were not all good i don t know i did not hear any of them just the number he has the numbers he has the contributions to the game and community and he is a great role model i would not say that he is the best pitcher to ever pitch the game probably not even top but he would be the first pitcher i would put in the hall of fame because of his accomplishments no hitters strikeouts respectable numbers even with some weaker teams you can go on and on i really hope he gets all the possible votes so in summing up i have groups those that belong those that probably do but i am not sure and those that i lean towards saying don t belong at least not without my seeing stats and possibly hearing reasons why they should go yes winfield yount brett not in your mail o smith puckett and ryan maybe murray and l smith no reardon garvey morris evans and definately kingman as i said i do not have the stats around so i do not have numbers to back this up these are entirely my opinions based on my perceptions mike q steve
