HOF horserace blogging

Another consequence of the Mitchell report is that any chance Mark McGwire had to increase his vote totals this year is as lost as the innocence of the East German women's swim team. Between that and the fact that Tim Raines is the best player coming on to the ballot, this is looking like a good year for the players who've been hanging around just below the 75% thresh hold for awhile.

I made a chart.

As you can see if you've got really good glasses or a high quality display, all the trends point to Goose Gossage going into the Hall. Jim Rice also looks pretty strong, but you have to wonder why he lost support last year.

For historical context, here's another chart.

And here's a piece of trivia: The last time that no player received enough support to be elected to the Hall of Fame was 1996.