HOF: The Maz controversy
Ted Williams vehemently disagreed, yet Mazeroski was welcomed to the hall
Twenty-two years have passed, and the sense of outrage has dissipated, but the National Baseball Hall of Fame’s induction of Bill Mazeroski was controversial in 2001. Controversial with a capital C.
The second baseman’s quality score (11 points) was the worst for any American or National League honoree since Rick Ferrell in 1984, and his career batting average of .260 was the fourth-lowest for any position player to be enshrined in Cooperstown’s plaque gallery.
The Baseball Writers’ Association of America had already deemed Mazeroski’s credentials to be unconvincing. Fewer than a quarter of the writers had voted for him in any of his first nine elections, and only 42.3 percent had supported him on his 15th and final try in 1992.
Everybody agreed that Mazeroski was wondrous in the field — wide-ranging, sure-handed, quick on the double play — but those skills never swayed a majority of the BBWAA’s members.
“What he has to sell is lots and lots of defense, and the Hall of Fame isn’t buying,” wrote statistical guru Bill James in 1995.
What kept Mazeroski’s campaign alive, ironically enough, was one stroke of his bat, an iconic (and uncharacteristic) home run that clinched the 1960 World Series for the Pittsburgh Pirates. The glory of that moment was captured in a classic photograph — Mazeroski rounding third base with his right arm high in triumph — and that was how most fans (and most writers) remembered him four decades later.
But another factor would give Mazeroski’s candidacy a greater boost. The Veterans Committee was chaired in 2001 by Joe Brown, the very general manager who had assembled Pittsburgh’s 1960 championship roster.
Brown had always been a convincing negotiator in trade talks, and he proved to be equally persuasive in the committee room. One of the panel’s members, Ted Williams, was reportedly angered by Mazeroski’s selection. But open-heart surgery forced Williams to miss the meeting, so he was unable to counter Brown’s advocacy.
Cooperstown at the Crossroads
Read about the Hall of Fame’s checkered history (and uncertain future)
Mazeroski’s election in March 2001 triggered a pair of aftershocks in the 10 months that followed. The first was the Hall of Fame’s decision in August 2001 to restructure the Veterans Committee.
The panel had been making strange choices ever since its creation 48 years earlier. A pair of umpires in 1953? Ray Schalk in 1955? Max Carey, Heinie Manush, and Lloyd Waner in the 1960s? Frankie Frisch’s flood of Giants and Cardinals in the 1970s? Travis Jackson, George Kell, Tony Lazzeri, and Phil Rizzuto in subsequent years? All of these picks by the Veterans Committee had stirred up doubts and questions — and justifiably so.
Yet Mazeroski’s induction somehow aroused more criticism than any previous selection. Critics accused Joe Brown of exerting excessive pressure on behalf of his former player. “Obviously, Joe spoke very vigorously for him,” admitted Leonard Koppett, a sportswriter who sat on the committee. But Brown’s advocacy was in no way unusual. Cronyism had been a trait of the Veterans Committee from the very start.
What seemed to matter more, certainly to Ted Williams and other critics, was Mazeroski’s relative weakness as a hitter. He simply didn’t fit the stereotype of a Hall of Famer.
Some critics made this point in mild terms, including Bill James: “I don’t see Bill Mazeroski as a Hall of Famer; obviously some voters did.” Others were caustic. New York Post columnist Joel Sherman fired this broadside the day after Mazeroski was chosen: “The Hall of Fame Veterans Committee was created to rectify mistakes. Which means its next act should be self-abolishment.”
The hall apparently agreed. It announced in August 2001 a sixfold expansion of the committee, which would henceforth consist of all living Hall of Famers, as well as all sportswriters and announcers who had won the hall’s annual awards for those fields, a pool of 90 voters in all.
This enlarged panel would vote by mail — no more meetings in tiny rooms — and only in odd-numbered years. “We didn’t do this because we’re unhappy with the people the Veterans Committee selected,” insisted Joe Morgan, the star second baseman who had become the hall’s vice chairman. Nobody was fooled.
The second aftershock rumbled five months later in January, when shortstop Ozzie Smith became the only player elected by the BBWAA — and hence the only member of the hall’s class of 2002.
Smith was very much in Mazeroski’s mold, a player honored primarily for his glovework. His nickname, “the Wizard of Oz,” referred to his lightning-fast reflexes and acrobatic abilities, not any skills he might have displayed at the plate. Smith’s career batting average (.262) was the fifth-lowest for any position player inducted to that point, just two points better than Mazeroski’s. But his 44.2 defensive wins above replacement were the most in big-league history.
Smith was elected easily — crossing the threshold with 79 votes to spare — and he wondered if the furor over Mazeroski’s selection might have inspired the writers to think more deeply about fielding, easing his own journey to Cooperstown.
“Bill and myself,” Smith said, “are the guys leading the way to remind people how important that aspect of the game always has been and always will be.”
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HOF box score: Bill Mazeroski
Career: 1956-1972
Teams: Pittsburgh (National League)
Primary position: 2B
Career stats: G 2,163, HR 138, RBI 853, BA .260
League leader: IBB once
Quality score: 11 points (poor)
Selected to HOF: 2001
Selected by: Veterans Committee