Tag: Baseball Hall of Fame

Golf fanatic John Smoltz shares that he lost his father just hours before Field of Dreams Game broadcast

John Smoltz has a number of passions — golf, for one, which he got serious about when he was 21.

John Smoltz has a number of passions — golf, for one, which he got serious about when he was 21 with Atlanta Braves teammates Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine as a way to spend time on their days off between starts — but his work ethic comes from his father.

The Hall of Fame pitcher and former National League Cy Young Award winner hasn’t rested on his laurels since retiring from Major League Baseball, digging hard into the celebrity golf circuit, playing in multiple PGA Tour Champions events and working as the lead MLB analyst for Fox Sports.

During Thursday’s Field of Dreams Game between the Cincinnati Reds and the Chicago Cubs, Smoltz revealed on air that he lost his father earlier in the day, yet remained in Iowa to carry through with the national broadcast.

“It’s been an emotional day,” Smoltz said of losing his father, who was 79. “He lived by his faith, he loved family and he would be so mad if I didn’t do this game. I can’t think of another day to honor him, when you think about this park, this movie and how he loved every one of us and anyone he came in contact with. I’m the man I am because of him.”

Aside from his incredible baseball career, Smoltz has made a name for himself on the golf circuit, playing eight PGA Tour-sanctioned events, all on the Champions Tour. His best finish was a T-53 at the Cologuard Classic in 2019. He played in the U.S. Senior Open in 2018.

Smoltz has said that his most memorable round was with Annika Sorenstam, Tiger Woods and his Atlanta Braves teammate Chipper Jones.

He added Thursday that his family received tremendous support after losing John Adam Smoltz.

“I can’t explain the peace I have,” Smoltz said. “That comes from God and the way he lived. I call it the 4 L’s. He lived. He laughed. He learned. He listened. He gave us everything that we needed to fulfill and show up to work.

“And I feel like I’m showing up to work and what a better way for my Mom, my brother and my sister, and the support we’ve gotten today,” Smoltz added. “It’s started this early this morning. I’m sure it will hit me when I get home. But this is the perfect day for him if he was going to leave.

“He was so proud. When I was in high school, he made my first baseball card. And everywhere he went, he just handed them out to people. I didn’t get it then. I was actually begging him to stop doing that. I get it now, because I’ve run into so many people who met my dad and they say, ‘I met your dad.’ And I say, ‘Stop. Did he give you a card?’

“We’ll miss him. I’m going to live every day for him.”

Interestingly enough, Smoltz’s last major golf duel involved a similar scenario. Smoltz lost in a playoff at the 2021 American Century Championship celebrity golf tournament in Lake Tahoe to Vinny Del Negro, who then revealed after the victory that his father, Vincent, had passed just before the tournament began,

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Todd Helton’s 2022 Baseball Hall of Fame voting results

A look at Todd Helton’s 2022 Baseball Hall of Fame voting results.

Former Colorado first baseman Todd Helton appeared on the Baseball Hall of Fame ballot for the fourth time in 2022.

Helton received 205 votes (52 percent) on 2022 ballots, needing 75 percent for election into the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Helton played baseball and football at the University of Tennessee before a career with the Rockies (1997-2013). He was the No. 8 overall selection by Colorado in the 1995 Major League Baseball draft.

Helton’s career batting average was .316, while totaling 2,519 hits, 369 home runs, 1,406 RBIs and 1,401 runs.

He was a five-time all-star (2000-04), a three-time Gold Glove Award winner (2001, 2002, 2004) and a four-time Silver Slugger Award winner (2000–2003). His No. 17 is retired by the Rockies.

Below are 2022 Baseball Hall of Fame voting results. David Ortiz finished with at least 75 percent and will be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Players receiving less than 5 percent will drop off future ballots.

The Baseball Hall of Fame is a silly museum that we should just continue to ignore

We don’t need a bitter voters to tell us who the great players were.

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The Baseball Hall of Fame is officially, and sadly, a joke.

Congratulations, baseball writers. You did it. You saved your little upstate New York museum and in doing so let everyone know you don’t really love the game, you just love having some power that you no longer deserve.

In cased you missed it, the 2022 Hall of Fame class was announced yesterday and it was made up of just one legendary baseball player – David Ortiz.

Left out of that class were some other legendary players, including Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Sammy Sosa. Curt Schilling also didn’t get in and is now off the ballot.

While those first three didn’t make it because of their ties to performance enhancing drugs, Schilling was basically not voted in because of his personality and the things he has said and done in the past. I personally don’t like Schilling at all but the great Bomani Jones did recently make a good argument for why the former three-time World Series champ should have been voted in.

Not having those guys in the precious Hall of Fame makes the Hall of Fame a pointless place to visit or talk about it. It’s a sham and a waste of time because it’s a game of favorites picked by people who don’t care what you think, because level-headed people like you and I know that Bonds, Clemens, Sosa and yes, Schilling, deserve to be in that club.

Let’s stick with the steroid-era discussion, though. It’s easy to elect those guys and make a mention of what they did, or were suspected of doing, and allow them to be in the Hall of Fame. Everyone will be OK and the museum will remain standing.

Life will go on. Trust me!

Bonds is the home run king. Clemens is one of the best pitchers to ever take the mound. Sosa brought baseball back with that fun summer in which he and Mark McGwire chased Roger Maris’ home-run record.

Those legendary players are baseball and are big characters in the story of baseball, a story that can’t be told without them. They should all be in Cooperstown and they should have all been in the first time they were eligible.

Players who are in the Hall of Fame should stand up and boycott the silly museum until those former stars are put in, because without them there is a big stain on the reputation of the place, a stain that has been created by the writers who think they are doing the opposite of that.

Until that happens there’s really no point to visit the museum or talk about it or give it any serious thought. It’s a silly playground built by people who care more about themselves than the game that so many people love.

We know who deserves to be in and we don’t really need the voters to tell us who the great players were. We really don’t need Hall of Fames, to be honest. We saw those players play. We saw the incredible things that they did. We get it. We know.

Oh, and Jonathan Papelbon got 5 votes? Really?

LOL.

Quick hits: Awesome mic’d up video of Travis Kelce… Sean Payton/Kevin James jokes… NFL OT ideas… And more.

– This video of a mic’d up Travis Kelce during his game-winning touchdown on Sunday is too good.

– Sean Payton announced yesterday that he was leaving the Saints and everyone made jokes about Kevin James.

– NFL fans came up with a number of interesting ways to change the NFL’s overtime rules.

– Do you play Wordle? Here are 8 great starting words to use.

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David Ortiz had a wonderfully wholesome reaction to being told he’s a first-ballot Hall of Famer

What a moment for David Ortiz!

David Ortiz is officially a first-ballot Hall of Famer!

On Tuesday, the Baseball Writers’ Association of America voted for Ortiz as the only member of the 2022 Baseball Hall of Fame class from the regular ballot. In his first year of eligibility, Ortiz joins a long list of first-ballot Hall of Famers, with Derek Jeter being the last after making it in his first year back in 2020.

What a moment for baseball history and the Boston Red Sox, as the 14-year first baseman and designated hitter for Beantown is a worthy inclusion into the Hall of Fame. Though Ortiz’s introduction into the Hall was a near certainty, his reaction to getting the call surrounded among friends and family is an absolute delight.

Congratulations to Ortiz after a historic MLB career!

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MLB world reacts to the snubs of Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens from Baseball Hall of Fame

Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens have been snubbed from Cooperstown.

Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens have been passed up for the Baseball Hall of Fame once again.

On Tuesday, the Baseball Writers’ Association of America voted for which players will make up the 2022 Hall of Fame class in Cooperstown. Only one player was selected, David Ortiz, who makes it in as a first ballot Hall of Famer with 77.9 percent of the vote.

Both Bonds (66 percent) and Clemens (65.2 percent) fell short of the 75 percent mark needed to make the Hall of Fame and are now officially ineligible to be voted upon by the BBWAA as their 10-year window has closed. Technically, both Bonds and Clemens can make it in via the Today’s Game committee, which is run by the Hall of Fame itself, but will need 12 of 16 votes to make it in.

It was a long shot for both Bonds and Clemens — the former especially — to make it into the Hall of Fame. Bonds’ history with performance enhancing drugs as part of the BALCO scandal was a major layup for many in the Hall of Fame, enough to keep him out throughout his entire 10 years of eligibility even though the support for him grew with each passing year.

Ortiz, for what it’s worth, has also reportedly tested positive for a banned substance during an anonymous survey test conducted by the MLB in 2003.

Here’s how the baseball world reacted to both Bonds and Clemens being snubbed by the BBWAA in their final year of voter eligibility.

Barry Bonds, Curt Schilling and 6 others who have a shot at making the Baseball Hall of Fame

Here’s who could be voted in on Tuesday night.

It’s Hall of Fame day, everyone.

That’s right, on Tuesday evening East Coast time, we’ll learn which players will make the 2022 class of the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Of course, as of publishing this post, we don’t know for sure who will make it. But thanks to the good folks at the Baseball Hall of Fame Vote Tracker, we have somewhat of a picture painted as we head into the big reveal.

Per the site, at the moment, just under 50 percent of ballots are known, so we’re listing anyone at 48 percent of the votes or above who could approach the 75 percent threshold required for induction.

Here they are:

Get to know Jim Kaat, the incoming Baseball Hall of Famer who also shot his age both right and left handed

“I’ve had a lot of good things happen to me late in life.”

Jim Kaat has had more sporting lives than a feline. Hence, the nickname Kitty.

He played a quarter century in Major League Baseball for six different teams, winning 283 games and, amazingly, earning 16 Gold Gloves for his defensive prowess. His arm was as durable as the slab he toed to deliver each pitch — the only two times he suffered major injury was while running bases, not throwing curveballs. He had a rubber arm.

He has been a Stuart, Florida, winter resident for 37 years, and has spent even more time in baseball when you add almost 30 years as a TV commentator.

Kaat also made history almost a decade ago when at 75 he likely became the first player on this planet to shoot his age left-handed and right-handed while a member of McArthur Club in Hobe Sound, Florida.

But Kaat isn’t finished making headlines. Earlier this month, the 83-year-old was elected into the National Baseball Hall of Fame by the Golden Days Era Committee. While receiving that wonderful phone call wasn’t shocking, it sure was meaningful.

Jim Kaat
Former New York Yankees pitcher Jim Kaat in July 1979. (Photo: Ray Stubblebine, AP)

The veteran’s committee meets only once every five years these days, and COVD-19 stretched the last interval to seven years. Do the math and you’ll see why Kaat was giddy about entering Cooperstown next July.

These ceremonies don’t tend to be as enjoyable when one enters the Hall of Fame posthumously.

“There’s no question I was running out of time,’” Kaat, who will be inducted alongside former teammate Tony Oliva, recently said. “In a perfect world, Tony and I would have gone in together with (another ex-teammate) Dick Allen (who died a year ago). It’s been worth the wait.”

Kaat had come close the two previous times he was on the veteran’s ballot — close but no bust. Even though he said he had put the induction chances “in his rearview mirror,” he had hope this time because of the makeup of the 16-man committee.

“In the past, there were guys on the committee who had never seen me play,” Kaat said. “This time, there were a lot of guys on the committee who had played with me or against me. I thought I had a chance.

“But as I told Dick’s widow, Willa, when she called to congratulate me, if someone votes for Dick who voted for me, he would have gotten in and I still would be waiting. It’s a very fine line between getting in and having to wait.”

In my mind, Kaat bettering his age while playing golf left-handed and right-handed is one of the most amazing, if not quirky, accomplishments in sports. He would sometimes play both ways during the same round, much to the chagrin of his caddie.

Kaat always downplayed the achievement.

“I was the only one crazy enough to try it,” he said.

Jim Kaat
Jim Kaat tees off during a round at the Medalist Golf Club on Jan. 11, 2003, in Hobe Sound, Florida. (Photo: Steven Martine, TCPalm)

Kaat was a natural lefty, but after he started getting the short-game yips, a PGA Professional suggested he played right-handed around the greens. He hits with more power from the left side, but he’s more consistent as a righty.

As time has gone on, and it does, he savors the achievement more often. He rarely shoots his age these days no matter what side of the ball he stands on.

“It’s harder,” Kaat said. “Your body just doesn’t do what you want it to do at 83.”

We should all be so lucky to still be playing golf at 83.

Slowly, Kaat has become like the rest of us when it comes to chasing the little white ball.

“I just do it now for the camaraderie with the guys and to hit a few good shots,” he said. “I just enjoy the challenge of the game. I try to hit balls every day. It’s great therapy just to be outside.”

Kaat is not sure how many more winters he will be spending on the Treasure Coast. The things that brought him here — less traffic, low population density — have changed in recent years, no doubt affected by the COVID migration.

One boon he doesn’t mind is the increasing number of high-end golf courses being built here. In addition to McArthur, he also was a member of Medalist and played his most recent golf at Hobe Sound Golf Club.

“Tom Fazio II did a great job with the re-design,” Kaat said. “It’s only going to get better.”

Kaat has few complaints, especially recently.

“I’ve had a lot of good things happen to me late in life,” he said.

This cat is not finished.

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Derek Jeter’s Hall of Fame speech took a playful shot at the baseball writer who snubbed him

Well played.

There has never been a position player to earn unanimous entry into the Baseball Hall of Fame, but Derek Jeter came awfully close.

Given his popularity amongst baseball writers and his spot in history as one of the best shortstops to play the game, Jeter’s chances of matching longtime teammate Mariano Rivera with the unanimous vote looked solid.

He just needed one vote.

Jeter ended up drawing 396 votes out of the 397 ballots submitted for 2020’s class, which was good for the highest vote share for a position player. But that one vote — the voter remained anonymous — was glaring. Still, Jeter managed to laugh at the whole situation during his Hall of Fame speech on Wednesday.

Jeter said with a smile:

“Thank you to the baseball writers — all but one of you — who voted for me.”

The joke drew plenty of laughs and a long applause. And it was honestly a great way to address the snub. After all, if players like Ken Griffey Jr. and Greg Maddux couldn’t get a unanimous share of first-ballot votes, then coming one vote short is still beyond impressive.

Hopefully that one voter — whomever it may be — had a laugh at that line too.

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