The Worst Hall of Famers

A couple of days ago, brilliant blog reader Paul White sent an email essentially wondering why someone (someone!) doesn't take up the Hall of Fame case of former Royals owner Ewing Kauffman. Now, I must admit that my first reaction -- and probably yours -- was, "You're kidding, right? Ewing Kauffman?"

Look: I have overwhelming respect for Ewing Kauffman as both a man and a baseball owner. He was a self-made billionaire. He brought the Royals to Kansas City even though, at first, he had no particular love for baseball. He hired a brilliant general manager (Cedric Tallis) and in a very short time the Royals were contenders. After a couple more years, they were, quite possibly, the model franchise in baseball. Kauffman was an innovator -- he was the force behind the baseball academy and the money behind the fountains that flow at Kauffman Stadium -- and a winner. Still, my gut reaction was negative; I guess I thought that to get to the Hall of Fame as a baseball owner, you need to do a lot more.

If you look at it closer, though, you will find something surprising: To get to the Hall of Fame as an owner, you actually need to do a whole lot less.

THERE IS ALWAYS talk about the worst baseball Hall of Famers. My personal choice has always been Candy Cummings, who is in the Hall of Fame for inventing the curveball even though it's pretty likely that he did not invent the curveball. To me, this hurts his Hall of Fame case ... though it should be said that the Hall of Fame itself is in Cooperstown, where baseball was not invented, and it is right next to a field named after Abner Doubleday, who most definitely did not invent baseball.

Of course, our country is named after Amerigo Vespucci, who almost certainly never stepped foot here.

Anyway, Cummings is a bad Hall of Famer. I have not heard a particularly compelling explanation for Jesse Haines being in the Hall; he went 210-158 with a 3.64 ERA. There are at least 50 starting pitchers who are not in the Hall and will never be in the Hall who can look at Haines and go, "No way ... that guy?" You know the Hall of Fame is not especially sold on Haines' resume either considering the first word on his Hall of Fame plaque is "Durable." Sorry, "Durable" is not a Hall of Fame word. It's an advertising word for underwear.

Burleigh Grimes? Not a good choice. Catfish Hunter? He probably would not be in the Hall if Charlie Finley had called him Jim. Herb Pennock? Eppa Rixey? Rube Marquard is an especially bad choice -- he had three good seasons in his career and had a 103 ERA+. Red Ruffing is not a particularly inspired choice either. There are more not-so-great pitchers.

And there are some not-so-great hitters too. The catcher Rick Ferrell is in the Hall of Fame. Do you know who the No. 1 Baseball Reference comp for Rick Ferrell is? Jim Gantner. Yeah. So you say, well wait a minute Ferrell was a brilliant defense catcher, you can't compare him to Gantner. OK, you know who his No. 1 catcher comp is? Tony Pena. My man Tony was a brilliant defensive catcher too. Anybody for putting Tony into the Hall? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

Apparently Ferrell was good at "handling the knuckleball." So there you go.

Tinker? Evers? Chance? All three better be happy there was a poem written about them. Tinker's top 20th century comp is Ozzie Guillen; Evers has Mark McLemore on his list; the most recent comp to Chance is Darryl Hamilton. See, poets can have a huge impact on the world.

In fact, maybe I can help a couple of former Royals Hall of Fame cases with a poem.

There are saddest of possible phrases
Patek to Rojas to Mayberry
A powder blue trio that always amazes
Patek to Rojas to Mayberry
The first a pint shortstop whose glove never fumbles
The second's named Cookie, but he never crumbles
At last it's Big John, and the announcer's voice rumbles
Patek to Rojas to Mayberry

Joe Sewell is in the Hall of Fame, and even though that's somewhat questionable (his defensive reputation as a shortstop does not seem to be all that special), you do have to offer up this statistic: His last nine years as a player, the most he ever struck out in a season: 9 times. In 1929, he had 578 at-bats and he struck out FOUR times all season. So you know what? I'm OK with putting him in the Hall of Fame just for that.

Lloyd Waner? Inexplicable.

Also, there are several shortstops in the Hall of Fame who couldn't hit all that much but are there for their defense and overall ball-playing moxie -- Travis Jackson, Luis Aparicio, Phil Rizutto, Dave Bancroft, Bobby Wallace, Rabbit Maranville, Ozzie Smith, even Pee Wee Reese. This is a clear-cut pattern. If you believe Omar Vizquel was a truly brilliant defensive shortstop (not everyone does), then you would have to say he should go to the Hall too.

I like going through all these second-tier Hall of Famers because, for one thing, nobody seems to realize they're in the Hall of Fame. It's a good reminder that the Hall of Fame standard is not Ruth, Gehrig and Koufax. It's also Lindstrom, Willis and Chesbro.

But our topic today is owners in the Hall of Fame. Let's take a closer look, shall we?

FIRST OFF, there are fewer baseball owners in the Hall than you might think. There are quite a few Hall of Famers who owned Major League teams at least for a while (Connie Mack, Al Spalding, Morgan Bulkley, William Hulbert, Larry MacPhail was part owner of the Yankees) but ownership was not a major reason why they were elected into the Hall. I would say, in total, there are only five people in the Hall of Fame in large part BECAUSE they were owners.

1. Clark Griffith. He won more than 200 games as a pitcher and more than 1,500 games as a manager. His plaque does not include the word, "owner," but he was an owner of the Senators for 36 years, so we include him here.

2. Charlie Comiskey. Again, it was a varied baseball career -- long before he was sending flat champagne to his players, he was a good fielding first baseman (according to his plaque, he was the first to play off of first base) and a superior manager (his .608 winning percentage ranks third all time). He owned the Chicago White Sox for 31 years.

3. Branch Rickey. He would be in the Hall of Fame anyway for his many innovations -- most notably, the farm system. But I will include him here because he owned 25 percent of the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1945 when he signed Jackie Robinson. It was probably his stake in the club that allowed him to make the daring signing.

4. Bill Veeck. He's the first of the group who is in the Hall entirely for what he did as an owner. What did he do? Well, he was the first to put names on uniforms (this is actually on his Hall of Fame plaque), he signed Larry Doby, and he sent a midget to the plate. "A champion of the little guy," it says on his plaque.

5. Tom Yawkey. He had his Red Sox team travel by plane in 1936. Also, he, um, had his team travel play by plane -- nobody else was doing that in 1936, I don't think. Also, he did sign a black player, you know, eventually. And his team almost won a couple of times. Second-worst Hall of Famer, I think. We'll get to the worst in a moment.

That's it. Those are the five Major League owners in the Hall of Fame. You could argue pretty convincingly that two or three would be in there even if they had never owned a team. But I want to go with five because I'm about to tell you something that might blow your mind. It blew my mind.

There are also five NEGRO LEAGUES owners in the Hall of Fame.

1. Rube Foster. He was a great pitcher, and he founded the Negro Leagues, so he would be in the Hall of Fame anyway. But he formed and owned the Chicago American Giants. He's actually a fascinating story, but we've got to move on.

2. Cumberland Posey. He was a player and manager too, but mostly he was the George Steinbrenner of his day -- 10 Hall of Famers played for his Homestead Grays through the years, including the best of the best: Satchel Paige, Josh Gibson, Cool Papa Bell, etc.

3. J.L. Wilkinson. He owned the Kansas City Monarchs for many years and was, by all accounts, a remarkable man. Another fascinating story that we don't have time for now, but suffice it to say that he was had his team play night baseball years before the Major Leagues, he signed a football player and track star named Jackie Robinson, and he rescued Satchel Paige's career.

4. Alex Pompez. He was pretty undistinguished as an owner, unless you want to distinguish him for his racketeering indictment. Really made his mark in later years as a breakthrough scout in Latin America.

5. Effa Manley. Wife of owner of the Newark Eagles. Her plaque says she was on the cutting edge of civil rights, and maybe she was -- she apparently organized a boycott of stores that refused to hire black sales clerks. From a baseball standpoint, however, her teams were usually no good, her contributions to the game are suspect at best, and she was rumored to have slept with her players. She's the single worst choice in the Hall of Fame, barely edging out Yawkey.

That's five. This is absolutely remarkable to me. Hey, I think it's on record that I LOVE the Negro Leagues. But how can there be as many Negro Leagues owners in the Hall of Fame as Major League owners? The Major Leagues have been going on for about 90 more years than the Negro Leagues. And I'm not sure that anyone saw the Negro Leagues as a model of business efficiency -- checks often bounced, players jumped, and the World Series was sporadic at best.

LOOK, MAYBE OWNERS don't belong in the Hall of Fame at all -- I'm fine with that. But there are owners in the Hall of Fame now, and they are (for the most part) miserable choices. if How can you put in Tom Yawkey, Bill Veeck and Effa Manley and leave out Jacob Ruppert, Walter O'Malley and Gus Greenlee? Let's take a look at just a few owners who are not in the Hall of Fame.

-- Walter O'Malley is not in the Hall of Fame. How can this be? You don't have to like Walter O'Malley (and if you are from Brooklyn, you probably don't) but his teams won, they drew huge crowds, he expanded baseball to California -- that might have had a larger impact on the game than exploding scoreboards. He had Dodgers Stadium built. His teams drew larger crowds than any baseball team ever. Then his son Peter O'Malley won an awful lot of games and drew an awful lot of people as well.

-- Col. Jacob Ruppert. Having Tom Yawkey in the Hall of Fame and not Jacob Ruppert is like, what ... putting in Neifi Perez and leaving out Cal Ripken? Ruppert built the New York Yankees. He (along with Col. Tillinghast L'Hommedieu Huston) bought Babe Ruth. He hired business executive Ed Barrow (in the Hall). He hired manager Miller Huggins (in the Hall of Fame). He was the owner of what is often regarded as the greatest team in baseball history, the 1927 Yankees. You know, I'm all for getting Bert Blyleven in the Hall, Goose Gossage, Ron Santo, a bunch of others. But Colonel Ruppert might need to be at the head of the line.

-- Phillip Wrigley. He owned the Cubs for almost 30 years. He was a television visionary. And he started the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League.

-- Roy Hofheinz. Astros owner, he built the first baseball dome. He was the driving force behind Astroturf. He was one of the first -- maybe the first -- to think of the luxury box. Come to think of it, none of these are great things. But he definitively changed the game.

-- Sam Breadon. Owned the Cardinals through their glory years and put Branch Rickey in the front office.

-- Jerold Hoffberger. He's a personal favorite of mine simply because nobody seems to remember him. He brought the Orioles to Baltimore -- he clinched that deal by having his brewery sponsor the Washington Senators (who were trying to block the move). Then he hired Frank Cashen and Earl Weaver and ran what was perhaps the best franchise in baseball for almost 20 years. He was also, by all accounts a sweet man and a major philanthropist (although Marvin Miller apparently thought he was a union buster).

-- Barney Dreyfuss. Owned the Pirates for 30 years and is credited for creating the World Series. I'll repeat that. He's credited for creating the World Series.

Hall of Fame checklist
-- Guy who sent midget to the plate and had disco demolition night? Check.
-- Last guy to sign a black player? Check.
-- Guy whose legendary cheapness helped bring on the Black Sox? Check.
-- Guy who created the World Series? (Buzzer sounds). Nope. Next.

-- Powell Crosley. Saved the Cincinnati Reds from extinction or, worse, moving to New York.

-- Gus Greenlee. He was a numbers man, but several owners in the Negro Leagues had some sort of illegal activity going ... there weren't that many ways for African Americans to get ahead in the 1920s and 1930s. Anyway, if you're going to put Negro Leagues owners in, Greenlee was probably the most powerful of them all. He signed all the big stars, built his own stadium and created some of the best teams of the 1930s.

I'm sure there are others (including Ewing Kauffman) who deserve mention here. But I guess the surprising thing to me is that it sure seems like owners have largely been IGNORED by the Hall of Fame, when all this time I always thought they were over-represented. It looks like one of the toughest ways to get into the Hall of Fame is by buying a baseball team.

One last owner thought: Will George Steinbrenner go to the Hall of Fame? You would have to say he's one of the most -- perhaps THE most -- influential owner in baseball history, maybe even in American sports history. He took the Yankees from a low point to one of the two or three most famous/dominant/beloved/despised sports teams in the world, right? Trouble is, he was also suspended from baseball twice. It's a checkered legacy. Does he go? I say yes.