The Daily News’ Bill Madden was on Chris Russo’s MLB Network Radio on SiriusXM this afternoon, reacting to Deadspin’s purchase of a Hall of Fame vote from a BBWAA member. Go listen to the segment here. You will not be shocked to learn that Madden is not pleased with this.
Madden started out by saying that whoever sold his or her vote would be “dead in the baseball writers ...” which he later clarified to mean drummed out, saying “this person will be forever banished from the Baseball Writers’ Association.” He added that this is “one of the most despicable things I can ever think of.”
All of which is understandable. To be clear: I personally think this is all a riot and could serve to open some people’s eyes about how messed up the Hall of Fame voting is. But the organization itself can’t tolerate this. Indeed, if I were a senior or managing member of the BBWAA I’d be angry too, in that it makes the organization look like a joke. If and when this person is kicked out of the BBWAA it will be well-deserved and a totally valid thing for the BBWAA to do. Take a provocative action and pay the price, you know.
But the desire for someone in the BBWAA to essentially give the organization the finger here is easy to sympathize with when you hear Madden start to get self-righteous about the BBWAA’s role in the Hall of Fame voting. Madden, when trying to illustrate why it’s so off-base to go after the BBWAA like Deadspin, this voter and other critics are, says “it’s because of the baseball writers -- because it’s so hard to get into the Hall of Fame -- that’s the reason this is the only Hall of Fame that anyone gives a damn about.”
Me personally? I’d say they give a damn about it because of the baseball stuff. The players inducted, the history it represents and the memorabilia and mementos the institution curates and maintains. The fact that it chronicles and honors a sport with a far richer and far longer history than those other Halls of Fame he mentions do.
But hey, if Madden and other baseball writers believe that it is their gatekeeping which gives the place public legitimacy, well, God bless them. But understand that such an arrogance is exactly why people like Deadspin and this rogue voter are doing what they’re doing. And why, in the Internet age, when people who do not work for newspapers can actually have their voices heard, the folks who are the gatekeepers are getting a lot of blowback.
