Member of committee that voted Jeff Kent into HOF, Jayson Stark, explains process | The Show - video Dailymotion

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Watch Member of committee that voted Jeff Kent into HOF, Jayson Stark, explains process | The Show - New York Post on Dailymotion

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00:00Jason was a part, a member of the special, the Contemporary Errors Baseball Committee,

00:08player's main contribution, 1980s onward. There were eight players on that ballot. That's the

00:14one that Jeff Kent got elected to the Hall of Fame. And only Jeff Kent, it caused a level of

00:21controversy. It's why we wanted Jason on. But the exchange when you're on that committee is there's

00:27a certain no murder to it, right? Like the mafia. Good word, Joel. Like you can't, there's certain

00:33things you can't speak about that happen in that room and how you voted. So the way I want to open

00:40this up, Jason, is there is, people know our larger committee, right? That all three of us are part of

00:46the hundreds. We'll vote by the end of this month and we'll know by the third or so week in January

00:53who's elected into the Hall of Fame by the Baseball Writers Association. Tell us about the function,

00:58how it works with those 16 people to get to Jeff Kent. Yeah, I apologize that I can't tell you

01:05specifically about what happened in the room and how we voted. I honestly don't even know how anybody

01:12else in the room voted. But I can tell you that I've done this a couple times now. I consider it to

01:18be an incredible honor. As both of you know, I love the Hall of Fame. I care about the Hall of Fame.

01:25I understand the impact on lives and on baseball fans of voting for the Hall of Fame. And so I take

01:31that role going into that room as a member of that committee extremely seriously and prepare

01:38as thoroughly as you can imagine. And so the makeup of the committee, at least this year,

01:45was nearly half was players. There were seven Hall of Fame players in the room. Then we had six

01:52longtime Major League executives in the room, plus myself, my friend and co-worker at The Athletic,

02:00Tyler Kepner, and Steve Hurt, who is currently with Stats, formerly with the Elias Sports Bureau,

02:09one of the foremost baseball historians on earth. He's now done this 14 times. And so let me try to

02:18tell you how I consider my role in that group. I look at things obviously different than not just

02:28other Hall of Fame voters, but obviously different than how players and executives look at the Hall of

02:34Fame. And so I consider my job to frame the case for each player. We consider the eight players in

02:43the ballot alphabetically. You know, a name gets thrown out there and basically people look at us

02:49and me and Steven Tyler. And so we start talking and try to frame the case, the historic impact

02:55of that player. And then my favorite part of being on those committees is to then look at those Hall of

03:02Fame players and say, this is why I think we as writers never elected this player. What did you

03:11guys see? And I mean, some of the perspective that you get back is incredible, Joel. I love that part

03:20of it. We have executives in the room. You can say to those executives, when you were a GM and this guy

03:29was playing, how did you look at them? We could say, who would you have rather had in your team,

03:36this candidate or that candidate? And that's really how we get there. And it honestly is a

03:44fantastic experience in terms of all of that. I, you know, I berated you in the hallway. I apologize

03:51for that because I was dissatisfied with the result. Although I did vote for Jeff Kent ultimately in the

03:56last several years. So I get it. I understand that. But certainly in New York, we were very

04:02disappointed that Don Mattingly didn't make it. A guy I voted for every single time. Same with I

04:07voted for Murphy every single time that he was on the ballot as well. So how do you feel? Because,

04:12you know, we heard when it was announced at MLB Network, you could even hear groans in,

04:17I felt bad for Jeff Kent for the first time in my life. But, you know, in the lobby,

04:23even the lobby, not all New Yorkers, anywhere in Florida, so many New Yorkers probably. But

04:28how did you feel about the final result? Were you dissatisfied too? Because I know you voted for

04:34several of those players. Yeah. You know, I can't really comment too specifically about Jeff Kent and

04:43whether even I voted for him in the room. I mean, the fact there was only one. Also, the fact there was

04:48only one too. Right. So let me try to do this this way. First off, I voted for Jeff Kent for 10 years

04:56too. I look at him as a historically significant player in his position. You know, he was the guy

05:04who hit more home runs than any second baseman who ever played baseball. Drove him more runs than any

05:09second baseman who ever played baseball, or at least since RBIs became an official stat.

05:14He has the highest slugging percentage of any second baseman in the last 100 years. I've written

05:19all of this a million times. And, you know, it was a big part of winning him and Barry Bonds on those

05:26teams in San Francisco. So Jeff Kent had enough historical impact as a player that, you know, I don't,

05:37I know there's a lot of furor. I don't think the furor should be that we elected Jeff Kent. As I

05:42interpret it, it's much the way you just described it, John. The frustration out there is why only

05:50Jeff Kent? Why Jeff Kent, not Barry Bonds, for that matter. Why Jeff Kent and not the feel-good

05:57Hall of Fame stories we could have written with Murphy and Mattingly. I completely understand the

06:04frustration. And I wish I could tell you more about what happened in the room and why Jeff Kent got

06:14elected and other guys didn't. What I would suggest is what I've told everybody. Look at the way we vote

06:20and try to think it through and think about how the people in that room process that ballot. An

06:28incredibly loaded ballot where you could easily make a case for all eight players on it. And we

06:35only had three spots. Hall of Fame voting is difficult when we do it in the writer's election.

06:41It's, it's, it might even be more difficult when you're looking at a ballot with only three spots

06:48that many great players, and that many great players.

Member of committee that voted Jeff Kent into HOF, Jayson Stark, explains process | The Show

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