Batgirl,

There are things in this world that are so patently unjust, it makes one's insides clench and one's synapses fire all rage-ily, causing one to invent new words in a desperate attempt to describe that damnéd state. Arguably the greatest example of such a thing is the continued lack of a plaque in Cooperstown honoring perhaps the greatest of all Dutchmen, Rik Aalbert Blyleven. With the release of the ballot, I am again reminded of the collective idiocy of the Baseball Writer's Association of America. Aside from the fact that their acronym is BBWAA, implying that Ball is a distinct word, their continued reliance on the gold standard of 300 wins is misguided at best. Listing stats runs contrary to our goal of emphasizing sass over stats, but here the stats pile up to a whole heap of something that sure smells like the Hall of Fame.

-242 Complete games. No bull. We could really stop right here.

-287 wins, good enough for 25th all-time (even though wins are a severely overrated statistic dependent on good hitting, good defense behind you, and decisions out of your control).

-3,701 K's, good enough for 5th all-time. Incidentally, he's the only player in the top 12 not named Roger Clemens or Randy Johnson that's not in the Hall.

-60 career shutouts, good enough for 9th all-time. Everyone else in the top 25 is in the Hall, except former Twin Luis Tiant (T-21st with 49).

In regards to his "grit," usually a wholly sassy characteristic, certain statistics can be brought to bear on his Hall-worthiness in this regard. He was a workhorse: 13th all-time in IP (the top 12 are
all in the Hall, and he's ahead of guys like Seaver and Mathewson). 9th all-time in Games Started. Bottom line, he was good enough for long enough for the manager to keep sending him out there.

-Continuing with grit, we'll focus more on the sassiness of his stoic demeanor. The man didn't go all Klohsey or Romeral after giving up a home run. He faced his disappointment, overcame it, shrugged his shoulders, and went on pitching. Stoic, sure, but more than that, he was self-confident and unshakeable, which is truly at the heart of sass.

-Nastiness. He had, by almost all accounts, the nastiest curveball around. Dave Winfield (Note: Mr. Winfield is good at baseball), called Bert's curve "a bowel-locking, jelly-leg-inducing curveball."

-Clutch. He has a career 5-1 postseason record, with a 2.47 ERA.

-Durability and Consistency. He was the Rookie Pitcher of the Year in 1970. He was the Comeback Player of the Year (coming back from arm surgery) in 1989. In between, he pitched a no-hitter, pitched in a couple All-Star games, and put a couple of World Series rings on his fingers.

In addition, we must take into account subjective accomplishments and the extenuating circumstances leading to Blyleven's failure to reach 300 wins, which would surely have led to his enshrinement long ago.

-Bad luck. He just has to lead the all-time list in going the distance for a team, keeping them close, only to watch Rivas-like players ground out weakly to short to lose another 1-0 game. Unfortunately for our purposes, Elias and MLB apparently do not keep records for such a statistic. More's the pity.

-Again, bad luck. He played for some pretty garbage teams in his day, including the Twins, Rangers, Pirates, Indians, and Angels. Hence the Radke-like run support. To this point, I offer that he won 15 games by a score of 1-0. Only Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson won more 1-0 games.

-Bad situations. He pitched in a statistically significant amount of hitter-friendly ballparks, turning a lot of warning-track fly balls into just-barely home runs.

-Overcareful managing. In the 1979 season with the Pirates, Bert ran into an arm-saving manager, Chuck Tanner, who routinely held top starters to seven innings and often fewer. Not normally a problem, except that the '79 Pirates didn't have much of a pen (Tanner ignored the arm-saving philosophy for the playoffs, and they won the Series). Bert lost five games that year. He had 20 no-decisions (a record).

More than any statistic, the Baseball Writers want to elect only players that were emblematic players of their respective days. Fine, I'll play along. English has co-opted a German word, Zeitgeist, which
means "spirit of the time." Dutch is the latest distinct modern language to break off from the Germanic branch of languages. Bert is Dutch. What's more, he was born in a town named Zeist. Zeist? Zeitgeist? Eerie.

Not just for my sake. For the People's sake. For baseball's sake. And yes, for Christ's sake, put Bert in the Hall.

Warmest Personal Regards,
Chris