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Remember my last article, my look at Eddie Murray's Hall-of-Fame candidacy by way of Bill James' Keltner List?

Well, this article is a look at Andre Dawson in the same way.

Murray was a lock for the Hall, which was confirmed by yesterday's voting results (more on that later), but Andre Dawson is a much tougher case, so the Dawson article is a little more interesting.

Anyway, make sure to head over there sometime today and give it a read.

Steady Eddie, The Kid, Ryno, and The Rest: Andre Dawson

Thanks.

The voting totals for the Hall-of-Fame were announced yesterday.

First of all, congratulations to Eddie Murray and Gary Carter, the two newest members of baseball's Hall-of-Fame and two men greatly deserving of the honor.

Last month I wrote an article about all of the 33 Hall-of-Fame candidates on this year's ballot and I gave my vote to Murray and Carter and I am glad the majority of the real voters felt the same way.

Along with those two guys going in, there were also a few surprises.

Ryne Sandberg failed to even reach 50% of the vote, checking in with only 49.2%.

Along with Carter and Murray, I also gave my vote to Sandberg and I really feel as though he is a fairly easy choice for the HoF.

In my opinion he is, without a doubt, one of the top 8-10 second basemen in baseball history and anyone that can say that should be a Hall-of-Famer.

That said, I believe Sandberg will get the necessary 75% of the vote eventually, probably within the next 3-4 years or so.

Those of you that read my Bert Blyleven/Jack Morris rant from yesterday may be wondering how those two pitchers did.

Blyleven received 29.2% of the vote and Morris received 22.8%.

I feel a little better knowing that the entire group of voters did not feel as Jayson Stark did, but it bothers me a great deal that Bert Blyleven is still not even close to being elected and he and Morris are so close in the voting.

Another former Twins' pitcher, Jim Kaat, received only 26.2% of the vote and was dropped from the ballot because this was his 15th and final year he could appear on it without being elected.

I also gave Kaat my vote, although I feel he is probably a borderline candidate.

That said, he should absolutely have received far more than 26.2% of the vote.

The man about whom my most recent Baseball Primer article is about, Andre Dawson, received exactly 50% of the vote.

He didn't get elected this year, but, like Sandberg, I think he will eventually be a Hall-of-Famer.

I wouldn't vote for Dawson, but he is another borderline candidate.

For more on him, check out my article (have I said that enough yet?)

3 closers each received over 40% of the vote.

Bruce Sutter got 53.6%, Lee Smith got 42.3% and Rich Gossage got 42.1%.

That order - Sutter, Smith and Gossage - is exactly the opposite of how I would rank them.

I wouldn't vote for any of them, but Gossage is the closest to a Hall-of-Famer in my mind.

Aside from Blyleven's paltry totals, the biggest travesty on this year's ballot was the 14.1% of the vote that Alan Trammell received.

I gave Trammell my vote and it amazes me how little respect he gets from the voters.

His longtime teammate and double-play partner, Lou Whitaker, was dropped off the ballot after only one year because of his low vote total, so perhaps it shouldn't be so surprising. Whitaker is definitely a borderline Hall-of-Famer and has a much better case than a lot of guys that get pretty high vote totals.

Sadly, I don't think Alan Trammell will ever be a Hall-of-Famer, unless the Veteran's Committee makes a good decision in 20 years or so.

Another player that got way fewer votes than he deserves is Keith Hernandez.

Hernandez is yet another borderline Hall-of-Famer and he only received 6.0% of the vote, narrowly avoiding being left of the ballot in the future (5% is the cutoff).

The players that will be booted from the ballot are: Darryl Kile, Vince Coleman, Brett Butler, Sid Fernandez, Rick Honeycutt, Tony Pena, Darren Daulton, Mark Davis, Danny Tartabull, Danny Jackson, Mickey Tettleton, Mitch Williams and Todd Worrell.

Among those players, I think only Butler and Pena deserve a longer stay on the roster, although neither is a Hall-of-Famer certainly.

By the way, whichever idiot gave Mark Davis a vote should not only have his voting privilages taken away immediately, but should also be banned from attending any baseball game ever again and probably should be beaten to a bloody pulp by large men with bats.

In other news...

I actually played baseball yesterday.

For those of you in the south or the west, that might not sound like such a big deal.

But here in Minnesota, it has been below 30 for much of the last couple months...which is actually a lot warmer than most winters.

Usually, by this time of year, there are several inches of snow on the ground and the temperatures are nearing zero.

But, it was about 45 degrees at around noon today and my uncle and I played a little 1-on-1 baseball.

He stormed out to a 12-5 lead early, but I scored an amazing 9 runs in the top of the 9th inning, to take a 14-12 lead.

Sadly, my bullpen (which would be me, of course) couldn't hold the lead and he won the game with a walkoff 2-run homer.

It was really a lot of fun.

I got a chance to break in the new glove I got for my birthday last week and I also managed to hit 2 home runs, which is very rare for me.

I think we played about 50 games during the spring/summer/fall and I am pretty sure my home run total was somewhere between 6-8.

The jet streams were really working to left centerfield today though, and I managed to hit an absolute bomb to left center and then another one that bounced off the top of the fence in the left field corner, popped straight up in the air and then miraculously landed on the other side of the fence.

Of course, I also gave up 2 home runs and lost the game, but in this case I think I will take personal accomplishments over team performance anyday.

After all, I managed to hit 2 homers and score 12 runs, it's not my fault if the stinking pitching staff (which, once again, is me also) stinks and can't hold a 7 RUN LEAD!.

And finally...