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| The "Rock" on 1981 Topps Traded |
This coincides with an annual habit of mine, of sifting through the arguments (and sometimes, illogic) behind voters who continue to leave Tim Raines off the ballot.
Some, instead of admitting that they never really paid attention to Tim Raines as a Montreal Expos, they come up with ludicrous singular reasons for leaving him off the ballot. This one being one of my favorite preposterous reasons (by Ron Chimelas):
"But if Raines gets in because he is fifth in steals, what about Vince Coleman, who is sixth? That’s why I talked myself out of it.”
Vince Coleman never hit more than 6 home runs in a season, and finished with 28 for his career. While Raines hit double digits in home runs seven times and finished with 170 over his career. Another glaring difference ... Coleman had 1200 fewer hits than Raines.
Now consider for a second that Tim Raines wasn't just a speed-demon, but a 5 tool player. If he were to rank among the elite of the elite in these statistical categories, wouldn't you say that's pretty Hall-worthy?!
Well here's my take on making that point:
Other than Tim Raines, there are no players from the modern era that compiled a career of fewer than 1000 strike outs while having:
500+ SBs (Raines: 808)
2500+ Hits (Raines: 2605)
150+ HR's (Raines: 170)
900+ RBI's (Raines: 980)
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<1000 K's (Raines: 966)
Not even his peers like Rickey Henderson (1694 K's) or Lou Brock (1730 K's) could match Tim's eye at the plate. To find players with those power & speed numbers and low strikeouts, these are the only names you'll find: Ty Cobb, Eddie Collins and Honus Wagner.
To read more on Tim Raines remarkable career goto: http://raines30.com/
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| My 2 heroes growing up. |