2008 Woodie Awards
Avoiding oops-erstown, '07 class exemplifies Hall
Brian Fitzsimmons
Issue date: 1/25/07 Section: Sports
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However, the upcoming era of voting will be inevitably littered with speculation that the National Baseball Hall of Fame will become a theme park filled with liars, cheaters, and even gamblers.
It is the Baseball Writers Association's obligation to sway from this possibility and extend its arms to reclaiming what Cooperstown is all about. It is necessary to recognize they are off to a promising start.
Granted, 2007's class of inductees involved two men who were shoe-ins worthy of entering to begin with, not just because of their lasting legacy on America's pastime, but for the respect they attracted and still attract in an era where that honor is quite rare.
I remember as a 10-year-old boy watching Ripken at Yankee Stadium and my parents telling me how watching a man with grey hair and wearing an orange number 8 stitched to a Baltimore Orioles uniform was a big deal. I didn't understand then, since I was too involved with spotting where the cotton candy vendor was, but I get it now.
I stared and observed this man for three hours that afternoon stuffing my face pondering why I was being told to do so. I asked why he changed his batting stance every time he went to the plate, not knowing I was witnessing the pioneer who paved the way for players like Derek Jeter, Jose Reyes and every other great shortstop today to be widely acclaimed. His streak of 2,632 consecutive games played earned him the title, "Baseball's New Iron Man," after passing Lou Gehrig's previous record and I applauded as he hit a homerun in his final All-Star game in Seattle off Chan Ho Park, with more knowledge than I had gathered as a child new to the game.
Years later, I understand exactly why he received 98.5 percent of the possible votes, good for third most in baseball's history next to Nolan Ryan and Tom Seaver.
Tony Gwynn was simply a hitting machine throughout his career, but as a young teenager in 1998, watching him compete in his first World Series appearance against the prevailing Yankees, it didn't occur to me how much of a gentleman he was during his long tenure lacing up the cleats.
He was a fan's player to say the least, and his love for the game shadowed the heavy set man, who has set a bar for non-homerun hitting players such as Ichiro Suzuki and Michael Young to possibly gain a lifelong honor in the corridors of Cooperstown.
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