FanPost Friday: Your Hall of Fame Ballot

The offseason is terrible, and very few things can distract me during this depressing time of year. The Winter Meetings are one, the beginning of Spring Training is another, and the final one (and the one that takes up the largest chunk of the offseason) is the annual Hall of Fame voting.

This year, the following names were added to the ballot: Derek Jeter, Bobby Abreu, Jason Giambi, Alfonso Soriano, Eric Chavez, Rafael Furcal, Josh Beckett, Heath Bell, Adam Dunn, Chone Figgins, Brad Penny, Carlos Peña, Cliff Lee, Paul Konerko, J.J. Putz, Raúl Ibañez, Brian Roberts, and José Valverde. In his final year on the ballot is Larry Walker. If he doesn’t get in this time around, he’ll have to wait around for a special Modern Baseball Era Committee vote (which is currently deliberating on such names as Dwight Evans and Lou Whitaker. Also on the ballot are holdovers Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Curt Schilling, and more.

This year’s ballot is distinctive, because once you get by the three most controversial names on the list, you are left with a much smaller ballot, that is among the least crowded we’ve had in recent memory. While few would complain about Scott Rolen getting into the Hall (I’m one of the people who believes he really should be in), it was difficult to imagine him getting in, in previous years.

So this ballot comes down to a few hot button questions.

1. Are Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens worthy of being in the Hall of Fame? What about Curt Schilling?
2. Who is the best non-Bonds/Clemens/Schilling/Jeter player on the ballot?
3. With the ballot being so weak, will Jeter be unanimous?

There are other questions of course, but these are the three that have dominated early discussion of the ballot.

As is tradition, every year, we give you a pretend ballot. Just a few rules.

1. You can choose up to 10 players. You can talk about the other players on the ballot as well, but you can only vote for 10.
2. You can vote for as few as zero players, as long as you can justify why you didn’t vote for anyone.
3. You cannot vote for a player that is not presently on the ballot. For a brief primer of who is on the ballot, go here.

That’s it! We’ll collect responses, and I’ll fill out my own ballot early next week! Have fun!