No one can really argue that the six men inducted into the 2014 Hall of Fame did not deserve the honor.
Maddux, Glavine and Frank Thomas were all All-Star/MVP caliber players during their eras.
Cox, LaRussa and Torre all had long managerial careers, with plenty of playoff teams and at least one World Series title.
The Hall is in the process of changing its rules. Instead of a player being on the ballot for 15 years (if he continues to get 5% of the vote), it is going down to a 10 year window. Many have argued that if you are a Hall of Fame player, you should get on the ballot in the first year.
Yes and no. Yes, a player's stats don't change as the ballots pass from year to year. Yes, if you are Hall worthy, waiting a decade does not make a lot of sense. But, there are a few "no" issues. There are several sportswriters who believe that no one is entitled to first ballot selection, unless you are the monster equivalent of Babe Ruth, who totally transformed the game. So there is a current ballot bias. Also, each voter can only select up to ten candidates. And to get into the Hall, there needs to be 75% approval. Last year, 571 members voted. One needed to get voted in by 429 votes.
Besides ballot bias, there is also hometown and league bias. There is very little turnover in the sportswriter membership. Many will have to write columns about their own hometown players on the ballot. And many may not have seen much of the other league players (but with today's overexposure on internet and MLB.com that excuse should fade over time). So many voters are pressured to "waste" their votes on players who will not get 75%.
Since 10 years only gives a player a shorter chance to be elected to the Hall, writers may actually not use all their 10 selection votes in an attempt to narrow the process further to truly "worthy" candidates. In the same process, a worthy candidate may lose support quicker after a couple of years and never have a chance to be elected by the writers.
There has been no reason stated for the rule change. It could be to allow players falling off the ballot to be reviewed by a veteran's committee. But history has shown that the veteran's committee is a harder vote to get than from the writers.
