By Yours Truly
https://throneberryfields.blogspot.com/2018/07/needles-and-humility-for-six-new-hall.html
The Hall of Fame class of 2018; l to r: Vladimir Guerrero,
Trevor Hoffman, Chipper Jones, Jack Morris, Alan Trammell,
Jim Thome.One of the first things you notice now on the day of the Hall of Fame's formal, ceremonial inductions, is that there's at least one incumbent Hall of Famer who seems at the mercy of needling teammates. John Smoltz, one of the pitchers who made the 1990s Atlanta Braves the powerhouse they were, was that incumbent thanks to incoming Hall of Famer Chipper Jones.
When Smoltz's rotation mate Tom Glavine was inducted a few years ago, Glavine turned to his co-inductee Greg Maddux and said in his usual becalmed manner, "Greg, you made me a better pitcher and a better person, and you made me wealthy with all the money we took from Smoltzie on the golf course."
This time Jones brought the needle. "Smoltzie always pitched like his hair was on fire," he drawled during his induction speech, with the bald Smoltz sitting among the Hall of Famers with a tiny grin. "Makes sense looking at him now . . .
"Seriously, though, Smoltzie is a tremendous athlete," continued the arguable third greatest switch hitter who ever played baseball. "He can do anything he sets his mind to, whether it's starting, closing, or even making the U.S. Senior Open in golf. What's up with that 85 in the first round, though?"
A first-ballot Hall of Famer, Jones was the first of the six newcomers to speak, a courtesy the Hall of Fame granted because he and his wife expected the arrival of their new son (they plan to name him Cooper, after the Hall of Fame's locale) at any moment, figuratively speaking. It would give the couple one short of a full starting lineup in their blended household.
Known almost as much for his up-and-down personal life as for his ability to learn pitchers on the spot and correct flaws as swiftly as he gunned line drives around the park or over fences, Jones gave his wife, Taylor, a summer valentine during a speech that often sounded like he was trying to one-up the Academy Awards for swollen thanks to just about everyone who crossed his path and taught him something, anything.
"Took me forty years and some major imperfections in me along the way to find my true perfection," he said. "Now we've taken our two families, blended them together, and it's given me what I've been searching for my entire life, true happiness. The last six years have been the best six years of my life. Tay, you made me believe in love again."
All Jones would need to complete his domestic lineup is a pitcher. Preferably Trevor Hoffman on his side for a change. "I hated facing you, bro," Jones said to the longtime Padres relief chief who also went into the Hall of Fame Sunday. "Hated it. You had the most devastating changeup I've ever seen in my life. [But] you've been a great ambassador for the city of San Diego and baseball in general."
A third-ballot Hall of Famer, Hoffman, too, was prepared to thank his wife, though he saved it for the end of his comparatively more modest speech. "You shared with me this amazing journey of ups and downs from the beginning," he said, "always never letting me get too high or get too low. I love you."
So was Jim Thome, the slugging first baseman whom Jones recalled forging a lifelong friendship at the bottom of a pile in a minor league brawl. (Thome pulled Jones from the pile, pinned him to the backstop, and asked, "You done?" "I said, yes, sir, I'm done," Jones said. "We've been buddies ever since. I'm glad I'm here sharing this day with you, buddy.") His prodigious home runs and remarkable ability to take walks are sometimes called the textbook exercise in what's wrong with baseball today.
But after calling his first-ballot Hall of Fame enshrinement one of the great honours of his life, Thome---the gentle giant already on the emotional side after his daughter, Lila, opened the ceremonies by singing "The Star Spangled Banner"---addressed his wife, Andrea. "The best thing, though, that's ever happened to me is the day you agreed to marry me," he said. "You are without a doubt the best teammate I could ever have, and with the world as my witness, I love you more today than ever."
Vladimir Guerrero stuck out from the Hall of Famers in a powder blue suit contrasting to their assorted shades of darker blues. He spoke in his native Spanish even though he's reasonably comfortable speaking English, but he wanted no discomfort if he could help it, as he thanked his father and his mother---who endeared herself to her son's teammates and opponents alike by cooking them sumptuous meals during his playing seasons.
Guerrero is the first Hall of Famer to be shown with an Angels cap on his plaque image and the first position player born in the Dominican Republic to be enshrined. (Pitchers Juan Marichal and Pedro Martinez are ahead of him.) "I know that this could open the door for the next Dominican position players: recently retired David Ortiz and active still Adrian Beltre and Albert Pujols," he said in his speech. "I'm opening the door for these players who are going to follow me into the Hall of Fame."
The greatest bad-ball hitter of all time who isn't named Yogi Berra, Guerrero left impressions ranging from awe to terror and back to astonishment with his hard contact and howitzer throwing arm alike. "Vlad," Jones said during his own speech, "I'm not sure you ever saw a pitch you didn't like, but man, you always seemed to put it in play hard somewhere. You've been an inspiration to all Latin players and it was a pleasure to watch you roam right field, brother."
Vlad the Impaler made the Hall of Fame on his second try. The man whose hits were once described as looking like a half dozen chain saws flying toward you, they were hit so hard, and whose namesake son is now considered baseball's number one prospect, hitting like his father in the Blue Jays' system, flashed the grin that endeared him as much to Montreal and Anaheim fans as his cannon-blast home runs.
Both Jones and Alan Trammell, the longtime Tigers middle infield co-anchor at shortstop, made pitches for particular teammates to join them in Cooperstown. For Jones, it was namesake center fielder Andruw Jones; for Trammell, it was his longtime double play partner Lou Whitaker.
"Druw, I hope you'll be joining us soon," the Chipper purred. "Nobody played a better center field than you. You've got ten Gold Gloves to back it up. For a lot of years, pitchers had to go through the Jones boys in the three and four holes to beat us, and we took a lot of pride in that. I am so proud to call you my brother from another mother."
The rangy center fielder who often looked like Willie Mays's son running down drives or swinging smoothly at the plate experienced an almost inexplicable drop off the table from being as feared at the plate as he was in center field to a shell, so profoundly that the Dodgers, to whom he went in his first free agency, bought out his contract.
We know now that Andruw Jones played through injuries in his final Braves days and for the rest of his career. We also suspect his ill-considered reaction to Dodger Stadium booing during his lone season there probably hurt him, too. When he said he played for his team and not for the fans, it only metastasised a season rendered ill before it began when the once-lithe center fielder reported to spring training so out of shape he was a target for fat jokes.
Trammell threw down from the heart when he spoke of Whitaker, who was one-and-done inexplicably on his lone Hall of Fame ballot but could yet find himself with a plaque by way of a future convening of the Modern Era Committee. As did Trammell in the shadows of fellow Hall of Fame shortstops Ozzie Smith and Cal Ripken, Jr., Whitaker probably suffered even more for recognition amidst such second base bellwethers of his time as Ryne Sandberg and Roberto Alomar.
"My whole career, I have been linked with one person," Trammell said, with Whitaker himself among the crowd. "For nineteen years, Lou Whitaker and I formed the longest-running double play combination in the history of baseball. I doubt that record will ever be broken . . . For all those years, it was Lou and Tram. Lou, it was an honour and a pleasure to have played alongside you for all those years, and I hope---my hope is, some day, you'll be up here as well."
Their Tigers teammate, Jack Morris, was known to be curmudgeonly in his active playing career but has mellowed with the years, particularly after he---like Trammell---was finally elected to the Hall by a Modern Era Committee. The old-school pitcher whose career shook out to numerous statistical analysts as a hair or three short of genuine Hall of Fame greatness accepted his induction gently enough.
"I believe in the human heart and human spirit," said Morris, who gave several weekend interviews apologising for having been so pillish in his pitching years, and whose career was pockmarked by a couple of bitter experiences during the 1980s collusions against free agency, "and no analytics can define them. "There is no telling what you can accomplish if you have the will and desire to try.
"God blessed me with a gift," continued the righthander whose money pitch was a split-fingered fastball that went wild as often as it went through hitters, "and it was meant to be shared with others. My life in baseball has been an incredible journey, and I am grateful for everything."
In front of the second-largest crowd in its history, the Hall of Fame has ways unseen by which the most combative of men are humbled. But it's entirely possible that next year could break the crowd record, considering the likeliest first-ballot Hall of Famer to come then---Mariano Rivera, whose invincibility out of the bullpen was always equaled only by his own humility.
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