I Don’t Want to Brag, But…

In November I wrote a column predicting the results of this year’s Hall of Fame ballot. And I’m proud to say that I was just five votes short of being 100% correct, confounding all of the so called experts.

I correctly predicted Andre Dawson (left, with fellow former Expos Hall of Famer and Mets hero Gary Carter) would get in. I also thought this was finally Bert Blyleven’s year. He missed by those five votes. I also said while Roberto Alomar and Barry Larkin were eventually going to be Hall of Famers, they wouldn’t get in on the first ballot. Well, I was right again. Alomar just missed with 73.7%, and Larkin got  a surprisingly low 51.6%. Two other first-timers on the ballot, Edgar Martinez and Fred McGriff, received tepid support at best, just as someone I know predicted.

But wait, there’s more. In December, I wrote a column about suspected steroid users and the Hall of Fame, in which I advocated that except for players who failed drug tests, they should all be allowed in because no one knows for sure if they were using. I said Mark McGwire deserves to be elected, but that he wouldn’t, and that his support would remain in the usual 25% range that he got in his three previous elections. Guess how much support McGwire got this year — 23.7%

“Baseball experts” Peter Gammons, Bob Costas, Jon Heyman, Ton Verducci and Ken Rosenthal all appeared on MLB-TV Wednesday morning in the hour leading up to the Hall of Fame announcement, and they all virtually guaranteed that Alomar and Larkin would get in. “No doubt about it first ballot Hall of Famers,” they said, especially about Alomar. They even had a live camera set up at Alomar’s house in Queens (interesting that Alomar stayed in Queens after his horrible stint in Flushing). Anyway, afterwards they all expressed shock that Alomar and Larkin didn’t make it. And by the way, they never went back to Alomar’s live-shot. It would have been interesting to see his reaction.

So yeah, I was right. Now that I’m on a streak, let me make some more predictions:

— The Mets trade Luis Castillo for Albert Pujols
— The Mets trade Oliver Perez for Tim Lincecum
— The Mets sign Babe Ruth, who emerged from the grave in his prime