Hall of Fame Plaques

If you have ever been fortunate enough to visit Coopersown, NY., home of the Major League Baseball, you've taken in the sight of the bronze plaques commemorating each Hall of Famer.

They are unique works of art, and the ones I love are the ones that are, well, clean.

I'm not talking about anything steroid-enhanced or in need or rustoleum, I'm talking about the bit at the top, where the teams the players played for, and the appropriate seasons, are listed.

My favorites are the ones for players who spent their entire careers with one team - Ted Williams, BOS (AL) 1939-1960; Lou Gehrig, NY (AL) 1923-1939; Tony Gwynn, San Diego 1982-2001; Cal Ripken, Jr., Baltimore, 1981-2001.

I'll even accept the multi-team players as long as there's a nice, clean distinction (Ozzie Smith, San Diego, 1978-1981, St. Louis, 1982-1996; Rod Carew, Minnesota, 1967-1978, California, 1979-1985). It's unrealistic to expect all great players to play their careers in one place, as Manny's Cleveland/Boston and Vlad's Montreal/Los Angeles of Anaheim plaques will one day attest.

What drives me batshit is the ridiculous clutter some guys have on their plaques.

A pair of f'rinstances:

Ryne Sandberg. I think we all remember him as the most dominant 2B of the mid-'80s to the mid-'90s, but he has the screwy line of:

1981 PHI (NL), 1982-1994, 1996-1997 CHI (NL)

Yes, Ryne Sandberg began his career as a Phillie. The Cubs and the Phillies made a deal for Larry "Let's make Scott Rolen a pariah in Philadelphia" Bowa for Ivan "My base-running skills are negated by the fact that I'm constitutionaly incapable of reaching base" DeJeusus.

Sandberg was a throw in.

As for the missing '95 season - Sandberg was going through a divorce, and decided to forego a year of making big money to avoid monster alimony payments.

Then there is a great pitcher I was fortunate enough to see in person, even though he was at the end of the line, Steve Carlton:

STL (NL) 1965 - 1971, PHI (NL) 1972 -1986, SF 1986, CHI (AL) 1986, CLE 1987, MIN 1987-1988.

The St. Louis/Phildelphia split would have been fine, but what's up with his journeyman status at the end of his career?

Of course, Baseball history abounds with player like this - Braves great Warren Spahn spending the end of his career with the Mets and the Giants, Tigers' greats Ty Cobb and Hank Greenberg hanging on for dear life with the A's and Pirates, respectively, at the end of their careers, and Babe Ruth's end-of-career-embarrasment tour with the Boston Braves in the last season of his career.

What gets me now is the current players who are sullying their HOF plaques with a load of team changes at the backend. Frank Thomas is a great example - it seemed like he was going to be a career White Sock, but now he'll have (at the least) Oakland and Toronto engraved for posterity.

The next HOF candidate who is absolutely guaranteed of enshrinement (assuming he ever quits the San Diego Surf Dawgs) is Rickey Henderson, whose plaque will read:

1979-1984, 1989-1993, 1994-1995, 1998, OAK, 1985-1989 NY (AL), 1993 TOR, 1996-1997, 2001 SD, 1997 ANA, 1999-2000, NY (NL) 2000 SEA, 2002 BOS (AL), 2003 LA.

How will there be room for his achievements after all that is listed?

(And while we're on the subject, does anyone else feel for Tim "Rock" Raines. He was probably the second-best leadoff hitter of all time - certainly better than Lou Brock, a borderline Hall of Famer fer sure - who suffered the misfortune of having a career that parallelleld that of the greatest leadoff hitter ever)

When I heard that Greg Maddux was going back to the Cubs a few seasons back, I envisioned a pretty little HOF plaque that involved his Braves' years being bookended by his Cubs years. Now he's marred that by a half-season with the Dodgers and whatever he's going to do with the Padres.

Mike Piazza has been sullied for awhile. He started out with the Dodgers, but was traded twice in mid-season in the same year (how many people remember that he spent a week and a half with the Marlins in '98?) and now that he's bounced to the Padres and the A's the last two season - that's going to be an ugly plaque.

And then there's Roberto Alomar's plaque - I still think he's a Hall of Famer, but that thing is going to be a mess when it covers his final seasons.

This is all dependent on my own sensibilities - that a player either spend his entire career with one team, or have strictly delineated breaks between a few teams. But who wants to see that Tom Seaver split '86 between the Sox of Chicago and Boston? That's not why we remember him, and no one wants to talk about the fact that he was traded for a guy who Fox fired for making racist comments about Lou Pinella.