Neyer: There will always be room for Jamie Moyer
From SABR member Rob Neyer at Baseball Nation on January 28, 2014:
A long time ago, in a job far, far away, I decided we needed a new way to think of our outstanding baseball players who didn’t finish their careers with Hall of Fame-worthy numbers.
Oddly, I began to think of this “Wing of Amazing” because of Omar Vizquel. Why oddly? I’ll get to that in a few minutes.
I’ve actually nominated (and selected!) a few players for the Wing of Amazing. My standards are exceptionally high. I began with Jamie Moyer (and that was before he came back and recorded a victory after his 49th birthday). Then came Jim Abbott, followed by Bo Jackson. After R.A. Dickey’s Cy Young season, I added him to the Wing of Amazing. A few months later, our most recent nominee: Terry Mulholland, who just couldn’t be run on.
Now, about Omar Vizquel … He was actually my first nominee, largely because I wanted to provide an “out” for Hall of Fame voters, and there are a lot of them, who just know, deep down in their guts, that Vizquel should be rewarded for his amazing career. If only there was a Wing of Amazing — just as there are made-up wings for writers and broadcasters — maybe the voters could do that for Vizquel, instead of electing (or trying to elect) him to the actual Hall of Fame.
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A personal note: This is my last column for SB Nation, at least for a good little while. When I signed up three years ago, I wanted a different kind of adventure and that’s what I got. At various points along the way, I was blessed to work every day with Grant Brisbee, Jeff Sullivan, and Al Yellon; their passion and commitment continue to inspire me. My bosses were Tyler Bleszinski and Kevin Lockland, and both treated me better than I probably deserved.
Grant’s still around, of course; with him and Steve Goldman and Marc Normandin and Justin Bopp and all the other talented people covering baseball here, this site remains in wonderfully capable hands. I’m grateful to everyone above, and of course I’m forever grateful to you for reading. At some point in the next couple of weeks, I’ll be writing about baseball again, and I hope you’ll find me again.
Read the full article here: http://www.baseballnation.com/2014/1/28/5353092/baseball-moneyball-statistics-future-jamie-moyer
Originally published: January 28, 2014. Last Updated: January 28, 2014.