Colorado Rockies: Another Baseball Hall of Fame mock ballot

The Baseball Hall of Fame inductees will be announced on Tuesday on MLB Network. With tomorrow coming, writers here at Rox Pile are submitting our own mock ballots.

We all know how it works. Every ballot gets a max of 10 selections. Every eligible player gets 10 years after their retirement to receive at least 75% of the vote in order to be inducted. So let’s take a look a my mock ballot, including the Colorado Rockies players on it.

The Rockies

Since this is Rox Pile, of course there is a bias for my first two choices. In high school in the early 2000s, I was a left-handed first baseman, so it is no wonder why I idolized Todd Helton.

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The numbers he put up in a five-season stretch from 1999-2004 made him one of the most feared hitters in all of baseball and his ’00 and ’01 seasons were remarkable. Too bad the injury bug took a toll in his later seasons. Otherwise, he would be a surefire Hall of Famer.

What more can be said about Larry Walker that hasn’t been discussed this winter? The only Rockies’ player to win an MVP is in his 10th and final year on the ballot. Sadly, the stigma of playing at Coors Field for 10 seasons have hurt his chances. However, there is no argument that he put up the stats over his 17-year career to get in.

The obvious

Our Noah Yingling said it best in his mock ballot, “Is Derek Jeter one of the most overrated players in the history of baseball? Yes. Is he one of the most overrated players in the history of professional sports. Yes. Is he a Hall of Fame baseball player? The answer is still yes.” My disdain for the Yankees also skews my thoughts on Jeter but there is no denying what he accomplished over his 20-year career in New York.

The steroid trio

As a baseball purist, it pains me to say that Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Sammy Sosa are on my list. In my book, 61 and 755 are still the all-time home run records and I honestly couldn’t tell you where the actual records stand without looking them up. However, these three players (and Mark McGwire, who also should be in the HOF) practically resurrected MLB after the ugly labor stoppage in 1994.

Questionable character

Say what you will about Curt Schilling off the field, he was still one hell of a Major League pitcher. The pitching duo of Randy Johnson and Schilling with the Diamondbacks in the early 2000s might be one of the best pitching combos in MLB history. There was also his time in Boston where he helped break “the Curse of the Bambino” which included the infamous “Bloody Sock” in Game 6 of the ALCS. Throw in his longevity to go along with his many awards/accomplishments and he is most deserving of the Hall.

Final spots

I am going to be one of those guys and not use all of my allotted 10 selections. The reason is that I couldn’t find 10 players who jumped off the page. This leaves me to my last two picks of Jeff Kent and Scott Rolen.

The decision for Kent has more to do with the fact that he was thorn in side of the Rockies when he was with the Giants and Dodgers in the last half of his career. He also was an offensive threat from a second baseman, which had been almost unheard of at that time.

Finally, Rolen is a tough pick for me as offensively he was rather inconsistent from season to season. However, his numbers as a whole over his 17 years are solid and eight Gold Gloves is definitely something that can’t be ignored.