MLB Showdown Obsession

When the Hall of Fame voting began, there really weren't many rules in place for voting. Now into the 1950's rules were still being fine tuned and tweaked. With the Veterans Committee in place, no one who retired more than 25 years before were allowed on the BBWAA ballot. That limit was extended to 30 years by the 1955 vote. Everything before that (as well as managers, owners and umpires for consideration) were handled by the Veterans Committee. Also, the "wait 5 years" policy was established, meaning that anyone who retired after 1949 had to wait for a shot. 1955 gave us four new HoF members from the BBWAA vote, something that wouldn't be seen again for a long time. The glut of elite players was slowly being worked through and voted in, and it wouldn't be such a large collection of players voted in for another 60 years. The Veterans Committee added another two names to the collection from yesteryear.

 It still feels like the last WBC had just ended, but here we are determining the final teams that will qualify for the 2026 competition. Most teams from the previous run automatically qualified, but the last place team from each round 1 pool dropped out and had to earn their trip back against four hopeful upstarts. China, Taiwan, Nicaragua and Colombia all finished last in 2023, while Spain, South Africa, Germany and Brazil are looking to punch their ticket. Now, this isn't the main attraction, so players in MLB are much less inclined to abandon their parent clubs in the middle of spring training to go compete, so there countries will rely mainly on lower level players and even a few former major leaguers. As a result, the qualifiers have a much weaker appeal without big names to market. There are still some familiar names involved in the showcases, with only China entering play with absolutely zero MLB names, so let's take a look at the players involved who have logged time i...

 At the time of this writing, it's still breaking news, but the Showdown world has just lost another original. Scott Sauerbeck died of a heart attack at the age of 53. His 2000 Showdown card was pretty average across the board from his 3 Control to his 17+ baserunners allowed...which made him a solid option out of your bullpen when you barely had anyone else to call upon in your early days since he came in the starter deck on the NL side. On a personal note, in the first ever game of MLB Showdown I played against my dad, Scott Sauerbeck was the losing pitcher as his 3 control lost the advantage to Mike Sweeny (on-base of 9) and I hit a walk-off homer. But today as the baseball world mourns, let us look back on Scott and the cards he would have had in his brief MLB career. Sauerbeck was drafted by the Mets, but they lost him to the Pirates in the Rule 5 Draft. He debuted in 1999 for Pittsburgh, but that and his 2000 season are already covered by the original Showdown 2000 and 2001 s...

 Back when I was doing my Righting Wrongs series, I had mentioned Rod Beck as a player who was elite earlier in his career but was pretty human by the time the official MLB Showdown set started in 2000. Now that I've finally taken the time to properly go through his career, let's take a look at all those seasons of Beck... Beck was drafted by the Oakland A's in 1986, but before the 90's he would get traded across the Bay and debut in 1991 with the Giants. The rookie who would go on to save 286 games would only get one in his rookie season, but his chart showed very good promise. When Beck arrived the San Francisco, Dave Righetti was the Closer, but by the end of '92 he was the heir to the role as he adds 17 Saves to his resume. His control doubles and his chart is outstanding. The transition between Closers can be a stressful period for some teams, but the Giants lucked out here. Beck's best season yet (as mentioned before here) where he makes his first all sta...

 Hall of Fame voting fell into a rhythm by now. The Veterans Committee only met in odd years, meaning the BBWAA was the only source of new members for '54. Luckily by now there was a big glut of talent all waiting for their turn to be voted for, so the voters had a wide selection to choose from. Greats like Joe DiMaggio fell short of votes, not because of talent, but because there were older guys on the ballot that the voters wanted to vote for while there was still time for them. So while an all time great like Joltin' Joe had to wait his turn, a few men got the call for immortality, including a fellow Yankee great.