Congrats Bert Blyleven, a top-20 pitcher

Bert Blyleven

I previously posted about Bert Blyleven, in my opinion one of the top 20 MLB pitchers of all time, when he was finally elected to the Hall of Fame.

Don't believe me? He's 27 in career wins, 14th in innings pitched, ninth in shutouts, 11th in starts, 13th in wins above replacement for pitchers and 43rd in wins above replacement for all players. And still, in today's whiff-heavy era, No. 5 in strikeouts.

Well, today was induction day. Blyleven, top-notch second baseman Robbie Alomar and Pat Gillick, a very good baseball executive with several teams, including Alomar's World Series-winning Toronto Blue Jays, all were honored.

There's an interesting sidebar, which probably hasn't happened before in any induction of three or more people. All three have significant non-American histories.

Blyleven was born in the Netherlands. Alomar has his best years in Toronto; his top two years were their 1992-93 World Series teams. And Pat Gillick was GM for those teams.

And Bert? Per Jim Caple, consider yourself circled. In the HOF.

Bert made it! - and steroids "made it" too

Bert Blyleven had finally made the Hall of Fame, as has Robbie Alomar. (That said, even with all the years of enlightening more people, it's still sad he got "only" 79 percent, while Alomar zoomed past him, in his second year of eligibility to 90 percent. The biggest "issue" with Alomar is his career negative dWAR. Not sure whether it's more him being overrated by us all these years or more an issue with dWAR.

That said, per complete ballot information at Baseball-Reference.com's home page, it's clear the steroid era's fallout is looming large.

Jeff Bagwell failed to break 50 percent.
Rafael Palmeiro barely broke 10 percent.
Mark McGwire fell back below 20 percent.

Other interestings?

Barry Larkin moved up more than 10 percentage points. He may be there next year.

Jack Morris may have plateaued. (I hope.)

Edgar Martinez may have plateaued, but it's too early to tell.

Robbie Alomar has AIDS?

Or, does he have a gold-digger ex-girlfriend?

Ilya Dall, who lived with Alomar for three years, is suing him for $15 million, claiming the former, and that he had unprotected sex with her even after an AIDS test.

Given the dinero involved, the fact that, after he allegedly tested positive, Dall says she stopped having sex with him, and the fact she claims her children were “exposed” to the virus …

Sounds like a gold-digger to me.

On the other hand, a schadenfreude-minded friend of mine said that, if Alomar does have AIDS, it would be “funny” if he got it from a shared steroid-infection needle.