FanPost

Whitey, Mister K fail to make the cut

The Veterans' Committee has announced this year's selections and no Royals-related nominees were inducted, unless you count former commissioner Bowie Kuhn, who had as much significance to the Royals as to the other 25 teams then in the Major Leagues.

Personally, I'm not too bothered by that. Ewing Kauffman was a great philanthropist and was the soul of the Royals, but I don't see what makes him a Hall of Famer over other owners who were dedicated to their teams and cities, such as Gene Autry or Bud Selig. Whitey Herzog won plenty of games with both the Royals and Cardinals, but only one World Series. They belong (and are) in the Royals Hall of Fame, but I don't think their denial of plaques in Cooperstown is unfair.

As for the actual inductees...I'm not sure how crazy I am about Bowie Kuhn being selected. He (or his side, at least) pretty much completely lost the battle of wills in the 1981 strike. Baseball fared much better under all of his successors than it did under him. Somehow the article linked above credits him with the television revenues earned by baseball teams, but if he'd managed things better, we might have had decent revenue sharing like the NFL does. I think he was a poor choice, and it pretty much means a rubber-stamp plaque for anyone who holds the commissioner job. I'll bet even Bart Giamatti gets a plaque, despite his short term of service, since he brought down Pete Rose.

As for the others - Billy Southworth, don't know much about, but seems OK based on his stats. Dick Williams, a winner almost everywhere - dynasty in Oakland, WS appearances in Boston and San Diego, and the only playoff appearance for Montreal (OK, someone else finished that year, but I consider him primarily responsible). Good choice. Walter O'Malley brought baseball to the west coast, that makes him more than "just another owner" in my eyes. And Barney Dreyfuss apparently invented the World Series, so he sounds worthy to me.

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