Minnesota Twins: My 2022 FanSided Hall of Fame Ballot, Explained

First three Votes that were Elected: David Ortiz, Barry Bonds, and Roger Clemens

We’ll start off with the three candidates that I voted for that were elected into the Mock Hall: Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and David Ortiz. In our election, Bonds was named on 83% of the ballots, Ortiz was named on 80%, and Roger Clemens was named on 77%.

Starting with David Ortiz, my affinity for Minnesota Twins and Boston Red Sox players doubled up here. Big Papi ranks in the Top 50 all-time in slugging percentage, OBS, total bases, homers, walks, and is in the Top 20 for RBI, homers, doubles, and extra base hits. He’s made his mark on the game.

Throw in three World Series titles, seven Silver Slugger awards, ten All-Star appearances, and a World Series MVP award, and you’ve got a first ballot Hall of Famer. His one positive steroid test isn’t enough to deter my vote either, especially since it happened before his success. His Baseball Hall of Fame vote tracker shows most voters agree, as he’s sitting at 84.2%.

I picked Barry Bonds in his tenth year of eligibility for a similar reason to why I picked him last year: Bonds put up some of the greatest numbers of all time, and his steroid use didn’t take place until after he had already built a Hall of Fame career. In year ten, he’s waited long enough.

For Roger Clemens, he has the same case as Bonds. A steroid user with a ridiculously good resume including an MVP, two World Series titles, seven Cy Young awards, and seven ERA titles. He wasn’t juicing throughout his entire career, so I put him through here as well.

Neither player relied entirely on steroids to build a legendary resume, and with the MLB not doing enough to prevent steroid use from running rampant, both players make it into the Hall here. BHOF vote tracker currently has their ballot numbers at 77.2% and 76.1% respectively, so I think they might make it here.