IBWAA SELECTS KEN GRIFFEY, JR. AND EDGAR MARTINEZ IN 2016 HALL OF FAME VOTE

IBWAA SELECTS KEN GRIFFEY, JR. AND EDGAR MARTINEZ IN 2016 HALL OF FAME VOTE

Los Angeles – In its seventh annual Hall of Fame election, the IBWAA selected Ken Griffey, Jr. unanimously (230 votes) and Edgar Martinez, with 75.22% of the vote (173 votes). A 75% threshold is required for election.

Trevor Hoffman finished in third place with 70.87%, followed by Mike Mussina (68.26%), Roger Clemens (66.09%, after receiving 64.76% in 2015) and Barry Bonds (65.65%; 63.44% last year). There are 423 members in the IBWAA; 230 voted in this election.

The 2016 IBWAA Hall of Fame ballot compared identically to the BBWAA ballot, with the following exceptions:

1. Mike Piazza’s name did not appear on the IBWAA ballot because he was elected by the group in 2013.

2. Jeff Bagwell’s name does not appear on the IBWAA ballot because he was elected by the group in 2015.

3. Tim Raines’ name does not appear on the IBWAA ballot because he was elected by the group in 2015.

Per a group decision in January, 2014, the IBWAA allows members to vote for up to 15 players, instead of the previous 10, beginning with the 2015 election. In the 2016 election, 99 members voted for 10 or more candidates. Twenty-one members voted for 15 candidates. The average vote per member was 8.74.

Complete voting results are as follows:

Player Name	Votes	Percentage
Ken Griffey, Jr.	230	100.00%
Edgar Martinez	173	75.22%
Trevor Hoffman	163	70.87%
Mike Mussina	157	68.26%
Roger Clemens	152	66.09%
Barry Bonds	151	65.65%
Curt Schilling	147	63.91%
Alan Trammell	135	58.70%
Larry Walker	104	45.22%
Fred McGriff	83	36.09%
Mark McGwire	83	36.09%
Jeff Kent	78	33.91%
Lee Smith	75	32.61%
Gary Sheffield	74	32.17%
Billy Wagner	71	30.87%
Sammy Sosa	57	24.78%
Jim Edmonds	50	21.74%
Nomar Garciaparra	14	6.09%
Mike Hampton	3	1.30%
Mike Lowell	2	0.87%
Troy Glaus	2	0.87%
David Eckstein	1	0.43%
Garret Anderson	1	0.43%
Jason Kendall	1	0.43%
Luis Castillo	1	0.43%
Mark Grudzielanek	1	0.43%
Mike Sweeney	1	0.43%
Brad Ausmus	0	0.00%
Randy Winn	0	0.00%

Ballot tabulations by Brian Wittig & Associates.

The IBWAA was established July 4, 2009 to organize and promote the growing online baseball media, and to serve as a digital alternative to the Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA). Voting for full season awards takes place in September of each year, with selections being announced in November. The IBWAA also holds a Hall of Fame election in December of each year, with results being announced the following January.

In 2010, the IBWAA began voting in its own relief pitcher category, establishing the Rollie Fingers American League Relief Pitcher of the Year and the Hoyt Wilhelm National League Relief Pitcher of the Year Awards.

Among approximately 400 others, IBWAA members include Jim Bowden, Jim Caple, David Schoenfield and Mark A. Simon of ESPN.com; Tim Brown, Yahoo! Sports; Craig Calcaterra, NBC Sports Hardball Talk; Bill Chuck, GammonsDaily.com; Derrick Goold, St. Louis Post-Dispatch; Danny Knobler, Bleacher Report; Kevin Kennedy; Kostya Kennedy, Sports Illustrated; Will Leitch, Sports on Earth; Bruce Markusen, Hardball Times; Ross Newhan; Dayn Perry and Matt Snyder, CBSSports.com; Tom Hoffarth and J.P. Hoornstra Los Angeles Daily News; Pedro Moura, Orange County Register; Tracy Ringolsby, MLB.com; Ken Rosenthal, FoxSports.com; Eno Sarris, FanGraphs; Dan Schlossberg, USA Today; Jesse Spector, Sporting News and Wendy Thurm.

Association membership is open to any and all Internet baseball writers, with a yearly fee of $20, or $35 lifetime. Discounts for groups and scholarships are available. Members must be 18 years of age to apply.

For more information please visit www.ibwaa.com.

Contact:

Howard Cole
Founding Director, IBWAA
baseballsavvy@aol.com

WHEN IT WAS JUST A GAME; REMEMBERING THE FIRST SUPER BOWL By Harvey Frommer

WHEN IT WAS JUST A GAME; REMEMBERING THE FIRST SUPER BOWL
By Harvey Frommer

(Excerpt 3)

With Number 50 – almost upon us, it seems like looking back on the mythic, epic, historic first one is in order. My latest labor of love When It Was Just a Game has been getting lots of exposure. Here for your reading enjoyment is just a piece of the action:
One of Commissioner Pete Rozelle’s suggestions for the name of the new game was “The Big One.” That name never caught on. “Pro Bowl” was another Rozelle idea. Had the name been adopted there would have been confusion, for that was the name used for the NFL’s All-Star Game. Another name floated was “World Series of Football,” which died quickly after being deemed too imitative of baseball’s Fall Classic.

There was no Super Bowl Committee, which some said was part of the problem. There was also a game that had no location and no name. That, too, was part of the problem.
It was Rozelle’s idea to call the contest the AFL–NFL World Championship Game. While the name was made official, it never took off . It was too cumbersome, a mouthful, no good for newspaper headlines.

BOYD DOWLER: We thought it was kind of funny they called it
the Super Bowl; that was a feature of the media more than anybody
else. But the AFL–NFL Championship Bowl Game, yeah, that’s a lot
more words than necessary. Super Bowl is a lot more practical.
SHARON HUNT: Th e name AFL–NFL Championship Game was
too unwieldy, hard to get straight.
Two days after the hullabaloo about the merger, New York Times sports columnist Arthur Daley wrote about what the future had in store: the “new super duper football game for what amounts to the championship of the world.”
The Los Angeles Times reported on September 4, 1966, that the game was being
“referred to by some as the Super Bowl.”
The New York Times sports section’s lead story that same day headlined, “NFL Set to Open Season That Will End in Super Bowl.”
A week later, the Washington Post reported, “The brash upstarts who will tackle Goliath in professional football’s ultimate production, a highly appealing ‘Super Bowl’ that promises extra pizzazz at seasons’ end.”
LAMAR HUNT JR: My parents got divorced, and my dad would
come over and pick us up. And I remember showing him the Super
Ball, the “Whammy” super ball, and saying, “Hey look, this will
bounce over the house, this ball.”
You know my dad was not going to be preoccupied with toys
that were given to children. You know, he might have bounced the
ball. We just remember demonstrating it.
But then what happened going forward is my dad was in an
owner’s meeting. They were trying to figure out what to call the last
game, the championship game. I don’t know if he had the ball with
him, as some reports suggest.
My dad said, “Well, we need to come up with a name, something
like the “Super Bowl.”
And then he said, “Actually, that’s not a very good name. We can
come up with something better.”
But “Super Bowl” stuck in the media and word of mouth.
It kind of came out of my dad’s mouth. What do you want to
call it? Power of suggestion or just an idea or whatever, it stuck. And
the inspiration was that Super Ball. I feel blessed to be the son of guy
who really came up with the name.
BILL MCNUTT III: I became very close friends with the Hunt children. We would go over to Dallas, and I would play with that ball
with them. We were just amazed at this ball. It was the most popular
toy of its day.
The Wham-O Super Ball was introduced in 1965. Invented by Norm Stingley, a chemical engineer at the Bettis Rubber Company in Whittier, California, the ball was made of Zectron. The “Super Ball” could bounce six times higher than any regular rubber ball. Millions were sold, and it remained a craze through the 1960s.
PAUL ZIMMERMAN: The National Football League hierarchy
frowned on the term “Super Bowl,” but the fans and the media liked
it and used it, and Super Bowl would become the name to represent
professional football’s championship game.
SHARON HUNT: It was something else that a toy a child was playing
with could have inspired the name.
JERRY IZENBERG: The afternoon of the merger, the switchboard
rang at the NFL offices, and the guy said, “I want 20 tickets for the
title game.”
They said, “We don’t even know where it’s going to be.”
And he said, “I don’t care, I want to buy it right now!”

(Autographed, mint, discounted copies of WHEN IT WAS JUST A GAME are available direct from the author)

Written by acclaimed sports author and oral historian Harvey Frommer, with an introduction by pro football Hall of Famer Frank Gifford, When It Was Just a Game tells the fascinating story of the ground-breaking AFL–NFL World Championship Football game played on January 15, 1967: Packers vs. Chiefs. Filled with new insights, containing commentary from the unpublished memoir of Kansas City Chiefs coach Hank Stram, featuring oral history from many who were at the game—media, players, coaches, fans—the book is mainly in the words of those who lived it and saw it go on to become the Super Bowl, the greatest sports attraction the world has ever known. Archival photographs and drawings help bring the event to life.

Dr. Harvey Frommer is in his 40th year of writing books. A noted oral historian and sports journalist, the author of 43 sports books including the classics: best-selling New York City Baseball, 1947-1957 and best-selling “Shoeless Joe and Ragtime Baseball. He also authored the acclaimed Remembering Yankee Stadium and best-selling Remembering Fenway Park. The prolific Frommer is working on “the Ultimate Yankee book” to be published in 2017.

IBWAA VETS COMMITTEE SELECTS MARVIN MILLER IN 2016 HALL OF FAME VOTE

IBWAA VETS COMMITTEE SELECTS MARVIN MILLER IN 2016 HALL OF FAME VOTE

Los Angeles – In its inaugural Hall of Fame election, the IBWAA Vets Committee selected labor leader Marvin Miller with 16 out of a possible 20 votes cast (80%). A 75% threshold is required for election.

The IBWAA, which has been voting in its own non-official Hall of Fame election since 2010, established the Vets Committee on November 5, 2015 to consider individuals, who with one exception (see note below) have not be honored with a Cooperstown enshrinement by the BBWAA, or by any of the various Eras Committees tasked with the assignment (the Golden Era Committee, the Pre-Integration Committee, etc.).

All candidates, which were nominated by the IBWAA Vets Committee members themselves, were placed on a digital ballot, with voting taking place electronically during December, 2015.

The inaugural IBWAA Vets Committee members, serving two-year terms, are as follows: Barry Bloom, Jim Bowden, Craig Calcaterra, Jim Caple, Kavitha Davidson, Stacey Gotsulias, Tom Hoffarth,Will Leitch, Ross Newhan, Harry Pavlidis, Dayn Perry, Tracy Ringolsby, Miriam Romain, John Rosengren, Eno Saris, David Schoenfield, Ted Schwerzler, Jesse Spector, Wendy Thurm and Al Yellon.

Note: Barry Larkin has not reached the 75% threshold in an IBWAA election thus far, and as a nominated player, was eligible for Vets Committee consideration in this election.

Election results are as follows:

Name	Votes	Percentage
Marvin Miller	16	80%
Barry Larkin	14	70%
Minnie Minoso	12	60%
John Scheurholz	10	50%
George Steinbrenner	10	50%
Dick Allen	9	45%
Gil Hodges	9	45%
Lou Whitaker	9	45%
Steve Garvey	7	35%
Tommy John	7	35%
Dwight Evans	6	30%
Tony Oliva	6	30%
Maury Wills	6	30%
Buzzie Bavasi	5	25%
Jim Kaat	5	25%
Dale Murphy	5	25%
Bobby Grich	4	20%
Ted Simmons	4	20%
Don Mattingly	2	10%
Vada Pinson	2	10%

Results of the traditional 2016 IBWAA Hall of Fame election will be announced via Twitter on Wednesday, January 6, 2016 at 1:00 p.m. PST. A press release will follow.

The IBWAA was established July 4, 2009 to organize and promote the growing online baseball media, and to serve as a digital alternative to the Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA). Voting for full season awards takes place in September of each year, with selections being announced in November. The IBWAA also holds a Hall of Fame election in December of each year, with results being announced the following January.

In 2010, the IBWAA began voting in its own relief pitcher category, establishing the Rollie Fingers American League Relief Pitcher of the Year and the Hoyt Wilhelm National League Relief Pitcher of the Year Awards.

Among approximately 400 others, IBWAA members include Mark A. Simon of ESPN.com; Tim Brown, Yahoo! Sports; Bill Chuck, GammonsDaily.com; Derrick Goold, St. Louis Post-Dispatch; Danny Knobler, Bleacher Report; Kevin Kennedy; Kostya Kennedy, Sports Illustrated; Bruce Markusen, Hardball Times; Matt Snyder, CBSSports.com; Mark Purdy, San Jose Mercury News; J.P. Hoornstra Los Angeles Daily News; Pedro Moura, Orange County Register and Ken Rosenthal, FoxSports.com.

Association membership is open to any and all Internet baseball writers, with a yearly fee of $20, or $35 lifetime. Discounts for groups and scholarships are available. Members must be 18 years of age to apply.

For more information please visit www.ibwaa.com.

Contact:

Howard Cole
Founding Director, IBWAA
baseballsavvy@aol.com