With the Hall Of Fame election announcement coming on January 9, 2012, it is time to review the ballot, go over the names, and decide who belongs in the Hall Of Fame.

There are twenty seven men on the ballot this year and we will take a look at each one individually prior to official announcements. You can find all of the profiles in the I-70 Baseball Exclusives: Cooperstown Choices 2012 menu at the top of the page.

Tune in Saturday, January 7, 2012 as I-70 Baseball Radio will host a panel of writers discussing the Hall Of Fame Ballot in a 2-hour special.

In this article, we take a look at Edgar Martinez

Edgar Martinez
Martinez enjoyed an 18 season career and is the poster child for the Designated Hitter. He signed with the Seattle Mariners as an undrafted free agent in 1982, eventually making his debut for the club in 1987. His career would come to a close at the end of the 2004 season at the age of 41. This will be his third year on the ballot for induction.

Why He Should Get In
Martinez is the hope for all players that spend a majority of their career as Designated Hitters. By 1995 he had transitioned full time to that role for the Mariners and extended his career due to it. A fielder that was hobbled in the field, he found a career by hitting and hitting well. A career .312 batting average and 2247 hits demonstrates that ability. His numbers are low by most standards, but he is the bar by which the designated hitter standards are set.

Why He Should Not Get In
For a man that spent his career as a hitter, his numbers do not support the suggestion that he was a great one. He may have been one of the best designated hitters, but until voters can get a feel for what barometer to judge those players by, it will be hard to determine if Martinez was a great hitter or simply someone clinging to a few more years because he was in the American League.

Bill Ivie is the editor here at I-70 Baseball as well as the Assignment Editor for BaseballDigest.com.
He is the host of I-70 Radio, hosted every week on BlogTalkRadio.com.
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It was a wild and crazy opening week at Kauffman Stadium full of extra innings, lead changes, walk-offs, meltdowns and best of all, a 4-2 record for the Royals. Here is a look at some of the biggest plays from each game based on win probability added (WPA) (numbers all from the indispensable Fangraphs):

March 31 • Angels 4 Royals 2

The opener did not feature any of the dramatic swings that the next five contests did. The key moment of the game came when the Royals threatened to come back in the bottom of the eighth after Melky Cabrera, Billy Butler and Kila Ka’aihue walked the bases drunk with just one out. They were down 2-4 but had raised their win expectancy (WE) to 38%. Jeff Francoeur stepped to the plate but struck out, which dropped the Royals WE down to 23%. Alcides Escobar was up next with a chance to play hero, but flew out instead, and the Royals chances fell all the way down to 8%.

(WPA is a descriptive or “story” stat, meaning it describes what happened without necessarily reflecting a player’s true talent. Still, it is worth noting that Escobar had the worst WPA in the majors last season and has jumped out to the worst WPA for the Royals so far. Hopefully some timely hits will start falling in for him. The good news is he has looked outstanding with the glove.)

April 1 • Royals 2 Angels 1

The start of the four-game winning streak, and first of three walk-off wins on the week. Not surprisingly, Kila’s 9th inning bomb was the play of the game, boosting KC’s WE from 64% to a cool 100%.

April 2 • Royals 5 Angels 4

The Royals came-back came in the eighth inning this time with a couple of unlikely names doing the damage with the bat. With two outs and two on, the Royals were down 3-4, and had just a 31% WE. Light-hitting Matt Treanor knocked Billy Butler in with a single to tie it, and also-light-hitting Chris Getz gave the good guys the lead for good with a single of his own. KC’s WE shot all the way up to 86%.

April 3 • Royals 5 Angels 4

More late-innings madness, this time in both the ninth and 13th innings. Down by two in the bottom of the ninth, things were not looking good until suddenly the bases were loaded; Wilson Betemit had the biggest hit for the Royals all week (judged by WPA) when he doubled in two runs. Tying the game resulted in a mammoth 51% swing in WE in the Royals favor. The teams locked horns for four more innings before Treanor continued an amazing first week as a Royal with a walk-off ding dong. Even though it won the game, it had a smaller impact on WE (39%) than Betemit’s game-tying double.

April 5 • Royals 7 White Sox 6

How about another extra-inning, walk-off win? Once again it was the hit to tie the game that had the biggest effect on WE, rather than the walk-off hit itself. The tying runs came on a mammoth home-run from Bam Bam Butler, boosting the Royals WE from 20% to 56%. Cabrera’s single in the 12th wasn’t bad either, moving the WE from 70% to game over.

April 6 • White Sox 10 Royals 7

insaness

The magic ran out in another crazy game. It looked like the Royals were going to win in non-dramatic fashion for a change after jumping out to a 5-0 lead and handing a 6-3 lead to Joakim Soria in the ninth. Soria got two quick ground-outs, and the game was basically over. The Royals WE was 99.6%. The White Sox had flat-lined and were moving towards the light. Three singles and a walk later, the White Sox were within one run, but the Royals WE was still 83%. Next came the biggest WPA play of the week when Carlos Quentin doubled in the tying and go-ahead runs, swinging the WE 66% in the White Sox’s favor. It appeared the Royals might come back from the collapse when Ka’aihue doubled in the tying run in the bottom of the ninth, moving the WE 42% back in KC’s favor. The Royals couldn’t score. Then in the 11th, the Royals got their WE all the way back up to 83%. In a repeat of opening day, Jeff Francoeur and Alcides Escobar squashed a rally with back-to-back outs. It was not to be this time, and the Sox finally finished the job in the 13th inning.

Top five plays by WPA during opening week:

-66%: April 6 • 9th • Carlos Quentin go-ahead 2B

+51%: April 3 • 9th • Wilson Betemit tying 2B

+42%: April 6 • 9th • Kila Ka’aihue tying 2B

+39%: April 3 • 13th • Matt Treanor walk-off HR

+36%: April 5 • 8th • Billy Butler tying HR

Joe Keough, 1969

Kansas City’s Municipal Stadium hosted professional baseball from 1923-1972 on the corner of 22nd & Brooklyn. It is most widely associated with the Kansas City Blues, Monarchs and Athletics, but was also home to the Royals for their first four seasons. The Royals opened their time at the park on April 8th and 9th, 1969 against the Twins. It was an auspicious start – a pair of 4-3, extra inning, walk-off wins for the home team. On the 8th, Joe Keough knocked in the winning run in the 13th inning, and on the 9th, Lou Piniella was the hero in the 17th inning. Just two games old and the franchise had played 30 innings. The Royals went on to play a total of 318 games at Municipal over those four years, and won exactly half of them.

Their was a surprisingly stable group of core players that were with the expansion team all four years in Municipal, including Lou Piniella, Ed Kirkpatrick, Paul Schaal, Bob Oliver, Joe Keough, Tom Burgmeier, Dick Drago, Jim Rooker and Mike Hedlund. Piniella played the most games at Municipal as a Royal (280). Amos Otis joined the team in 1970. Paul Splittorff pitched there between ’70-’72. (This was pre-DH, so he hit there too.) Fred Patek plied his trade as a Royal for the final two years in Municipal. Big John Mayberry began his reign as a Royal in ’72.

Dimensions at Municipal circa 1972. It played as a neutral hitter's/pitcher's park during the Royals time there.

Public bonds had been issued in 1967 to build what would become the Truman Sports Complex, and according to Curt Nelson, Royals Stadium was initially slated to open for the 1972 season, but was delayed a year by a construction strike. The team did not seem to mind playing in Municipal that year–they posted a 44-33 record at home. The Royals played their final Municipal game on October 4, 1972, and went out in style with a 4-0 shutout by Roger Nelson, who allowed just two hits to the Rangers. The stadium sat empty for four years before it was demolished in 1976.

The following leader-boards include only stats racked up by Royals players at home games in Municipal Stadium:

Games:

Plate appearances:

Runs:

Hits:

Doubles:

Triples:

Home runs:

RBI:

Stolen bases, caught stealing, success rate:

Walks:

Strikeouts:

Batting average (min. 100 PA):

On-base percentage (min. 100 PA):

Slugging percentage (min. 100 PA):

On-base plus slugging (min. 100 PA):

Total bases:

Wins:

Losses:

ERA (min. 50 IP):

Games started:

Innings Pitched:

Hits allowed:

Runs allowed:

HR allowed:

Walks allowed:

Strikeouts:

Strikeouts per 9 IP (min. 50 IP):

Shutouts:

Saves: