Buck to the Hall?

Here's a good article on the upcoming selection of Negro League players to the Hall of Fame. There are 39 players on the list who can be voted on by 12 historians. If the player receives 9 votes, he'll get elected to the Hall and be inducted along with Bruce Sutter. You can view the complete list of eligible players here.

Larry Hogan, who is one of the historians and has worked on this project for some time was interviewed on MLB radio several days ago. BTW, you can get the MLB radio podcasts through iTunes.

Having lived in Kansas City, I've met Buck O'Neil on several occasions and am hoping that he gets in - not only because of his playing and managing career but also because of what he's meant to baseball overall. Steve Treder has written a nice piece on the Negro League Hall of Fame that O'Neil is active in in Kansas City.

What I've found most interesting about this effort is that the project collected most of the box scores from the 1920-1940s. I'm hoping that data will be made available in digital form so that we can really begin to analyze the accomplishments of these players, and hopefull, put them into some kind of historical perspective.

There is a book connected with the project called Shades of Glory co-authored by Hogan but it's not clear to me whether the statistics are a part of the book. There will also be a book tour that starts February 21st with stops in Atlanta; Birmingham, Ala; Chicago; Cleveland; Detroit; Kansas City, Kan.; and Washington, D.C.