HELTON HALL-WORTHY
Ex-GM O’Dowd makes his case
Todd Helton, the face of the Rockies and the only player to have his number retired by the franchise, finished his 17-year career with a .316 batting average, 2,519 hits and 369 home runs.
He becomes eligible for the Hall of Fame in 2019. His legions of fans believe his induction is an easy call. But many Hall of Fame voters aren’t so sure, and they point to Coors Field as the primary reason they won’t vote for Helton. In other words, playing his home games at baseball’s notoriously hitter-friendly ballpark may cost him a spot in Cooperstown.
Dan O’Dowd wants to make sure that doesn’t happen.
The former Rockies general manager, now an analyst for the MLB Network, on Thursday made a passionate case for Helton’s induction into the Hall.
“I’ve got to get in here on Todd Helton,” O’Dowd told the panel debating the induction Class of 2018. “We’re going to debate his rate stats … for me he was a 5.00 WAR player for 12 straight years. His stretch between 2000 and 2005, his peak years, were as good as anyone currently in the Hall of Fame.
“His year 2000, you could say historically might have been one of the best years in the game.”
For the record, Helton batted .372, mashed 42 home runs, drove in 147 runs and posted a 1.162 OPS and an 8.8 WAR in 2000. And he came in fifth in the National League MVP voting.
“There’s two things I want to address,” O’Dowd said. “First of all, I want to dig into the Coors Field myth. I am so tired of hearing this split argument. If you’re a player and you’ve got to play all your home games at 5,280 (feet), the adjustments you have to make in hitting — which is a musclememory sport — to play your games in Colorado, to go on the road and play your games, is the most difficult adjustment in the history of the game. He had to do that for 17 straight years.
“No. 2: The physicality of mentally and physically playing your games at 5,280, is the most difficult place to play. So you’ve got to put in context the home/road split, as relations to the challenge of that particular venue.
“No. 3: It’s called the Hall of Fame. It’s called the Hall of Fame because there has to be some historical understanding of what a player means to a franchise. This is a relatively new franchise within the game of baseball, from a historical perspective. This is by far the greatest player to wear a Rockies uniform and spend 17 years playing for that organization. There has to be some recognition (and) understanding, because he did it with class, he did it with integrity and he did it with this level of consistency.”
O’Dowd went on to say that Helton was one of baseball’s toughest warriors: “I’ll go on record as saying, I bet you Todd didn’t play more than 50 percent of his games at 100 percent physically and mentally, to be able to go compete, because of the challenges of the venue he played in.”
The bottom line, according to O’Dowd?
“One team his entire career, greatest player in the Rockies’ history. It has some value.”