Legendary Red Sox writer's Hall of Fame ballot is a disrespectful disgrace

New York Yankees lefty postseason God Andy Pettitte will not be elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2026, his eighth year of eligibility. He has two years left at the mercy of the writers before being turned over to the Eras Committee. Considering they can't seem to get Don Mattingly's case right, it's probably in Pettitte's best interest to continue building momentum in hopes of sneaking past the finish line in his final year on the ballot. If Dan Shaughnessy of the Boston Globe, who's covered Boston sports and the Red Sox for generations, has anything to do with it, it'll never happen.

Pettitte finished at 27.9% of the vote last cycle, a far cry from the 75% necessary for election. However, there's reason to believe he'll be able to charge late and follow the path of fellow longtime waiters like Jack Morris and Bert Blyleven in recent decades.

Pettitte's statistics mirror those of CC Sabathia, who went in first ballot last winter. Yes, Sabathia's peak was more impressive, and his strikeouts were impossible to deny. But Pettitte's sturdiness, postseason acumen, and role in baseball history have given him a fighting chance. Before private votes are counted, he's currently tracking at 55.8% this winter. He'll lose a significant chunk from the stingy private voters, but still, he should finish over 40% or close to it; he's gained 20 votes from returning voters, and has earned 70% of the vote from first-time electors. That makes election attainable as his clock ticks.

Of course, there's still the human element. There's still a group of Boston homers at the ballot box, writers who should appreciate Pettitte's dogged pursuit of postseason glory more than most, but don't seem to.

Only two of the six Boston Globe writers voted for Pettitte this time around, somehow the same number who wrote down the scorned and suspended name of Alex Rodriguez. Shaughnessy, who coined the term "Curse of the Bambino" before making a lot of coin off it, turned in the worst ballot of all, writing only Dustin Pedroia's name and nobody else's.

Yankees icon Andy Pettitte not getting respect from Boston voters - including Dan Shaughnessy, who saw enough after Dustin Pedroia!

While he may have seen it as an act of Pedroia Preservation, thinking nobody else would've taken up the diminutive second baseman's case, he was very wrong on that front; Pedroia has already received enough votes to survive for another year. Any other explanation is completely unjustifiable. This is disrespectful to Pettitte, sure, but also ridiculous to borderline cases like Felix Hernández and Andruw Jones. You don't need to vote for them, but they deserve earnest appraisal. Shaughnessy can say whatever he wants in terms of justification. The reality is that there is no way he treated this ballot earnestly. Anyone who comes to the conclusion that Pedroia is the only Hall of Famer listed is lying to themselves, the public, or both.

Pedroia was a great player felled much too soon by injuries, much like David Wright or Nomar Garciaparra. He has a stronger Hall case than the other two, but not by much. He did go 21-for-65 against Andy Pettitte, though. In case that's your sole metric.