Abstract
Todd, Jewell R., Robert W. Brown, and Scott E. Miles. Measuring Discrimination in Major League Baseball: Evidence from the Baseball Hall of Fame. Applied Economics, Volume 34, Number 2 (January 2002): 167-178.
Each year members of the Baseball Writer’s Association of America (BBWAA) vote on the most significant performance-related award in Major League Baseball, induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. This study looks at the effects of race on player induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame, concentrating on player’s first ballot. The data for this study consists of 290 hitters who were eligible for election into the Hall of Fame over the years 1962-1998. The sample includes 200 hitters who received votes and 90 hitters who appeared on the ballot but did not receive votes. The results show that race does in fact not seem to affect whether a player receives enough votes to get into the Hall of Fame on his first ballot.
Extended Abstract
Each year members of the Baseball Writer’s Association of America (BBWAA) vote on the most significant performance-related award in Major League Baseball, induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. This study looks at the effects of race on player induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame, concentrating on player’s first ballot. The data for this study consists of 290 hitters who were eligible for election into the Hall of Fame over the years 1962-1998. The sample includes 200 hitters who received votes and 90 hitters who appeared on the ballot but did not receive votes.
The models utilized are:
EVALij = STATSjαi + RACEjβi
VOTEij = 1 if EVALij >= HOFi
VOTEij = 0 if EVALij < HOFi
ln ( Pj/1-Pj) = STATSjαi + RACEjβi + εi
*Total number of votes in annual elections are from the Hall of Fame’s web page ( Each eligible player’s name and number of votes received are from the Total Baseball web page, an online version of the official encyclopedia of MLB ( Players that were placed on ballots but did not receive votes were found in various issues of the Dallas Morning News, The New York times, USA Today, and The Boston Globe. Player statistics are collected from the Total Baseball web page.
EVALij is a voter’s evaluation of any player
STATSj are a player’s career statistics
SEASONS seasons played
HOMERS home runs
RBIS runs batted in
BATTING batting average
STEALS stolen bases
WORLD World Series championship appearances
RACEj is the race of a player
BLACK variable equals one if player’s skin tone perceived to be black
LATIN equal to one if player born in Latin America
BLACK*LATIN equal to one if player black and bon in Latin America
i represents voters
j represents players
αi and βi are influenced by voter preferences
VOTEij is a binary response (yes or no) for each voter
Pj is the observed dependent variable for each players which is the percentage of votes
received out of total votes
N is the total number of votes cast
εi is the random error term
BOTH a dummy variable for players who spent at least 10% of their career in both
Leagues
FIRST, SECOND, THIRD, SHORT, CATCHER dummy variables included for primary
fielding position
TREND used as a linear time trend, equals zero if player’s first vote was in 1962, equals
one if player’s first vote was in 1963, and so forth
YEAR dummy variable measuring the first year the player was on the ballot
The positive coefficient on BLACK means that black players receive more votes than non-black players. LATIN is significant and negative, suggesting that players from Latin America are discriminated against. The negative coefficient on TREND indicates that players on the ballot in later years receive fewer votes. The coefficients on the performance statistics are positive as expected.
The authors conclude that race does in fact not seem to affect whether a player receives enough votes to get into the Hall of Fame on his first ballot. Another finding in this study is that model specification has a large influence on the measured effect of race on voting outcomes.