Cubs legend Ron Santo was put into the Hall of Fame this week, and the Veterans Committee is composed of jackasses for doing it. You heard me.

Ron Santo was totally deserving of a Hall of Fame berth, and he long had the numbers to prove it.* As an ambassador of the game, he had few rivals; his fight with diabetes and cancer was accepted with good humor, and he inspired many to go beyond their disabilities to achieve things. These are not histrionics; people sent him letters every day like this. And indeed, the more you learn about Ron Santo, the more your mind boggles that he (or anyone) could put up with such hardships and endure.

(*It is incredible that people still argue this. They quibble about his road records, and so on, until you mention the names of a couple more recent inductees whose numbers were way below his, and these folks usually say “Oh.” Yeah, people way less qualified than Santo got in on their first attempt.)

But the Cubs fans began to pressure the Hall of Fame to put him in, and they refused. The harder Cubs fans pushed, the more the Hall of Fame said no. To them, it got to be a Bob Uecker-like joke: every batch of nominess inducted included the catchphrase “…but not Ron Santo.” For the first twenty years, it was sorta funny. And he would usually miss by one vote.

At first, Santo was a bit uncomfortable with the attention, and he modestly eschewed talk about the Hall of Fame. But the fans—they talked about it so much that Santo could not avoid thinking about it. And sometimes, one wonders if Ron’s eventual enthusiasm to be in the Hall of Fame was more about rewarding the fans’s wishes than it was about him personally.

Then things took a turn for the worse. It became clear to people that Santo had little time left. His illnesses kept returning and lasting longer. In 2007, he led all other candidates by a large margin, but due to a technicality in the rules, he was denied entry (as was everyone else). In 2008, a change in those rules assured he would get in; once again, denied.

By 2010, it was clear that Ron Santo was not going to see another induction; he even stated that a posthumous induction would be an insult. He died that year, and upon hearing the news, the Czar remarked to a few people “If the Veterans Committee are asses, they’ll overwhelmingly vote him in—but not because Ron deserved it; but because they want to relieve their guilt.”

The joke was old and tired. And sure enough, they voted him in. Only one vote abstained. It so frequently came down to one vote with Santo. And while baseball has enjoyed many great figures in its long history, few were nicer about it than Santo. And the game betrayed him in the end.

So congratulations to Ron Santo for making it in; he can now sign HOF2011 under his name as if that matters. And to the Veterans Committees over the last 21 years who made fun of him for being a nice guy, go bite yourselves.

The Czar of Muscovy

Божію Поспѣшествующею Милостію Мы, Дима Грозный Императоръ и Самодержецъ Всероссiйскiй, цѣсарь Московскiй. The Czar was born in the steppes of Russia in 1267, and was cheated out of total control of all Russia upon the death of Boris Mikhailovich, who replaced Alexander Yaroslav Nevsky in 1263. However, in 1283, our Czar was passed over due to a clerical error and the rule of all Russia went to his second cousin Daniil (Даниил Александрович), whom Czar still resents. As a half-hearted apology, the Czar was awarded control over Muscovy, inconveniently located 5,000 miles away just outside Chicago. He now spends his time seething about this and writing about other stuff that bothers him.