Twenty in the first year, five a year after that
The BAMSBL Hall of Fame opened in 1999 with twenty-one inductees at once -- Pat Carroll, Chuck Caruso, Jeff Creamer, Jeff Fanfelle, Bob Frederick, Phil Federico, Rob Goldstein, Pete Gonzales, Marc Kasky, Mike Knittel of the Monarchs, Kurt Knopf, Mike Lyon of the Twins, Jared Martin, Craig McKee-Parks of the Oaks, Tony Michael of the Indians, Bob Rice of the Seals, Steve Schefsky, B.J. Strickland, Reggie Vance of the Monarchs, Chris Willshire and Terry Whitfield.
It has inducted steadily ever since, more than seventy in total, each recorded with his club and his year: Dean Asimos of the Orioles in 2002, Ray Allen of the Giants in 2003, Paul Bachtold of the Red Sox in 2011, Danny Lebron of the '91 Red Sox and David Nemec of the '88 Braves and PCL Oaks in 2022, and Carlos Colom of the Cubs in 2026.
The rules for it are published: five years in the league minimum, nomination in writing by another player, manager or officer with a full explanation, no self-nomination, the board paring the list down, and a three-quarters yes vote to induct -- capped at twenty in the first year and five a year thereafter.
A Hall of Fame on a High Cheese league page is a set of pages, one per inductee, attached to the clubs and seasons they played -- so a name and a year becomes a career anyone can read.
San Francisco MSBL in detail
- Don't go soft. Play hardball. Four divisions, 450 players, and two men who have never missed a season since 1988.
- Sixteen games on weekends from April, across four divisions and four sub-regions.
- Standings and a stats login sit together in the navigation.
- Results feed standings and a written history; neither is public.
- Twenty-six clubs, many of them named in the Hall of Fame decades after they folded.
- A stats login, and a written history full of numbers the league clearly keeps.
- A contact page, a board and a president with real authority behind them.
- Tryouts in February, a compulsory workout, and pitchers and catchers must show it at the position.
- Facilities are the league's first stated promise; no ground is named.
- A Fairness Doctrine at the front, and four separate rules against clubs gaming the draft.
- Announcements on the front page, with an archive of retired ones.
- No gallery is published.
- A sponsors section sits in the top-level navigation.
- Semi-finals and a championship series, plus tournament teams in Phoenix, Las Vegas, Palm Springs and Florida.
- A written history of every championship since 1988, told as stories rather than a list.
- Ages, season length, tryouts and the pitching rule are all answered; the fee is not.
- Rules and regulations, bylaws filed with the State of California, and a league content archive.
- Tryouts February to March, sixteen games from April, and a World Series in the fall.
- Nothing is for sale; uniforms are governed by numbered rule.
- The best officials the league can provide, and a numbered rule against abusing them.
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