For Dawson, vote provides a ray of hope for next year

Andre Dawson must have had a spectacular 2007 season.

That's all I can figure.

At the age of 53, and not having played a game since 1996, Dawson somehow improved so much last year that his Hall of Fame vote total jumped from 56 percent a year ago to 65.9 percent when results were announced Tuesday.

"Yeah, I guess I did,'' Dawson chuckled Tuesday night, over the notion that he had a banner season. "I don't know what happened, but I've learned to kind of be surprised by how this works.''

After falling 100 votes shy in 2007, Dawson was only 50 votes away from making the Cooperstown cut Tuesday, and though no one expected him to scale the wall this year, that significant jump has Dawson tiptoeing the edge of history in 2009.

He finally has turned the corner in this painful process, and it's only a matter of time now before he makes the leap to immortality.

"It's important, but it's not life and death,'' Dawson said. "I have to take that attitude because I've seen what it does to guys who wait so long that it just kills them.''

While the vote total was good news, the bad news is Jim Rice missed by 16 votes (72.2 percent), trailing only Goose Gossage, who was elected with 85 percent after receiving 71 percent the year before.

It means Rice goes in next year on his final ballot try, when Rickey Henderson will undoubtedly reach in his first. Had Rice made it, Dawson's chances would have been excellent in 2009, probably a slam-dunk.

Now, it gets a little tricky.

Logic would suggest that Dawson will jump another 10 percent and finally get that plaque next year, but as any longtime observer (and member of the electorate) can tell you, logic doesn't always play a role.

Consider that in 2007, Rice, Dawson and Bert Blyleven all lost percentage points because first-timers Cal Ripken and Tony Gwynn both drew very high vote totals, and it tends to cost others at the ballot box when two newcomers score big.

"I won't get ahead of myself, not after I went backwards last year,'' Dawson said. "Now at 65 (percent), that's probably kind of a turning point, but you still have to wait and see.''

In the last 24 years, only twice have the writers voted in more than two players.

It occurred in 1999 when Nolan Ryan, George Brett and Robin Yount all were elected on the first ballot.

In 1991 -- and here's the encouraging one -- Rod Carew was a first-ballot choice with 90 percent, Gaylord Perry jumped from 72 to 77, and Fergie Jenkins went from 66 to 75.

If those numbers sound familiar it's because Henderson should be close to 90, Rice is at 72 and Dawson's at 65.9.

If it doesn't happen, we turn an eye toward 2010 and first-time eligibles Roberto Alomar, Barry Larkin and Fred McGriff.

Not one is a lock, and of course it's too early to tell, but Alomar and Larkin were the best players at their positions in their leagues for at least a decade, which previously was a common voting standard.

Their defense and postseason performances also will give them some traction, but at this moment only Alomar seems like he'd have a shot at a first-ballot election.

All things being equal -- and we know they're not -- Henderson and Rice would be voted in next year, Dawson would get very close, and if he doesn't make it the Hawk would head for Cooperstown in 2010.

So the cruel wait for one of baseball's all-time greats continues, but the light at the end of the tunnel got much brighter and bigger Tuesday.

In the last 40 years, only four players received as much as Dawson's 65.9 percent of the vote and weren't elected shortly thereafter.

All four were at or near the end of their writer's ballot eligibility, and all were subsequently voted in by the veterans committee, including Nellie Fox, who missed by only 2 votes in his last chance with the writers in 1985.

That doesn't include Rice, who gets in next year, and Dawson, who should get in next year or the year after.

And Dawson has eight years left on the ballot.

"There's a lot of guys who had to wait a long time, guys who deserved it,'' he said. "You just hate to see it because you want guys to be able to enjoy it for as long as they can and not lose all those years of their life waiting.''

You could argue that's exactly what has happened to Dawson, but he won't say it, and he won't be reduced to a loud campaign along the lines of Gossage or Gary Carter.

"It's up to the people voting to do their homework and decide,'' Dawson said. "I won't politic for it. That's never been my style.''

As painful as this has been at times for Dawson, he also realizes that any hard feelings he has possessed in the past will be dismissed the minute he gets the call.

"Gossage said he felt a rumble go through his body. I can believe that,'' Dawson said. "Everyone's different, but I'm sure the euphoria is unbelievable.

"I don't know what that day would be like if it happened.''

With a little bit of luck, in 12 months Andre Dawson will find out.