January 03, 2017
Former Phillies ace and Breitbart News host Curt Schilling thinks he knows why he will again fail to make it to Cooperstown in his fifth year of eligibility for the Baseball Hall of Fame.
He's just not anti-Trump enough to overcome the "character clause" that the hall's voters, most of them journalists, have at their disposal to blackball players with a questionable record off the diamond. Also, life's not fair.
Schilling spoke candidly to TMZ Sports about his take on the snub despite a resume that includes three World Series championships and six All-Star Game appearances. He's stated in the past that being a Republican must be the reason he isn't enshrined.
“If I had said, ‘Lynch Trump,’ I’d be getting in with about 90 percent of the vote this year,” Schilling claimed. He was referencing an ill-advised and deleted November tweet in which he applauded a shirt promoting the lynching of journalists.
Former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling, who is planning to run for Senate in MA, approves of lynching tshirt. https://t.co/EZy1pxAmJk pic.twitter.com/vKifoYBK1S
— southpaw (@nycsouthpaw) November 7, 2016
The incident was just one in a series of moves that landed Schilling at Breitbart News, where his views are not only tolerated but appreciated and shared. The outspoken former pitcher's right-wing persona and meme-laced disdain for liberalism led him down a path that cost him his job at ESPN and sometimes put him in the middle of awkward interviews about largely indefensible actions.
Schilling, 50, has said he hopes to run for the U.S. presidency in 2024. Based on who's voting, he may be more likely to get into the White House than the Baseball Hall of Fame.