Red Sox: Hall of Fame voters want to retract Curt Schilling votes

Former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling has found himself in hot water once again because he cannot shut up. He gave his thoughts following the attempted insurrection in Washington DC back on January 6, continuing to spew his usual vitriol about life via his Parler account. Considering his views and commentary in the past, no one should have been surprised by his beliefs.

Yet somehow, several Hall of Fame voters were shocked that Schilling dared to continue to be himself. Although everyone could have foreseen what he would think, they somehow did not. Now they are reportedly requesting to change their votes, and remove Schilling from their ballots.

Too little, too late to remove former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling from the Hall of Fame ballot

Unfortunately for those writers, their change of heart will not matter. The Baseball Hall of Fame has refused to allow them to recant their votes, as the ballots were due by December 31. Those votes, regardless of the regret of the voters, will remain.

This essentially means that it is now or never for Schilling. He had already felt that he would not be inducted into the Hall of Fame for his political views, given that he is an unapologetic conservative. But his support for the insurrection that left five people, including a Capitol police officer, dead appears to have been the final straw.

Schilling had certainly given the writers plenty of fodder before to leave his name off of the ballot. Between his transphobic memes, bigotry towards Muslims, and calls to lynch journalists, there were plenty of reasons to bypass him on the ballot. After all, if the morality clause is being applied to Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens, it can be applied to Schilling as well.

With 157 known ballots, Schilling finds himself at 74.5% of the vote, just missing the threshold. However, he had already lost two votes overall in this cycle, making his chances of induction slimmer than they would appear. However, those two lost votes may seem minor compared to what he would have been facing had the Hall of Fame allowed voters to recant their previous ballots.

This has to be the year for Curt Schilling to make the Hall of Fame. Otherwise, the former Red Sox star may find that his mouth will cost him dearly when it comes to the ballot.