As I stared at my Hall of Fame ballot last week, just before I sealed the envelope and headed for the post office, I was struck -- and saddened -- by this thought:

The Hall of Fame is broken.

Broken.

Isn't it obvious?

Think about it. A man who won more Cy Youngs than any pitcher who ever lived -- Roger Clemens -- has no shot at being elected on Wednesday. None.

A man who hit more home runs than any hitter who ever stepped into a batter's box -- Barry Bonds -- has as much chance of being elected as Jacque Jones.

A guy who hit 609 home runs (Sammy Sosa) might not even collect enough votes to stay on the ballot. Ditto for a once-proud member of the 3,000-Hit, 500-Homer Club (Rafael Palmeiro).

Greg Maddux is eighth all-time with 355 wins. There's no doubt that he's a Hall of Famer. USA TODAY Sports

Look, I get why that is. We all get it. But even if we understand the reasons the Hall of Fame finds itself in this mess, it's still a sad commentary on the sport these men played -- and on the beautiful museum that was built to celebrate it.

At least we know that, unlike last year, the writers who cast these votes will elect somebody this time around. Phew. Greg Maddux ought to be unanimous (but won't be, for no sane reason). Tom Glavine and Frank Thomas ought to be first-ballot locks.

Craig Biggio's time, after 3,060 hits, should finally come. It's possible that Jack Morris is about to become the third player ever elected in his 15th (and final) year on the ballot -- although I wouldn't bet my '91 World Series DVD on it.

But beyond Maddux, there's no reason to feel confident about the fate of any of those men. Just take one look at the list of luminaries who weren't elected last year. That will tell you all you need to know about how confused voters seem to be these days about what a Hall of Famer is supposed to look like.

I've been a Hall of Fame voter for 25 years now. For most of those years, I looked at that as a privilege, as an exhilarating and enlightening experience, as an opportunity to plunge into an energizing debate about where the greatest players of modern times fit into the fabric of baseball history.

Anybody out there still remember that debate? Yeah, I thought so. Good times.

Yes, once, Hall of Fame time really did involve an actual baseball conversation. Then it became a PED conversation. And now, it's just a flat-out train wreck.

I used to pride myself on my consistency as a voter. I didn't change my mind from year to year, or play favorites, or try to orchestrate who got in when. All I aspired to do was look at the names on the ballot and decide: Was this player a Hall of Famer or not?

And if I decided he was, I was going to vote for him every year -- because he either was or wasn't. Any other philosophy on how to vote felt like game-playing, or agenda-building. And that wasn't for me.

But now, we live in an age where -- in the eyes of Jay Jaffe, one of America's great Hall of Fame historians -- the number of qualified candidates on this ballot has swelled "beyond anything seen in the previous 25 years." Beyond 10 names. Beyond 15 names. To the point where some voters now have 20 players they'd like to vote for.

And how did we get to this point? Because we keep forgetting to elect most of those "qualified candidates" anymore. That's how. Only four electees in the past four years. Just seven in the past six years.

So now, because of the pointless rule that says we can vote for only 10 players, it's no longer possible for someone like me to vote the way I've always voted. Which meant that, from the start, I resigned myself to the fact that, no matter how I filled out this ballot, I was going to boil over in frustration at the look of it and the feel of it.

But I've always believed in being as honest, as open and as transparent about my ballot as I can be. So here's a look at the 10 players I voted for, how I got there and how frustrating a process this became. I don't expect you to agree with all of these choices. All I can pledge is that I spent many painful days and weeks contemplating what turned out to be an impossible challenge.

My ballot

First up, you should know the names of the 10 players I voted for: Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, Frank Thomas, Mike Mussina, Jeff Kent, Craig Biggio, Tim Raines, Jeff Bagwell, Mike Piazza and Jack Morris. Now let's discuss how I settled on those 10.

The process

I knew, from the moment I first eyeballed this ballot, that this was a puzzle with too many pieces, a question with too many answers. I knew because I started this journey with 14 players I'd voted for in the past. Fourteen. And only 10 slots to put them in.

But then came all the first-year players with enough Hall of Fame credentials to merit a long, serious look -- especially Maddux, Glavine, Thomas, Mussina and Kent. So that got me, potentially, to 19 names for 10 spots. Nineteen.

You should know that I don't believe in dismissing any first-year candidate. But as I took my customary long look at players like Luis Gonzalez and Moises Alou, I actually started feeling sorry for them.

Alou had a .516 career slugging percentage and an .875 OPS (amazingly close to Willie McCovey's .515/.889). Gonzalez got 2,591 hits and finished a 19-year career with an .846 OPS (an almost exact match for Reggie Jackson's 2,584/.846). And those two men were going to be lucky to get five votes apiece on a ballot this overcrowded.

So how was I going to find a reason not to vote for as many as nine players who I thought were Hall of Famers? If you have a good answer to that question, let me know.