On Wednesday, it was revealed that ESPN’s Dan Le Batard had turned his Baseball Hall of Fame vote over to Deadspin to allow the site’s readers to fill out his ballot. He was subsequently stripped of his Hall of Fame vote “for transferring his Hall of Fame ballot to an entity that has not earned voting status.” This was pretty much the expected result for Le Batard.

However, further review reveals that Le Batard wasn’t the first writer to get a little outside help with his ballot. It turns out that BBWAA vice president Jose de Jesus Ortiz of the Houston Chronicle has crowd-sourced his ballot for years, in a very public manner.

In 2007, Ortiz posted on his blog inviting readers to join him at a Mexican restaurant to help him fill out his ballot:

“I hope you come join me and a group of baseball fans to discuss the ballot and fill it out together. Ever since I earned my first ballot, I vowed to always fill it out with the help and guidance of the readers who know as much and sometimes even more about the history of the game. Last year I filled it out with a Texas Supreme Court Judge, several big-time lawyers in town and my father in-law.”

We can only assume that none of the fans, a Texas Supreme Court Judge, some lawyers or his father-in-law had “earned voting status,” so what exactly differentiates what Le Batard did and what the BBWAA’s vice president has done in the past?

It seems that if Le Batard had just polled his followers for “help” filling out his ballot rather than flaunt the privilege, he would have been in the clear.

Obviously the BBWAA didn’t like being shown up in such a public manner, but when its own vice president (who is slated to become president in October) has consistently done something so strikingly similar, the organization has displayed a shade of the self-righteousness that Deadspin and Le Batard set out to prove.

Requests to Ortiz seeking comment were not immediately returned.