Scott Rolen is Elected to the Hall of Fame

This evening, Scott Rolen, one of the greatest defensive third basemen in the history of baseball, was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, New York. The 389 voting members of the Baseball Writers Association of America (BBWAA) elected Rolen to the Hall with 76.3% of the vote in an election that requires 75% or more for induction.

Rolen will join Fred McGriff on stage in Cooperstown this July. The Crime Dog was unanimously elected to the Hall of Fame by the Contemporary Baseball Eras Committee last month.

Rolen, who won 8 Gold Gloves and made 7 All-Star squads during his 17-year career with the Phillies, Cardinals, Blue Jays, and Reds, barely made it to the Hall this year, with just a five-vote surplus above the 292 out of 389 required to make the 75% number. Rolen’s razor-thin margin was the 12th most narrow margin for a player to make it to Cooperstown.

After electing a whopping 22 Hall of Famers from 2014-20, the BBWAA has only elected two players in the last three years. In 2021, nobody got the requisite 75% for a Cooperstown plaque. Last year, only one player (David Ortiz) made it into the Hall.

In the last 50 years of the BBWAA voting, Rolen’s induction represents a new standard for the biggest leap from the player’s first-ballot tally to an eventual 75% and a plaque in Cooperstown. Prior to Rolen’s election, you have to go all the way back to 1964 (Bob Lemon) to find a player who received less than 15% in their first BBWAA vote but climbed all the way to 75% in the years that followed.

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First baseman Todd Helton, who hit .316 (.414 OBP, .539 SLG) in 17 seasons with the Colorado Rockies, fell just eleven votes short of 75%, finishing with 72.2% of the vote, an impressive 20.2% more than the 52.0% he received in 2022. As we’ll see, most players who finish above 70% of the vote make it over the finish line in the year thereafter.

Closer Billy Wagner, who saved 422 games in 16 seasons with the Astros, Phillies, Mets, Red Sox, and Braves, earned 68.1% of the vote, a 17.1% increase over his 2022 tally.

Center fielder Andruw Jones, a 10-time Gold Glove Award winner, also made big gains, finishing at 58.1%. In the history of the BBWAA voting, most players who surpass the 50% mark make it into the Hall of Fame eventually.

Slugger Gary Sheffield can only hope that the 50% rule applies to him. Sheffield, who swatted 509 home runs in 22 MLB seasons, clocked in at 55.0%, his first time over 50%. Unfortunately for Sheff, he is forever linked to Performance Enhancing Drugs (PEDs) thanks to his connection to Barry Bonds and the BALCO scandal. The voters do seem to see a distinction, however, between Sheffield and two all-time great hitters who were actually suspended by Major League Baseball, Alex Rodriguez and Manny Ramirez, who both earned less than 36% of the vote.

In his first time on the ballot, outfielder Carlos Beltran got 46.5%, a disappointing outcome for a superb player. Beltran clearly paid the price for his role in the Houston Astros’ sign-stealing scandal of 2017.

Finally, in his final year of eligibility on the ballot, second baseman Jeff Kent also finished with 46.5%. Kent will next be eligible for the Hall of Fame via the Contemporary Baseball Players Committee, which will meet in December 2024.

16 players (including Omar Vizquel, Andy Pettitte, Jimmy Rollins, Bobby Abreu, Mark Buehrle, Francisco Rodriguez, and Torii Hunter) earned enough votes to return to the ballot in 2024.

Here is the final tally for all players who received at least one vote this year.

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(cover photo: Philadelphia Inquirer)

The players who received less than 5% of the vote will not be eligible for future ballots.

Here is a recap of the vote for each of the players to earn at least 5% of the vote. At the end of the piece, I’ll share a look-ahead to the 2024 and 2025 ballots.

Cooperstown Cred: Scott Rolen (76.3%)

• Phillies (1996-2002), Cardinals (2002-07), Blue Jays (2008-09), Reds (2009-12)
• Career: .281 BA, 316 HR, 1,287 RBI
• Career: 122 OPS+, 70.1 WAR (Wins Above Replacement)
• 7-time All-Star, 8-time Gold Glove Winner, 2002 N.L. Silver Slugger

Scott Rolen’s BBWAA journey did not start well. He got a mere 10.2% in his first year of eligibility (2018) but that ballot was jam-packed. There were several other strong first-time candidates (Chipper Jones, Jim Thome, Vizquel, and Andruw Jones) along with two returnees (Trevor Hoffman and Vladimir Guerrero) who had earned over 70% in the previous year. Edgar Martinez, Mike Mussina, Larry Walker, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Curt Schilling were still on the ballot.

In 2018, it was a basic math problem. Writers are only allowed to vote for ten candidates and candidates like Rolen got squeezed. The BBWAA successfully elected Chipper, Thome, Hoffman, and Guerrero in 2018, clearing the logjam a bit. However, the 2019 ballot had several strong first-timers as well (Mariano Rivera, Roy Halladay, Helton, and Andy Pettitte). Rolen did better (17.2%) but still was many writers’ 11th or 12th choice.

The writers, in their collective wisdom, unclogged that ballot even more in 2019, electing Rivera, Halladay, Edgar Martinez, and Mike Mussina. And, so, with Derek Jeter the only obvious new candidate in 2020, Rolen surged to 35.3%. Jeter was elected, of course, along with Walker. Then, in 2021, there were no especially strong first-time candidates, so Rolen moved up to 52.9%. Finally, a year ago, with Ortiz and Alex Rodriguez the only strong new candidates, there was plenty of space for writers who liked Rolen to flip from “no” to “yes.”

Because of his career WAR of 70.1, Rolen has always been a strong sabermetric candidate, similar to Martinez and Walker (and Tim Raines before them). Of the 36 newly eligible BBWAA members who have joined the rolls of Hall of Fame voters from 2021 to 2023, Rolen has gotten a positive response from 32 of them (89%).

When a player has the kind of voting momentum that Rolen has had for the last few years, there becomes an air of inevitability and that manifested in today’s happy news.

Here is a look at the year-by-year vote with the BBWAA for Rolen:

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Todd Helton (72.2%)

Helton joined the BBWAA ballot party in 2019, a member of that crowded ballot year in which Rivera, Halladay, Martinez, and Mussina made it to Cooperstown. Due to the logjam, he got just 16.5% of the vote. The next year, in 2020, his longtime teammate with the Colorado Rockies (Larry Walker) barely made the Hall of Fame in what was his 10th year of eligibility.

Walker had for a long time languished at the bottom of the ballot due to the skepticism many writers had about his career statistics due to the benefits of hitting at Coors Field. Helton hit the ballot with the same concerns since he spent his entire career in the Mile High City.

However, once Walker secured his plaque in Cooperstown, the Coors effect has clearly not being held against Helton anymore. Helton has improved to 29.2% in 2020, 44.9% in 2021, 52.0% in 2022, and now 72.2% in 2023. Given that he still has five years of eligibility with the BBWAA, it’s a lock that he’ll make it to the Hall of Fame, most likely next year.

Since 1990, 13 out of 14 players who earned 70% or more on the ballot made it to the Hall of Fame the next year. The exception is Schilling, who sabotaged his chances at the Hall with his polarizing Twitter feed and a Facebook post asking to be removed from the 2022 ballot.

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As you can see, recent history bodes well for Helton’s chances at the Hall next year. In case you’re wondering why pitcher Jim Bunning fell from 74.2% to 63.3% from 1988 to 1989, it’s because the ’89 welcomed four top-tier candidates, Carl Yastrzemski, Johnny Bench, Gaylord Perry, and Ferguson Jenkins.

Here is a look at the year-by-year vote progression with the BBWAA for Helton:

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Billy Wagner (68.1%)

Wagner is a popular candidate due to his superb rate stats. For pitchers with a minimum of 900 innings pitched, his 2.31 ERA is the second-lowest in the last 100 years to Rivera. His career WHIP (walks + his per inning) is 0.998 and is the second-best all-time to Hall of Famer Addie Joss. However, he does encounter resistance from many writers (including this one) in that he only pitched 903 innings, which would be the lowest of any pitcher elected to the Hall of Fame.

Like most closers today, Wagner was a one-inning wonder However, the eye-popping rate stats he authored have been matched by three active 9th-inning closers (Craig Kimbrel, Kenley Jansen, and Aroldis Chapman).

Wagner made such a big jump this year with the BBWAA members that it seems likely that he’ll cross the 75% finish line in the next year or two (his final year of eligibility is in 2025).

Here is a look at the year-by-year vote progression with the BBWAA for Wagner:

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Andruw Jones (58.1%)

Jones has a very strong basic Hall of Fame case: 10 Gold Gloves and 434 home runs at a premium defensive position (center field). On the sabermetric side, the defensive metrics that go into WAR anoint him as the greatest defensive center fielder in baseball history. That elevator pitch is clearly resonating with the writers, based on the amazing gains Jones has made since earning less than 8% of the vote in his first two turns on the ballot.

Frankly, I’m surprised Jones is doing so well now considering that his career fell off a cliff in his final five campaigns. The stench of those last five seasons, when he was still relatively young (his age 31-35 seasons), still resonates with a lot of writers (including this one). On the crowded ballots of 2018 and 2019, Jones didn’t even get 10% support (earning 7.3% in ’18 and 7.5% in ’19).

Still, I’d consider Jones’ 58.1% tally this year a disappointment. Jones was sitting at 66.7% on the publicly revealed ballots on Ryan Thibodaux’s Hall of Fame tracker before today’s results were announced.

There’s a decent chance that Jones will make it to Cooperstown via the BBWAA and that possibility is looking increasingly likely. If he falls short, however, given that there are several of his Atlanta Braves teammates already in the Hall (Chipper Jones, Fred McGriff, Tom Glavine, Greg Maddux, John Smoltz), he may have friendly advocates when it’s his turn to hit the Eras Committee ballot if he doesn’t make it with the writers.

Here is a look at the year-by-year vote progression with the BBWAA for Jones:

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Gary Sheffield (55.0%)

Given that he only has one more year on the ballot, there is no chance that Gary Sheffield will get elected to the Hall of Fame by the writers. Sheff admitted using PEDs shortly after he was named in the Mitchell Report but claims he took them unwittingly. Also, A-Rod and Manny were suspended by MLB; Sheffield never was.

Clearly, to many of the writers, that’s a distinction that has elevated him above Alex Rodriguez and Manny Ramirez since Sheffield made big gains with the voters this year, going from 40.6% on the 2022 vote to 55.0% this year.

I’ve always viewed Sheffield’s career as authentic. His body didn’t get massive in his 30s (compared to some other PED users). He was a fantastic hitter, one that other teams feared.

However, considering how poorly Bonds and Clemens did with the Veterans Committee last month (each getting less than 4 out of 16 committee votes), it seems unlikely that Sheffield will be viewed differently by the 2025 committee, but I suppose it’s possible.

Carlos Beltran (46.5%)

Carlos Beltran has the fourth most home runs (435) and fourth most RBI (1,587) among all center fielders. He stole 312 bases with a success rate (of 86.4%) which is the best in baseball history for players with at least 200 steals. He also has the fourth most HR and third most RBI for any switch-hitter in MLB history.

Additionally, he was a 9-time All-Star and one of the greatest postseason performers the game has ever seen.

To this writer, Beltran is an obvious Hall of Famer, and, based on his first-year vote tally, he’s probably going to make it into Cooperstown via the BBWAA eventually. A first-year total of 46.5% usually portends a future path to 75%.

What’s unknown is what percentage of writers have decided to give Beltran a “one-year penalty” for his role in the Astros sign-stealing scandal and how many of those writers will take a hard line against him. My guess is that there will be more “one-year penalty” writers than “lifetime ban” writers.

Jeff Kent (46.5%)

Given that he was a historically great hitter for a second baseman, I was always baffled by why Kent struggled in the BBWAA balloting. In his early years on the ballot, he was definitely squeezed by the packed ballots. However, in recent years, other players (Rolen, Helton, Wagner, Jones) made significant gains with the voters while Kent’s support remained static.

Perhaps dozens of writers just woke up this December and said to themselves, “wow, where has the time gone, how have we already reached Kent’s final year of eligibility?”

Kent’s final-year vote surge is one of the highest in the last 40 years of the BBWAA voting. As you can see in the chart below, Kent’s double-digit increase in his final year of eligibility bodes well for a future plaque in Cooperstown.

With the exception of the late Maury Wills, every player in the last 40 years who has had a final-year increase of 10% or more has made it into the Hall of Fame (although it did take Gil Hodges nearly 40 years to make it).

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I expect that Kent will be elected by the Eras Committee in December 2025. These 16-person committees tend to vote for players with big, juicy numbers. Kent’s 377 home runs (the most all-time for a second baseman) will likely get him the nod that that committee, putting him into the Hall of Fame in the summer of 2026.

Alex Rodriguez (35.7%) and Manny Ramirez (33.2%)

A-Rod and Manny are the two candidates on the current ballot who were actually suspended from Major League Baseball for using PEDs. As a result, they are in voting quicksand. While eight different players converted 10 or more writers from “no” to “yes” from 2022 to 2023 (according to Thibodaux’s tracker), Rodriguez and Ramirez received similar vote totals to what they got in 2022.

A-Rod was clearly a much better player than Ramirez was, which explains why his vote tally is slightly higher. Still, it’s clear that the writers have put them in the same PED-loser bucket.

Last month, the Eras Committee thoroughly rejected two of the greatest players of all time (Bonds and Clemens). Each superstar received fewer than 4 out of 16 committee votes in a process that required at least 12 votes for a plaque in Cooperstown. McGriff went 16 for 16 while Bonds and Clemens did so poorly that the Hall did not even release their exact vote tallies.

The point here is that there is an obviously institutional position at the Hall of Fame (and with the living Hall of Famers) that PED users are not welcome in Cooperstown. A-Rod and Manny aren’t going to get in either via the BBWAA or the Eras Committee anytime soon. Perhaps decades later there will be a re-evaluation but, for now, they’re all out.

The Other Seven Remaining Candidates

There are five other candidates coming back to the 2024 BBWAA ballot who earned between 5% and 20% this year.

Omar Vizquel (19.5%): in his third year on the ballot (in 2020), Vizquel got 52.6% of the vote, representing a gain of nearly 10% from the previous year. It seemed inevitable that Vizquel was destined for a plaque in Cooperstown. However, in the last couple of years, Vizquel has been tarnished by two scandals (domestic battery and sexual harassment). As a result, his voting support has plummeted.

Unless there is a satisfactory exoneration of Vizquel in the two cases, it’s unlikely he’ll make it into the Hall in his final four years of eligibility. In this writer’s opinion, Vizquel didn’t deserve a Hall of Fame plaque anyway.

Andy Pettitte (17.0%): Pettitte was a prolific postseason pitcher and his 256 career wins are unlikely to be surpassed by many (or any) active pitchers but he needed to take advantage of this weak ballot and make a much bigger gain this year than he did.

Pettitte admitted to once using human growth hormone, so he has the PED taint. Additionally, his career record is easy to diminish because he always pitched for top-tier teams. He’s not going to make the Hall via the BBWAA. There’s a chance that the Eras Committee will smile more favorably, with Rivera, Jeter, and Joe Torre being possible future committee members.

Jimmy Rollins (12.9%): Rollins has a weak career WAR (47.6) and OPS+ (95), which makes it unlikely that he’ll ever break through with the writers. I do consider him, however, a strong future Eras Committee candidate because he’s a popular player who was a cornerstone of a team that won five consecutive N.L. East titles. Additionally, he was unusually durable for a shortstop.

I’ll surprise some people by saying that Rollins has a better than 50% chance of making the Hall eventually.

Bobby Abreu (15.4%): Abreu combined power, speed, and durability. He played in 150 or more games in 13 consecutive seasons, The only other player to ever do it was Willie Mays. Abreu was also prolific at drawing walks, leading to a high career on-base percentage (.395).

Given that he had a 60.2 career WAR, he’ll stick around on the BBWAA ballot for his full 10 years of eligibility. But his odds at a plaque in the Hall are pretty dim.

Mark Buehrle (10.8%): on the 2021 ballot in which no Hall of Famers were elected, Buehrle got a surprising 11.0% of the vote. The presence of Ortiz, A-Rod, Rollins, and a few other newcomers in 2022 took away nearly half of that support. Buehrle never felt like a Hall of Famer. It’s possible that his career will look better a decade or two from now when 200-winners become extinct.

His case is better than you might think. But it may be harder for him to survive the 2024 ballot when Beltre, Mauer, and Utley join the party.

Francisco Rodriguez (10.8%): K-Rod will return to the 2024 ballot thanks to having the 4th most saves (437) in baseball history. It’s clear, however, that the writers have (accurately) concluded that he’s not in Billy Wagner’s league.

Rodriguez was brilliant in his tenure with the Angels (2002-08) and set the all-time single-season saves record (with 62 in ’08) but he was not an elite reliever in the years since then.

Torii Hunter (6.9%): Hunter barely re-qualified for the 2023 ballot, clearing the 5% bar by just two votes in 2022. He’ll return for a fourth try in 2024 but, as we’ll see, the ballot is getting a bit more crowded.

Hunter has some nice basics for an elevator pitch (353 HR, 2,452 Hits, 9 Gold Gloves) so it wouldn’t shock me if a future Eras Committee smiled upon his candidacy.

Coming Attractions to the BBWAA Ballot

After a weak first-ballot class in 2023, the 2024 and 2025 ballots are full of players who are either obvious Hall of Famers or strong candidates.

The 2024 ballot will feature first-time candidates Adrian Beltre, Joe Mauer, Chase Utley, David Wright, Bartolo Colon, Matt Holliday, Adrian Gonzalez, Jose Reyes, Victor Martinez, and Jose Bautista. From this group, Beltre is a lock, while Mauer and Utley are very strong candidates. Wright is a long shot but does have a case reminiscent of the late Kirby Puckett as a top player whose career was cut short due to injury.

I can’t see any universe in which Colon, Holliday, Gonzalez, Reyes, V-Mart, or Joe Bats make it to the Hall but they were all really good players.

The only players who will drop off the ballot from this year to next are Scott Rolen and Jeff Kent (who was in his 10th and final year for 2023).

And so, after a light ballot this year, the 2024 edition will be a bit more crowded. Some writers (including this one who doesn’t have a real vote) will be struggling to pare our lists down to 10 names. Given the seeming hopelessness of Alex Rodriguez or Manny Ramirez ever making the Hall of Fame (because of their PED suspensions), I’ll likely be dropping them from my 2024 virtual ballot to make room for some of the newcomers.

Recent Ballot Strength by WAR

I have never been in favor of voting for Hall of Fame candidates by WAR. However, as a metric that attempts to place an overall career value for all players, it’s a useful tool here to showcase the overall quality of talent on each ballot.

Generally speaking, most players with a career WAR of 70 or above are in the Hall of Fame (or aren’t due to scandal or the fact that they aren’t eligible yet). Excluding the ineligible or scandal-plagued players, the only players not in the Hall with a career WAR of 70 or greater are early baseball stars Jim McCormick and Bill Dahlen, along with Lou Whitaker, Bobby Grich, and Carlos Beltran.

That’s it. Every other eligible player who isn’t tainted by scandal.

Again, generally speaking, players with a career WAR of 60 or better are often strong Hall of Fame candidates, although there are many who never got more than a nibble from the BBWAA. As for players between 50 and 59.9, there are dozens of non-Hall of Famers but there are also plenty who have plaques in Cooperstown.

Anyway, take a look at the number of quality candidates (ranked by WAR) for each of the ballots from 2012 to 2024.

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As you can see, there was a huge increase in high-quality players to join the 2013 ballot: Bonds, Clemens, Sammy Sosa, Schilling, Mike Piazza, Craig Biggio, Kenny Lofton, and David Wells all were on the ballot for the first time, all with a career WAR of 50 or greater.

With so many PED-linked players joining the BBWAA party, the writers couldn’t come to a consensus on any player to get 75% or more, resulting in a shutout. Although there were no Hall of Famers elected in 2013, ten players on that ballot have been elected in the years since, including four who were elected by the Eras Committee.

Based on the number of 50, 60, 70, 0r 80 WAR players, you can see that the 2024 ballot will have more star power than this year’s edition.

Looking Ahead to 2025 and Beyond

Another first-ballot lock will join the ballot in 2025: Ichiro Suzuki. Because of his 3,089 career hits, 10 Gold Gloves, and 10 All-Star nods, Ichiro is widely considered a shoo-in. It’s interesting, however, that his career WAR is 60.0, which is less than Bobby Abreu’s.

Joining Ichiro as first-time candidates in 2025 are CC Sabathia (who is a likely Hall of Famer although probably not on the first try), Dustin Pedroia, Ian Kinsler, Felix Hernandez, Curtis Granderson, Troy Tulowitzki, Ben Zobrist, Hanley Ramirez, Russell Martin, and Brian McCann.

Gary Sheffield will not be on that ballot (having exhausted his 10 years of eligibility in 2024) and it will be Billy Wagner’s last chance with the BBWAA if he doesn’t make it next year.

Given how close Todd Helton came to induction this year, one would assume that he’ll make it in 2024.

The first-time candidate pool for 2026 is exceptionally weak: the strongest potential candidates are Ryan Braun and Cole Hamels, although Hamels is trying to make a comeback in 2023, which would delay his Cooperstown clock for several years.

In 2027, the top new candidates will be Buster Posey and Jon Lester, with Albert Pujols and Yadier Molina becoming eligible in 2028.

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