Will Manny Ramirez Ever Be Manny in Cooperstown?

Of all of the candidates on the 2023 BBWAA Hall of Fame ballot, there are none more mercurial or enigmatic than Manny Ramirez, the supremely talented right-handed hitter who hit .312 with 555 home runs in 19 Major League Baseball seasons. Ramirez was a superb hitter, one whose statistical resume is undoubtedly worthy of a plaque in Cooperstown. However, as a player who was often ensnared in controversy, it was perhaps inevitable that his Hall of Fame case would be controversial as well, thanks to two suspensions due to positive tests for Performance Enhancing Drugs (PEDs) late in his career.

When it comes to the Hall of Fame voting among sluggers with PED ties, the Dominican-born Ramirez has occupied a tier all to his own, one that is below all-time greats Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens but above fellow Dominican Sammy Sosa. One year ago, Bonds, Clemens, and Sosa were on the BBWAA for the 10th and final time each. Bonds got 66.0% of the vote, Clemens 65.2%, and Sosa 18.5%.

Ramirez, in his own middle tier between Bonds/Clemens and Sosa, received 24% of the vote in 2017, 22% in 2018, 23% in 2019, 28% in 2020, 28% again in 2021, 29% in 2022, and 33% last month.

In this piece, I’ll take a brief look at Ramirez’s long and productive career and why the controversy that swirled around him was often simply described as “Manny Being Manny.” I’ll then attempt to place Manny’s offensive prowess into a historical perspective and discuss whether a two-time loser to Major League Baseball’s drug-testing policy deserves to have a plaque in Cooperstown.

Cooperstown Cred: Manny Ramirez (OF)

8th Year on the BBWAA Ballot in 2024 (received 33.2% of the vote in 2023)

• Indians (1993-2000), Red Sox (2001-08), Dodgers (2008-10), White Sox (2010), Rays (2011)
• Career: 555 HR, 1,831 RBI, 2,574 Hits, .312 BA, .411 OBP, .585 SLG
• Career: 154 OPS+, 69.3 WAR (Wins Above Replacement)
• 12-time All-Star
• 9-time Silver Slugger
• Career postseason: .285 BA, .394 OBP, .544 SLG, 29 HR, 78 RBI
• 29 HR are the most in postseason baseball history
• 21 career regular-season grand slams (3rd most in history: A-Rod, Gehrig)
• 2004 World Series MVP: .412 BA, .500 OBP, .588 SLG, 4 RBI
• Finished in the Top 6 of MVP voting 7 times

(cover photo: espn.com)

This article was originally posted in 2018 and has been updated in advance of the 2024 vote.

Manny Ramirez: Before the Majors

Manuel Aristides Ramirez was born on May 30, 1972, in Santo Domingo, the capital city of the Dominican Republic. The Ramirez family (including Manny’s three older sisters and grandmother) moved to New York City when Manny was 13. Manny, his father Manuel, mother Onelcida, sisters, and grandmother lived on the sixth floor of an apartment building in the Washington Heights section of upper Manhattan. The neighborhood in which the Ramirez family lived was populated with many drug dealers and had frequent murders.

Manny was known and respected as a hitting savant long before he made the majors. In high school, on a team with 24 other Dominicans, Manny was a legend, known for both his batting skills and grueling workouts, in which he would run up a steep hill near George Washington High School with an automobile tire roped around his waist. Ramirez hit .650 with 14 home runs in 22 games as a senior while being named the New York City Player of the Year. Manny was Manny even in high school, skipping team photos and occasionally blowing off Major League Baseball scouts but he was essentially a good kid. He worked hard and “never drank anything stronger than the nonalcoholic Puerto Rican eggnog from the corner bodega he chugged to bulk up.”

Still, Ramirez prioritized baseball over his studies and had not yet graduated high school at the age of 19 when he was selected with the 13th overall draft pick by the Cleveland Indians in 1991.

1993 & 1994: Major League Debut and Rookie Year

Manny Ramirez moved up quickly through the Indians’ minor league system. He hit. 326 with a 1.105 OPS at Class A Burlington (North Carolina) in 1991. After an injury-shortened hiccup in 1992, Ramirez was Baseball America’s 1993 minor league player of the year with his stops in AA (Canton-Akron) and AAA (Charlotte). In 129 games between the two top tiers of the team’s minor league organization, Manny hit .333 with 31 HR, 44 doubles, 115 RBI, 105 runs scored, a .417 on-base percentage, and a .613 slugging percentage.

After going 0 for 4 in his Major League Baseball debut on September 2 in Minnesota, Ramirez returned home to New York. Manny’s high school was just a couple of miles north of Yankee Stadium, across the Harlem River. With many family members and friends in the stands, Ramirez hit a ground-rule double in his first at bat for his first MLB hit. Manny’s double also represents the first documented evidence of “Manny Being Manny” in the majors; Ramirez jogged around the bases, believing he had hit a home run.

Ramirez didn’t have to wait long before he could get a re-do on the home run trot. After flying out in the 4th inning, Manny hit a 2-run home run off Melido Perez in the 6th and a solo shot off Paul Gibson in the 8th.

(If you watched the two clips and were wondering who were the other voices on the telecasts with Yankees’ legendary Hall of Famer Phil Rizzuto, Bobby Murcer was on the call with Tom Seaver for the double with the Hall of Fame pitcher joining Rizzuto on the home run call).

Ultimately, Manny’s spectacular debut in the Bronx would not be sustained for the rest of 1993; he hit just .133 in his final 47 plate appearances.

Despite the slow start in MLB in September 1993, Ramirez made the Indians out of spring training in 1994 and was the team’s Opening Day right fielder. Before the players’ strike canceled the final 49 games of the season, Ramirez impressed with a .521 slugging percentage, thanks to 17 HR and 22 doubles in 336 plate appearances. He finished 2nd in the A.L. Rookie of the Year voting to Bob Hamelin of the Kansas City Royals.

1995: All-Star and World Series Participant

After the strike wiped out the first 18 games of the 1995 regular season, the Cleveland Indians showed that they were the team to beat in the American League. The Tribe, under manager Mike Hargrove, were 33-11 in mid-June and 46-21 at the All-Star break, with a 12-game lead in the A.L. Central. The 23-year-old Manny Ramirez was a first-time All-Star on an Indians’ team filled with them. Center fielder Kenny Lofton, second baseman Carlos Baerga and left fielder Albert Belle were all voted in as starters for the Mid-Summer Classic, with Ramirez joining veteran starter Dennis Martinez as reserves.

The ’95 Indians also had future Hall of Famers Jim Thome and Eddie Murray in the lineup, with the 1988 N.L. Cy Young Award winner (Orel Hershiser), anchoring the rotation with Martinez. The Indians won 100 games out of 144 in the regular season, winning the Central by a whopping 30 games over the Royals. For the season, his official sophomore campaign, Manny had a slash line of .308 BA/.402 OBP/.558 SLG to go with 31 HR and 107 RBI. The slash line was good enough for what we now can record as a 147 OPS+. The league’s coaches and managers at the time noticed Manny’s prodigious bat by awarding him the Silver Slugger while the writers gave him a 12th-place finish in the MVP vote.

Ramirez had many big moments in the ’95 campaign but perhaps the biggest came on July 16th. In a game against the Oakland A’s, the Indians were down 4-3 with two outs and a runner on 2nd base, with future Hall of Famer Dennis Eckersley on the hill. Ramirez took Eckersley’s 2-2 offering and deposited it deep into the left-field bleachers to walk off the win. It was Manny’s 4th home run of the series (a 4-game sweep for the Tribe) and his second walk-off tater in a span of four weeks.

The historic regular season put the Indians into the postseason for the first time since 1954. The Tribe matched up against the Boston Red Sox in the newly expanded playoffs. Despite Ramirez going 0 for 12, the Indians swept the Red Sox in the A.L. Division Series. In the ALCS (against the Seattle Mariners), the Indians coasted to a 4-2 series victory, with Manny being the hitting star in the Tribe’s Game 2 triumph. In that game, Ramirez went 4 for 4 with two solo HR to pace the Indians to a 5-2 win.

In the World Series, against the Atlanta Braves and their three future Hall of Fame starters (Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, and John Smoltz), the Indians fell in 6 games; Ramirez hit .222 with one HR and two RBI.

1996-2000: Cleveland’s Consistent Slugger

For the next five seasons, Manny Ramirez was one of the most consistent sluggers in the American League. From 1996-2000, only Edgar Martinez (160) had a higher OPS+ than Manny’s 158 among A.L. batters with at least 1,000 plate appearances. Only Rafael Palmeiro (642) and Belle (636) drove in more runs than Manny’s 632.

These are the numbers, year by year, for Cleveland’s slugging right fielder, with the reduced plate appearances in 2000 as a result of a hamstring injury that cost him 39 games.

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Ramirez and the Indians were in the post-season for all of his years in Cleveland except for 2000. The Tribe returned to the World Series in 1997 but fell in 7 games to the Florida Marlins; Manny hit .154 with 2 HR and 6 RBI in his second appearance in the Fall Classic.

Highlighted among Ramirez’s years with Cleveland were the 1998 and ’99 seasons. Manny finished 6th in the MVP voting in 1998 and 3rd in ’99, when he drove in 165 runs, the best in the majors and the most in all of baseball since Jimmie Foxx drove in 175 in 1938. In a late September game in ’99, Manny hit a 3-run tater (his 43rd to record RBI 162-64) to give him the all-time Indians single-season RBI mark (passing Hal Trosky’s 162 in 1936). He followed it up the next day with home run #44 and RBI #165.

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Unfortunately for the Tribe, Manny’s bat went silent in the ALDS, where he went 1 for 23 with just 1 RBI in a 5-game series loss to Boston.

In 2000, Manny’s “walk year,” he delivered 38 HR and 122 RBI (with a league-leading 1.154 OPS) despite missing 39 games in the first half of the season due to a hamstring injury. Even in the shortened season, Ramirez finished 6th in the MVP voting.

Manny was a free agent after the 2000 campaign and sold his services to the highest bidder. The Boston Red Sox inked the 28-year-old slugger to an 8-year, $160 million contract, making him the second-highest-paid player in baseball behind Alex Rodriguez, who had just signed with Texas for a whopping $252 million.

2001-08: Manny Ramirez in Boston

In his first two seasons with the Boston Red Sox, Manny Ramirez was used more as a designated hitter than in the field. When he was used defensively, Manny was employed mostly in left field after having spent his entire career in right. The reasons for this are obvious. Although he was known for a strong arm, nobody ever confused Ramirez with a Gold Glover in right field for Cleveland. In Boston, right field is massive, requiring a premium defensive player.

Ramirez was a 3-time All-Star with Cleveland. In Boston, he was on the squad for 8 years in a row. Manny won 3 Silver Slugger Awards in Cleveland; he earned 6 more in Boston. Additionally, after 3 top-10 finishes in the MVP vote with the Indians, Ramirez earned 5 more with the Red Sox, finishing 3rd in 2004 and 4th in 2005.

Take a look at Manny’s numbers with the BoSox on a year-by-year basis:

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Ramirez got off to a superb start in a Boston uniform. In his first 40 games (exclusively as a DH), Manny hit .412 with a 1.258 OPS, 14 HR, and 50 RBI. Although he “slumped” to a final BA of .306 (with 41 HR and 125 RBI), he still led the team in all three categories plus OBP and SLG.

In 2002, Manny missed a month due to a broken left index finger on a slide at home plate but still managed 33 HR and 107 RBI in 120 games; he led the American League with a .349 BA and .450 OBP. He finished 9th in the MVP voting in both 2001 and ’02.

The Red Sox mostly used Manny in left field (not as a designated hitter) in 2003 but it wasn’t because he had made a magical transformation into a defensive wizard. It was simply because the team had a new primary DH, David Ortiz. The left-handed-hitting slugger, like Ramirez, was born in the Dominican Republic. Unlike Ramirez, Ortiz took years to find his hitting stride in the majors. He was released by the Minnesota Twins after the 2002 season, available for any team to acquire. Ortiz was signed in January 2003 to a one-year, $1.25 million contract.

Initially, as the Boston Globe reported, Ortiz was slated to most likely “be involved in a mix ‘n match in which he will share time at first and DH with the newly acquired Jeremy Giambi and Shea Hillenbrand.” Of course, as history would have it, Ortiz and Ramirez wound up forming one of the most formidable one-two punches in all of baseball with Ortiz becoming a postseason legend.

 

Manny Ramirez and the Postseason with Boston

The 2003 arrival of Ortiz in Boston, joining a lineup with Ramirez, Nomar Garciaparra, Troy Nixon, and batting champion Bill Mueller, helped the Red Sox score an MLB-leading 961 runs with a top-to-bottom lineup that posted a 118 OPS+. In that strong lineup, Manny led the way with a 160 OPS+ and 37 taters; he finished 6th in the MVP vote. With future Hall of Famer Pedro Martinez anchoring the rotation, the Red Sox made the postseason party for the first time in Manny’s time with the Red Sox.

Initially, Ramirez struggled in his first playoff opportunity with Boston (the ALDS against the Oakland A’s); he hit just .188 with no RBI in the first four games. In Game 5, however, Manny was the hitting star. In the top of the 6th inning, with the score tied at 1, Ramirez hit a 3-run bomb to left field off Barry Zito to give Boston a 4-1 lead, a lead they would not relinquish. Although the Red Sox would fall to the New York Yankees in the ALCS in 7 games, Manny hit .310 with 2 HR and 4 RBI in the series.

Ramirez led the A.L. in home runs (with 43) and slugging percentage (.613) in 2004; he and Ortiz finished 3rd and 4th in the MVP vote while Curt Schilling joined the rotation to help lead the Red Sox back to the postseason. Manny set the pace for the Red Sox with a 3-run homer in Game 1 of the ALDS against the Anaheim Angels, a series that Boston would eventually sweep. In the ALCS, again against the Yankees, Manny hit .300 but with no RBI while Ortiz became a nationally known name with his two walk-off hits in Games 4 and 5. The Sox famously came back from down 3 games to none to win the pennant.

In the World Series, against the St. Louis Cardinals, Ramirez captured MVP honors by slashing .412/.500/.588 with a home run and 4 RBI. Manny’s best game was in Game 3, in which he hit a first-inning home run and also showed that he could throw the rock. In the bottom of the first, with one out and the bases loaded, Jim Edmonds hit a fly ball to left field; Ramirez gunned down Larry Walker at the plate to end the inning. The assist helped Manny atone for two errors he made in Game 1.

For the franchise and its players, the 2004 postseason exorcized their postseason demons with their first World Championship since Babe Ruth was on the team in 1918.

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The Red Sox returned to the playoffs in 2005 but were swept in the ALDS by the Chicago White Sox, despite two solo HR by Ramirez in the final contest. In 2006, Manny missed 22 games late in the season due to patellar tendinitis; Boston did not make the postseason.

The 2007 Postseason

Manny Ramirez had a down year in the 2007 regular season, in which he hit just 20 HR and 88 RBI in 133 games, missing time with an oblique strain. It was the first time since 1997 that Manny had failed to eclipse both the 30 HR and 100 RBI marks. That didn’t stop the Red Sox from winning the A.L. East, thanks to Ortiz’s best season to date and the 20 wins from newly acquired starting pitcher Josh Beckett.

The 2007 Red Sox romped to another World Championship, with Ramirez slashing .348/.508/.652 in 14 games to go with 4 HR and 16 RBI. For Manny, the signature moment was in Game 2 of the ALDS (against the Angels) when he hit a towering walk-off 3-run bomb over the Green Monster. In the Sox’ 7-game ALCS win against the Cleveland Indians, Manny drove in 10 runs against his former team. Against the Colorado Rockies in the World Series, Ramirez went 3 for 4 with 3 runs scored and 2 RBI in the Sox’ 13-1 Game 1 romp. Boston swept the Rockies in 4 Games.

Trade to Los Angeles

As I’ll detail shortly, during Manny Ramirez’s years in Boston, “Manny Being Manny” became the go-to phrase whenever Manny did something odd, which was often. In 2008, Manny was Manny one too many times, precipitating a trade to the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The season started well for Ramirez. He drove in 4 runs in the team’s first game of the season, in Tokyo against the Oakland A’s. At the end of April, he was hitting .343 with 6 HR and 20 RBI. On May 31st, Manny became the 24th player in baseball history to hit 500 home runs.

As Bill Nowlin notes in his SABR bio about Ramirez, June was rough for Manny. Early in the month, he got into a fight in the dugout with teammate Kevin Youkilis. Then, later in the month, he shoved 64-year-old traveling secretary Jack McCormick to the ground during an argument about complimentary tickets. In July, there were reports that Ramirez wasn’t giving 100% of his efforts despite an 18-game stretch in which he hit .426 with 4 HR and 15 RBI.

At the trading deadline, Ramirez was dealt to Los Angeles in a 3-team trade that brought Jason Bay to the Red Sox.

2008-10: Los Angeles Dodgers

After spending 4 1/2 years with Terry Francona in Boston, Manny Ramirez joined a Dodgers team led by future Hall of Fame manager Joe Torre. Ramirez was an instant hit with the Dodgers, going on an offensive tear. In just 53 games in “Mannywood,” Ramirez hit .396 with 17 HR and 53 RBI. His OPS+ was 221 in his first couple of months in Dodger Blue. Despite playing in only those 53 games, Manny finished 4th in the N.L. MVP voting.

Ramirez got his postseason career with the Dodgers off to a great start with home runs in the first two games of the NLDS (against the Chicago Cubs); all told he hit .500 with a 1.743 OPS in the Dodgers’ 3-game sweep. Los Angeles fell to the Philadelphia Phillies in 5 games in the NLCS but it wasn’t because of Manny’s bat. He slashed .533/.682/1.067 with 2 HR and 7 RBI in those 5 games.

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In 2009, a season in which he turned 37 years old, Manny Ramirez continued to hit with authority, albeit not at the level with which he finished 2008. Ramirez slashed .290/.418/.531 (155 OPS+) with 19 HR and 63 RBI in 104 games. The reason for the low total of games played was that Manny tested positive for a banned substance and was suspended for 50 games from May 7th through July 2nd. The Dodgers lost again to the Phillies in the NLCS. In what would be his final postseason, Manny hit .281 with 1 HR and 4 RBI in 8 games between the LDS and LCS.

Although his power dipped (8 HR), Ramirez got off to a solid start in 2010, slashing .322/.412/.525 in his first 59 games. At the beginning of July, Manny landed on the disabled list with a strained right hamstring. After two games in July, Manny was back on the DL with a right calf strain. He would not return until late August, upon which time it was time for Manny to be Manny. Upset at being benched for a game in Colorado, Ramirez got himself ejected after one pitch in a pinch-hitting appearance.

The Dodgers, out of contention as of late August, decided to put Ramirez on waivers, with the purpose being the saving of $3.8 million on the balance of his contract.

2010-15: Manny Goes Around the World

After being placed on waivers by the Dodgers, Manny Ramirez was selected by the Chicago White Sox. The Chisox entered the month of September just 4 games behind the Minnesota Twins in the A.L. Central and were hoping Man-Ram would go on the same kind of new team tear as he had in Los Angeles. It was not to be. After winning 5 games in a row to start the month, the team lost 12 out of 14 games to drop out of contention. Manny played in 24 September games for the Chisox (exclusively as a DH or pinch-hitter), slashing .261/.420/.319 with just one HR (his last in the majors) and 2 RBI.

The White Sox did not re-sign Ramirez but, in January 2011 the Tampa Bay Rays decided to take a chance on the mercurial 38-year-old slugger. After playing in just 5 April games for the Rays (going 1 for 17), Major League Baseball announced that Ramirez had tested positive for a PED during spring training. Ramirez opted to retire rather than serve the 100-game suspension that his second drug offense mandated.

Of course, Manny wouldn’t be Manny without a couple of attempted comebacks. He made a deal with MLB to be allowed to return to the league in 2012 if he served a 50-game suspension to start the season. In late February, he signed with the Oakland A’s, appearing in that team’s uniform during spring training. After serving his suspension, Ramirez played in 17 games for the AAA Sacramento River Cats, hitting .302 with 14 RBI. He never appeared in any regular-season games with the A’s and was released on June 15th.

During the 2012-13 offseason, Ramirez played for Aguilas Cibaenas in the Dominican Winter League, hitting .293 with 4 HR and 17 RBI in 25 games. When no MLB teams came calling for the 2013 campaign, Manny went to the Far East, playing for the EDA Rhinos in Taiwan in the Chinese Professional Baseball League. Manny was a huge hit in Taiwan, boosting attendance; he hit .352 with 8 HR and 43 RBI in 49 games. Feeling homesick, Manny decided not to return to the Rhinos for the second half of the season.

Instead, the 41-year-old Manny was signed in July 2013 by the Texas Rangers. However, after hitting just .259 with a lowly .698 OPS in 30 games for the AAA Round Rock Express, Ramirez was released again.

In late May 2014, shortly before his 42nd birthday, Ramirez signed with the Chicago Cubs. Again, he never made it back to the majors; in 24 games with the AAA Iowa Cubs, he hit just .222 with a .648 OPS. Manny finished his baseball playing career by spending one more winter in the Dominican League; he went out in style, hitting .313 with a .920 OPS, 6 HR, and 28 RBI in 41 games.

Below is a colorful collage of the eight uniforms Manny Ramirez wore since being let go by the Dodgers late in the 2010 campaign.

Manny Being Manny

If you Google the phrase “Manny being Manny” you’ll find many articles dedicated to the subject. The “urban dictionary” defines the phrase as “any behavior associated with baseball player Manny Ramirez acting foolishly.” In an espn.com article published in 2008, Mike Hume reported that the phrase “Manny being Manny” had appeared in print 1,621 times, according to a Lexis Nexis search. During his career, sometimes “Manny being Manny” was used to describe actions that were deemed to be unfriendly to his teammates and fans, more often just to something air-headed.

As I noted earlier, Manny rounded the bases as if he hit a home run on his first MLB hit (a ground-rule double at Yankee Stadium). Today we look upon that fondly as “Manny being Manny.” Hume’s article attributes the first use of the phrase to a quote from Indians manager Mike Hargrove in Newsday, referring to an incident in which he had left his paycheck in a pair of boots in the visitor’s team clubhouse. Regarding Manny’s reputation for “his singular obsession with baseball and his aloofness regarding anything else,” Hargrove just said, “That’s Manny being Manny.” The article went on to describe other invocations of “Manny being Manny” as Manny being mysterious, malignant, or masterful.

A Bleacher Report piece from August 2010 chronicled its’ top 10 “Manny being Manny” moments. Some of these can be described as air-headed, some mysterious, and many malignant.

1. The aforementioned incident of leaving his paycheck in his boots.
2. During a pitching change, Manny went through the door of the Green Monster to make a phone call.
3. Not during a pitching change, Manny disappeared behind the Monster to relieve himself.
4. “Manny has an Ouchie”: Manny would occasionally take himself out of games due to “sore calves.”
5. “Manny being Womanly”: when he failed his first PED test, it was because of his use of a woman’s fertility hormone, which is a masking agent for steroids.
6. The previously mentioned incident of throwing the Red Sox traveling secretary to the ground in June 2008.
7. Ramirez once missed a series against the Yankees due to a sore throat but had been spotted partying with the Yankees’ Enrique Wilson.
8. Manny once asked to use the song Good Times by Styles P for his “walk-up song.” This particular song is about getting high and includes profanity.
9. In his final at bat with the Red Sox, he took three consecutive pitches in the middle of the strike zone without removing the bat from his shoulder.
10. As detailed earlier, in his last at bat with the Dodgers, he got himself tossed out of the game after one strike went by.

My favorite “Manny being Manny” moment regards a mental lapse on the field. Watch him prematurely cut off this throw from Johnny Damon, leading to an inside-the-park home run by David Newhan.

The way in which “Manny being Manny” refers to him being “masterful” was his ability, once in the batters’ box, to forget about everything else. Ramirez was a brilliant hitter, one capable of hitting any pitch on any count to any part of the ballpark.

The Hall of Fame case for and against Manny Ramirez

Let’s quickly dispatch with the case against Manny Ramirez for the Hall of Fame. It’s very simple. He failed two tests for PEDs. Period. End of story. Rafael Palmeiro spent virtually his entire career playing in the testing-free regime of baseball prior to 2005 but failed a test at the age of 40 in his final season. Palmeiro never played again and, despite 3,020 hits, 569 HR, and 1,835 RBI, he was drummed off the Hall of Fame ballot after a 4.4% vote tally in his 4th year of eligibility.

Of the biggest names ensnared or suspected of using PEDs, Palmeiro was treated most harshly by the BBWAA writers because he actually failed a test. Ramirez didn’t simply fail a test at the end of his career; he also served a 50-game suspension for testing positive in his 3rd to final season (2009).

How does one explain why one-time loser Palmeiro never received more than 12.6% of the vote while two-time loser Ramirez has not gotten less than 22%? The answer is fairly simple and detailed at great length in this piece about Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens. Since Palmeiro’s expulsion from the ballot, the writers of the BBWAA have elected three players widely suspected (but never tangibly tied) to PED use: Mike Piazza, Ivan Rodriguez, and Jeff Bagwell. Ever since many writers have been more forgiving of the PED-linked stars of the game.

There are a growing number of writers who classify their voting philosophy as “performance only” and they no longer penalize players for their PED use, either alleged or proven. If you judge Manny Ramirez only by his performance, of course, he belongs in the Hall of Fame.

Where does Manny Ramirez rank among the game’s great hitters?

I’m stating as an inarguable fact that Ramirez has a record that is obviously worthy of Cooperstown. For those focused on sabermetrics, his career WAR of 69.3 is above the midpoint of previously enshrined Hall of Fame left fielders. His WAR is “only” 8th among all left fielders in baseball history because of brutal defensive metrics that deflate his overall value. However, using offensive WAR only, Ramirez ranks 5th among all left fielders, behind only Barry Bonds, Ted Williams, Rickey Henderson, and Pete Rose.

Generally, there are two ways that a player builds a statistical case for the Hall of Fame: either with a brilliant peak or with longevity. One of the simplest and crudest ways to identify the game’s best hitters is to simply look at where they rank in various statistical categories and compare them to their rank in career plate appearances. Rather than get caught up in ratios that may be difficult to put into context, just look at the raw numbers. If a player is ranked way higher in a category, for instance, than in total plate appearances, that’s a simple way to identify that the player not only accumulated a high total but also did it at an impressive rate.

Ramirez logged 9,774 plate appearances in his career, the 102nd most in baseball history.

Manny Ramirez’s career statistical ranks:

• Plate Appearances: 9,774 (102nd)
• Home Runs: 555 (15th)
• RBI: 1,831 (20th)
• Runs: 1,544 (60th)
• Doubles: 547 (34th)
• Walks: 1,329 (41st)

Among the 289 players with 8,000 or more PA:

• Batting Average: .312 (41st)
• On-base %: .411 (19th)
• Slugging %: .585 (6th)
• OPS: .996 (7th)
• OPS+: 154 (15th)

What makes Ramirez special as a hitter is reflected in the numbers above, most notably his OPS+. Ramirez had the ability to get on base at a high level and to hit for enormous extra-base power, reflected in his high OBP, SLG, and OPS. The reason that his career OPS+ rank is lower than his raw OPS is simply because of the reality that he performed in a more favorable hitting environment than some of his predecessors.

Regardless, the list of names ahead of Ramirez in career OPS+ is a who’s who of the greatest hitters in baseball history: Ruth, Williams, Bonds, Gehrig, Hornsby, Mantle, Cobb, Foxx, Musial, Speaker, Thomas, Mays, Ott, and Aaron. Among players to debut in the last 50 years and who logged at least 8,000 PA, only Barry Bonds and Frank Thomas have an OPS+ higher than Manny’s 154.

In terms of raw batting productivity (as measured by “WAR runs batting,” the hitting-only component of WAR), Ramirez’s 651.5 “runs from batting” ranks as the 18th best in baseball history, behind the previously mentioned names, plus Frank Robinson, Albert Pujols, and 19th-century star Dan Brouthers.

Conclusion

It’s my opinion that, in spite of his two failed drug tests, Manny Ramirez deserves a spot in the Hall of Fame. I don’t believe in zero tolerance and now I no longer believe in situational tolerance, even in today’s system when “cheaters” are identified by positive drug tests. The sport of baseball now has penalties for the use of Performance Enhancing Drugs. Ramirez lost 50 games during his age 37 season, 50 games in which he was unable to add to his Hall of Fame resume. His career was cut short before his 39th birthday because of the 100-game suspension for his second failed test.

With the penalties baseball has in place for using PEDs, the player loses playing time, hurting his statistical record. Once the player has completed their suspension, they are welcomed back into the game with no conditions other than that the next failed test comes with harsher consequences.

Different writers or Hall of Fame enthusiasts have different reasons why they evolve on the PED issue regarding who should or should not be in Cooperstown. A couple of years ago, veteran writer Barry Bloom of Forbes noted in his ballot explanation that the Chicago White Sox’ signing of catcher Yasmani Grandal to a $73 million contract was a tipping point for him. Forbes noted that Grandal’s 50-game suspension in 2012 for using testosterone was clearly a non-issue when he came onto the open market.

“It’s long been my feeling that most Major League Baseball’s owners have their own agendas when it comes to signing players who were caught using performance-enhancing drugs. And a man I respect, White Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf, just proved it again.

But the Grandal signing was a turning point for me regarding my annual Baseball Writers’ Association of America ballot. While I’ve always voted for Bonds and Clemens, I’ve had reservations about selecting a player who failed a drug test. No longer.

We are deep into the voting of culprits besmirched by the steroid era and it’s not going to get any better… Looking at this particular ballot, eight of the 31 players on it admitted to or were suspected of using PEDS; that’s a whopping 26%.”

— Barry Bloom (Forbes, Dec. 4, 2019)

I’ve always thought it to be likely that Ramirez used PEDs prior to his first suspension in 2009. However, what I’ve recently learned is that extensive research has been done that claims that PEDs have a nominal impact on a player’s ability to hit and hit home runs. Whether you believe that or not, what I also know is that Ramirez had a fierce work ethic, in particular with respect to his conditioning, going back to his high school days. Under the baggy uniform that he preferred to wear was a well-sculpted athlete.

The Hall of Fame is for players of significant accomplishments; Manny has those. My belief is that those accomplishments are a representation of genuine authentic ability. It’s for his on-field deeds that I’m in favor of a Cooperstown plaque for Manny Ramirez.

Having said that, it’s pretty clear that Ramirez will not become a Hall of Famer for a long time. He has no chance of making it via the BBWAA since he has never even cleared 33% in a vote that requires 75% for election. Additionally, the failure of Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Rafael Palmeiro to even get 25% of the vote on last December’s Eras Committee vote makes it crystal clear that PED users are not welcome in Cooperstown.

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