Could Ichiro Suzuki change into the second player ever to be unanimously elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum? Will Billy Wagner get back the five votes he missed last yr to be eligible in his final election yr? Will CC Sabathia make it to Cooperstown on his first try?
Ahead of the Hall of Fame voting results being announced on January twenty first, all three scenarios are on the table.
Voting is conducted by the nearly 400 voting members of the Baseball Writers Association of America; All 151 ballots were recorded by Ryan Thibodaux Baseball Hall of Fame Tracker Starting Tuesday afternoon, get the box next to Suzuki's name checked.
So far, only famed Yankee closer Mariano Rivera has been unanimously elected to the Hall of Fame – not Babe Ruth, not Hank Aaron, not Ken Griffey Jr. or Derek Jeter, just Rivera. Could Suzuki be second?
Thibodaux said he doesn't expect a solution until the outcomes are official.
“We haven’t seen him take part in a vote yet, and I suspect we won’t see a single one until the results are announced,” Thibodaux said in a direct message on Bluesky earlier this week. “If someone let him down, we probably won’t find out until later, if ever.”
Jeter was excluded from one ballot in 2020 and Griffey was excluded from three in 2016.
Voters aren’t required to post their ballots, however the Hall of Fame allows voters to ascertain a box on the ballot after the vote is announced to release their selection. Last yr, a complete of 385 ballots were returned, with 306 voters selecting to make their ballot public. Neither the voter who passed Jeter in 2020 nor the three who left Griffey off their ballots in 2016 have been announced.
Suzuki isn't the one candidate leaning toward adoption. Sabathia is at 140, or 92.7 percent, which bodes well for the first-year prospect.
“I admit I'm a little surprised by the strength of CC's support so far. “I had my eye on him as a candidate in the 75 percent bubble, but he has been doing well so far, sitting comfortably in the low 90s for most of the election season,” Thibodaux wrote. “As long as late public and private voters don’t view Sabathia’s qualifications completely differently, it looks like he will be inducted into the Hall of Fame on the first ballot.”
FanGraphs' Jay Jaffe, creator of “The Cooperstown Casebook,” said he was surprised by Sabathia's performance in his first yr on the ballot.
“I thought he was going to be someone who would get involved like (Joe) Mauer did last year,” said Jaffe, who developed the Jaffe War Score System (JAWS) that Hall of Fame voters often seek advice from, to help candidates in placing historical perspective. “I don’t expect it to stay at 92 percent or even 90 percent, but I think something over 80 percent is very likely.”
Wagner is on the ballot for the tenth and final time. After narrowly missing the 75 percent mark a yr ago, he’s steadily trending towards induction. As of Tuesday afternoon, he was at 84.1 percent on public ballots.
It's not only the numbers that talk for Wagner; The trends are also behind him. After narrowly missing out, he was added to eight ballots last yr where he was not represented, and of the 141 public votes solid, nobody who checked his name last yr voted for him this yr. Another eight first-time voters also voted for Wagner.
“There are more first-time voters out there and he must maintain solid support from that group,” Thibodaux wrote. “There are also probably several dozen voters who dropped out of the electorate this year. If he has extremely strong support among them, then there may still be a lot of work to do to get him over the finish line.”
Carlos Beltrán had 79.5 percent of the vote as of Tuesday afternoon and Andruw Jones was just under the brink with 74.2 percent. Thibodaux said those that posted their ballots before the announcement received a median of seven.55 votes per ballot last yr. Voters who waited until after the announcement received a median of 6.77 votes per ballot, and personal ballots averaged 5.8 names. Thibodaux, who began tracking voting in 2012, said these trends have remained consistent over time.
The current voting results aren’t encouraging for Beltrán or Jones by way of their 2025 hopes, but they’re positive for eventual inclusion. Next yr's first-year eligible class doesn’t feature any players with a profession bWAR of 60 or more, akin to Suzuki (60) and Sabathia (62.3). The top first-year players in next yr's voting are Cole Hamels (59 bWAR) and Ryan Braun (47.1 bWAR).
Jaffe said Sabathia's strong support bodes well for the long run of not only Sabathia, but additionally Andy Pettitte, Félix Hernández, Mark Buehrle and Hamels.
“Andy Pettitte and Félix Hernández are almost complete opposites in terms of how they got to this point. Pettitte has a very workmanlike career and a tremendous amount of postseason work that was very important in helping teams reach and win the World Series. said Jaffe. “Félix had a very high peak and lack of longevity, early burnout and no postseason experience.”
Pettitte, who was collaborating within the election for the seventh time, had 31.8 percent as of Tuesday afternoon. Last yr Pettitte received 52 (13.5 percent) votes and this yr he’s already on 48 ballots, a major increase. Hernández, who took part within the election for the primary time, received 25.2 percent of the votes solid on Tuesday afternoon.
While the main focus when voting is all the time on the 75 percent threshold required to enter the electorate, one other marker to think about is the 5 percent required to stay on the ballot.
Of the 14 names that appeared on the ballot for the primary time, seven had not yet received a public vote as of Tuesday morning. Of the remaining seven eligible first-year players, only Suzuki, Sabathia, Hernández and Dustin Pedroia (12.6 percent) received the essential five percent to stay on the ballot.
That means 10 players are vulnerable to falling off the draft list, including two catchers in Russell Martin (4.6 percent) and Brian McCann (4 percent), who can be off the draft list after just their first yr. Torii Hunter (1.3 percent), who’s on the ballot for the fifth time, and Francisco Rodríguez (7.9 percent), who’s on the ballot for the third time, also face the opportunity of not receiving 5 percent. Mark Buehrle has 19 votes on his fifth ballot Tuesday morning, which will likely be enough to maintain him on the ballot for one more yr so long as not more than 380 ballots are returned. One more vote for Buehrle between Tuesday afternoon and next week's announcement would guarantee the longtime Chicago White Sox starter a spot on next yr's ballot.
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