Dick Allen, Ken Boyer, John Donaldson, Steve Garvey, Dave Parker, Vic Harris, Tommy John and Luis Tiant were revealed today by the Hall of Fame as this year’s candidates on the Era Committee ballot. Most commonly known as the “veterans committee,” a panel of 16 people (comprised of former players, executives, sportswriters, and historians) will meet during the Winter Meetings to vote on whether or not any of these eight candidates will be elected to Cooperstown. At least 12 of 16 votes are needed for induction, and the results of the balloting will be revealed on December 8.
The Era Committee rotates between three pools of candidates every year — players from the “Contemporary Baseball” era of 1980 until the present, managers/executives/umpires from this same 1980-present period, and all individuals from the “Classic Baseball” era of pre-1980. This year’s ballot focused on the Classic Baseball era, ranging from well-known MLB stars to somewhat lesser-known names like Harris and Donaldson, who were both icons of the Negro Leagues.
Several of the candidates have appeared on Era Committee ballots in the past, with Allen infamously falling a single vote short of induction in both 2015 and 2021. Harris was also a near-miss on the 2021 ballot, landing 10 of the minimum 12 votes necessary for induction to Cooperstown.
Narrowly missing out on what is already a second-chance ballot adds to the bittersweet nature of the Era Committee. While the process has corrected many oversights from the writers’ ballot, getting to these oversights sometimes decades after the fact means that some of the inductees aren’t able to personally enjoy their day of glory in Cooperstown. Garvey, Parker, and John are the only members of this year’s ballot who are still alive, as Tiant passed away less than a month ago.
The Era Committee ballot is separate from the annual BBWAA ballot for more modern Hall of Fame candidates, and the results of the BBWAA ballot will be revealed on January 21. Ichiro Suzuki is a lock for induction in his first year on that ballot, and C.C. Sabathia and Felix Hernandez are two other first-timers with solid Cooperstown cases.
Dick Allen, Garvey , Parker and Tommy John should be in
Second it.
Especially Garvey with the 10 all star games, any clean player with 10 all stars should be in (he probably won’t get in with the politics he’s in)
TJ changed the game of baseball and has a career that looks like don sutton who’s in
Tommy John didn’t change the game of baseball. Dr. Frank Jobe did. John was the patient. Jobe was the surgeon whose procedures have resurrected the careers of countless players, especially pitchers. It should be Dr. Frank Jobe Surgery, not Tommy John Surgery. I can’t find a single surgical procedure named after a patient except that one.
It’s not a surgical procedure, but have you ever heard of Lou Gehrig disease? It wasn’t named after the doctor who diagnosed it
That’s a disease, not a surgical procedure. Surely you can see the difference. Jobe’s impact on the game of baseball is enormous. If not for him, countless players wouldn’t have been able to continue pursuing baseball as a livelihood.
I went to school with Tommy John’s nephew growing up so maybe I’m biased a bit but he was still very very good and I think deserves to be in.
“Especially Garvey with the 10 all star games”…All Star game is a popularity contest.
Looking just at numbers (in a nut shell) of the 3 position players mentioned….
Allen War 58.7 OPS 912 OPA+ 156
Garvey War 38 OPS 775 OPA+ 117
Parker War 40. OPS 810 OPA+ 121
Allen hands down (plus he did it in 4 fewer years than the others)
I’m a Dodger fan but have never felt strongly about Garvey’s HOF credentials.
Allen was dominant. And he did it in just 1,749 games.
Of the players listed, Ken Boyer has better credentials than either Garvey or Parker. Boyer has a BWAR of 62.8 despite playing considerably fewer games than Garvey and Parker. Unfortunately for Boyer, he died in 1982, and not many people lobby for a guy who’s been dead that long.
Games played
Parker — 2,466
Garvey — 2,332
Boyer — 2,034
Allen — 1,749
NL consecutive games played record holder, light years behind Ripken, but still…
Allen deserved to be in a long time ago but he wasn’t popular with the media who wrongfully vote on who should or shouldn’t be in the Hall.
Allen was unpopular in Philly due to the infamous Frank Thomas incident (not the White Sox HOF-er but the 50s/60s guy). Good old-fashioned racism (which some might call America’s national pastime).
Not Parker, had the same production as Boog Powell in 3,000 more plate appearances. No on womanizer Garvey, too.Allen should have been in long ago.You can’t tell me Jim Rice was better.
Where’s Bobby Grich? What a joke.
You can say the same thing to Lou Whitaker.
Whitaker would qualify for 1980-present ballot. Grich straddles both eras.
I second that
I really agree with you. Bobby Grich is the Greatest Second Baseman in the History of not one, but two MLB Franchises. The Orioles and The Angels. Tremendous player.
Mazeroski is in and Grich and Whitaker are nit? Scam!
Screw Steve Garvey.
totally agree. pay your taxes deadbeat
Let’s not get too personal here
Don’t look at his hof resume as a politician look at it as a player
Neither resume is good enough.
Garvey’s reputation as a great defender is unearned. He had good hands, but the reason that he made so few errors is because he wouldn’t throw the ball when a double play was in order or if a runner was trying to score. Dude couldn’t throw accurately, so he usually held onto the ball. On day in the clubhouse, Don Sutton called him on it, and he and Garvey got into a fist fight. Apparently it started to get out of hand, especially after Sutton told Garvey that Reggie Smith was the real star of the team – which was the truth.
Garvey was selfish and a glory hound. Good hitter, sure, but a first baseman that played in as much games that he did should be way up the list in assists, but he’s not. Garvey played in more games at first base than Keith Hernandez, but Keith is up near the very top all-time in assists because he was a complete defender. Garvey didn’t want to look as bad of a thrower as he was, so he held the ball instead of trying to get more outs recorded for his pitchers. Steve Garvey is totally overrated as a great ballplayer, especially his defense. His Gold Gloves mean nothing…
Garvey!
Garvey had knee to knee range.
Put all the old-timers in, what the hell already. Ichiro should be unanimous, I could make a case for C.C. and I’m stuck on King Felix. I would want to see him get in but I would have a tough time voting for him. Perplexing quandary, I know.
CC should make it, his innings pitched and the 09 World Series is HOF caliber
I’m a mariners fan (big surprise) but Felix is nothing close of HOF with 5-8 good years in a pitchers park and nothing notable in October (September too)
CC has 250 wins and 3000 strikeouts, and his playoff performance helps his case. Felix is a difficult case and Ichiro probably would have been the hit king if he comes over from Japan sooner, he’s a no doubter.
Chub Chub!
Allen, Garvey and Parker would get my votes.
Tommy John is like the pitching version of Julio Franco. Played forever and racked up tons of stats but doesn’t have the accolades for the hall. He’s more famous for a surgery or underwear (not him I know)
Dick Allen should have been in years ago.voters please wake up and do the right thing.
How is Dave Concepcion omitted?
He was Ozzie before Ozzie.
Won Five Gold Gloves (Four in a row) and a better hitter than Ozzie! Dave Concepcion was a NINE Time All-Star and finished with over 2,300 hits! Come on! He needs to be on this ballot!
Concepcion’s omission is one of the great injustices over the years.
Defensively, Mark Belanger was Ozzie before Ozzie. All-star shortstops in the 70s were bad. especially in the National League. Bud Harrelson, Don Kessinger, Larry Bowa, Chris Speier, Bill Russell, and Concepcion all made multiple all-star teams. Not a strong bunch compared to those who came later.
You just listed Six outstanding fielding shortstops who were great for their teams but could not hit like Dave Concepcion could.
OPS .679 and OPS+ 88. Concepcion wasn’t that good of a hitter.
He was a better hitter than those six SS.
How many votes does each panel member hold?
Three. Each panelist can vote for up to three players on the ballot.
Tommy John and Steve Garvey not already being in is a travesty!
Does Tommy John’s bust consist of his elbow / forearm instead of his head?
Donaldson, Harris, and Boyer.
At first I thought it was the Vic Harris from the 70’s. He was terrible. I remember I got about 25 of his 1975 baseball cards. I didn’t know about the good Harris.
I would say, Allen, Parker and Tiant. Garvey is a borderline “no” for me. I rank Keith Hernandez over Garvey and it’s not likely Keith gets in either.
Really disappointing group honestly. No one before 1950, just a bunch of Hall of Very Good candidates, surely not a single one that slipped through the cracks
You must not ever saw Dick Allen swing that 40 oz bat like it was a wiffle ball bat.
It’s total B.S. that Thurman Munson isn’t included in this group. FFS, nobody would take Ted Simmons over Munson. Nobody.
I would. Ted Simmons was a great player.
Munson was better than Fisk and certainly better than Simmons.
Honestly, none of them really stand out as amazing players that should be in the Hall of Fame. They all probably belong in the Hall of Very Good.
oof. Why is Harold Baines in and Dwight Evans not?
Only Garvey deserves it
Dick Allen, Luis Tiant and Tommy John should be voted in. All three dudes are more than worthy, but Dick Allen especially deserves it in my opinion.
Mark McGwire Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa, Roger Clemens and Curt Schilling all belong in the Hall. There are worse dudes than these guys in there already. These guys dominated their era, and it’s time to forgive the steroid era stars. And the so-called “character clause” is a total joke.
Curt Schilling doesn’t belong in that group of steroid users. He’s not in because of his politics.
What Schilling did to Tim and Stacy Wakefield should be enough to keep him out forever. Character matters and that was as low-character as it gets.
For the Love, the last line I wrote addressed Schilling. I never implied he was a roid user.
McGwire, Bonds, Sosa and Clemens cheated their peers and knew that when they were doing it. They can buy a ticket like the rest of us to visit the Hall.
What about Piazza and Big Papi?
Parker 100%
Need i state my position?
I agree that Bobby Grich deserves it. Jim Edmonds and Tim Salmon also. Players who have played the majority of their careers on the West Coast get the shaft in All Star invites and Hall of Fame votes.
Luis Tiant should have been a shoe-in for the HOF.; he was a fantastic pitcher and inspiring person. It’s absolutely shameful they did not vote him in before he passed away. They waited for Santo to pass away before honoring him, and now Tiant faces the same fate. Disgusting.
Tiant actually stated before his death that he did not want to be enshrined after his death if they were unwilling to put him in while he was alive. I respect that so much. All they are doing when they elect someone posthumously is trying to make money off a dead man. Disgusting is not the word I was thinking of, but I think it fits better.
Historically, it’s nearly impossible to get 12 votes, I wouldn’t count on many if any getting in.
Also Dale Murphy deserves it. Compare to Joe Mauer, who is in.
Mauer is a Top 10 catcher. He belongs. So does Thurman Munson, who was a better player than Carlton Fisxk when both were active in the ’70s.
Except Fisk continued to play after the 70s. I know it is clearly not Munson’s fault that he didn’t, but he still didn’t. We cannot assume what Munson would have done had he survived. If we do that we might as well induct Jose Fernandez next. Or Oscar Taveras. Or Lyman Bostock. Or Ken Hubbs. There are lost of players that were lost during their career that COULD have become HOFers had they survived,
I understand, but Munson was a great player during the decade he played. The second-best catcher in baseball after Bench.
Comparing Munsion to those other players you mentioned is, frankly, sick.
It’s not a great comparison because those other players all died much younger. But they were all talented enough to get to the level of second best in the league. It’s tough to find a perfect Munson comparison because not too many died at their peak like he did.
It’s hard to find one because Munson is an all-time great. He was the player who began the Yankees’ return to relevance. Outstanding behind the plate and one of the best clutch hitters I’ve ever seen. Reggie was called Mr. October for the home runs. But if you needed a run-scoring hit with men on base, Munson was the guy. As a Dodger fan, I used to turn off the sound and peek through my fingers when Munson came to bat in the World Series. In those two series, he was 16-50 with 10 RBI. And he had three straight 100-RBI seasons hitting less than 20 HR. Since I lived in the NYC area, I came to respect his greatness. Fantastic player.
Bill Freehan would like a word about that
stathead.com/baseball/versus-finder.cgi?request=1&…
El Kabong, you are 0 for 2. Mauer was a good, not a great catcher. I’m okay with him in the hall, but equivalent players such as Dale Murphy need to be in as well. Murphy was a 2 time MVP. Schilling belongs for his playing, not for his politics. See Ty Cobb.
Garvey was not the best 1st of his era. If you look at the stats Keith Hernandez almost doubles him in WAR and GG, yes Garvey hit more home runs and has more RBI’s, but Hernandez has the better OPS+.
Well you don’t necessarily have to be the absolute best of your position of your era to get in. Roberto Clemente was not the best RF (Hank Aaron) of his era, but I don’t anyone ever said he didn’t deserve to be in the Hall.. Not that I think Hernandez and Garvey are on the same tier as Aaron and Clemente, but just an example.
Garvey was tremendously overrated on defense too. It’s easy to not make errors when you hold onto the ball instead of trying to turn double plays. Garvey’s arm was weak and erratic, so he wouldn’t throw the ball. It hurt his pitchers, but the low error total helped his image. His Gold Gloves weren’t earned…
Garvey could not throw to a base. He couldn’t make the 3-6-3.
Dale Fricken Murphy!
I’ll never forget the jaw-dropping HR I saw Dick Allen hit into the far reaches of the Comiskey Park right- center upper deck, when I was a teenager. It was electrifying! Wow, what a superstar he was for the White Sox. Vote him into the Hall of Fame!
Ichiro is most likely getting in but I don’t think CC or Felix are close to being HOFers. They’re more likely Hall of Very Good players.
Still no Dr. Frank Jobe. After Marvin Miller, no person has had a greater impact on the sport in the last 50 years than Dr. Jobe. Miller is deservedly in. Why not Dr. Jobe?
Finally Dave Parker. He was the best player in baseball for a decent while and not to mention the first million dollar player.
Long overdue WE ARE FAM-A-LEE
Hope Parker gets in. His throws in the ’79 ASG made me fall in love with baseball. Terrific player!
I assume with your user name that you are a Bob Dylan fan?
Allen, John, Tiant. But i doubt all three because it’s unlikely anyone other than Ichiro gets voted in on the other side
After all these years, Willie Davis still hasn’t been on any type of Hall of Fame ballot. Ridiculous.
HOF should be reserved for the all-time greats; not the very good.
It’s difficult to define what an all-time great is. There are different ways to get in. It’s not a statistical formula.
The HOF needs to have inductees every single year because the whole ceremony is just designed to get people to visit a museum and bring money to Cooperstown, NY. That’s all it was EVER designed to do. It is a museum to tell the history of the game of baseball, not a shrine to the gods. The question I always ask when trying to decide if someone should be in the Hall is can you fully tell the story of baseball during the years they played without mentioning them. If the answer is yes, then I don’t think they need to be in the Hall. If no, then they should be in there so future generations can learn about the ENTIRETY of baseball and not just the top 1% of players..
At first I thought they meant Vic Harris the mediocre utility player and was wondering what I was not understanding.
Steve Garvey is not a hall of famer. He accumulated hits and BA at the expense of walks and OBP. Not that Ron Cey is a hall of famer, but in the same era, he was more valuable to the Dodgers than Garvey, and so were Reggie Smith and Jimmy Wynn.
Dick Allen and Luis Tiant No doubt should be in.
For those that would put Tommy John in for changing the game, I’d say his teammmate Andy Messersmith did just as much to change the game.
@Sunday Lasagna,
As a 16-year-old Dodger fan in 1974, I was stunned when Garvey got the MVP. The difference-maker on the team that year was Jimmy Wynn.
Garvey was highly overrated. Numbers aren’t close to HOF worthy.
I’d say that Reggie Smith is an incredibly underrated player, but not enough people remember him to be rated in anyway.. I’m not sure he is a hall of famer, but he was very very good.
Yep. And his defense was totally overrated as well. Good hands, but no arm. That’s why his error total was so low. Can’t make a throwing error if you hold onto the ball instead of trying to turn a double play to help the pitcher. Don Sutton got so mad about Garvey’s unwillingness to throw that he tried to kick his tail in the clubhouse. Sutton straight up told Garvey that Reggie Smith was the real star of the Dodgers. Don was absolutely right about that…
Along with CubbyMike I appreciated that this article had me learn a few new things. Vic Harris as a manager definitely deserves to be in and the stories about John Donaldson will entertain you all for awhile and he quite possibly would have been in the top 10 for pitcher wins all time.
The hall of fame is a mess but certainly fun to talk about.
Lou Whitaker is a hall of famer.
As a Cardinals fan I don’t know why Edmonds isn’t in. He was a stud both offensively and defensively for a while. Rolen got in let Edmonds in.
Edmonds has great all-around numbers. Won 8 Gold Gloves and is a WS champion. How he slipped off the ballot after one round is just ridiculous. Yet Harold Baines got in.
Agree Whitaker and Edmonds should be in there.
All worthy players.
I would vote for Concepcion and Dwight Evans in the future. Compare Evans’ stats with other hall members.
I REALLY hope they don’t put Luis Tiant in ever. His dying request was if they didn’t want to elect him when he was alive, they should NOT put him the Hall after his death. He should have been put in before his death, but since they didn’t they should really respect his wishes.
That being said, Dave Parker is not doing well physically and I really hope they can get him in there while he is still alive to enjoy it. And for his fans to get to see him enjoy it.
Garvey needing all kinds of votes this year.
Allen, Parker, Tiant…
I am not understanding the case for Garvey (and yes I was a BB fan back then….heck I was a BB fan when Dick Allen one RoY in 1964)
Garvey:
38.0 career WAR | 28.7 7yr-peak WAR
Average HOF 1B (out of 25):
64.8 career WAR | 42.0 7yr-peak WAR
He doesn’t come close to measuring up to other 1B
The Hit king should have been in long before he passed. PETE