Now that we have all have had some time to digest the 2018 inductees, and pitchers and catchers start this week, let’s take a look what the future holds for the baseball Hall of Fame. We are going to address some of the questions that everyone is thinking like, will Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds get in? Will Edgar Martinez and Mike Mussina stockpile enough votes to finally get in? And whose name will appear on the ballot and get in on the first attempt? First, I will show how voting has shaken out the last three years according to baseball-reference.com
Here is the 2016 voting. Now as a reminder the requirements are that you need to get over 75% to get in, you have ten years on the ballot and you must have 5% of votes to stay on the ballot the following year. As you look at these graphs you will be able to see trends within the voting, who is catching steam and who is fading. The players in bold are the players who were selected. As you can see Griffey and Piazza were inducted this year.
Here is how the 2017 ballot ended up. As you can see this is where it gets interesting for the baseball purist. Ivan Rodriguez and Jeff Bagwell have had steroid speculation and now are in.
And here is how this year’s ballot came out. In my opinion, everyone who was voted in this year was 100% correct and hopefully, with these players getting in, it will clear up the ballot, so more people can get in. Chipper Jones, Jim Thome, Vlad Guerrero and Trevor Hoffman were all locks to get in ultimately. As mentioned previously it’s a good thing that these players are getting in so hopefully more players will get the nod in.
So, without further ado let’s start predicting.
CLASS OF 2019
Big names still on ballot: Edgar Martinez, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Mike Mussina, Fred McGriff (last year on ballot), Curt Schilling, Omar Visquel, Sammy Sosa, Manny Ramirez, Jeff Kent, Larry Walker, and Gary Sheffield
Newcomers: Mariano Rivera, Andy Pettitte, Todd Helton, Lance Berkman, Roy Holliday and Michael Young
Who gets in: Edgar Martinez and Mariano Rivera
CLASS OF 2020
Big names still on ballot: Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Mike Mussina, Curt Schilling, Omar Vizquel, Andy Pettitte, Manny Ramirez, Jeff Kent, Sammy Sosa, Larry Walker (last year on ballot), Todd Helton and Roy Holliday
New Comers: Derek Jeter, Alfonso Soriano, Jason Giambi, Paul Konerko, Josh Beckett and Eric Chavez
Who gets in: Derek Jeter, Roy Holliday, Mike Mussina
Class of 2021
Big names still on ballot: Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Curt Schilling, Omar Vizquel, Manny Ramirez, Jeff Kent, Sammy Sosa, Todd Helton, Andy Pettitte, Alfonso Soriano, Jason Giambi, Paul Konerko, Josh Beckett and Eric Chavez
New Comers: Barry Zito, Mark Buehrle, Tori Hunter and Nick Swisher
Who gets in: Roger Clemens, Barry Bonds, Curt Schilling
Class of 2022
Big names still on ballot: Andy Pettitte Omar Vizquel, Manny Ramirez, Jeff Kent, Sammy Sosa, Todd Helton, Alfonso Soriano, Jason Giambi, Paul Konerko, Barry Zito, Mark Buehrle, Tori Hunter
New Comers: Alex Rodriguez, Mark Teixeira, David Ortiz, Prince Fielder, Ryan Howard, Carl Crawford, Jimmy Rollins, and Joe Nathan.
Who gets in: David Ortiz, Andy Pettitte
