Facilities of Consideration: Carlos Beltán and Andruw Jones Elected to the Corridor of Fame

The next article is a part of Jay Jaffe’s ongoing have a look at the candidates on the BBWAA 2026 Corridor of Fame poll. For an in depth introduction to this yr’s poll, and different candidates within the collection, use the instrument above; an introduction to JAWS may be discovered right here. For a tentative schedule, see right here. All WAR figures seek advice from the Baseball Reference model except in any other case indicated.

On the subject of heart fielders and the Corridor of Fame, BBWAA voters have been a very choosy lot. It’s all too simple to say, “This man was no Ty Cobb,” or “This man was no Willie Mays.” Who can reside as much as requirements like that? Till Tuesday, simply 9 heart fielders had been elected by the writers, fewer than some other place, however when Josh Rawitch introduced the outcomes of the 2026 balloting, two extra joined them: fourth-year candidate Carlos Beltrán and ninth-year candidate Andruw Jones.

Beltrán, a five-tool participant with 2,725 profession hits, 312 stolen bases and the no. 9 rating amongst heart fielders in JAWS, acquired 84.2% of the vote, up from 70.3% final yr. He needed to overcome some preliminary resistance to his candidacy owing to his involvement in the Astros’ unlawful sign-stealing scandal on the finish of his profession whereas serving to the Astros win the 2017 World Sequence. Commissioner Rob Manfred’s 2020 report positioned him on the heart of Houston’s scheme, and it value him his job as Mets skipper earlier than he might handle a single sport. Regardless of his transgression, he acquired 46.5% of the vote in his 2023 poll debut, and adopted with three straight years of double-digit features.

Jones, who hit 434 homers, gained 10 Gold Gloves because the defensive centerpiece of the Braves’ playoff dynasty, and ranks eleventh amongst heart fielders in JAWS (and first in fielding runs), acquired 78.4% of the vote, up from 66.2% final yr. Roughly talking, it’s a coin toss as as to if candidates inside 10 factors of the magic 75% make up the gap in a single yr or two, and in his case, the coin got here up heads. Which isn’t to say it was all easy crusing. Jones was superb in his 20s, however his profession fell aside in his 30s. He performed his final sport within the majors at age 35 in 2012, with an arrest for battery towards his then-wife, and his subsequent responsible plea to a lesser disorderly conduct cost, contributing to his disappearance from the majors and giving some voters pause.

Setting that apart — and understandably, not each voter was prepared to take action — Jones completed his profession with simply 1,933 hits. Till Tuesday, the writers hadn’t elected anybody with fewer than 2,000 hits since 1975, when Ralph Kiner (1,451 hits in a profession delayed by World Warfare II) obtained the nod. The writers had bypassed each candidate from the post-1960 period with fewer than 2,000 hits, although Period Committees have not too long ago elected Dick Allen, Gil Hodges, and Tony Oliva. Moreover, Jones debuted on an particularly crowded poll in 2018, one from which 11 gamers have since been elected, 9 by the writers; he acquired simply 7.3% of the vote that yr, so in crossing the 75% threshold, he set a document. Extra on that matter beneath.

That is the primary time since 2009 that two gamers on the identical main place (in addition to pitchers) have been elected by the writers in the identical yr. That yr, first-time candidate Rickey Henderson and Fifteenth-year candidate Jim Rice have been each elected. In additional methods than one, they don’t make ’em like that anymore.

Right here’s a have a look at the writers’ historical past of electing heart fielders:

Cobb headed the unique 1936 class, outdoing even Babe Ruth (95.1%) however — audible sigh — his being left off 4 ballots helped to create the “custom” of non-unanimity that stood till Mariano Rivera ran the desk in 2019. For as ridiculous because it was that Mays was left off of 23 ballots (don’t get me began), his share was the best since these of Cobb, Ruth, and Honus Wagner (95.1%) in 1936.

What follows listed below are a number of fast take-home factors from the electoral outcomes. I’ll have a candidate-by-candidate breakdown in my subsequent installment.

Big Leaps… Towards Cooperstown?

Chase Utley was the one different candidate to cross the 50% threshold, reaching 59.1% in simply his third yr on the poll, strongly suggesting he’s obtained a future in Cooperstown. And as voters debated how you can deal with beginning pitchers in an age of decreased workloads and more and more distant milestones, Andy Pettitte (48.5% in his eighth yr of eligibility) and Félix Hernández (46.1% in his second) each surged as properly. Their shares counsel they’ll finally be elected, whether or not by the writers or an Period Committee to be named later.

What’s extra, all three of these candidates landed on the leaderboard for the biggest year-to-year jumps in voting share because the writers returned to annual balloting in 1967, with Hernández barely setting a document:

That trio pushed a pair of back-to-back jumps by Scott Rolen out of the highest 20. He went from 17.2% in 2019 to 35.3% in ’20 (a achieve of 18.1%), after which to 52.9% in ’21 (a achieve of 17.6%) — greater than tripling his help in that span and turning him from an extended shot into a probable honoree.

With Beltrán, Jones, and Utley the one candidates to succeed in 50%, this was the primary time so few did so since 2000, when second-year candidate Carlton Fisk, ninth-year candidate Tony Perez, and sixth-year candidate Jim Rice have been the one ones to take action, with Fisk and Perez each elected.

Greatest Comebacks, Re-Re-Revisited

Whereas he was a part of the well-known triumvirate of celebrity heart fielders from New York Metropolis baseball groups within the Fifties together with Mickey Mantle and Mays, Duke Snider didn’t get the respect he deserved upon touchdown on the BBWAA poll in 1970, 4 years forward of the previous and 7 forward of the latter. He acquired simply 17% of the vote, and as famous above, it took him till 1980, his eleventh yr on the poll (of what was then a 15-year eligibility window) to surpass 75%. Till 2023, that stood as the most important comeback of any BBWAA-elected candidate, however with Jones’ election, candidates have surpassed Snider’s low mark in every of the previous 4 years. Once more, Jones now has the document for the most important comeback:

Seven of these eight lowest first-year percentages are from the previous 16 years, throughout the timespan that I’ve been masking Corridor of Fame elections. Overcrowded ballots induced a few of these candidates to slide by the cracks the primary time round, however instruments like JAWS and Ryan Thibodaux’s Tracker have helped cue voters that it’s price taking one other look… or 9.

This Time, the First Time Isn’t the Attraction

As The Athletic’s Jayson Stark identified final week, within the final 12 cycles earlier than this one (2014–25), BBWAA voters elected 18 first-year candidates, probably the most of any 12-year span in Corridor historical past. The one cycles inside that span that lacked one got here in 2021, when the writers didn’t elect anyone, and ’23, when Rolen, a sixth-year candidate, was the one honoree.

Now we’ve a 3rd such occasion inside a six-year span. Often when this occurs, it’s a single holdover breaking by, however this time it’s a pair. Previous to Tuesday, the final time a number of holdovers have been elected with out a first-year candidate becoming a member of them was in 2011, when second-year candidate Roberto Alomar and 14th-year candidate Bert Blyleven made it. Within the final 40 years, the one different instances that’s occurred have been in 1987 (third-year candidate Catfish Hunter and sixth-year candidate Billy Williams) and 2000 (Fisk and Perez).

Underlying this was the fact that this was a very weak class of first-year candidates from a Corridor standpoint, with Cole Hamels and Ryan Braun the one ones with a JAWS above 33.0 — which is to say the one ones inside 20 factors of the requirements at their respective positions. With Braun’s candidacy hamstrung by each his quick profession and two suspensions for violating the sport’s drug coverage (the primary of which was overturned by an arbitrator), he acquired simply 3.5%, knocking him off the poll, leaving Hamels (23.8%) as the one second-year holdover for 2027. The final time such a factor occurred was in 2012, when Bernie Williams was the one first-timer to make the reduce, receiving simply 9.6%. When the deluge of robust and controversial first-year candidates (Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens et al.) arrived the subsequent yr, Williams dropped to three.3% and fell off the poll. Hamels is at the least in a lot better form than that.

The Citizens Grows, the Poll Shrinks

A complete of 425 ballots have been solid throughout this cycle, a rise of practically 8% over final yr and the primary time since 2012 that at the least 400 votes have been solid. Pushed by an inflow of MLB.com writers and editors (extra on which beneath), this was the biggest voters since 2019 (additionally 425), although it fell far in need of the excessive of 581 ballots, set in ’11. The Corridor’s resolution to sundown voters greater than 10 years faraway from lively protection decreased the scale of the voters from 549 voters in 2015 to 440 in ’16, and it’s been slowly dwindling since then, with trade tendencies — layoffs, closures, ill-considered pivots to video — contributing to the decline.

This was a relatively weak poll on the whole, with simply three candidates assembly the JAWS customary at their respective positions, the bottom complete since 2006, and simply six with a JAWS of fifty.0 or greater (40.0 or greater for catchers), the bottom complete since ’08. On condition that panorama, the voters used simply 5.77 slots per poll, 1.0 fewer than final yr, and the bottom common since 2012, however not far off from a few different current cycles. This was the second time inside that 15-cycle span that the variety of clean ballots reached double digits:

New Youngsters on the Bloc

One of many key elements shaping the outcomes this yr was the inflow of recent voters. In 2015, the BBWAA voted to confess MLB.com writers and editors into the group, and now, with 10 years underneath their belt, they’re eligible to vote. Based on the parents on the Tracker, on the outset of this cycle, as many as 40 and even 50 new voters have been anticipated to affix the rolls, with about 25 of these coming from MLB.com. These estimates could have been low, as a result of as of 6 PM ET on Tuesday, 37 first-time voters had printed their ballots, as many as there have been in 2024 and ’25 mixed.

Maybe much more fascinating is how constantly these newcomers voted for probably the most favored candidates. All 37 included Beltrán, and all however three included Jones, serving to to push them throughout the end line. They gave Utley and Hernández greater than 75% of their votes, and helped a number of different candidates set new highs as properly:

With the Tracker probably so as to add one thing on the order of one other 100 ballots over the subsequent couple of weeks, these percentages will shift and doubtless converge. However for now, wow!

Everyone Positive aspects

As was the case in my year-to-year comparisons of our crowdsourced balloting, each returning candidate acquired a better share from the voters in 2026 than in ’25 — even Hunter, the one candidate who misplaced floor from the writers (and our crowd) final yr. Eleven candidates did obtain lower than 5% and are ineligible for additional consideration by the BBWAA, none of whom have been surprises; three have been shut out. Ramirez has aged off the poll after a 10-year run, unable to flee the influence of his two suspensions. Six holdovers posted double-digit features:

I’ll take a look at what these outcomes imply for every candidate in my subsequent installment.