Relative to other Major League Baseball franchises, the Miami Marlins have a brief and frustrating history. Even so, fans would rather celebrate it than hide from it, and the Marlins have taken steps recently to give the people what they want. That includes the opening of the Marlins Legends Hall of Fame at loanDepot park in 2025.
The Marlins use a vague criteria to select their Hall of Famers. As described on the HOF landing page of the team’s website, “legends who played a major role in béisbol history” are elected. “Each year, we’ll celebrate former players, coaches, managers, and staff members for their contributions to not just the Marlins organization, but also our South Florida communities,” the page continues. The inaugural class of inductees—Luis Castillo, Jeff Conine, Jim Leyland and Jack McKeon—are described as “players and coaches who shaped Marlins history over the years with their memorable plays, legendary leadership, and lasting impact on the game.”
Fish On First SuperSub @Casey Marika developed his own criteria for discerning which players did enough to distinguish themselves. Focused only on the Marlins portion of each player’s career, his “Team Hall of Fame Index” incorporates the following factors:
Wins above replacement
Longevity & franchise legends
All-Star Game appearances
Major awards & honors
Postseason impact
Franchise leaderboards
Single-game achievements
Peak dominance
The index ranks Castillo fourth, with an overall score that places him in the highest tier (“inner-circle Marlins HOF”). Conine is ranked 10th in the “borderline/ballot debate” tier, though that is without accounting for his extensive philanthropic work and contributions to the franchise since retiring as a player.
Giancarlo Stanton presumably won’t be considered until he hangs up his cleats and Sandy Alcantara is still adding to his Marlins legacy. That leaves Hanley RamÃrez, Miguel Cabrera, Dontrelle Willis, Josh Johnson and Mike Lowell as the index’s most deserving individuals.
Â
Amusingly, Casey also shared an expanded list of the index’s top 150 players. If the Marlins induct two new players every single year through the end of the 21st century, that’s the total they would reach. If this franchise is still around in 2099, we can reasonably assume that plenty of new impact players emerged in the interim, supplanting the likes of Wei-Yin Chen, Caleb Smith and José Ureña.
Seven active Fish crack the top 150.
Any last-minute predictions for who will comprise the class of 2026?