{"id":530926,"date":"2026-01-21T14:07:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T14:07:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/530926\/"},"modified":"2026-01-21T14:07:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T14:07:13","slug":"looking-to-next-years-hall-of-fame-ballot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/530926\/","title":{"rendered":"Looking to next year\u2019s Hall of Fame ballot"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Tuesday, Carlos Beltr\u00e1n and Andruw Jones were elected<\/a> by the Baseball Writers of America Association as the two latest inductees to the Baseball Hall of Fame. Those of you who have paid some attention know that I\u2019m a Hall junkie, so I thought it would be fun to take a look to the future, to see who is in a good position from this year\u2019s results and who will be joining the ballot next year; we\u2019ll also see if there are any former Brewers coming up for consideration anytime soon.<\/p>\n

Who\u2019s in a good position after this year\u2019s results?<\/p>\n

Next year\u2019s Hall of Fame ballot will be a really interesting one. There\u2019s one strong newcomer (see below) but there are no slam-dunk first-ballot choices like we saw with Ichiro Suzuki last year, and there are no players coming back to the ballot who just missed\u2014both Beltr\u00e1n and Jones were over 65% last year and needed to make only small jumps in support to make it.<\/p>\n

We aren\u2019t going to see that with returning players next year, and in fact, it\u2019s definitely possible that no returning players get elected.<\/p>\n

After Beltr\u00e1n and Jones, the next highest vote-getter on Tuesday was the former Phillies second baseman Chase Utley at 59%. That\u2019s a big jump for Utley, who got just 39.8% of the vote the year before, but he\u2019d need another leap of almost 20% to make it in next year. It\u2019s not inconceivable: as we saw with the selections of Ichiro, Billy Wagner, and CC Sabathia a year ago and no super-strong first-ballot candidates this year, others will tend to soak up votes from writers who now turn their focus elsewhere.<\/p>\n

This could get Utley close. His case is a bit non-traditional\u2014he finished his career with just 1,885 hits and 259 homers, he never won a Gold Glove, and he never finished higher than seventh in MVP voting. 20 years ago, he\u2019d have no chance. But the analytics that have become the most popular tools to evaluate players suggest that we were missing something with Utley, and his WAR-based case does not just make him a borderline candidate; if you believe the WAR numbers, he\u2019s a pretty ironclad Hall of Famer. Not everyone believes those numbers, which is why Utley is still 16 percentage points short after his third appearance on the ballot.<\/p>\n

There are a couple of other interesting returning cases: Andy Pettitte, a staple of the late-90s Yankees dynasty and one of the most prolific postseason pitchers of all time, also made a big jump\u2014even bigger than Utley\u2019s, from 27.9% to 48.5%. Pettitte is also reaching the end of his time on the ballot; he\u2019ll have two more chances before his eligibility expires. Pettitte\u2019s case is complicated by his connection to performance-enhancing drugs, a connection which is viewed as far less egregious than some of his contemporaries but is, nonetheless, an issue for many voters.<\/p>\n

The other big mover this year was F\u00e9lix Hern\u00e1ndez, who improved by 26.1 percentage points from year one to year two (the largest single-year gain under the modern voting system, according to Ryan Thibodaux<\/a>, who runs the Hall of Fame tracker) and, at 46.1% after two ballots, is in excellent position. Hern\u00e1ndez\u2019s counting stats are far lower than the traditional Hall of Fame starting pitcher, but it looks like he may be the test case for what Hall voters will have to start looking for in an era when starting pitchers do not play the same way as they used to.<\/p>\n

Other returners include Alex Rodr\u00edguez (who topped 40% this year on his 5th ballot but probably has a hard cap on the number of voters who will vote for him), Bobby Abreu (who made a modest leap to above 30% but is running out of time), Jimmy Rollins (the counting stats support him over his teammate, Utley, but the advanced stats do not), Dustin Pedroia, Cole Hamels, Mark Buehrle, David Wright, Omar Vizquel, Francisco Rodr\u00edguez, and Torii Hunter. Vizquel, who got 18.4% on his ninth ballot, will be back for the 10th and final time next winter. The one first-ballot player who will make a second ballot is Hamels, who received 23.8% of the votes on his first ballot. That\u2019s an uphill climb, but it\u2019s better than Hern\u00e1ndez did on his first try.<\/p>\n

Who\u2019s new to the ballot?<\/p>\n

The next big question is who the new players are. This group is headlined by a player who I think has a strong chance at becoming a first-ballot Hall of Famer but has a tricky case: Buster Posey. Posey, from a quality perspective, certainly played at a Hall of Fame level: he won an MVP in 2012, something only two other catchers have done since the 1970s (Iv\u00e1n Rodr\u00edguez in 1999 and Joe Mauer in 2009), and by rate stats had one of the best careers of any catcher, ever. FanGraphs\u2019 version of WAR, which includes a player\u2019s pitch framing prowess, is especially fond of Posey.<\/p>\n

But Posey had a short career. He played only 1,371 games (that\u2019s almost 150 fewer than Pedroia and over 200 fewer than Wright, both great players who we think of as having careers that were \u201ctoo short\u201d), and in terms of counting stats, finished with just 1,500 hits and 158 home runs. Even at catcher, where physical demands tend to limit the number of games played per season and shorten careers, that\u2019s low; that\u2019s fewer hits than Thurman Munson, another catcher who some feel played at a Hall of Fame level but isn\u2019t there because his career was cut short when he died in a plane crash not long after turning 32.<\/p>\n

Posey\u2019s case will be fascinating. I think the lack of great catchers, historically, will probably work to his advantage, and I think he\u2019ll be recognized for what he was, which was\u2014from a pure peak perspective\u2014probably the best catcher of the 21st century (though Joe Mauer and Cal Raleigh fans will argue, and I\u2019m sure Yadier Molina fans would argue too, though Molina\u2019s case is more about longevity than peak prowess).<\/p>\n

There is really only one other new name on the ballot next season who might garner enough support to make it to a second year, and that\u2019s pitcher Jon Lester. Lester probably didn\u2019t do enough to get real Hall support\u2014he has just 43.4 bWAR for his career\u2014but he won 200 games, a rarity in modern times, struck out almost 2,500 batters, had three top-four Cy Young finishes, and was a postseason hero who won an NLCS MVP and three World Series. That should be enough of a resum\u00e9 to get him to the 5% needed for a second showing.<\/p>\n

Other interesting but not exactly compelling first-year players include Brett Gardner, who won a World Series, was one of the best defensive corner outfielders of all time, and was about a league-average hitter; Ryan Zimmerman, one of the great heroes of the Washington Nationals franchise; and Kyle Seager, who has no shot at all at making the Hall of Fame but was a better player than people remember.<\/p>\n

Are there any former Brewers debuting on next year\u2019s ballot?<\/p>\n

We will not know who the new players on the ballot will be until it\u2019s announced late next fall, but we can make a few guesses at what former Brewers could join Francisco Rodr\u00edguez in representing the franchise.<\/p>\n

One very notable former Brewer should get a spot on next year\u2019s ballot: Jonathan Lucroy. Lucroy, who is the best catcher in Brewers history (though William Contreras is coming for that crown), had a 12-year career that included a couple of All-Star games and a fourth-place MVP finish in 2014, the best season ever by a Brewers catcher.<\/a> Lucroy was also one of the first players to get extra shine because of the new ways in which pitch framing was being measured, and FanGraphs\u2019 version of WAR viewed him as a legitimate star, with four straight seasons with at least 5.6 WAR. Lucroy\u2019s 17.7 career bWAR is nothing particularly special, but his 35.2 fWAR ranks 38th all time among catchers in that database.<\/p>\n

The next former Brewer who should get a spot on this ballot was only in Milwaukee briefly, and that\u2019s reliever Joakim Soria. From 2007-2010, Soria was one of the best relievers in baseball. A lost season in 2012 derailed him a bit but he continued to have solid seasons into the mid 2010s, and in 2018 the first-place Brewers acquired him from the White Sox at the trade deadline to bolster their bullpen for the stretch run (Milwaukee sent Wilber P\u00e9rez and former first-round pick Kodi Medeiros to Chicago; neither ever made the majors). Soria pitched 26 times for the Brewers in the regular season and suffered some bad luck (a 2.93 FIP but 4.09 ERA) but had a difficult postseason. He had three scoreless outings (including a win and a hold) in the divisional round against the Rockies, but he gave up multiple earned runs twice in four outings in the NLCS against the Dodgers. Soria became a free agent after the season and left for Oakland, and his brief Brewers career was over. In all, Soria amassed 229 saves and had a 3.11 ERA (137 ERA+) and 3.12 FIP in 763 innings pitched.<\/p>\n

The last guess is more borderline, and that\u2019s that Wisconsin native and former Brewer\u2014for all of 5 2\/3 innings\u2014Jordan Zimmermann will get an honorary spot. Zimmermann pitched 1,614 innings across 13 years, almost entirely for the Nationals and Tigers, and he had a respectable career that saw him make back-to-back All-Star Games and seventh- and fifth-place Cy Young finishes in the 2013 and 2014 seasons. Zimmermann, who was from Auburndale, Wisconsin and pitched at UW-Stevens Point, made his last two big-league appearances for the Brewers in 2021.<\/p>\n

None of these players has any shot at making the Hall of Fame, and I\u2019d be surprised if any got more than a token vote or two, but it\u2019s still fun to see their names.<\/p>\n

Brewers fans will need to wait until 2029 before anyone who spent time in Milwaukee will actually make some noise on the ballot. That\u2019s the year when Zack Greinke should become a first-ballot Hall of Famer. But he\u2019s not the only former Brewer with a good chance of getting a little support: Brewers Legend Josh Donaldson also debuts that year. (Let\u2019s go out for a beverage and I\u2019ll tell you why Donaldson should get serious consideration for the Hall of Fame.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Tuesday, Carlos Beltr\u00e1n and Andruw Jones were elected by the Baseball Writers of America Association as the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":530927,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2401],"tags":[5,136,843,59,24819,4280,4],"class_list":{"0":"post-530926","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-milwaukee-brewers","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-brewers","10":"tag-milwaukee","11":"tag-milwaukee-brewers","12":"tag-milwaukee-brewers-history","13":"tag-milwaukeebrewers","14":"tag-mlb"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115933481842992916","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530926","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=530926"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530926\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/530927"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=530926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=530926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=530926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}