On January 24 the Baseball Writers Association of America released the inductees for the annual Major League Baseball Hall of Fame induction. For only the fourth time in the Hall of Fame’s 74 year history, more than three players were selected to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.
The induction ceremony is scheduled for July 29 in Cooperstown, New York.
Atlanta Braves third baseman Chipper Jones was selected for the Hal of Fame on his first year of eligibility. With 97.2 percent of the vote, Jones tops the list of new inductees.
Joining Jones for the 2018 Hall of Fame induction are Vladimir Guerrero with 92.9 percent, Jim Thome with 89.8 percent, and Trevor Hoffman with 79.9 percent.
Players eligible for the Hall of Fame must receive at least 75 percent of the vote from the BBWAA members.
Edgar Martinez just missed becoming the fifth inductee with 70.4 percent of the vote.
Missing the vote again, Roger Clemens received only 57.3 percent of the vote, Barry Bonds received 56.4 percent of the vote, Curt Schilling received 51.2 percent of the vote, Fred McGriff received 23 percent of the vote, Manny Ramirez received 22 percent of the vote, Sammy Sosa received only 7.8 percent and Andruw Jones received 7.3 percent of the vote.
Livan Hernandez and Carlos Lee earned only one vote each; while Orlando Hudson, Aubrey Huff, Jason Isringhausen, Brad Lidge, Kevin Millwood, and Carlos Zambrano failed to earn any votes.
Players who received less than five percent of the vote will have their names stricken from any future consideration.
feature photo credit: By Tage Olsin – Cropped from Image:Baseball.jpg by Tage Olsin, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2342225