Carlos Delgado is on the Hall of Fame Ballot

If he had played in a different era, Carlos Delgado might already be in the Hall of Fame. At 6’3″ and 215 pounds, the left-handed-hitting Delgado evoked memories of Willie McCovey, Willie Stargell, and his predecessor in Toronto, Fred McGriff. His 473 career home runs, while 27 shy of the “magic” number of 500, would have been enough to get a plaque in Cooperstown in previous generations.

Unfortunately, Delgado, when he hit the Baseball Writers Association of America (BBWAA) Hall of Fame ballot in 2015, only earned the votes of 3.8% of the 549 ballots cast, not only putting him far shy of the 75% required to get a plaque in the Hall, but also short of the 5% minimum threshold required to appear on future BBWAA ballots.

Next Sunday, the Puerto Rican-born Delgado will get a second chance at the Hall, as one of the eight candidates for the Era Committee’s Contemporary Baseball ballot. A panel of 16 baseball executives, media members, and Hall of Famers will vote on the candidacies of Delgado, Gary Sheffield, Jeff Kent, Don Mattingly, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Dale Murphy, and the late Fernando Valenzuela. 12 out of 16 committee members (75%) must vote for any player in order to be in the Hall’s Class of 2026. Each committee member may vote “yes” for only three of the eight candidates.

After a brief recap of his playing career, I’ll render my verdict on whether Delgado deserves a spot in the Hall of Fame and whether there’s a chance he’ll get those 12 necessary votes from this committee.

Cooperstown Cred: Carlos Delgado (1B)

• Toronto Blue Jays (1993-2004), Florida Marlins (2005), New York Mets (2005-09)
• Career: .280 BA, .383 OBP, .546 SLG, 473 HR, 1,512 RBI, 2,038 Hits
• Career: 138 OPS+, 44.4 WAR (Wins Above Replacement)
• .929 career OPS is the 24th best in baseball history
• Runner-up for the 2003 A.L. MVP (.302 BA, 42 HR, 145 RBI, 117 runs)
• 4 times in the Top 10 of MVP voting
• 2-time All-Star, 3-time Silver Slugger Award Winner

(cover photo: CBC)

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Carlos Delgado: Early Career Highlights

Carlos Juan Delgado was born on June 25, 1972, in Aguadilla, Puerto Rico. Carlos’s father was a drug and alcohol counselor, while his mother worked as a medical laboratory assistant. Like many young boys in Puerto Rico, Carlos’s baseball idol was Hall of Famer Roberto Clemente, even though The Great One passed away in a plane crash just six months after Delgado was born.

As Paul Hofmann notes in his SABR Bio about Delgado, “having both parents employed in social-and-human service jobs and a hero like Clemente undoubtedly had an impact on Carlos’s development as a social activist and his deep commitment to social justice and charitable work in his adult years.”

A catcher in high school, Delgado signed as an amateur free agent with the Toronto Blue Jays in October 1988, at the age of 16. His contract with the Jays included a $90,000 signing bonus and a promise that the team would pay for his college education if he ever desired to pursue one, which was very important to his parents.

Delgado spent five full years in the minor leagues before getting his first cup of coffee with the Blue Jays in October 1993, just a few weeks before the team won its second straight World Series title on Joe Carter‘s Game 6 walk-off home run. After his 1992 campaign in Dunedin (the Florida State League), the 20-year-old Delgado was ranked the #4 prospect in baseball by Baseball America in the spring of ’93.

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Delgado had a big season with the Knoxville Sounds (AA) in 1993 (.303, 25 HR, 102 RBI) before his brief appearance in the majors. So, during spring training, with Pat Borders established behind the plate, the Jays decided to make room for Delgado on the big league roster by playing him in left field (the team had an opening there after Rickey Henderson departed as a free agent).

On Opening Day, batting 6th for the defending World Series champions at the SkyDome, Delgado got his first MLB hit off Jack McDowell and hit a 428-foot blast off lefty Dennis Cook for his first career home run. The next day, Delgado hit an estimated 445-foot tater off Alex Fernandez, which famously banged off the window of the Hard Rock Cafe in right-center field.

In his first 15 games in the majors, Delgado hit .275 with 8 home runs, 18 RBI, and a .771 slugging percentage. If Delgado had been able to sustain that production, he might be in the Hall of Fame today. Alas, in his next 30 games, Delgado hit just .183 with one home run and six RBI. On June 9th, he was optioned to Syracuse (AAA), where he played for the rest of the season. Because of the longest player strike in baseball history, there was no opportunity for Delgado to return to the bigs.

Delgado started the 1995 season with the Blue Jays as a pinch-hitter and occasional designated hitter, but, after hitting just .154 (with no homers) in his first 29 plate appearances, he was sent back to Syracuse. It was in Syracuse that Delgado transitioned to first base. He returned to the Jays in September, mostly playing left field (John Olerud was entrenched at first), but he only hit .169 (with two home runs) in 70 plate appearances.

Finally, in his age 24 season (1996), Delgado stuck with the big club all year. The slick-fielding Olerud was still at first, so Delgado served as the team’s primary DH. In 138 games, he hit .270 with 25 HR and 92 RBI.

The Blue Jays’ Starting First Baseman (1997-2004)

John Olerud was traded to the New York Mets in December 1996, so Carlos Delgado became the team’s starting first baseman and would be a regular presence in the Jays’ lineup for eight superb seasons as the team’s cleanup hitter.

He had a solid campaign in 1997 (.262 BA, 30 HR, 91 RBI), but really blossomed in 1998, his age 26 season, when he slashed .292/.385/.592 with 38 HR and 115 RBI, which was good enough to earn down-ballot MVP votes (he finished 21st).

In 1999, Delgado’s slash line was lower (.272/.377/.571), but he hit 44 taters with 134 RBI and 113 Runs. That performance earned him his first Silver Slugger Award and a 12th-place finish in the MVP balloting.

2000 was the best year of Delgado’s career. Playing in all 162 games, he hit .344 (with a .470 OBP and .664 SLG) with 41 home runs, a league-leading 57 doubles, 132 RBI, and 115 Runs. By advanced metrics, he set his career high with a 7.3 WAR (Wins Above Replacement) and also posted a 181 OPS+, which means that he was 81% better than league average. Delgado also won his second straight Silver Slugger, made his first All-Star squad, and finished 4th in the MVP vote, behind only Jason Giambi, Frank Thomas, and Alex Rodriguez.

Delgado’s production dipped a bit in 2001 (.279 BA, 39 HR, 102 RBI) and 2002 (.277 BA, 33 HR, 108 RBI), but he remained one of the top first basemen in the game. In 2003, he finished 2nd in the MVP vote (behind Rodriguez), slashing .302/.426/.593 with 42 HR, a league-leading 145 RBI, and 117 Runs. His OPS+ (161) and raw OPS (1.019) were also both best in the majors. Delgado also made his 2nd All-Star team and won his 3rd Silver Slugger.

Late in the 2003 campaign, Delgado became the 13th player ever to hit four home runs in a game, with the second of those taters being the 300th of his career. The years from 1998 to 2003, spanning six seasons, were the prime years of Delgado’s career: playing an average of 154 games per year, he slashed .295/.413/.585, while averaging 39 HR, 123.5 RBI, 40 Doubles, and 107 Runs.

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In his final year with the Blue Jays (2004), Delgado hit .269 with 32 HR and 99 RBI. The usually durable slugger missed five weeks in ’04 with an oblique strain.

In his insightful profile of Delgado, FanGraphs’ Jay Jaffe detailed Delgado’s impact off the field during his years in Canada, “taking it upon himself to carry on the legacy of Clemente by using his platform to speak out for social justice.” He and other Puerto Rican celebrities protested the United States’ use of a small island close to Puerto Rico as a bomb-testing site, which was believed to cause higher rates of cancer and other illnesses in Puerto Rico. The Navy withdrew from that island in 2003. Delgado was also one of the few athletes to publicly take a stand against the war in Iraq.

Carlos Delgado’s Final Five Campaigns (2005-09)

As previously noted, the Toronto Blue Jays won the World Series a few weeks after Carlos Delgado’s Major League debut in 1993. They failed to make the playoffs in each of Delgado’s next eleven campaigns north of the border, and only once finished within 10 games of the division leader (in 2000, when they wound up 4.5 games behind the New York Yankees).

A free agent after the 2004 campaign, Delgado signed a four-year, $52 million contract with the Florida Marlins, a deal that was so back-loaded that he only earned $4 million in the first year. In his lone campaign in Miami, Delgado slashed .301/.399/.582 with 33 HR and 115 RBI. He finished 6th in the MVP vote (which was won by Albert Pujols).

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In the offseason, the Marlins conducted one of their many fire sales, trading Delgado to the New York Mets for Mike Jacobs, Yusmeiro Petit, and minor leaguer Grant Psomas. On the same day, the team traded Josh Beckett and Mike Lowell to the Boston Red Sox.

On the Mets, Delgado joined a team primed to contend. Center fielder and fellow Puerto Rican Carlos Beltran was in the prime of his career, with third baseman David Wright and shortstop Jose Reyes just beginning theirs. The Mets also had three future Hall of Fame pitchers nearing the end of their careers (starters Tom Glavine and Pedro Martinez, and closer Billy Wagner).

The Mets won the N.L. East with 97 wins; Delgado did his part by slashing .265/.361/.548, slugging 38 home runs with 114 RBI. In late August, Delgado hit the 400th home run of his career with a titanic grand slam to right field.

In his first (and only) opportunity in the postseason, Delgado was superb. He slashed .351/.448/.826 with 4 HR and 11 RBI in 10 games against the Los Angeles Dodgers and St. Louis Cardinals.

In Game 1 of the NLDS (against the Dodgers), at Shea Stadium, Delgado tied the game at 1-1 in the bottom of the 4th with a solo tater off Derek Lowe. Later, in the bottom of the 7th, Delgado broke a 4-4 tie with an RBI single to left off Brad Penny, leading the Mets to a 6-5 victory, with Delgado going 4 for 5. The team won both Games 2 and 3 to sweep the series.

Behind Glavine, Guillermo Mota, and Wagner, the Mets shut out the St. Louis Cardinals 2-0 in Game 1 of the NLCS, with Delgado going 2 for 3 with a pair of doubles. In Game 2, the Mets’ first basemen went 2 for 5 with two home runs and 4 RBI, both to the opposite field. The second tater gave the Mets a 5-4 lead, but the Cardinals rallied to win 9-6.

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After being shut out in Game 3, the Mets clobbered the Redbirds 12-5, with Delgado hitting a three-run home run with five RBI overall. The teams split Games 5 and 6, setting up a winner-take-all in Game 7. Delgado walked his first three times at the plate (all on full counts) and then struck out in the bottom of the 8th with no outs and a runner on first. After Yadier Molina‘s go-ahead two-run home run in the top of the 9th, the Mets loaded the bases in the bottom of the 9th off rookie closer Adam Wainwright. Beltran famously struck out looking to end the game, with Delgado waiting in the on-deck circle.

After the season, thanks to his charitable works, which included raising money for homeless, underprivileged, and handicapped Puerto Rican children, and sponsoring college scholarships through his Extra Bases Foundation, Delgado won the 2006 Roberto Clemente Award.

The Mets did not return to the postseason in Delgado’s final three campaigns, but they should have in 2007 in 2008. In ’07, he team lost six of its final seven regular-season games to fall one game behind the Philadelphia Phillies in the N.L. East. Although the seven-game collapse was a collective failure, Delgado hit .348 with a pair of RBI (no homers) during those seven games. Overall, in his age-35 season, Delgado hit .258 with 24 HR and 87 RBI.

In his final full campaign (2008), Delgado hit .271 with 38 HR and 115 RBI. The Mets won 89 games (losing six of their last nine) and finished one game out of the Wild Card race. Delgado, once again, wasn’t the culprit; he hit .353 with two HR and eight RBI in those nine tilts.

Delgado entered the 2009 campaign with 469 career home runs, and the Mets picked up his $12 million option. After 30 games, he was hitting .298 with 4 HR and 23 RBI, but had to undergo surgery for a torn right hip labrum in May, and did not play again for the rest of the campaign.

Delgado became a free agent after the season but had a setback while playing winter ball in Puerto Rico, requiring a second hip operation in February 2010. In August, he signed a minor league contract with the Boston Red Sox, but, after five games in Pawtucket, he aggravated the hip again, ending his season and, ultimately, his career. Delgado announced his retirement from baseball in April 2011.

The hip problems that derailed Delgado’s career left him with a career of 473 home runs, 1,512 RBI, and 2,038 hits. At the time, Delgado’s 473 long balls put him in 30th place on the all-time list.

Carlos Delgado and the 2015 Hall of Fame Ballot

Baseball players are eligible for the BBWAA Hall of Fame ballot five years after they play their final game in Major League Baseball. This put Carlos Delgado on the 2015 ballot, and the timing could not have been worse.

As previously noted, Delgado got just 3.8% support from the 549 writers who cast ballots, putting him shy of the 5% minimum required to appear on the 2016 ballot.

Delgado had the bad luck of hitting the ballot for the first time in the same year as three of the best pitchers of his generation (Randy Johnson, Pedro Martinez, and John Smoltz), as well as a right-handed hitting slugger (Gary Sheffield) whose longer career yielded 509 career HR.

That jam-packed 2015 ballot also featured Craig Biggio (elected to the Hall with Johnson, Martinez, and Smoltz), Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Sammy Sosa, Mark McGwire, Jeff Kent, Don Mattingly, Curt Schilling, and future inductees McGriff, Mike Piazza, Jeff Bagwell, Tim Raines, Edgar Martinez, Larry Walker, Alan Trammell, Mike Mussina, and Lee Smith. That ballot included over 20 players with credentials worthy of Cooperstown, but the writers had to limit themselves to just 10 names.

All told, this ballot had four elected Hall of Famers, nine more who would make it in the future, and five others who would have made it if not for their links to performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs). In most of the history of the Hall of Fame balloting, a player with 473 career home runs would be noticed, but, on this ballot, five players had more.

Now, this Sunday, Delgado will get another chance, via the Era Committee’s Contemporary Baseball ballot, which features eight candidates whose primary career contributions were in 1980 or later.

The Case for Carlos Delgado for the Hall of Fame

The case for Carlos Delgado for the Hall of Fame is fairly straightforward. He was a premier hitter with elite slugging numbers. Besides the 473 taters, he had 1,512 RBI, the 49th highest tally in baseball history as of 2009, his final campaign.

Today, his 473 home runs are still the 34th most in baseball history, and his 1,512 ribbies are the 55th most.

Of the 33 players with more home runs than Delgado, all but nine are in the Hall of Fame. Two of those nine are not yet eligible (Albert Pujols and Miguel Cabrera) but are locks as future first-ballot inductees. The other seven (Bonds, Alex Rodriguez, Sosa, McGwire, Rafael Palmeiro, Manny Ramirez, and Sheffield) are connected to PEDs.

There are 10 players who have more RBI than Delgado who are not in the Hall of Fame. The other 44 have plaques in Cooperstown. Who are those ten players? Many of them are the same: Pujols, Cabrera, Rodriguez, Bonds, Palmeiro, Ramirez, Sheffield, and Sosa. The others are Beltran and Kent. Beltran, Delgado’s teammate with the Mets, has an excellent chance of making it this year; he got 70.3% of the BBWAA vote this January, and a 70% or better tally almost always results in a Hall of Fame nod in the next election.

As for Kent, he is on the Era Committee ballot with Delgado and six others. He has the simplest Hall of Fame case: his 377 career home runs are the most in baseball history for a second baseman. That’s the kind of one-line case that generally plays well with these 16-member voting committees.

So, let’s suppose that Kent makes it this Sunday and Beltran clears 75% in January. If that happens, then Carlos Delgado will have the most home runs and most RBI in history for any eligible player who has never been linked to PEDs.

Carlos Delgado’s OPS

Let’s go beyond home runs and RBI. Carlos Delgado also hit a lot of doubles and drew a lot of walks, giving him a high career on-base percentage (.383) and slugging percentage (.546). If you combine the two metrics, Delgado’s career OPS is .929. For the 295 players in baseball history with at least 8,000 career plate appearances, his .929 OPS puts him in 24th place all-time. He’s behind 20 Hall of Famers, plus Bonds, A-Rod, and Manny, who would be inner circle Hall of Famers if not for their PED links.

Delgado’s .929 OPS is ahead of luminaries such as Hank Aaron, Frank Robinson, Mike Schmidt, Ken Griffey Jr., and many others.

Now, if you’re smelling a rat with Aaron being behind Delgado in OPS, we have to remind ourselves that Delgado played in one of the most prolific offensive eras in baseball history. So, when you put that into the context of the time (which is what OPS+ does), his career number is 138, which is 38% above average.

Even when adjusting for ballparks and the offensive era of the 1990s and 2000s, Delgado’s 138 OPS+ is still the 48th best in baseball history for players with at least 8,000 career PA. He’s behind 37 Hall of Famers and 10 others who are not: Bonds, Ramirez, Pujols, Joey Votto, Freddie Freeman, Cabrera, Rodriguez, Sheffield, Jason Giambi, and Bob Johnson.

If you are saying “who” for Bob Johnson, he was a left fielder in the 1930s and 1940s, playing for the Philadelphia A’s (1933-42), Washington Senators (1943), and Boston Red Sox (1944-45). He had a career slash line of .296/.393/.506 with 288 HR, 1,283 RBI, and a 139 OPS+ (one above Delgado). Johnson barely makes this list because he had 8,051 plate appearances in his 13-year career.

Still, with OPS+, with the exception of Johnson, everyone on the list above Delgado is in the Hall of Fame, not yet eligible, still active (Freeman), or linked to PEDs.

Hall of Fame Monitor and Similarity Scores

On every player’s page on Baseball Reference, there are Hall of Fame “statistics” and Similarity Scores. These are mostly inventions of sabermetric pioneer Bill James. One of those (the Hall of Fame Monitor) assigns point values to certain statistical benchmarks (career totals) and accomplishments (MVP Awards, All-Star appearances, etc.) and tallies the total points. A player with over 100 points is a “likely Hall of Famer.” Delgado’s score is 110, which puts him over the bar.

Similarity Scores (explained here) take each player’s career statistics and compare them to players with the “most similar” stats.

These are the 10 players who are “most similar” to Carlos Delgado.

1. Jason Giambi
2. *Willie Stargell
3. *Jeff Bagwell
4. Nelson Cruz
5. Jose Canseco
6. *Fred McGriff
7. Paul Konerko
8. Mark Teixeira
9. Paul Goldschmidt
10. *Willie McCovey

*Hall of Famer

As you can see, there are four Hall of Famers on Delgado’s list, one active player (Goldschmidt) and three contemporary sluggers who were linked to PEDs (Giambi, Cruz, and Canseco).

Take this for what you will. As we’ve already discussed, Delgado performed in a prolific offensive era, so his 473 home runs don’t shine quite as brightly as they would have if he had played his entire career in the 20th century.

The Case Against Carlos Delgado for the Hall of Fame

OK, the case in favor of Carlos Delgado for a plaque in Cooperstown is compelling. But the case against is also strong, and we’ve seen some of the seeds of it already.

So, let’s start with the Bob Johnson appearance on the career OPS+ list. Delgado scores really well on that list, with his 138 career OPS+, but take a look now at the players who are just slightly below him, with at least 8,000 PA and a career OPS+ of 137. The names are Will Clark, Jack Clark, Sherry Magee, Reggie Smith, and Goldschmidt. All good players, and Goldschmidt might wind up in the Hall, but none have obvious cases in favor.

Next, let’s look at the players behind Delgado on the home run list: Chipper Jones (468), Dave Winfield (465), Cruz (464), Canseco (462), Adam Dunn (462), Giancarlo Stanton (453), and Carl Yastrzemski (452). There are Hall of Famers on this list to be sure, but they had other supreme credentials. Jones played a more important defensive position (third base), won an MVP, and was an eight-time All-Star, while Winfield and Yaz both had over 3,000 hits.

The players behind Delgado on the career RBI list make him look a little better: Mickey Mantle (1,509), Vladimir Guerrero (1,496), Dave Parker (1,493), Billy Williams (1,475), Ed Delahanty (1,466), Rusty Staub (1,466), Eddie Matthews (1,453), and Jim Rice (1,451). That’s seven Hall of Famers plus Staub. However, if you go a bit lower on the list, you get names that include Joe Carter, Giambi, Luis Gonzalez, Andres Galarraga, Aramis Ramirez, and Konerko.

Carlos Delgado’s WAR and JAWS

With the caveat that it is unlikely that most of the voting members of the Era Committee will take a look at these numbers, I am compelled to point out that Carlos Delgado does not score well on the advanced metrics featured on Baseball Reference, specifically WAR (Wins Above Replacement) and JAWS. Delgado’s career WAR is only 44.4, because the totality of his value was with the bat. He played a lesser position on the defensive spectrum (first base), wasn’t a very good fielder, and added no value on the basepaths (14 career stolen bases).

Delgado’s 44.4 career WAR is only the 40th best among first basemen in history. He’s behind 23 Hall of Famers but also behind 16 players who are not in the Hall. These sixteen players are Pujols, Palmeiro, Cabrera, Freeman, Goldschmidt, Votto, McGwire, Keith Hernandez, John Olerud (his teammate in Toronto), Will Clark, Norm Cash, Giambi, Teixeira, Joe Judge, Ed Konetchy, and Mark Grace.

Delgado is 38th on JAWS (which averages a player’s career WAR with their 7-year peak WAR). He’s mostly behind the same players listed above, but also Dolph Camilli, and he’s ahead of Konetchy, Grace, and Judge.

Now, in fairness, he is ahead of a few Hall of Fame first basemen (Frank Chance, Gil Hodges, Jim Bottomley, and George “High Pockets” Kelly). The latter two were teammates with Hall of Famer Frankie Frisch, who was influential in their nods by the Veterans Committees of the early 1970s. Chance and Hodges (elected just a few years ago) also had important contributions to the game as managers.

Will Carlos Delgado Make the Hall of Fame?

OK, we’re at the bottom line. Will Carlos Delgado be elected to the Hall of Fame this Sunday, and should he? Let’s start with the “will he” question. My guess is “no,” but it wouldn’t shock me if he were elected. Most of the 16 members of the committee will probably not care about Delgado’s low rankings on the WAR and JAWS lists. After all, Harold Baines (38.8 career WAR) was elected by a similar committee in 2019. Hodges (43.8) was elected in 2022 along with Tony Oliva (43.1).

Three years ago, the Contemporary Baseball Committee unanimously elected Fred McGriff, who is one of the players on Delgado’s Similar Score list. McGriff’s career was much longer (he had 10,174 career PA, compared to Delgado’s 8,657), and he hit 493 HR with 1,550 RBI, barely more than Delgado’s tallies (473, 1,512).

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Will Delgado be viewed similarly to McGriff? Maybe, but I doubt it. McGriff finished very close to the magic number of 500, and he would almost certainly have made it if not for the player strike of 1994.

Then, there’s always the issue of the competition for votes. Delgado is on the ballot with Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Jeff Kent, Gary Sheffield, Dale Murphy, Don Mattingly, and Fernando Valenzuela. The committee members can only vote for three out of those eight players. Despite being two of the greatest players in baseball history, using history as a guide, Bonds and Clemens will not get much support; they both got no “reported” votes from the same committee that unanimously elected McGriff three years ago. Clearly, the Hall of Fame doesn’t look kindly on PED users.

So, how will they feel about Sheffield, who also has a PED link? That’s a tough one, only because he was one of the rare PED users who admitted it at the time. Sheffield claimed that he unknowingly took steroids when working out with Bonds one offseason. His career statistics seem more authentic than many of the other big names who were accused of PED use.

What about Mattingly and Murphy? They have both been on these ballots multiple times and have not made it beyond 50% of the vote. In December 2022 (the year McGriff got 16 out of 16 votes), Mattingly got 8 out of 16 (50%), while Murphy got 6 out of 16 (37.5%). They were two of the biggest stars of the 1980s, but saw their careers peter out in their 30s. Still, they both earned MVP Awards (Mattingly once, Murphy twice) and were highly respected. To me, Murphy’s “peak performance” case is stronger because he mostly played center field.

Regarding Valenzuela, his statistical case is weak (173-153 record, with a 3.54 ERA). He passed away a year ago and was a true ambassador for the game from the country of Mexico. Jay Jaffe has mentioned that he would be a more appropriate recipient of the Buck O’Neil Award.

“The Buck O’Neil Lifetime Achievement Award is presented by the Hall of Fame’s Board of Directors not more than once every three years to honor an individual whose extraordinary efforts enhanced baseball’s positive impact on society, broadened the game’s appeal, and whose character, integrity and dignity are comparable to the qualities exhibited by O’Neil. The Award, named after the late Buck O’Neil, was first given in 2008, with O’Neil being the first recipient.”

— The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum

That leaves us with Kent, who, as I mentioned earlier, has the most open-and-shut Hall of Fame case on this ballot. He has the most home runs (377) all-time for a second baseman.

My guess is that Kent will be elected nearly unanimously and will probably be the only player to make it 75% or more. But it wouldn’t surprise me if the committee rallies around Mattingly or Murphy.

Final Thoughts

So, let’s wrap up with my take on whether Carlos Delgado should be in the Hall of Fame. My answer is “no.” Though he has a compelling case, I feel that his career was too short. I supported the election of Fred McGriff, but his career started seven years earlier, and those seven years really matter in the context of home run hitting. He led the league in home runs twice and finished in the top five of his league seven times.

Delgado, by contrast, never led his league in home runs and only finished in the top five in four different seasons. Now, it’s true that Delgado had more seasons in which he was competing with PED users, but that was a factor for the careers of both men. There was only one year (2003) in which Delgado was one of his league’s “clean” home run champions. In that 2003 campaign, Alex Rodriguez hit 47 dingers, while Delgado and Frank Thomas each had 42. If your chief calling card for the Hall of Fame is hitting home runs, leading your league at least a couple of times should be a minimum requirement.

Meanwhile, McGriff led the A.L. with 36 HR in 1989 and the N.L. with 35 in 1992. Also, in 1988, he was 2nd in the A.L. to Jose Canseco.

Delgado has a higher OPS+ (138 to 134), but that’s in part due to the fact that his career ended at age 37, while McGriff played until he was 40, lowering his number from 137 to 134. And, yes, there’s also the fact that McGriff would have hit the “used to be” magic number of 500 if not for the strike of 1994.

We also have to consider that first base is a position where the bar simply has to be higher. There are so many big-hitting first basemen in baseball. If your totals are shy of the magic numbers, you need to add more to your resume, either with the glove, on the basepaths, or with intangibles (such as postseason glory). Delgado had a great postseason in 2006, but his team fell short of the Fall Classic.

Delgado never won an MVP Award, although one could argue that he deserved it in 2003 when he was behind only Alex Rodriguez, who was using PEDs. In 2000, he was behind Giambi (PEDs), Frank Thomas (no), and Rodriguez (yes). But the award probably should have gone to Pedro Martinez (18-6, 1.74 ERA). He never finished in the top five in any other year, and, having gone through the numbers year-by-year, I can’t find any year in which he should have been.

Among non-PED-tainted first basemen in the last 50 years who are not in the Hall of Fame, I would put Delgado behind the still-active Freeman and Goldschmidt, as well as Joey Votto (not eligible yet), Lance Berkman, and Keith Hernandez. I’d put him in the same bucket as Will Clark, John Olerud, Mark Teixeira, and Mattingly, excellent first basemen who fall short of the bar for a plaque in Cooperstown.

On the current ballot, if I had three votes, I would choose Kent, Murphy, and Sheffield, acknowledging that Bonds and Clemens were all-time greats who are not likely to get any support whatsoever for the Hall. Delgado had a terrific career, but falls short to these eyes.

Thanks for reading.

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