Former Ranger Ian Kinsler is among the newcomers to the BBWAA ballot
The Baseball Writers Association of America has released the 2025 Hall of Fame ballot, with former Texas Rangers second baseman Ian Kinsler among the first time eligibles on the ballot.
There are 28 players on the ballot — 14 first-timers and 14 returning candidates.
The first timers are:
Carlos Gonzalez
Curtis Granderson
Felix Hernandez
Adam Jones
Ian Kinsler
Russell Martin
Brian McCann
Dustin Pedroia
Hanley Ramirez
Fernando Rodney
Ichiro Suzuki
Troy Tulowitzki
Ben Zobrist
The returning candidates, in order of percentage of the vote received last year, are:
Billy Wagner — 73.8%
Andrus Jones — 61.6%
Carlos Beltran — 57.1%
Alex Rodriguez — 34.8%
Manny Ramirez — 32.5%
Chase Utley — 28.8%
Omar Vizquel — 17.7%
Bobby Abreu — 14.8%
Jimmy Rollins — 14.8%
Andy Pettitte — 13.5%
Mark Buehlre — 8.3%
Francisco Rodriguez — 7.8%
Torii Hunter — 7.3%
David Wright — 6.2%
My guess is that we have two players voted in this year — Ichiro and Wagner. Jones and perhaps Beltran could sneak in, though I think Andruw will probably have to wait another year or two (this is his 8th year on the ballot, so he has only two more shots after this year), and the trashcan banging stink is still lingering on Beltran to the point where I doubt he sees a big jump in vote total.
I would guess that Sabathia gets in fairly soon, but I don’t think he’ll end up getting voted in on his first ballot. Everyone else is, at first blush, at risk of getting less than 5% of the vote and thus being one and done.
There is a certain irony in Ian Kinsler and Dustin Pedroia being on the ballot at the same time, as Pedroia beating out Kinsler for the starting shortstop job at Arizona State led to Kinsler transferring to the University of Missouri for his junior season, where he did enough to be selected in the 17th round of the 2003 draft by the Rangers. Pedroia was picked in the second round by the Red Sox a year later.
Kinsler and Pedroia coming on the ballot at the same time is probably bad luck for both of them, particularly with Chase Utley being a holdover who barely crossed the 25% mark last year. Pedroia and Kinsler have remarkably similar cases — IK is 20th all time among second basemen in bWAR, at 54.1, while Pedroia is 23rd at 51.9. Ranking second basemen by JAWS has Pedroia and IK 19th and 21st, at 46.5 and 46.1, respectively.
Pedroia probably has a slight edge over Kinsler among voters due to the hardware — Rookie of the Year, MVP, three rings (even though he didn’t play in the postseason when he won the third one) — though he also has a relatively short career for a Hall of Fame candidate. Pedroia appeared in the majors in 14 different seasons, but the first year was a cup of coffee, and his final two years he appeared in just nine games (and collected just three hits) combined. He has just 1512 career major league games — only 10 more than Marcus Semien — and the only second baseman in the Hall with fewer career games is Jackie Robinson, whose MLB career didn’t start until he was 28 years old due to the color barrier.
But at the end of the day, voters looking at the numbers are going to have a hard time justifying voting for Pedroia but not Kinsler, and vice versa, and they are both inferior candidates to Utley, who is struggling to get votes as it is. All three were contemporaries, and all three have cases to be made for them, but Utley deserves to be in, while Pedroia and Kinsler appear to fall just short of the line (though not so far short that they’d be unworthy honorees should they somehow eventually get voted in). I’m not sure many voters are going to check the box for all three, which likely hurts the chances of both IK and Pedroia staying on the ballot.
Felix Hernandez is the only other newcomer I can see potentially reaching the 5% threshold. He’s King Felix, was one of the greatest pitchers in baseball for a number of years, before injuries de-railed him and cut his career short, with the final four of his 15 major league seasons being, in aggregate, replacement level.
I’m still mad about Johan Santana, who I think should be in the Hall of Fame, dropping off the ballot several years ago with just 2.4% of the vote. I think Felix is a weaker candidate than Santana, though the evolving view and standards for starting pitchers, as well as a weaker overall ballot, may get King Felix over the 5% bar.