I’m just going to go with what Jay Jaffe says here.
On an eight-man Hall of Fame ballot featuring three players who were linked to performance-enhancing drugs, and four others who had shortened careers that ended by age 37 due to declines accelerated by injuries, it appeared from the outset of this cycle that Jeff Kent — a former MVP who holds the record for most home runs by a second baseman — had the easiest path to a plaque. Sure enough, when the votes from the 16-member Contemporary Baseball Era Committee were counted at the Winter Meetings on Sunday in Orlando, Kent was the lone candidate elected to the Hall. He’ll be inducted on July 26, 2026 in Cooperstown alongside any candidates elected by the BBWAA.
Meanwhile, in a repudiation that echoed the one that he received from the 2023 edition of this committee, Kent’s former Giants teammate and clubhouse nemesis Barry Bonds again received fewer than five votes. So did Roger Clemens (again) and first-timer Gary Sheffield, the two other candidates connected to PEDs, as well as the late Fernando Valenzuela. Based on a new rule introduced earlier this year, all four are ineligible for consideration on the 2029 Contemporary Baseball ballot, assuming the format goes unchanged; the earliest they can next appear is the 2032 ballot, to be voted on in December 2031. If any of those candidates again slips into the fewer-than-five zone, they will be ineligible for future consideration, period — an aspect of the rule that appears ripe for abuse given the heavy hand the Hall has demonstrated when choosing its committees.
Astute readers of my coverage will note that those four candidates were the ones from this ballot whom I endorsed for election. I argued that Valenzuela, who barely made a dent in two years on the BBWAA ballot (2003–04), should be considered primarily as a modern-day pioneer for serving as a beloved global ambassador and international icon who brought generations of Mexican American and Latino fans to baseball. That’s on top of a very good — but not Hall-caliber — playing career which included six All-Star selections and four top-five finishes in the Cy Young voting, highlighted by his incredible age-20 season, in which he won the NL Rookie of the Year and Cy Young awards, led the Dodgers to their first championship in 16 years, and emerged as the centerpiece of a cultural phenomenon, Fernandomania.
As for Bonds, Clemens, and Sheffield, this was an extension of the support I gave them during their tenures on the BBWAA ballot, first virtually and then once I joined the voting pool starting with the 2021 cycle. All three were among the very best of their day, with Bonds and Clemens perhaps the best position player and pitcher of all time — period. As for their connections to PEDs, I’ve long drawn a distinction between PED use that dated to the time before testing and penalties were in place, when a complete institutional failure prevented the league and the union from adopting a coherent drug policy. This isn’t a fringe view within the BBWAA electorate, either. Particularly once Bud Selig, who as commissioner presided over the game’s steroid mess, was elected to the Hall via the 2017 Today’s Game election, all three received support from a substantial majority of Hall voters, climbing to at least 63% by the end of their runs on the ballot (2022 for Bonds and Clemens, 2024 for Sheffield).
Judged by the outcome, this committee was far less forgiving on that front.
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Even with five of this ballot’s eight candidates ruled out for 2029, the 11-member BBWAA Historical Overview Committee that creates the next slate faces a challenge, as the list of intriguing candidates is only growing. Setting aside the PED-linked Manny Ramirez, who with two positive tests isn’t going to leapfrog Bonds et al. into Cooperstown, candidates who could fill those vacancies in 2029 include [Lou] Whitaker and Dwight Evans, both frozen out after solid showings on the 2020 Modern Baseball ballot, plus Jim Edmonds, Keith Hernandez, Kenny Lofton, Johan Santana, and Omar Vizquel, none of whom has appeared on an Era Committee ballot before.
With its reputation for cronyism and for choosing candidates who don’t measure up to their BBWAA-elected brethren, the Era Committees, like the Veterans Committees before them, have often invited criticism and even cynicism. Perhaps the joke is on any of us who looked at this slate and dared to imagine that this time it could be different, that voters could break free of past patterns by finding nuance within the Steroid Era, or even break new ground by recognizing a modern-day pioneer. In the end, the only consensus reached was on the ballot’s safest pick. Welcome to the byzantine world of Cooperstown, Jeff Kent.
There’s a decent chance that Pete Rose could soon get elected to the Hall of Fame, so I have a lot less tolerance for the usual preening about PEDs, and that’s before we get to the raw deal that guys like Gary Sheffield have dealt with. I’m fine with Jeff Kent being elected, but the issue is who has been bypassed and overlooked while others have been ushered in. Those are bigger questions for another day. Congrats to Jeff Kent, good luck to everyone else. ESPN has more.
Hypocrites, as various veterans committees have voted in Bud Selig and three “knowing” managers as well.