CC Sabathia officially became the latest longtime Yankee to reach the Baseball Hall of Fame when the voting by the Baseball Writers Association of America was announced Tuesday night, sending Sabathia to Cooperstown along with Ichiro Suzuki and former Mets reliever Billy Wagner.
Other bits of intrigue ahead of Tuesday's 6 p.m. announcement: Will CC Sabathia be a first-ballot Hall of Famer, and is this the year Billy Wagner gets in?
The New York Yankees are the winningest team in Major League Baseball history, and they have had countless household names play for them over the years. From Hall of Famers to current superstars, the Yankees have it all when it comes to talented players over the years.
In Ichiro Suzuki, CC Sabathia and Billy Wagner, the Baseball Writers Association delivered quite an eclectic trifecta to Cooperstown on Tuesday. The first Japanese player ever elected to the Hall of Fame,
CC Sabathia’s career ended abruptly. Yes, the longtime Yankees left-hander had announced months earlier his plans to retire after the 2019 season, but his final appearance did not go as ceremoniously as Derek Jeter’s or Mariano Rivera’s.
After his election into the baseball Hall of Fame on Tuesday, CC Sabathia said he wants a Yankees logo on the cap on his plaque in Cooperstown. “I love the other organizations,” Sabathia said. “But this is home. I found a home in the Bronx and I don't think I'll ever leave this city, so I think it’s only fitting.”
Ichiro Suzuki missed unanimous election to the Baseball Hall of Fame by one vote Tuesday night when he headlined a three-player class selected by the 394 voting members of the Baseball Writers Association of America.
Ichiro Suzuki became the first Japanese player chosen for baseball’s Hall of Fame, falling one vote shy of unanimous when he was elected Tuesday along with CC Sabathia and Billy Wagner.
Ichiro falls a vote short of being the second unanimous choice ever. CC makes it in his first year of eligibility, Wagner in his last. The recent ballot glut has cleared.
In electing Wagner, the BBWAA has defined the modern-day closer as its own entity, with candidates’ credentials measured not against the whole of the body but against this specific peer group.
Ichiro Suzuki, the first Japanese-born player elected to Major League Baseball's Hall of Fame, reacted humorously Thursday to the one vote that he did not secure. The voting results Tuesday showed Ichiro coming up one vote shy of becoming the second player to be unanimously voted into the hall after former New York Yankees closer Mariano Rivera.