The following article is part of my ongoing look at the candidates on the 2026 Contemporary Baseball Era Committee ballot. For a detailed introduction to this year’s ballot, use the navigation tool above. An introduction to JAWS can be found here.

Though he won the Rookie of the Year award, a Cy Young, and a World Series all in his first full season while beginning a six-year streak of All-Star selections — the first of those as the game’s starter — Fernando Valenzuela wasn’t just a star pitcher. He was an international icon, the centerpiece of a cultural phenomenon, and a beloved global ambassador who brought generations of Mexican American and Latino fans to baseball while helping to heal the wounds caused by the building of Dodger Stadium, the very ballpark in which he starred.

“Roberto Clemente is ‘The Great One,’ but culturally, Fernando Valenzuela has been more significant in terms of bringing a fan base that didn’t exist in baseball,” José de Jesus Ortiz, the first Latino president of the BBWAA, told author Erik Sherman for Daybreak at Chavez Ravine, a 2023 biography of Valenzuela. Sherman himself described the pitcher as “like a composite of the Beatles — only in Dodger blue. His appeal was universal.”

After excelling in a relief role during a September 1980 cup of coffee with the Dodgers — as a 19-year-old in the heat of a playoff race, no less — Valenzuela took the world by storm the following spring. Pressed into service as the Opening Day starter, he threw a five-hit shutout, then reeled off four more shutouts and six more complete games within his first eight starts, a span during which he posted a 0.50 ERA. Despite speaking barely a word of English, the portly portsider (listed at 5-foot-11 and 180 pounds, but generally presumed to be at least 20 pounds heavier) charmed the baseball world with his bashful smile while bedeviling hitters with impeccable command of his screwball, delivered following a high leg kick and a skyward gaze at the peak of his windup.

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The following article is part of my ongoing look at the candidates on the 2026 Contemporary Baseball Era Committee ballot. Originally written for the 2014 election at SI.com, it has been updated to reflect recent voting results as well as additional research. For a detailed introduction to this year’s ballot, use the navigation tool above. An introduction to JAWS can be found here.

Jeff Kent took a long time to find a home. Drafted by the Blue Jays in 1989, he passed through the hands of three teams that didn’t quite realize the value of what they had. Not until a trade to the Giants in November 1996 — prior to his age-29 season — did he really settle in. Once he did, he established himself as a standout complement to Barry Bonds, helping the Giants become perennial contenders and spending more than a decade as a middle-of-the-lineup force.

Despite his late-arriving stardom and a prickly personality that sometimes rubbed teammates and media the wrong way, Kent earned All-Star honors five times, won an MVP award, and helped four different franchises reach the playoffs a total of seven times. His résumé gives him a claim as the best-hitting second baseman of the post-1960 expansion era — not an iron-clad one, but not one that’s easily dismissed. For starters, he holds the all-time record for most home runs by a second baseman (not counting any other positions) with 351. That’s 35 more than Robinson Canó, 74 more than Ryne Sandberg, 85 more than Joe Morgan, and 87 more than Rogers Hornsby — all Hall of Famers, and in Hornsby’s case, one from before the expansion era. Among players with at least 7,000 plate appearances who spent at least half their time at second base, only Hornsby (.577) has a higher slugging percentage than Kent’s .500. From that latter set, only Hornsby (1.010) and another pre-expansion Hall of Famer, Charlie Gehringer (.884), have a higher OPS than Kent (.855). Read the rest of this entry »

The following article is part of my ongoing look at the candidates on the 2026 Contemporary Baseball Era Committee ballot. Originally written for the 2015 election at SI.com, it has been updated to reflect recent voting results as well as additional research. For a detailed introduction to this year’s ballot, use the navigation tool above. An introduction to JAWS can be found here.

Wherever Gary Sheffield went, he made noise, both with his bat and his voice. For the better part of two decades, he ranked among the game’s most dangerous hitters, a slugger with a keen batting eye and a penchant for contact that belied his quick, violent swing. For even longer than that, he was one of the game’s most outspoken players, unafraid to speak up when he felt he was being wronged and unwilling to endure a situation that wasn’t to his liking. He was a polarizing player, and hardly one for the faint of heart.

At the plate, Sheffield was viscerally impressive like few others. With his bat twitching back and forth like the tail of a tiger waiting to pounce, he was pure menace in the batter’s box. He won a batting title, launched over 500 home runs — he had 14 seasons with at least 20 and eight with at least 30 — and put many a third base coach in peril with some of the most terrifying foul balls anyone has ever seen. For as violent as his swing may have been, it was hardly wild; not until his late 30s did he strike out more than 80 times in a season, and in his prime, he walked far more often than he struck out.

Bill James wrote of Sheffield in the 2019 Bill James Handbook:

“In all the years that I have been with the Red Sox, 16 years now, there has never been a player the Red Sox were more concerned about, as an opponent, than Gary Sheffield. Sheffield was a dynamite hitter and a fierce competitor… When he was in the game, you knew exactly where he was from the first pitch to the last pitch. He conceded nothing; he was looking not only to beat you, but to embarrass you. He was on the highest level.”

Two decades before that, James referred to Sheffield as “an urban legend in his own mind,” referencing the slugger’s penchant for controversy. Sheffield found it before he ever reached the majors through his connection to his uncle, Dwight Gooden. He was drafted and developed by the Brewers, who had no idea how to handle such a volatile player and wound up doing far more harm than good. Small wonder then that from the time he was sent down midway through his rookie season after being accused of faking an injury, he was mistrustful of team management and wanted out. And when he wanted out — of Milwaukee, Los Angeles, or New York — he let everyone know it, and if a bridge had to burn, so be it; it was Festivus every day for Sheffield, who was always willing to air his grievances. Read the rest of this entry »

The following article is part of my ongoing look at the candidates on the 2026 Contemporary Baseball Era Committee ballot. Originally written for the 2015 election at SI.com, it has been expanded and updated. For a detailed introduction to this year’s ballot, use the tool above. An introduction to JAWS can be found here.

Though blessed with as much talent to crush a baseball as nearly anyone in his era, Carlos Delgado had a hard time getting the attention that his performance might have merited. Almost certainly, that owed something to the record numbers of balls flying out of the park during his heyday, with a proliferation of 30- or 40-homer seasons. That he spent the bulk of his prime in Toronto, arriving just after the Blue Jays’ back-to-back world championships but unable to aid in replicating that accomplishment, didn’t help either; not until late in his career would he reach the postseason.

Beyond that, Delgado didn’t fit the mold of what the public has come to expect from professional athletes. The controversies in which he was engulfed weren’t the garden-variety ones of so many other jocks — money, respect, performance-enhancing drugs, off-field lifestyle. No, they were bigger. In an age when most athletes shirk political stances because they can narrow their public appeal and impact their personal brands, Delgado was unafraid to protest against what he felt was wrong, even if his stance was unpopular. He spoke out against the United States Navy using part of his native Puerto Rico for bombing practice, and publicly opposed the war in Iraq. He took a stand by taking a seat (to borrow a headline from The New York Times), refusing to go through the motions during the post-9/11 ritual of “God Bless America” — an action that prefigured San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick’s kneeling during the national anthem to protest police brutality against people of color in 2016. Delgado was the conscientious slugger.

Deglado’s outspokenness and activism stemmed from his admiration for Hall of Famer and Puerto Rican hero Roberto Clemente. He died six months after Delgado was born, but his legacy of humanitarianism and fighting for social justice left a deep impression on Delgado. He wore Clemente’s no. 21 briefly with the Blue Jays and later with the Mets, and thanks to his charitable endeavors — 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. Read the rest of this entry »

The following article is part of my ongoing look at the candidates on the 2026 Contemporary Baseball Era Committee ballot. Originally written for the 2013 election at SI.com, it has been expanded and updated. For a detailed introduction to this year’s ballot, use the tool above. An introduction to JAWS can be found here.

Don Mattingly was the golden child of the Great Yankees Dark Age. He debuted in September 1982, the year after the team finished a stretch of four World Series appearances in six seasons, and retired in 1995 after finally reaching the postseason — a year too early for the franchise’s run of six pennants and four titles in eight years under Joe Torre.

A lefty-swinging first baseman with a sweet stroke, “Donnie Baseball” was both an outstanding hitter and a slick fielder at his peak. He made six straight All-Star teams from 1984 to ’89 and won a batting title, an MVP award, and nine Gold Gloves. Along the way, he battled with owner George Steinbrenner even while becoming the standard bearer of the pinstripes, the team captain, and something of a cultural icon. Alas, a back injury sapped his power, not only shortening his peak, but also bringing his career to a premature end at age 34. At its root, the problem was that Mattingly was so driven to succeed that he overworked himself in the batting cage.

“Donnie was one of the hardest workers I had ever seen and played with. He would go in the cage before batting practice and take batting practice. And after batting practice was over, he’d take batting practice,” former teammate Ron Guidry said for a 2022 MLB Network documentary, Donnie Baseball (for which this scribe was also interviewed).

“I should have learned quicker to not to beat my body up, and if I did less, I could perform better,” said Mattingly for the same documentary. Read the rest of this entry »

The following article is part of my ongoing look at the candidates on the 2026 Contemporary Baseball Era Committee ballot. Originally written for the 2013 election at SI.com, it has been expanded and updated. For a detailed introduction to this year’s ballot, use the tool above. An introduction to JAWS can be found here.

It took four position changes — from catcher to first base, then left field, right field, and finally center field — and parts of five major league seasons for the Braves to figure out where the 6-foot-4 Dale Murphy fit. Once they did, they had themselves a franchise centerpiece, a wholesome, milk-drinking superstar whom Sports Illustrated profiled for its July 4, 1983 cover story by proclaiming, “Murphy’s Law is Nice Guys Finish First.”

The title was a reference to the slugger helping the Braves to an NL West title the previous year, their lone playoff appearance during the 1970-90 stretch. “Here’s a guy who doesn’t drink, smoke, chew or cuss,” wrote Steve Wulf. “Here’s a guy who has time for everyone, a guy who’s slow to anger and eager to please, a guy whose agent’s name is Church. His favorite movie is Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life. He’s a wonderful ballplayer.” Let the record show that Wulf did unearth some dirt on Murphy, noting that he once got a speeding ticket for doing 35 in a 25-mph zone… while running late to speak to a church group.

Murphy won the first of his back-to-back MVP awards in 1982 as well as the first of his five consecutive Gold Gloves, and made his second of seven All-Star teams. He would spend most of the 1980s as one of the game’s best players. Alas, knee problems turned him into a shadow of the player he once was while he was still in his early 30s, and he played his final game in the majors at age 37. Read the rest of this entry »

The champagne and tears have barely dried in the wake of this year’s instant-classic World Series, but election season is already upon us. On Monday, the National Baseball Hall of Fame officially unveiled the 2026 Contemporary Baseball Era Committee ballot, an eight-man slate covering players who made their greatest impact on the game from 1980 to the present and whose eligibility on the BBWAA ballot has lapsed. For the second year in a row, the Hall stole its own thunder, as an article in the Winter 2025 volume of its bimonthly Memories and Dreams magazine revealed the identities of the eight candidates prior to the official announcement. The mix includes some — but not all — of the controversial characters who have slipped off the writers’ ballot in recent years, including Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens, as well as a couple surprises. This cycle also marks the first application of a new rule that could shape future elections.

Assembled by the Historical Overview Committee, an 11-person group of senior BBWAA members, the ballot includes Bonds, Clemens, and fellow holdovers Don Mattingly and Dale Murphy, as well as newcomers Carlos Delgado, Jeff Kent, Gary Sheffield, and Fernando Valenzuela. As with any Hall election, this one requires 75% from the voters to gain entry. In this case, the panel — whose members won’t be revealed until much closer to election time — will consist of Hall of Famers, executives, and media members/historians, each of whom may tab up to three candidates when they meet on Sunday, December 7, at the Winter Meetings in Orlando. Anyone elected will be inducted alongside those elected by the BBWAA (whose own ballot will be released on November 17) on July 26, 2026 in Cooperstown. In the weeks before that, I’ll cover each candidate’s case in depth here at FanGraphs.

This is the fourth ballot since the Hall of Fame reconfigured its Era Committee system into a triennial format in April 2022, after a bumper crop of six honorees was elected by the Early Baseball and Golden Days Era Committees the previous December. The current format splits the pool of potential candidates into two timeframes: those who made their greatest impact on the game before 1980 (Classic Baseball Era), including Negro Leagues and pre-Negro Leagues Black players, and those who made their greatest impact from 1980 to the present day (Contemporary Baseball Era). The Contemporary group is further split into two ballots, one for players whose eligibility on BBWAA ballots has lapsed (Fred McGriff was elected in December 2022), and one for managers, executives, and umpires (Jim Leyland was elected in December 2023). Non-players from the Classic timeframe are lumped in with players, which doesn’t guarantee representation on the final ballot. Read the rest of this entry »

For a good chunk of this season, a third MVP award for Aaron Judge looked inevitable. As late as May 21, he still had a batting average above .400 (.402/.491/.755, good for a 236 wRC+). As late as July 25, he had played every game and was on pace for 58 homers. And as late as August 6, he still had a slugging percentage above .700 (.339/.446/.702).

Unfortunately, a right flexor strain suffered while attempting to throw a runner out at the plate on July 22 sent Judge to the injured list a few day later. While he spent only the minimum 10 days on the IL, his bat cooled off, and now he’s neck-and-neck with Cal Raleigh in the AL MVP race. But even if he doesn’t win, the 33-year-old Judge has done something very impressive. In just his 10th major league season, he’s surpassed the JAWS standard for right fielders, which is to say that he’s got a higher score (58.5) than the average enshrinee at the position (56.0).

With that distinction, Judge joins Mike Trout and Mookie Betts among active players to reach the JAWS standard at their positions by the time they fulfilled the Hall of Fame’s 10-year eligibility requirement (playing in parts of 10 seasons, not accruing 10 years of service time). That’s the province of legends; among position players whose careers crossed into the 21st century, the only others to attain that distinction are Jeff Bagwell, Barry Bonds, Ken Griffey Jr., Rickey Henderson, Mike Piazza, Albert Pujols, Cal Ripken Jr., and Alex Rodriguez. That makes Judge an apt choice to lead off the third and final installment of this year’s annual Hall of Fame progress series (pitchers and catchers are here, infielders here). Note that unless otherwise indicated, all WAR figures within refer to the Baseball Reference version, and all statistics are through September 1. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s been a big season for Manny Machado — a revival, as I termed it in June. After being hampered by tennis elbow in 2022 and ’23, then limited to DH duty in early ’24 while recovering from surgery to repair the extensor tendon in that troublesome right elbow, he’s played in all 132 games for the Padres, who ended the weekend tied for first place in the NL West with the Dodgers.

Along the way, Machado has collected some milestones. He clubbed his 350th home run, a two-run shot off the Giants’ Robbie Ray, on June 5, and he collected his 2,000th hit, an infield single off the Diamondbacks’ Zac Gallen, on July 7, the day after his 33rd birthday. By industry convention, based on a player’s age on June 30 of that season, Machado became just the 12th player to reach both milestones in his age-32 season or earlier, joining Hall of Famers Henry Aaron, Jimmie Foxx, Lou Gehrig, Ken Griffey Jr., Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, Mel Ott, and Frank Robinson, future Hall of Famers Miguel Cabrera and Albert Pujols, and cautionary tale Alex Rodriguez. That makes him an apt choice to lead off this installment of my annual Hall of Fame progress series; I checked on pitchers and catchers last week, and will cover outfielders and unicorns next week. Read the rest of this entry »

Last week, Kenley Jansen did his best to make life harder for his former team. Pitching for the Angels against the Dodgers in Anaheim, the 37-year-old closer secured the final three outs in a 7-4 victory on Monday, August 11. He gave up the go-ahead run in the ninth inning of a tied game on Tuesday by allowing a breathtaking solo homer to Shohei Ohtani, but the Angels came back, tying the score in the bottom of the ninth and winning in the 10th. On Wednesday, Jansen secured a sweep for the Angels by retiring Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman, and Will Smith in order. The loss knocked the Dodgers out of first place for the first time since August 27.

That the Dodgers have retaken the top spot doesn’t detract from what’s been a banner season for Jansen. Pitching for the sub-.500 Angels — his third team in four years since departing the Dodgers in free agency — he’s posted a 2.68 ERA, his lowest mark since 2021. While his 24.6% strikeout rate is a career low and his 4.01 FIP is just off a career high, he’s notched 23 saves in 24 attempts and is now fourth all-time at 470, eight saves shy of Lee Smith’s 478, which stood as the major league record from late 1997 until Trevor Hoffman surpassed it in late 2006. Smith and Hoffman are now in the Hall of Fame, and Jansen has solidified his position as the next reliever due for serious consideration for Cooperstown. Not only does he have a legitimate shot at becoming the third pitcher to reach 500 saves following Hoffman (who finished with 601) and Mariano Rivera (603), but he’s closing in on 2025 enshrinee Billy Wagner’s no. 6 ranking in Reliever JAWS (R-JAWS).

Admittedly, relief pitching is a strange place to start my annual Hall of Fame progress series, but for reasons that will soon become apparent, opening this rundown with the starting pitchers made less sense, and when I began writing this roundup, Jansen’s jump in JAWS surprised me as much as that of any player. At the end of 2023, Jansen was tied for 14th with Craig Kimbrel, but he climbed to 10th by the end of ’24 and is now seventh, closing in on Wagner. So we’re beginning here; in this batch, I’ll get to the starters and catchers as well. Unless otherwise indicated, all statistics are through Monday, August 18. Read the rest of this entry »