The Baseball Hall of Fame will have a chance to right a wrong this December and put a Dick Allen plaque in Cooperstown. Allen fell just one vote shy of Hall induction in both 2014 and 2021. He passed away in 2020 at the age of 78, in his home town of Wampum, PA.
Allen hit .292/.378/.533 (.912 OPS) in his 15-year major league career, with 1,848 hits, 351 home runs, and 1,119 RBI. He accumulated 58.7 WAR, as calculated by Baseball Reference, and posted a 156 OPS+.
He racked up seven career All-Star selections, won a Rookie of the Year award in 1964, and was the American League MVP in 1972. Allen played for the Phillies from 1963 through 1969, then returned to Philadelphia for the 1975 and 1976 seasons.
© Malcolm Emmons-USA T | 1964 Jan 1The Phillies retired Allen's jersey number (15) in 2020, an honor previously reserved for ex-Phils in the Hall of Fame.
"Let’s be candid here, when you look at the voting of the Hall or the record of the Veterans Committee, it’s not exactly consistent,” said Phillies principal owner John Middleton in 2020. “There’s a lot of times when you scratch your head.”
Alen's case for the Hall of Fame is strong:
- His career WAR would place him near the middle of the pack when compared to first basemen or third basemen already in the Hall.
- His career OPS+, a metric which adjusts OPS to make it comparable across baseball's various eras and ballparks, is higher than all but two hitters in MLB history that are not in the Hall of Fame (min. 7,000 plate appearances): Barry Bonds and Mark McGwire.
Data via stathead.comAllen simply dominated his era:
Dick Allen was an underrated player who dominated parts of the '60s and '70s. pic.twitter.com/uWtZ8QVdB1
But the BBWAA never gave him more than 18.9% of the vote before he fell off their ballot.
Mike Schmidt believes that Allen was kept out of the Hall of Fame because he spoke his mind as a Black man in the 1960s and 1970s, in the face of racial hostility. "Dick did the wrong thing; he became the best player on his team,” Schmidt said during Allen’s number retirement ceremony. “He became the star of the team. He was a sensitive Black man who refused to be treated as a second-class citizen . . . Dick has had to fight labels his entire life.”
From Middleton: "It makes [Allen's] extraordinary achievement even more special when you consider the circumstances, the conditions under which he had to live and perform."
Now, after falling one vote short in his previous two appearances on the Hall's "Golden Days Era Committee" ballot, a 16-member "Classic Baseball Era Committee" will consider Allen's case at the 2024 MLB winter meetings in December. Allen will need 12 of the 16 members (75%) to vote in favor of his induction.
Introducing the Classic Baseball Era Committee ballot for consideration in the Hall of Fame Class of 2025.
Results will be announced at 7:30 p.m. ET on Dec. 8: https://t.co/F6noThgQnT pic.twitter.com/yfI6neqfoY
Let's hope they get it right this time.
