If Harold Baines is in the Hall of Fame, Edgar Martinez should be too.
LAS VEGAS — If this doesn’t lead to the election of Edgar Martinez to the Baseball Hall of Fame, what will?
“This” is news Sunday evening that the Today’s Game Era Committee (1988-present) elected DH Harold Baines, as well as closer Lee Smith, to the Baseball Hall of Fame. The two will share the stage in Cooperstown, N.Y., next July with however many other inductees are voted in by 75 percent of voting members of the BBWAA, who have until the end of this month to vote.
Martinez, the first great DH (David Ortiz is the other), has career stats that essentially dwarf those of Baines, yet he is in his last-chance year to be elected the old-fashioned way, by BBWAA voters. Next year, his name will be off the ballot and his only chance of getting in will be if some future committee deems him worthy. Martinez came the closest yet last year to being voted in when he received 70.4 percent of the vote. Traditionally, voters come around to a former great on his final year of eligibility (see Tim Raines two years ago) but the vote by the Today’s Game Era Committee may inadvertently become the final nudge voters need, unless they want the embarrassment of not having Martinez stand with Baines on the stage as well.
