Outside of an unlikely late surge over the next few weeks, Mariners icon Félix Hernández won’t be elected into the National Baseball Hall of Fame during this voting cycle.
There is, however, new hope that King Félix could find a new throne in Cooperstown someday.
In his second year on the Baseball Writers’ Association of America Hall of Fame ballot, Hernández has received the largest increase on publicly known ballots of any of the 15 returning candidates, nearly tripling his support among Hall of Fame voters.
It’s a rather stunning development for Hernández, who had an encouraging debut as a Hall of Fame candidate a year ago, when he appeared on 20.6% of BBWAA ballots.
That number has ballooned to 58.8% for Hernández in Year 2, with roughly a quarter of the 428 ballots having been revealed as of Friday.
Candidates must receive 75% of the votes for induction into the Hall of Fame (and 5% to remain on the ballot the following year).
“We anticipated Félix would gain some ground this year, both because that’s a typical thing that happens when a candidate makes a second ballot and because this year’s ballot is relatively weak compared to most others in recent years,” said Ryan Thibodaux, who has operated a popular Hall of Fame online tracker since 2013.
“Instead of just making some progress, though, the results we’ve seen for Félix so far have been literally unlike anything we’ve ever seen since starting the ballot tracker project.”
The Hall of Fame will announce Jan. 20 the results of the Class of 2026 voting.
The deadline for BBWAA voters to submit ballots was Dec. 31, and many voters send their ballots to Thibodaux and his team to track before the Hall of Fame’s formal announcement.
One trend Thibodaux has noticed is Hernández’s popularity among first-time voters. Of the first 17 ballots he received from first-time voters, 15 had included Hernández.
“We anticipate a larger than usual number of first-time voters this year — perhaps 50 or more,” Thibodaux said. “If that level of support among the rookie voters holds, it could fuel further impressive overall gains.”
This year’s ballot includes 27 HOF candidates, with 12 retired players on the ballot for the first time. In addition to Hernández, two other former Mariners — Alex Rodriguez and Omar Vizquel — remain on the ballot.
With 114 BBWAA ballots revealed, Carlos Beltrán and Andruw Jones were the only two sitting above the 75% threshold for election. Here’s the top 15 vote-getters as of Friday (via bbhoftracker.com):
Carlos Beltrán, 87.7%
Andruw Jones, 82.5%
Chase Utley, 65.8%
Félix Hernández, 58.8%
Andy Pettitte, 55.3%
Alex Rodriguez, 50.9%
Manny Ramírez, 45.6%
Bobby Abreu, 41.2%
Cole Hamels, 31.6%
Jimmy Rollins, 28.9%
Dustin Pedroia, 26.3%
Mark Buehrle, 22.8%
David Wright, 19.3%
Omar Vizquel, 11.4%
Over the last decade, two other candidates — Larry Walker and Scott Rolen — have had considerable increases in voting from one year to the next, but neither were near the 38% jump Hernández has made so far.
Walker gained 22% support through the first 100 ballots in 2019, and Rolen had a 29% jump in 2020 at the same point. Worth noting: Both Walker and Rolen were eventually elected to the Hall of Fame.
Those cases do offer a potential glimpse at Hernández’s Hall of Fame trajectory over the next few years, but Thibodaux did caution that voting can fluctuate year by year.
Edgar Martínez’s odyssey on the BBWAA ballot is a good example of that; his numbers went up and down for a decade before he was finally elected in 2019 on his 10th and final year of eligibility.
And as they did last year, the support for Hernández will likely decline among voters who don’t wish to reveal their ballots publicly.
“It is nearly certain that Félix won’t finish nearly as high as his current result shows,” Thibodaux said. “However, if he can achieve a final result north of 40% in Year 2 … he’d be in an excellent position to be elected in the coming years.”