Next week, the BBWAA will announce which players will be entering the Baseball Hall of Fame. But, what's coming in the next few years?
The 2025 Election:
Thanks to Ryan Thibodaux and his yearly Hall of Fame tracker (which can be found, here), along with the work from Jason Sardell- who has looked at historical data and trends of voting and run some analysis- the baseball world can confidently expect that the 2025 Baseball Hall of Fame class will include three more names:
Ichiro Suzuki,
C.C. Sabathia,
and Billy Wagner.
Meanwhile, the likes of Carlos Beltran and Andruw Jones will both come up short, yet likely within 10% of the threshold needed for induction (75%). Outside of these two, it is unlikely that any of the remaining candidates on the ballot finish with 50% of the vote or more.
Personally, in this class, I would vote for the following players: Ichiro Suzuki, C.C. Sabathia, Billy Wagner, Alex Rodriguez, Manny Ramirez, Carlos Beltran, Chase Utley, Andruw Jones, and Andy Pettitte.
So, let me look forward and try to make some predictions about the next 5 years (2026-2030) of Hall of Fame classes as well as a bigger picture of the future of the Baseball Hall of Fame.
The 2030 Election:
Today's post is going to be a little bit different from the last four days. As of right now, there are only two known candidates for the class of 2030: Charlie Blackmon and Brandon Crawford. That's because these two are the only players who have officially retired after playing their last games during the 2024 season and also meeting the 10+ year requirement.
When looking at those two, to start, let's get this out of the way: neither are future Hall of Famers. Just look at their bWAR:
Charlie Blackmon (+21.3 bWAR): No.
Brandon Crawford (+29.4 bWAR): No.
Instead, here is a list of all the current free agent players with 10+ seasons of service time who played in 2024. This gives us an interesting field for who else could make up the newcomers to the ballot for the class of 2030. This list is not complete, however, as some players with fewer than 10 seasons of service time have played in parts of 10 seasons, meeting the standard for the Hall of Fame.
Note: This list is in reverse order of service time; as of 12:00 PM on January 12th, 2025.
Clayton Kershaw, Max Scherzer, David Robertson, Jason Heyward, Kenley Jansen, Justin Turner, Jesse Chavez, Craig Kimbrel, Carlos Carrasco, Lance Lynn, Adam Ottavino, Wade Miley, J.D. Martinez, Anthony Rizzo, Matt Carpenter, Drew Smyly, Jose Quintana, Yasmani Grandal, Patrick Corbin, Martin Maldonado, Joe Kelly, Jordan Lyles, Jake Diekman, Matt Moore, Yan Gomes, Will Smith, Alex Wood, Kyle Gibson, Jurickson Profar, Jose Iglesias, David Peralta, Kevin Pillar, Anthony DeSclafani, Robbie Grossman, Enrique Hernandez, Jose Abreu, Randal Grichuk, James McCann, Kirby Yates, Andrew Chafin, and Nick Ahmed.
Of these players, the following have bWAR's above +30:
Clayton Kershaw (+79.4), Max Scherzer (+75.4), Jason Heyward (+41.8), Justin Turner (+38.3), Jose Abreu (+30.3), Lance Lynn (+30.0).
So, what is the case-by-case for each of these remaining 6 players?
Clayton Kershaw: While Kershaw declined a $10 Million player option for the 2025 season back in November, all likelihoods point towards him returning to the Dodgers. He's stated that he will be a "Dodger for life" and it's expected that he'll sign a 2 year deal, bumping his clear Hall of Fame candidacy/enshrinement back until at least 2032.
Max Scherzer: Another free agent pitcher who will become a Hall of Famer, Max Scherzer is also on the record stating that he is not going to willingly retire. However, these comments were made back in August while his 2024 season was mired by three different IL stints (back, shoulder, hamstring). I think retirement is going to be less about Scherzer's intent and more about what teams will be willing to take a shot on him. Ultimately, some team will, and Scherzer will stave back his Hall of Fame call until at least 2031.
Jason Heyward: I remember reading about how Jason Heyward was the heir apparent to the Home Run king throne when I was a kid and when he came into the league in 2010. Unfortunately for him, the expected power swing of his never flourished. Yet, he still has had a very productive and commendable career. While Heyward himself has not commented publicly on his desires to try and continue playing in 2025, most rumors surrounding him point towards retirement for the veteran star. This would place him in a currently weak Hall of Fame class of 2030, which could help his case tremendously.
Justin Turner: Justin Turner has expressed that he is "100 percent" planning on continuing to play in the MLB in 2025, and he also also expressed his desires to return to the Dodgers, of which there may be some momentum. He's still an above-average bat (though below-average defender) and I could see him playing in a platoon behind Freddie Freeman at first, Max Muncy at third, and Shohei Ohtani at DH to spread rest around the team. All that being said, Turner's Hall of Fame case is not particularly strong, unless he finds himself into the "David Wright" mold as a boosted player due to his beloved status as a Dodger.
Jose Abreu: After being released by the Houston Astros in mid-June of 2024, and being able to offer a team a player at a league minimum salary, nobody came calling for the services of Jose Abreu. There are some grumblings around a potential one-year reunion for a retirement tour with the White Sox, but I personally don't buy it. Nor would I buy any stock into Jose Abreu's future Hall of Fame case.
Lance Lynn: Rumors are, Lance Lynn is going to retire. He got his feel-good story by going back to the Cardinals for 2024, and he won't be back. He'll be remembered again in 2030 for a short time, and then he'll quickly drop off the Hall of Fame ballot. While he was a "Cardinal", his tenure there was just 7 years, which doesn't quite make it to the "beloved player" mark as others I've considered in this series.
So, it looks like the newcomers to the class of 2030 is largely going to be headlined by Jason Heyward.
Jeez.
Like the classes of 2026 and 2027, this will be another generally weak grouping of players.
This is Part 5 of a 5-Part article series this week where I discuss the upcoming 5 years of the Baseball Hall of Fame ballot.
Click here to see my article about the Class of 2026. Click here to see my article about the Class of 2027. Click here to see my article about the Class of 2028.
Click here to see my article about the Class of 2029.
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