Latino baseball celebrates Vlad’s Cooperstown induction

Another Hall of Famer expressing his joy on social media was Juan Marichal, the first Dominican elected to Cooperstown. “This is big @VladGuerrero27 Welcome to Cooperstown #hof2018,” Marichal posted in Spanish.

Dominican pride

How big was it? Vlad is the third Dominican — and the first hitter from a country renowned for free-swinging sluggers — to be inducted, following in the footsteps of aces Marichal (1983) and Pedro Martínez (2015). Vlad, 42, is the youngest of the 77 living members of the Hall of Fame. A bad-ball hitter extraordinaire, he obtained 392 out of 422 votes, raising the bar among the 14 Latino players and executives enshrined in Cooperstown. That’s good for 92.9 percent of the vote, surpassing Roberto Clemente (92.7), Pedro Martínez (91.1), Rod Carew (90.5) and Roberto Alomar (90.0) for the best Latino results to date. Vlad, who was active all day long on social media, waited for the call from Jane Forbes Clark, Hall of Fame chair, and Jack O’Connell, BBWAA’s secretary-treasurer, at his home on Long Island, N.Y. Surrounded by friends and family, he smiled and accepted hug after hug before posing in front of the Dominican flag. When he finally got a chance to get back on social media, he thanked the BBWAA and dedicated the honor to the Dominican Republic.

Proud Pedro

Guerrero received a special message from Pedro Martínez, who Skyped MLB Network to speak directly to Vlad. “I’m just like an older brother that feels really proud,” Pedro said, posting the interview on his Twitter page.

Venezuelan Bobby Abreu — who played with Guerrero in 2009 with the Angels — posted his congratulations on Instagram. Abreu, who hit .291 over 18 seasons, will be eligible for Cooperstown in 2020.

Fellow countryman Albert Pujols, who seems destined to join Vlad in Cooperstown, also congratulated Guerrero, Jones, Thome and Hoffman.

Vlad played 16 seasons with the Expos, Angels, Rangers and Orioles, hitting .318/.379/.553 with 449 home runs and 2,496 RBI. He could rake and was always worth the price of admission.

So close, so far

Édgar Martínez finished with 297 votes, just 20 votes below the 317 necessary to reach the 75 percent threshold. After nine years on the ballot, the legendary DH will have one more chance in front of the BBWAA judges. He can be consoled by the fact that he is trending upward. He jumped from 58.6 percent support last year to 70.4 percent this time. “It will be good if I’m elected (next year), but if doesn’t happen, I must be prepared for it, too,” he said in an MLB teleconference from Seattle. He made sure to thank fans and express hope for next year on social media.

Édgar, now the hitting coach for the Mariners, then congratulated the Hall of Fame’s new members.

Major League Baseball’s annual designated hitter award is named the Édgar Martínez Award.

Good start for Vizquel

In his first time around, Omar Vizquel obtained 156 votes, or 37 percent, easily allowing him to remain on the ballot. Among those who supported Vizquel’s candidacy was Sandy Alomar Jr., his Cleveland Indians teammate. In Alomar’s opinion, voters focused too much on Vizquel’s bat and not enough on his defensive skills. “He’d stop the ball with his feet like he was playing soccer and then it would pop up and he would grab it with his glove,” Alomar marveled in an interview with MLB.com’s Cleveland Indians reporter Jordan Bastian.

One-and-done

Players on the ballot needed a minimum of five percent to remain eligible. Among first-year players who missed the cut were Liván Hernández and Carlos Lee, each who got one vote, and Carlos Zambrano, who was shut out. But no ballot rookie felt greater pain than Venezuelan lefty Johan Santana, who won two Cy Young Awards in a stretch of five years and was recently elected to the Twins Hall of Fame. Santana obtained only 10 votes, or 2.4 percent, and he is officially one-and-done. Another first-year candidate, Andruw Jones, who was born in Curacao, received 31 votes, or 7.3 percent. Manny Ramírez, in his second year, earned 93 votes, or 22 percent. Sammy Sosa, in his sixth year, failed to gain any momentum, garnering barely 33 votes, or 7.8 percent. Poor Sammy. So many home runs, and so much ground to make up if he ever wants reach Cooperstown. As Édgar can surely tell him, sometimes it’s a long wait.

Featured Image: La Vida Baseball