We are just five days away from Jan. 21, the day the Baseball Hall of Fame will announced the inductees for the Class of 2025.
Thanks to the Hall of Fame Ballot Tracker, created by Ryan Thibodaux and faithfully maintained by Anthony Calamis and Adam Dore, we can see how all the candidates are doing on the publicly released ballots — of which there are currently 163 out of an estimated 392 ballots likely to be returned.
Thus far, we have one player with a perfect record, one player with a near-perfect record and two more above the 75% threshold for election.
Which candidates have the most votes so far?
Four players have garnered at least 75% of the vote on publicly released ballots.
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Ichiro Suzuki — 100%, 163 votes
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CC Sabathia — 93.3%, 152 votes
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Billy Wagner — 84.7%, 138 votes
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Carlos Beltran — 80.4%, 131 votes
Since our previous update, Suzuki has remained perfect, Wagner has remained at the same percentage, and Sabathia and Beltran have seen their vote shares increase.
Both Suzuki and Sabathia are in their first year on the ballot. Beltran is in his third year, and Wagner is in his 10th and final year. If Wagner is not elected this year, he will no longer be eligible for induction by the BBWAA but will be eligible to be inducted through the various Era Committees.
Only 30% of all ballots were publicly known as of the previous update, but that number has jumped more than 10 percentage points since then to 41.1% now publicly known. Yet even with that percentage growing, having enough votes now doesn’t mean any of these candidates is a lock for induction. They all still need significant support on the remaining ballots to maintain 75% of the vote.
Here’s how many more votes each needs to hit the 75% threshold:
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Ichiro Suzuki — 131 votes
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CC Sabathia — 142 votes
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Billy Wagner — 156 votes
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Carlos Beltran — 163 votes
To become the second ever unanimous Hall of Fame inductee (after Mariano Rivera), Suzuki needs votes on every remaining ballot, both public and private — approximately 229 total.
Who’s in danger of falling off the ballot?
As mentioned, Billy Wagner is in his 10th and final year of eligibility and will fall off the ballot after this year no matter what.
A player is removed from next year’s Hall of Fame ballot if he fails to garner at least 5% of the vote in the current year. Beyond Wagner, there are 11 players in danger of falling off next year’s ballot.
Below are the players who have less than 5% support on the publicly revealed ballots and how many votes they need to remain on the ballot for 2026.
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Russell Martin — 4.5%, needs 13 more votes
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Brian McCann — 3.8%, needs 14 more votes
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Ian Kinsler — 2.6%, needs 16 more votes
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Torii Hunter — 1.3%, needs 18 more votes
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Ben Zobrist — 0.0%, needs 20 more votes
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Troy Tulowitzki — 0.0%, needs 20 more votes
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Fernando Rodney — 0.0%, needs 20 more votes
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Hanley Ramirez — 0.0%, needs 20 more votes
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Adam Jones — 0.0%, needs 20 more votes
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Curtis Granderson — 0.0%, needs 20 more votes
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Carlos Gonzalez — 0.0%, needs 20 more votes
Of those players, 10 are in their first year on the ballot. The only exception is Torii Hunter, who is in his fifth year. Russell Martin was above 5% as of the previous update but has seen his support wane over the past week as more ballots have been revealed and is now in danger of falling off next year’s ballot.
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