The Baseball Writers' Association of America inducted four players to the National Baseball Hall of Fame on Tuesday. Jeff Idelson, the president of the Hall of Fame, announced the Class of 2015 on the MLB Network.
The BBWAA elected four candidates for the first time since 1955 and three starting pitchers in the same class for the first time ever. Randy Johnson (97.3%), Pedro Martinez (91.1%), John Smoltz (82.9%) and Craig Biggio (82.7%) will be inducted to the Hall of Fame on July 26 in Cooperstown, New York. Here is the Class of 2015:
Randy Johnson, SP
"The Big Unit" pitched 22 seasons in the MLB and won five overall Cy Young Awards, including one with the Seattle Mariners in 1995 and four consecutive with the Arizona Diamondbacks from 1999-2002. The now first-ballot Hall of Famer led the MLB in earned run average for the 2001 season and his respective league in '95, '99 and '02. Johnson owns a career record of 303-166 with a 3.29 ERA, 1.17 WHIP and 4,875 strikeouts in 618 games (603 starts) with the Montreal Expos, Seattle Mariners, Arizona Diamondbacks, New York Yankees and San Francisco Giants.
Pedro Martinez, SP
Martinez amassed 18 MLB seasons with the Los Angeles Dodgers, Montreal Expos, Boston Red Sox, New York Mets and Philadelphia Phillies. He led the entire league in ERA five separate times ('97, '99, '00, '02 and '03) and owns the sixth-highest winning percentage in baseball history (.687) with his 219-100 career record. The eight-time All-Star won the Cy Young Award three times and was runner-up twice. He owns a 2.93 ERA, 1.05 WHIP and 3,154 strikeouts in 476 games (409 starts). He's now a first-ballot Hall of Famer.
John Smoltz, SP, RP
Smoltz began his career as a starter and was then converted to a reliever after undergoing Tommy John surgery and missing the entire 2000 season. He then went back to the starting rotation after four seasons as a reliever for the Atlanta Braves. As a starter, the right-hander was 209-149 with a 3.40 ERA, 1.19 WHIP and 2,804 strikeouts in 481 games. In 242 career games as a reliever, Smoltz maintained a 2.41 ERA, 0.98 WHIP, 154 saves and 280 strikeouts. In 21 MLB seasons (20 with the Atlanta Braves), Smoltz owns a career record of 213-155 with a 3.33 ERA, 1.17 WHIP and 3,084 strikeouts in 723 games (481 starts). Another first-balloter here.
Craig Biggio, 2B, OF, C
Biggio spent his entire career with the Houston Astros (20 seasons) and is 21st on the all-time hit list with 3,060. He also has the most doubles by a right-handed hitter in history (668) and is the only player in history to accumulate 3,000 hits, 600 doubles, 400 stolen bases and 250 home runs. The seven-time All-Star also won five Silver Slugger Awards and four Gold Gloves at second base. He was elected to the Hall of Fame after his third year on the ballot and owns a career stat line of .281/.363/.433 in 2,850 career games. He now works in the Houston Astros' front office.
As for other notable players, Mike Piazza (69.9%) and Jeff Bagwell (55.7%) fell short of the 75% voting percentage threshold for election.
Here's the complete list of the voting results from BBWAA provided by NBC Sports' HardballTalk. The maximum amount of votes a candidate can recieve is 549.
Votes Player Percentage 534 Randy Johnson 97.3% 500 Pedro Martinez 91.1% 455 John Smoltz 82.9% 454 Craig Biggio 82.7% 384 Mike Piazza 69.9% 306 Jeff Bagwell 55.7% 302 Tim Raines 55.0% 215 Curt Schilling 39.2% 206 Roger Clemens 37.5% 202 Barry Bonds 36.8% 166 Lee Smith 30.2% 148 Edgar Martinez 27.0% 138 Alan Trammell 25.1% 135 Mike Mussina 24.6% 77 Jeff Kent 14.0% 71 Fred McGriff 12.9% 65 Larry Walker 11.8% 64 Gary Sheffield 11.7% 55 Mark McGwire 10.0% 50 Don Mattingly 9.1% 36 Sammy Sosa 6.6% 30 N. Garciaparra 5.5% 21 Carlos Delgado 3.8% 4 Troy Percival 0.7% 2 Aaron Boone 0.4% 2 Tom Gordon 0.4% 1 Darin Erstad 0.2% 0 Rich Aurilia 0.0% 0 Tony Clark 0.0% 0 Jermaine Dye 0.0% 0 Cliff Floyd 0.0% 0 Brian Giles 0.0% 0 Eddie Guardado 0.0% 0 Jason Schmidt 0.0%
