Jeter on track to join Rivera at 100 pct.
Derek Jeter followed Mariano Rivera into the major leagues less than a week after Rivera’s debut in 1995. With a week left before voting closes on this year’s Baseball Hall of Fame class, Jeter is in line to follow Rivera into Cooperstown as the second player elected unanimously.
As of Tuesday afternoon, ballots tallied by the Twitter account @NotMrTibbs indicated Jeter had received a vote on all 56 ballots made available. History indicates Jeter has a long way to go, since Rivera was named on each of the 425 ballots sent in last year.
The results won’t be announced until Jan. 21, but Rivera made it clear last year he expected Jeter to reach the same threshold he did.
“If it was me, it would be 1,000 percent,’’ Rivera said at Yankee Stadium in August when asked if he believed Jeter would also be voted in unanimously. “Forget about 100 percent. I played with Derek for so many years, and seeing him day in and day out, and seeing the way he played the game and respected the game, I don’t see why not. Obviously I don’t vote, but I don’t see why not.”
In 2016, Ken Griffey Jr. fell just three votes short of becoming the first unanimous inductee, receiving 99.32 percent of the vote.
Larry Walker, in his 10th year on the ballot, was on 85.7 percent of the ballots tallied by @NotMrTibbs, while Curt Schilling was at 83.9 in his eighth year. Both would reach the 75 percent cutoff for enshrinement at their current pace.
Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds — controversial candidates due to their ties to performance-enhancing drugs — were both at 73.2 percent, leaving them just short after they got just under 60 percent of the vote a year ago.
No other candidates were at 50 percent as of Tuesday.
Ted Simmons and former MLBPA union chief Marvin Miller were selected by the veteran’s committee earlier this month and will be enshrined at the ceremony in Cooperstown in July.