The two candidates who received at least 75% of the vote and were elected are indicated in bold italics; candidates who have since been selected in subsequent elections are indicated in italics. (The award was voted at the December 2002 meeting of the BBWAA, dated 2002, and conferred in the summer 2003 ceremonies.). He is in the most important HOF- my heart and mind. The Dodgers won each. His screwgi wad unique, his defense won him gold gloves his hitting silver bats. At that point, Valenzuela was 5-0 with a 0.20 ERA, and everyone wanted to know when Fernando was going to pitch again. The Dodgers Spanish-language voice since 1959, Jarrn is without question worthy of his place in the broadcasters wing of the Hall of Fame.
Hall of Fame Inductee Fernando Valenzuela and his daughter attend the Just 6.2% in 2003 and 3.8 in 2004.
Jacob deGrom - Namuwiki He was also very playful when he got comfortable.. (Italics mark those subsequently elected. Nathalie Alonso is part of the editorial team of LasMayores.com, MLBs official Spanish-language website. We created this new class of player called Dodger Legends in our new center-field plaza. On-field excellence aside, his impact off the field for many people of Mexican and Latino heritage made Fernando so important. There are certain guys who, for me, impacted the game way beyond any kind of statistical analysis or the standard criteria that most voters use. Seriously, if commissioners can receive baseballs highest honor for creating the stage on which todays players perform, a player should be able to too. Elections to the Baseball Hall of Fame for 2003 proceeded in keeping with rules enacted in 2001. Long before we got here, they established a policy, which I agree with, and that is that we'll just use Hall of Fame people for retired numbers. How Palm Springs ran out Black and Latino families to build a fantasy for rich, white people, 17 SoCal hiking trails that are blooming with wildflowers (but probably not for long! "Fernando was one person and he obviously was a massive success, and he did bring tons of Mexican-American fans to the park, but it wasn't like every single person from those communities all of a sudden said, Because of Fernando, we're going to change our feelings and go to Dodgers games,'" Nusbaum says. I believe that the manager Tom Lasorda overused him with the excuse of Fernandomania frenzy of those days and that he was only thinking of making the Dodgers richer with the millions of fans that he brought to the park every time he pitched. The 2002 Baseball Hall of Fame Ballot Results are detailed in full by Baseball Almanac. Uh oh. 2002 Baseball Hall of Fame Voting Results. Instead Fernando went the whole way (he probably threw more than 140 pitches) and helped get the Dodgers on the path to winning the 1981 World Series. "He was an extremely important person in the history of baseball.. The audience that was won over by Valenzuela remains. Fernando Valenzuela played 17 seasons. I threw well -- nine innings, nine zeros. Each of the Dodgers retired numbers was worn by a player who played a majority of his career with the club and was later inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Ryne Sandberg was selected a total of ten times, while Eddie Murray (eight times), Lee Smith (seven), Fernando Valenzuela (six) and Tony Pea (five) were all selected at least five times. I have always tried to see first what I have to do in certain situations and with certain things, and then act. Back at sold-out Dodger Stadium, fans bought T-shirts with Valenzuelas name on the back, made their own or bought bootleg versions available all over the city. How many strikeouts did Fernando Valenzuela have? Didnt . He knew how to play the game. For my generation, Im talking Generation X, the children of Mexican immigrants that grew up in Southern California in the 1980s, hes not a myth, he was a hero. Why do they keep ignoring the fact that he was one of th e best? The next season, when he was only 20, Valenzuela energized fans in Los Angeles, Mexico and throughout the big leagues with one of the more remarkable seasons in baseball history. But with Valenzuela starting in Game 3 at Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles won, 5-4. The newly eligible candidates included 22 All-Stars, five of whom were not on the ballot, who were selected a total of 68 times.
While the ERA looks impressive, the Mexican Center League was a low-offense environment and three team staffs had lower ERAs. All fathers wanted their sons to be the next Fernando Valenzuela, and all of us kids would imitate his delivery, looking up to the sky, hands up in the air high and everything. No ifs or butts about it!!! Years later, Lopez made his own statement with a No. There are countless Mexican immigrants and Mexican-Americans in Los Angeles and across the country with stories like Lopezs. It didnt give us a shot in the arm, it gave us a shot in the heart because he gave us somebody to love forever. If theres someone [else] that can wear it, thats no problem. Players you saw at the end of their careers who were surprisingly good - posted in Trivia, Questions, Advice: Im looking for guys who surprised you how good they were once you were old enough to go back and look at their numbers. It was immediate, and it was powerful. The teams decades-long relationship with the Mexican and Mexican-American communities is complex. I think the players were as caught up as anyone else., Decades later, Valenzuela said his 1981 success was simple. Fernando Valenzuela was a Pitcher. The same applies. In his next seven starts, Valenzuela completed every game, a rarity. The last played in the majors during 1980 or 1981. How many of them impacted the fans like Fernando did? Fernando was in the inaugural class because of the impact he had here and because of the following he continues to have among our fanbase.. Players elected to the Hall of Fame fall into different categories: No matter why or how they got in, they are in the Hall of Fame. Bobby Cox, Bud Selig,John Schuerholz, Bruce Sutter, Bill Mazeroski, and many others without the qualifications of Valenzuela are in the Hall of Fame. On January 8, 2002, the Baseball Writers Association of America (BBWAA) conducted their yearly ballot for induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
Fernando Valenzuela - Wikipedia One thing is certain: Valenzuela broke barriers. Gwynn owns all-time Padres records for batting average, runs, hits, total bases, doubles, triples, RBIs, walks, stolen bases and games played. You can try refreshing the page, and if you're still having problems, just try again later. When we see managers, commissioners, and front office personnel elected to the Hall of Fame with sketchy contributions to the game, and players like Fernando Valenzuela are not, then something is wrong. 34. Walk-up sales increased from 8,000 to 12,000 fans on nights Valenzuela pitched. The most powerful people in the government were in line waiting so that a young man from Mexico who didnt speak English could sign an autograph for them, Jarrn said.
Why Fernando Valenzuela should be in Baseball Hall of Fame - Los I've spent the past 20 years or so making strong arguments in favor of performance standards for the Hall of Fame and using advanced statistics to try to cut through some of the superficialities, and I think it's clear that when you when you look at Fernando Valenzuela, that he's one of numerous pitchers who fall into that What might have been territory, says Jay Jaffe, senior writer at FanGraphs and author of The Cooperstown Casebook: Who's in the Baseball Hall of Fame, Who Should Be In. He had a strong start to his career that was kind of done in by overwork and a leveling off performance-wise, and in that regard, it's hardly unique because we can talk about dozens of other Cy Young winners who never really got to that peak again.. Young won 511 games between 1890 and 1911 and was elected to baseball's Hall of Fame in 1937. It was the fifth game of Valenzuelas eight-game winning streak. Both cycles first concluded with elections in February 2003, electing no one. He also appeared on the covers of The Sporting News, Sport Magazine, Baseball Digest and countless other publications. He made five starts, two of which were games where the Dodgers faced elimination. Get premium, high resolution news photos at Getty Images Not elected to 2023. In addition to calling games, Jarrn served as Valenzuelas interpreter at news conferences, which gained him exposure in other markets and, by extension, the electorate of the Hall of Fames Ford C. Frick Award. The pitch has always been about risk-reward with higher on the risk, but Fernando knew exactly what he was doing with it.. By then, Fernandomania was in full swing. During that moment, as still photographs showed, Valenzuelas eyes rolled back into his head. In the early '80s, theres still this huge migration wave from Mexico that brought up my parents, brought up all of my friends and the parents of my friends, Arellano says. But they could not have been sweeter. Mexican-Americans Lalo and Mark Guerrero, a father-and-son songwriting team, got into the act with tribute songs, Fernando, El Toro and Ol! TV ratings spiked, too. His family lived on a dirt road that was filled with potholes, he says. A lot of people appreciate what I tried to do and that is something Ill always remember. Fernando Valenzuela's screwballand unique deliveryoften baffled hitters in 1981. Fernando Valenzuela capped his 1981 season by winning the National League Rookie of the Year and Cy Young awards. Find History on Facebook (Opens in a new window), Find History on Twitter (Opens in a new window), Find History on YouTube (Opens in a new window), Find History on Instagram (Opens in a new window), Find History on TikTok (Opens in a new window), In the strike-shortened 1981 season, rookie Fernando Valenzuela won 13 games and pitched eight shutouts. #ProspectHugger. It led to a violent conflict between one family, the Archigas, and L.A. County Sheriffs in 1959. The mission of the Seneca Valley School District Sports Hall of Fame is to recognize the outstanding athletic contributions of Seneca Valley Alumni in their respective athletic endeavors and to promote pride in the athletic heritage of the Seneca Valley community as a whole. His numbers were impressive to me, but he just didnt do it long enough and that was his only drawback as far as I was concerned.. Before refuting the premise by citing his career numbers or the brevity of his peak, consider this: Bud Selig,. The server is misbehaving. Jarrn has often remarked on their loyalty. Hall of Fame Inductee Fernando Valenzuela and his daughter attend the 12th Annual California Hall of Fame Ceremony at The California Museum on December 4, 2018 in Sacramento, California. Or he could be elected to his rightful place in the Hall of Fame by the Veterans Committee, which considers candidates who are no longer eligible to be voted in by the Baseball Writers Association of America. However, it was the screwball that was the main reason for his amazing peak from 1980-1986. After posting league-leading totals in starts, shutouts, innings pitched and strikeouts that would eventually earn him Cy Young and Rookie of the Year honors, Valenzuela continued to make his mark in the 1981 postseason. He made everybody feel bigger and welcome. In his book, Stealing Home: Los Angeles, the Dodgers, and the Lives Caught in Between, Eric Nusbaum details how the club ended up with Dodger Stadium, specifically how three Mexican neighborhoods -- Palo Verde, La Loma and Bishop -- were destroyed to make way for a housing project that was canceled amid the Red Scare hysteria and real estate speculation. Fans bought T-shirts with Valenzuelas name on the back, made their own or bought bootleg versions available all over the city. But he never matched the heights of his rookie season. He was also a six-time All Star (1981-1986) and third in the Cy Young voting in 1982 with 19 wins and second in 1986 when he led the league in wins with 21. Note: With the Mexico Series taking place this weekend (April 29 and 30) between the Padres and Giants, we wanted to highlight some of the great Mexican players and stories from baseball's past. Long ago, he began golfing, giving pro golfers and amateur hackers in Southern California tales of Fernando sightings, from tony country clubs to city courses.