Baseball Hall of Fame's latest two additions are beyond overdue

Two great stars of the pre-1980 era have received long-overdue recognition via election into the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

Hall officials announced Sunday that the 16 members of the Classic Era Committee have elected Dick Allen and Dave Parker to the Hall of Fame. They will join whoever is elected by BBWAA members as the 2025 induction class in July.

The election had a strong sense of melancholy to it. Allen, who fell just one vote short of enshrinement in 2021, died four years ago at age 78. Parker, who is 73, has been dealing with the effects of Parkinson’s Disease for several years.

Election required approval by 12 of the 16 members of the Classic Era Committee, which is comprised of Hall of Famers, baseball executives, and baseball researchers. Parker and Allen were two of eight candidates considered. The others were John Donaldson, Vic Harris, Luis Tiant, Steve Garvey, Tommy John, and Ken Boyer. To be eligible for consideration on this ballot, players had to have made their major contributions prior to 1980.

Parker led the ballot with 14 votes; Allen got 13

In recent years, there have been debates over the work of the Hall’s various ‘era’ committees, but it’s not likely that there will be much issue with the election of these two.

Parker was a career .290 hitter with 339 home runs and a career .810 OPS. Primarily known as the right fielder of the Pittsburgh Pirates between 1973 and 1983, Parker was the 1978 National League Most Valuable Player, when he won his second consecutive batting title with a .334 average. He added 30 home runs and 117 RBIs.

Beyond his power, Parker was also known for a throwing arm that rivaled the game’s all-time best. He had 152 outfield assists for his career, with 91 of those assists coming between 1974 and 1980.

During the 1979 All Star Game, Parker famously threw out Brian Downing — attempting to score from second on a single — with a missile that reached catcher Gary Carter on the fly.

Parker was a candidate on the writers’ ballot annually between 1997 and 2011, but never received more than 24 percent of the vote, reaching that peak in 1998, his second season.

His candidacy may have been damaged by his involvement in the Pittsburgh cocaine scandal of the 1980s. Parker was one of seven Pirates players eventually identified as drug users, each of the seven receiving suspensions by commissioner Peter Ueberroth. The suspensions were commuted on condition that the seven submit to random drug testing, make donations to drug prevention programs, and perform community service.

Allen’s candidacy suffered from its own image issues, in his case those issues largely revolving around his relationship with local reporters in Philadelphia, where he spent the first seven seasons of his 15-year career.

Allen won the 1964 Rookie of the Year Award when he led the Phillies to the precipice of the National League pennant only to lose it on the final weekend. He hit .318 that season with 29 home runs and 91 RBIs.

Frequently booed by Phillies fans and eventually burdened by the label of being a disgruntled player, Allen shifted from Philadelphia to St. Louis, then Los Angeles, before emerging with the White Sox in 1972 as a renewed star. He led the league with 37 home runs and 113 RBIs that season, hit .308, and was voted the American League’s Most Valuable Player.

 He retired in 1977 with a career .292 average and 351 home runs.

But, like Parker, his Hall candidacy never gained traction with writers. He peaked at just 18.9 percent in 1996, and dropped off the ballot following the 1997 election, his final year of eligibility.

Six successive veterans committees have considered Allen since 2003, but it was only in 2009 that his candidacy gained any traction. He finished 12th that year. In 2015, he finished first but one vote shy of the requisite number required for enshrinement. Allen died in 2020, and when he was considered in 2022, he again missed by a single vote.  

Now, he and Parker — two of the game's preeminent stars of the 1970s — will receive their due recognition together in 2025.

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