George Steinbrenner and Davey Johnson among 10 names on Baseball Hall of Fame's Today's Game Era ballot
Yankees owner George Steinbrenner waves to fans in Tampa, Fla. on Feb. 17, 2003. Credit: AP/CHRIS O'MEARA
CARLSBAD, Calif. — Is this the year George Steinbrenner becomes a Hall of Fame Boss?
The longtime Yankees owner, who died in 2010, was one of 10 names on the Today’s Game Era Ballot for Hall of Fame consideration, a list the Hall released Monday afternoon.
Joining Steinbrenner on the ballot were Harold Baines, Albert Belle, Joe Carter, Will Clark, Orel Hershiser, Davey Johnson, Charlie Manuel, Lou Piniella and Lee Smith. A candidate getting votes on 75 percent of the ballots cast by the 16-member Today’s Game Era Committee earns election into the Hall in the 2019 class.
“I think he is a Hall of Famer whether he’s been inducted yet or not,” Brian Cashman, first brought to the Yankees as an intern in 1986 and whom Steinbrenner installed as GM in 1998, said Monday. “I think it’s important. I believe that committee and the people who have the votes would be hard-pressed not to acknowledge this was a transformative figure in all of sports, not just baseball. I can’t imagine that he doesn’t warrant [induction].”
Steinbrenner, who helped infuse life in what had become a moribund Yankees franchise almost as soon as he bought it in 1973, has been a consistent presence in recent years on this list. Under Steinbrenner’s watch, the Yankees won seven world championships and 11 American League pennants.
But the often bombastic owner was also a polarizing figure in the game, suspended twice and, more irritating to his fellow owners, helping raise player salaries with an all-in embrace of free agency in the 1970s and beyond.
“There’s some powerful people that view it differently I’m sure,” Cashman said of Steinbrenner’s Hall of Fame credentials. “But again, he was a transformative figure in this sport, sometimes in a very good way and sometimes in a very difficult way. But the bottom line was he was very impactful both for this franchise and this industry and clearly a Hall of Famer from my viewpoint.”
Erik Boland started in Newsday's sports department in 2002. He covered high school and college sports, then shifted to the Jets beat. He has covered the Yankees since 2009.
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