The Unanimous Question: Will Ichiro Suzuki Make History as First-Ever Japanese…
The 2025 Baseball Hall of Fame class will include Ichiro Suzuki. Rightfully so, of course, and it’s always nice to have at least one player in a class where there just doesn’t need to be much discussion.
In fact, most of the discussion in Ichiro’s case so far has revolved around whether or not he’ll be a unanimous selection.
My prediction is he won’t be and we won’t hear from the voter(s) who leave him off. Given that I’m an open book, as regular readers know, it won’t be me. I’m voting for him.
How could anyone not vote for Ichiro?
The (easy) case
After hitting a ridiculous .353/.421/.522 with 1,278 hits in nine seasons in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball, Ichiro came to Major League Baseball for his age-27 season. How many more MLB hits he could have racked up if he had come over to MLB earlier is open for debate, but he hit .350 with 242 hits in his first season stateside, winning the Rookie of the Year and MVP.
He would go on to lead the majors in hits seven times. Ty Cobb led eight times while Pete Rose, Tony Gwynn and Ichiro led the majors seven times. That’s the company he’s keeping.
