Ichiro!

I am trying to swallow my anger at the single idiot who did not put Ichiro on their Hall of Fame ballot to celebrate the fact that Ichiro is now in the Hall of Fame! By far by favorite athlete of my life, Ichiro simply brought all the joy to sports. The endless stories about Ichiro’s personality are also hilarious and here’s a few of them.

Congrats as well to a clearly deserving C.C. Sabathia for being a first ballot guy. I am a bit more ambivalent about Billy Wagner, but whatever. Glad to see Carlos Beltran take a big jump and things look solid that Andruw Jones might get in during one of his last two years.

Finally, I was happy to see Felix Hernandez get taken fairly seriously in his first year on the ballot, getting 20 percent of the voters. King Felix and Ichiro were the only good things on the Mariners for a very long time and he was one of the most dominant pitchers in the last five decades for 10 years. Unfortunately, he got about 12 wins a year during these years as no one could blow wins for a great pitcher like those Mariners teams. His arm also started falling apart after all those innings a year or two before he had a clear Hall case. Given the lack of starting pitchers that will be going into the Hall over the next few years (though the Kershaw/Verlander/Scherzer group will come up at some point), I think the King will probably get some very serious consideration over the next nine years.