Mariano Rivera may soon have some company.
As of Monday, Ichiro Suzuki had received votes on all ballots made public by voting-tracker Ryan Thibodaux (@NotMrTibbs on Bluesky).
If that is still the case when the ultimate results are released by the Baseball Writers Association of America on Tuesday, Ichiro might be the primary Japanese-born player within the Hall of Fame and just the second player ever to be unanimously elected to Cooperstown.
He would join Rivera, who did it when he made the Hall of Fame in 2019 in his first yr on the ballot. Rivera was named on all 425 ballots a yr before Derek Jeter fell one vote wanting one hundred pc.
Ken Griffey Jr. has the third-highest percentage, at 99.3 percent in 2016.
For Ichiro, it will be one other recent honor, because the outfielder was also elected to the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame last week in his first yr of eligibility for enshrinement there.
But he didn’t get there unanimously, as Ichiro was named on 92.6 percent of the ballots, perhaps because he spent only nine seasons playing in Japan before he made the move to MLB prior to the 2001 season.
In 19 MLB seasons, Ichiro finished with 3,089 hits. With the 1,278 he got while playing for Orix in Japan’s Pacific League, Ichiro’s 4,367 hits are probably the most in skilled baseball history.
And he’s one in all just seven players in MLB history with 3,000 hits and 500 stolen bases. The opposite six — Lou Brock, Ty Cobb, Eddie Collins, Rickey Henderson, Paul Molitor and Honus Wagner — are all in Cooperstown.
Ichiro led the majors in hits seven times.
Of the first-timers on this yr’s ballot, only Ichiro and former Yankees teammate CC Sabathia are more likely to get in.
One other ex-Ichiro teammate, right-hander Felix Hernandez, was at 26.1 percent as of Monday afternoon and former Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia was at 15.4 percent.
It takes 75 percent of the vote to get in, and five percent to remain on the ballot.
Former Yankee catchers Russell Martin and Brian McCann, in addition to shortstop Troy Tulowitski, are all at risk of falling short.
