The unveiling of ballots has begun as Chase Utley looks to secure seventy-five percent of the vote.
Voters are beginning to send in their Hall of Fame ballots, and former Phillies second baseman Chase Utley has had some early success.
There have only been four ballots released as of Tuesday afternoon.
Adam Rubin, a former ESPN writer for the New York Mets, gave Utley his first vote, according to Ryan Thibodaux, a ballot tracker:
Utley was not included on the anonymous voter’s second ballot; however, to be fair, they only cast votes for Joe Mauer and Adrián Beltré overall, so this shouldn’t be interpreted as an indication of how other voters will cast their ballots.
Among the three people who cast their votes for Utley on the third public ballot was David Skretta, an Associated Press writer.
Another anonymous voter’s fourth ballot has Utley categorized as follows:
Utley, who is making his first appearance on the ballot, played for 16 seasons, from 2003 to 2018. Before being traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers during the 2015 season, he played for the Phillies for portions of 13 seasons.
Six-time All-Star cut a deep one.275/.358/.465 for both teams over 1,937 games, including 1,885 hits, 259 home runs, 1,025 RBI, and 154 stolen bases.
And in crucial situations, he delivered. He was a career with runners in scoring position.282 hitter, and when there is a runner on third and fewer than two outs, that number rises to.342. He batted.281 in high-leverage situations, according to Baseball Reference.
His career WAR of 61.6 ranked fifth among all MLB eligible batters during that same period of years, according to FanGraphs. If you limit that to just his complete seasons with the Phillies (2003–2014), he was tied for third place in WAR (59.4) with only Miguel Cabrera and Albert Pujols.
To further narrow it down, Utley had a five-year period of exceptional, slashing performance from 2005 to 2009.301/.388/.535 with 507 RBI, 77 stolen bases, 146 home runs, and a WAR of 38.4, second only to Pujols.
Even though his power numbers weren’t particularly impressive, the electric second baseman was a force to be reckoned with because of his excellent baserunning and defense.
With only 22 instances of being caught in his career, Utley has the best success rate (87.5%) among players with at least 100 stolen base attempts. Moreover, he was skilled at maximizing plays; 54% of the time, he took the extra base. The infielder’s career-ending total of 4,535 assists, good for 38th place at the position, and his.982 fielding percentage were both career highs.
The tenacious player repeatedly pulled through for the group. Having been struck by a pitch 204 times in his career, Utley is currently ranked ninth among MLB players.
Even though Utley’s career-ending injuries probably prevented him from amassing a large number of counting stats, there’s no denying the infielder was a major factor in the Phillies’ incredible run of five consecutive postseason appearances from 2007 to 2011.
Based on Baseball Reference’s Bill James Hall of Fame Monitor, the four-time Silver Slugger has a score of 94, which places him 15th out of 26 players and puts him in the running to be elected to Cooperstown.
According to Baseball Reference, Utley’s WAR of his best seven seasons (49.3) ranks ninth for the position, and his JAWS metric of 56.9 puts him in line with the average second baseman in the Hall of Fame.
Utley will need to receive 75% of the vote to be inducted on his first attempt. As the Dec. 31 submission deadline approaches, ballots will still be made available, and on Jan. 23, the 2024 Hall of Fame inductees will be formally announced.