It’s official: Joe Mauer is a first-ballot Hall of Famer
From St. Paul to Cooperstown, New York. Yes, Joe Mauer is officially headed to the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
The St. Paul native, who played his entire 15-year career with his hometown Minnesota Twins, was announced as part of the 2024 Hall of Fame class on Tuesday night.
He’ll officially be inducted during a ceremony on July 21 alongside Adrián Beltré, Todd Helton and manager Jim Leyland.
5 EYEWITNESS NEWS reporter Joe Mazan went to one of Mauer’s hangouts, The Nook in St. Paul, to catch the reactions of many excited fans when his name was called.
“It was great to see someone from the local community, someone who I’ve watched play baseball for years, growing up seeing him at Cretin-Derham Hall, finally make it, I think is amazing,” said one fan.
“It’s awesome to see that a fellow [Cretin-Derham Hall] Raider made it to the Hall of Fame,” exclaimed another fan.
“Good for Joe. Not a lot of catchers get in. He did a lot of great stuff for Minnesota baseball,” another restaurant-goer stated.
He’s the first Twins player elected to the Hall since Tony Oliva and Jim Kaat in 2022 and the seventh Hall of Famer to primarily play for the Twins. Additionally, he’ll be the fifth Minnesotan to be enshrined in Cooperstown, following Jack Morris, Paul Molitor, Dave Winfield and Charles Bender.
Not including the 2024 class, just 270 players are in the Hall, 1.3% of the approximately 20,500 who have appeared in the major leagues, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. There are another 40 executives/pioneers, 23 managers and 10 umpires enshrined, raising the membership total to 343.
According to the public ballot tracker by Ryan Thibodaux, Mauer had garnered support on 83.5% of publicly released ballots, which made up nearly 57% of the total ballots. However, Mauer reached the 75% threshold for election to the hall by just four votes. Billy Wagner, on the other hand, fell short by five votes and has just one year left on the ballot.
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Mauer, the St. Paul native who played 15 years for the Twins from 2004-18 and joined the Twins Hall of Fame last summer, sat down with KSTP Sports Director Joe Schmit last week to talk about his career and what his plans are for Tuesday night. One of Mauer’s former teammates, Glen Perkins, also shared his view of Mauer and his Hall of Fame chances, as did one of his former managers and the general manager who drafted him.
Despite injuries forcing a move to first base for the final years of his career, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2001 MLB Draft hit .306/.388/.439 with an .827 OPS and 124 OPS+ during his career, earning All-Star honors six times, league MVP honors in 2009 and five Silver Slugger awards, three Gold Glove awards and three batting titles, a historic feat for a catcher. He ranks first on the Twins’ all-time list in doubles (428) and times on base (3,087); second in games (1,858), hits (2,123), walks (939) and at-bats (6,930); third in runs scored (1,018) and total bases (3,040); fifth in RBI (923); and 12th in home runs (143).
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Other names on the Hall of Fame ballot that Minnesotans may have been watching — Torii Hunter and Timberwolves owner Alex Rodriguez — both fell well short of election.