Finally, Cooperstown is calling Richard Anthony Allen’s name. The former American League MVP has been elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.
It took him a while to be welcomed to baseball’s most famous address in New York, but on Sunday, Hall of Fame President Josh Rawitch made it official.
Speaking live on MLB Network at the Winter Meetings in Dallas, Rawitch announced Allen’s name, first of the two newest members voted into the Hall of Fame by the Classic Baseball Era’s 16-member committee. Former Pittsburgh Pirate Dave Parker was also elected to the Hall’s Class of 2025.
“I have great memories of Dick Allen. He was a guy who could do it all,” Bucky Dent, a teammate of Allen’s during his first four MLB seasons while playing shortstop for the Chicago White Sox, told The Epoch Times this past week. “I loved playing with him. [Allen] had tremendous power to all fields.”
Allen, who passed away in December 2020 at the age of 78, received 13 of 16 ballots—81.3 percent—by the committee composed of Hall of Famers, historians, and executives. Allen and Parker, of the eight candidates on the ballot, were the only two to reach the 75-percent threshold necessary for election.
The Classic Baseball Era concentrates on individuals whose primary contribution to the game was prior to 1980.
Speaking from his home in south Florida, Dent praised his former teammate on Chicago’s South Side in the early 1970s as someone who could beat opposing teams in several ways.
“He could run. I mean [Allen] was one of the best base runners I ever saw. All around, Dick was a special player. He did ’march to a different drum,' but we had a great manager in Chuck Tanner who understood him.”
A native of Wampum, Pennsylvania, Allen began in 1963 with the Philadelphia Phillies and finished up with the Oakland Athletics after the 1977 season.
Allen led the National League in slugging percentage during one season, and in the American League twice. While with the White Sox, Allen twice led the American League in home runs. During the 1972 season, with his home run total of 37 and 113 RBIs, Allen was selected as the American League MVP.
During his 15-year MLB career, Allen suited up for five clubs. His imposing swing was always in fashion with club owners looking for bat power.
With 351 home runs and 1,119 RBIs, coupled with a .534 lifetime slugging percentage, Allen was one of the game’s most feared hitters of all time. The 894 career bases on balls drawn from opposing pitchers further illustrates his abilities.
Allen, along with Parker, became the 347th and 348th members to join the Hall of Fame ranks. Baseball Hall of Fame Induction Weekend is scheduled for July 25–July 28.
On Jan. 21, live from Cooperstown on MLB Network, the 2025 Baseball Writers’ Association of America’s Hall of Fame ballot results will be revealed. Like the voting done by the Classic Baseball Era Committee at Dallas’ Hilton Anatole Hotel, candidates on the BBWAA ballot need to receive 75 percent of all ballots cast to earn election to the Hall of Fame.
For more than 40 years, after five years into his retirement as an active MLB player, Allen has been eligible for the Hall of Fame. During the 2022 Classic Era Baseball Hall of Fame vote, Allen missed election by one vote. In 2015, Allen missed becoming a member of baseball’s shrine located in upstate New York by one vote as well.
