Mariners’ Ichiro elected into Baseball Hall of Fame, 1 vote shy of unanimous selection

Ichiro’s iconic baseball career has formally reached its historic capstone.

The Mariners’ all-time hits leader received the expected call Tuesday afternoon, officially welcoming him to the National Baseball Hall of Fame Class of 2025.

Ichiro was the first Japanese position player to appear in an MLB game, and he will be the first Japanese player enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame during the induction ceremony on July 27 in Cooperstown, N.Y.

“As a baseball player, this is the highest honor you can achieve,” Ichiro said Tuesday on MLB Network’s broadcast, via his longtime interpreter Allen Turner.

Because of his historic achievements on the field, Ichiro was a slam-dunk candidate to earn induction into the Hall of Fame during his first year of eligibility.

The only uncertainty about Tuesday’s announcement was whether he would become the first position player to earn a unanimous selection from the Baseball Writers’ Association of America.

Ichiro fell one vote short of that distinction.

More than half of the 394 BBWAA voters revealed their ballots before Tuesday’s announcement, and all 210 of those early ballots included Ichiro. When all of the ballots were revealed Tuesday afternoon, Ichiro was included on 393 of them.

Ichiro received 99.7% of the votes, matching Yankees great Derek Jeter (2020) for the highest percentage of votes received among position players.

Another Mariners icon, Ken Griffey Jr., was three votes shy of unanimity in 2016. The identity of the three writers who did not vote for Griffey have never been revealed.

Similarly, the voter who did not include Ichiro on their ballot did so anonymously. Voters are not required to reveal their votes.

Veteran baseball broadcaster Bob Costas and former Mariners second baseman Harold Reynolds were part of the Hall of Fame announcement show on MLB Network.

“I can’t fathom a single reason (that Ichiro wasn’t unanimous),” Costas said on the broadcast.

“I’m miffed,” Reynolds added. “Ninety-nine point seven — I mean, come on.”

Mariano Rivera, the Yankees’ legendary closer inducted in 2019, is the only player to earn a unanimous selection.

Longtime Mariners ace Félix Hernández, also eligible for the first time this year, fell well short of the necessary votes (75%) to earn induction. Hernández received 81 votes in all (20.6%) and will remain on the ballot in 2026.

But Hernández did earn enough votes to remain on the ballot in 2026. Players can stay on the ballot for up to 10 years. Another Mariners legend, Edgar Martinez, was inducted on his 10th and final chance in 2019.

Ichiro was scheduled to take part in a news conference at T-Mobile Park later Tuesday.

There has never been a player quite like Ichiro. He was part athlete, part artist, part wizard, part rock star.

Ichiro joined the Mariners at age 27 in 2001, making the leap from Japan at the height of MLB’s steroid era, a time when home runs were hit (and celebrated) like never before.

“I don’t think anybody in this whole world thought I would be a Hall of Famer,” he said Tuesday.

Listed generously at 5 feet 11 and 175 pounds, Ichiro was a slap-hitting throwback to a long ago era. And he was greeted with initial skepticism about his ability to handle major-league pitching.

“As the first Japanese position player coming over … I felt like there was going to be judgment on Japanese baseball,” he said. “And so there was definitely that pressure, and I knew that how I performed was going to be really looked at as ‘This is Japanese baseball.’”

That skepticism evaporated quickly, and Ichiro went on to lead the majors in batting average (.350), hits (242) and stolen bases (56). He was named the American League MVP and Rookie of the Year — only the second player in MLB history to win both honors in the same season — and helped lead the Mariners to a league-record 116 wins.

In 2004, Ichiro broke the all-time season hits record with 262 — a record some believe will never be broken.

From 2001 to 2010, Ichiro made 10 consecutive All-Star teams, won 10 consecutive Gold Gloves and was a fixture batting leadoff and playing right field for the Mariners.

He finished his MLB career with 3,089 hits, and when paired with his hit total in Japan (1,278), his 4,367 hits as a professional are more than any player in baseball history.

In his second stint with the Mariners, Ichiro retired at age 45, after a game in Tokyo in March 2019.

Ichiro, 51, has remained a part of the Mariners organization as a special assistant to the chairman.