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Once again, Dick Allen narrowly misses out on Cooperstown

It happened again.

Legendary Phillies slugger Dick Allen was not elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Allen was under consideration for election to Cooperstown via the Golden Days Era Committee, which met in Orlando, FL this weekend. The committee considers players whose main contributions to the game came in the years 1950-1969.

Dick Allen narrowly missed out on Cooperstown … again. (Gavin Baker/Icon Sportswire)

He received 11 out of 16 votes, falling just one vote short of the 75% needed to be elected to the Hall of Fame. The committee, who can only vote for a maximum of four nominees per ballot, elected Gil Hodges, Minnie Miñoso, Tony Oliva and former Phillies pitcher Jim Kaat.

The Early Baseball Era Committee elected Bud Fowler and Buck O’Neil.

The 16-person Golden Days Era Committee consisted of Allen’s former teammate Mike Schmidt as well as fellow Hall of Famers Fergie Jenkins, John Schuerholz, Rod Carew, Bud Selig, Joe Torre and Ozzie Smith. The committee also included MLB chief baseball development officer Tony Reagins, Diamondbacks owner Ken Kendrick, Cardinals president Bill DeWitt, Tigers GM Al Avila, Marlins GM Kim Ng, historian Adrian Burgos Jr., and media members Steve Hirdt, Jaime Jarrin and Jack O’Connell.

When the committee last met in 2014, Allen fell just one vote short of election to the Hall of Fame. Jenkins, Smith, Carew and Hirdt were the only returning voters from the 2014 committee. Former Phillies GM and president Pat Gillick and current president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski were on the 2014 Golden Days Era Committee.

The committee was supposed to meet at the Winter Meetings in 2020, but the COVID-19 pandemic delayed the vote until this year. Allen sadly passed away at the age of 78 after a long battle with cancer on Dec. 7, 2020, the day the vote was scheduled to be announced.

A native of Wampum, PA, Allen was one of the most prolific sluggers of his generation. He won the 1964 National League Rookie of the Year Award as well as the 1972 American League MVP Award as a member of the Chicago White Sox. Allen also appeared in the All-Star Game seven times.

In nine seasons with the Phillies, Allen slashed .290/.371/.530 with 204 home runs and 655 RBIs.

Allen is one of only 33 MLB players since 1871 to post an OPS+ of 140 in at least ten seasons in which he has qualified for the batting title. Of those 33 players, 29 of them are in the Hall of Fame, two are current players who will get into Cooperstown (Albert Pujols and Miguel Cabrera) and the other two are currently on the ballot, but are unlikely to get in based on past connections to performance enhancing drugs (Barry Bonds and Manny Ramirez).

Somehow, Allen never even eclipsed 20 percent of the vote after 15 years on the Baseball Writers Association of America Ballot. The Golden Days Era Committee is scheduled to meet again in 2026. Allen will presumably be under consideration again, but you begin to wonder how much it will actually matter since the Hall has repeatedly rejected his candidacy, despite Allen holding the career numbers that make him worthy of election.

The Phillies retired Allen’s No. 15 on Sept. 3, 2020. An exception was made to the club’s longstanding policy of only retiring numbers of players who were elected to the Hall of Fame.

Managing partner John Middleton released a brief statement to NBC Sports Philadelphia’s Jim Salisbury.