Hall of Fame Candidate Rickey Henderson
The Stolen Base King Should Be a Lock to Make it to Cooperstown
Jan 7, 2009
Rickey Henderson played for nine different teams during his twenty-five seasons in Major League Baseball. Along the way, he collected more than 3,000 hits, played on two World Series champions, won the 1990 MVP award and set new all-time records for career stolen bases and runs scored.
Henderson broke into the big leagues with the Oakland A’s in 1979, batting .274 with 33 stolen bases in 89 games. The next year, A’s owner Charlie Finley hired Billy Martin to manage the team, and it was Martin’s aggressive style that helped catapult Henderson to superstardom. Martin encouraged the speedy Henderson to steal at will, and Rickey took advantage of the opportunity, swiping 100 bases in his first full season in 1980. The next year, he was even better, batting .319 with a league-leading 135 hits and 56 steals in a year shortened substantially by the players’ strike. He finished runner-up in the American League MVP race to Brewers’ reliever Rollie Fingers.
In 1982, Henderson set a new Major League single season record with 130 steals, breaking Lou Brock’s standing mark by a dozen swipes, and in 1983, he stole 108 bases.
Henderson's Career with the New York Yankees
Prior to the 1985 season, Henderson was traded to the New York Yankees, where he played for the next four and a half years. Hitting leadoff for a Yankees team that featured Don Mattingly and Dave Winfield, Henderson had a spectacular year in 1985, batting .314 with 24 home runs, 72 RBI, 146 runs scored and 65 stolen bases. The next year, 1986, Henderson set career highs for home runs (28) and RBI (74). Despite playing well for the Yankees over the next two seasons, the team traded him back to the Oakland A’s on June 21, 1989.
Henderson Goes Back to Oakland
It was a good time for Henderson to get out of New York. The Yankees were a fifth place team, and Oakland was the defending American League champion. Henderson fit in perfectly with the A’s as a table-setter for sluggers Mark McGwire and Jose Canseco. The 1989 A’s repeated as American League champs, and Henderson won the American League Championship Series MVP on the strength of a .400 batting average, two home runs, five RBI and eight stolen bases in a five game series. The A’s then went on to sweep the San Francisco Giants in the 1989 World Series. In his first Fall Classic, Henderson hit .474 with three stolen bases in the four game series.
Rickey spent the next three and a half years with Oakland, winning the American League MVP in 1990 over Prince Fielder of the Tigers, who hit 51 home runs that year. On May 1, 1991, he broke the career stolen base record when he swiped his 939th base. He would go on to steal a lot more over the next decade. In the middle of 1993, the A’s traded Henderson to the Toronto Blue Jays, who were trying to repeat as World Series champions. Henderson played miserably for the rest of the year and during the postseason, but won his second World Series ring when the Blue Jays beat the Philadelphia Phillies in a six game series.
Henderson's Final Decade of Play
After the 1993 season, Rickey began a ten year journey that would take him back to Oakland, then to the Padres, Angels, Mets, Red Sox and Dodgers. Although he never announced his retirement, Henderson didn’t play again the majors after a brief stint with Los Angeles in 2003 (when he was 44 years old).
All tolled, Henderson finished his career with some pretty impressive statistics. He collected 3,055 hits, and became the all-time leader in stolen bases (1,406) and runs scored (2,295), and is second on the career walks list with 2,190. He hit 297 home runs, 81 of which he hit to lead off a game, another big league record. He made ten All-Star teams, led his league in steals twelve times, and won a Gold Glove award in 1981.
Henderson Finally Eligible for the Hall of Fame
His chances at being elected to the Hall of Fame are very high; many consider him a lock, and some voters have even said that Henderson should be the first player to gain unanimous induction. Results of the votes will be announced on January 12, and if all goes according to plan, Henderson should be in Cooperstown on the last of July.
