Who didn’t vote for Ichiro? What we know about snub from Baseball Hall of Fame unanimous list

Ichiro Suzuki is one of the best hitters of all time and will be forever immortalized in Cooperstown at MLB’s Hall of Fame. It was long known that he would get in, but his induction was still mired in controversy. 

While the Hall of Fame is a way to honor the best players from the history of America’s pastime, MLB’s is heavily scrutinized. How the voting committee handled the PED users of the early 2000s has many believing that the Hall of Fame isn’t valid until guys like Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, and Roger Clemens are admitted. Outside of that, the anonymous voting process itself is hated by the masses, and many fans call for change. 

Currently, there are 394 members of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA) who vote on the induction. In the process, they are able to vote for 10 players each year for that given class. The gripe from fans is that they also get to choose whether to make their voting results public. 

This came to a head once again for the 2025 class when Suzuki fell one vote short of being the second unanimously elected player in MLB history. 

Here’s what we know about the voters who kept Ichiro from being a unanimous Hall of Fame selection.

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Who didn’t vote for Ichiro?

Even several months after the announcement, we don’t know. 

Voting for the MLB Hall of Fame is unanimous unless the voter checks a box that allows their ballot to be displayed publicly. Many voters will also post their ballots to their social media accounts to drive engagement, often in the form of anger for players they didn’t vote for. 

The Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA) does release a listing of everyone eligible to vote for the MLB Hall of Fame in a given year. Unfortunately, with voters having the ability to keep their votes private, you would have to search every voter to see who released their ballots to the public. Then, the one voter who didn’t include Ichiro would be left among the writers who didn’t release their ballots.

In the case of Ichiro, 321 voters made their ballots public. This means the mystery non-voter remains among the 73 anonymous ballot voters. 

All 321 of the voters who made their Hall of Fame ballots public voted for Ichiro Suzuki. The one person who didn’t vote for Ichiro will remain a mystery.

(Here’s the part where I state the obvious: Everyone should make their ballots public. Accountability matters.) https://t.co/kOSG6Jo0jb

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) February 4, 2025

In true Ichiro fashion, he had a few messages for his unnamed non-voter. First, there was a callout by Ichiro. A rescinding of an offer followed this up. The now Hall of Famer had originally invited the unnamed voter to his house for dinner. During his induction speech, Ichiro promptly rescinded the offer. 

“3000 hits or 262 hits in one season are achievements recognized by the writers, well, all but one of you”

Ichiro Suzuki pic.twitter.com/3JBzWGWKn2

— CJ Fogler 🫡 (@cjzero) July 27, 2025

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How many baseball Hall of Famers were unanimous?

There are 351 members of the MLB Hall of Fame, including Ichiro’s 2025 class. Among them, only one has the honor of being selected unanimously. Yankees closer Mariano Rivera was included on all 425 ballots submitted when he was inducted in 2019.  

Many players in history were worthy of unanimous decisions, but the voting process has its flaws. With voters limited to the number of players they can vote for each year, they may want to refrain from voting for someone like Suzuki, who was all but assured of being inducted. A similar situation to Suzuki happened when Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter was inducted in 2020. 

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Highest voting percentages in Hall of Fame history

Suzuki wasn’t able to join Mariano amongst the unanimous, but his voting percentage did rank amongst the best in MLB history. There were 394 ballots submitted for the 2025 class, and 393 of them had a vote for Suzuki. This gave him a 99.7%, which is tied with Jeter for the second highest in history. 

Here’s a look at where Suzuki ranks. 

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Ichiro Suzuki career stats 

Here are Suzuki’s career stats.