We’re less than a week away from the Baseball Hall of Fame’s class of 2023 being revealed, so this seems like a good time to take stock of the active players who could be enshrined one day. Last year I focused on the players with borderline cases and broke them up by their position group: infielders, outfielders and pitchers/DHs. This time around, I’ll examine the most likely future candidates by their age.
This first chapter will cover the players who will not have played their age-30 season by the end of this year, while tomorrow we’ll deal with the older guys. Obviously, this list comes with the usual caveats when discussing younger players—injuries, production decline, etc.—and a lot can and will change as their career progresses. The idea is to look at the impressive paces these players already have set and project forward based on where they are right now.
Only two players in their age-20 season—Mets catcher Francisco Álvarez and Rockies shortstop Ezequiel Tovar—reached the majors last year, so we’ll start with the promising group of guys who are a year older and will be entering their age-22 seasons in ’23.
