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Boggs an instant hit
The five-time batting champion is expected to wear a Red Sox cap in Cooperstown.
By MARC TOPKIN
Published January 5, 2005
TAMPA - Wade Boggs was never sure.
Despite a dazzling array of credentials that seemed to guarantee entry, the longtime Tampa resident remained uncertain if he would be named to baseball's Hall of Fame, his anxiety mounting as a long Tuesday morning turned to afternoon and the phone kept ringing with false alarms.
At 12:26 p.m. - a time he decided later wasn't coincidence but a tribute to the two uniform numbers he wore in the big leagues - he got a call from Baseball Writers Association of America secretary-treasurer Jack O'Connell congratulating him on his election.
And he didn't believe him either.
Boggs asked, "Is this a joke?" Then he asked to talk to Hall chairman Jayne Forbes Clark, whom he had expected to call. She told him the same thing. He decided he had no way to know if it was really her, or someone his buddies put up to a prank.
Finally, he asked if there was anyone else there he knew. When Hall vice president Jeff Idelson, an associate for decades, offered his congratulations, Boggs finally realized it was true.
"That," he said, "is when it became reality."
For Boggs, 46, the news capped a career that took him from the youth fields of south Tampa to Plant High to six long seasons in the minors and then, finally, to 18 years in the big leagues.
He spent 11 with the Boston Red Sox, where he won five American League batting titles; five with the New York Yankees, where he won his only World Series championship, and the final two with the hometown Tampa Bay Devil Rays, where he became the 23rd player to reach the 3,000-hit plateau.
"This is just so special," Boggs said. "Very few people get to go to Cooperstown. When someone says you're the best to ever play baseball, just to be in that category, is just more than you could ever put into words and start to dream about."
Boggs, who had been concerned he would fall just short of the 75 percent minimum of votes cast to be elected, received staggering support from the BBWAA voters. He got the third most votes, 474, in history and was named on 91.86 percent of the ballots, the 19th highest percentage of all time. He was the 41st player elected in his first year of eligibility, becoming one of 260 members, fewer than 2 percent of all big leaguers.
"I couldn't believe it," Boggs said. "I was pretty overwhelmed."
There is some irony that there was so little question about his worthiness for the Hall, because there were so many questions about him throughout his career.
Questions about whether he was good enough to get to the major leagues - including a debate among some Red Sox officials about whether he should be released. Questions about the lack of home runs he hit. Questions about his defensive abilities at third base. Questions about whether his statistics were a product of playing in Fenway Park.
"One of my biggest attributes was probably that I loved to prove people wrong," Boggs said. "When they told me I couldn't do something, then that was the thing. It made me go out and work twice as hard as I had to. If I thought 125 ground balls were enough, then I took 175. If I thought 75 swings were enough, I went out and took 100.
"There are always the doubters. And I have to thank them as much as I thank the people that supported me the whole time because if it wasn't for the doubters, then I might have had a letdown, would have been a little complacent."
That work ethic came to define Boggs. He turned himself into one of the game's most consistent hitters, winning four straight batting titles and five in a six-year period (averaging .356), becoming the only player in the past 100 years to have seven consecutive seasons with 200 or more hits, and the only one to get 200 hits and 100 walks in four consecutive seasons.
While Boggs was keenly aware of his own offensive statistics (once pointing out that the Times had his spring training numbers wrong), he actually took more pride in his defensive accomplishments, specifically the two Gold Gloves that served as acknowledgment of his marked improvement.
He became known as one of the game's more colorful characters, developing a routine of superstitions and rituals that included eating chicken before every game, heading to the field at precise times, taking the same amount of ground balls each day, and occasionally making headlines for off-field issues as well.
Boggs was also proud to be the first Tampa Bay area product elected to the Hall for his accomplishments as a player, joining Al Lopez, who was chosen for induction in 1977 mainly for his managerial success.
"There's so many special players that have come out of this area," Boggs said. "I feel I was sort of on the ground floor of all that good water the Tampa Bay area has to produce all these great players."
Hall of Fame officials are expected to announce, possibly as soon as today, that Boggs will be portrayed in a Red Sox cap on his plaque. Boggs said it didn't matter, that he considered each stop an important part of his career. He became a batting champion in Boston, won a World Series in New York and got his 3,000th hit with Tampa Bay, an Aug. 7, 1999, home run at Tropicana Field.
"Whichever hat they pick is absolutely fine with me," he said. "If you take any one of those ingredients out of the equation, then I don't make it to the Hall of Fame."
After retiring following the 1999 season and working two years for the Rays, Boggs has kept something of a low profile, spending most of his time hunting, fishing, playing golf and working with his son Brett's Wharton High team.
Life as a Hall of Famer will be a little more hectic.
He and wife Debbie flew to New York Tuesday night for another news conference and several days of whirlwind appearances, with plans to ring the bell at the New York Stock Exchange and perhaps visit Late Show with David Letterman and Live with Regis and Kelly. He's going to be booked for card shows and events nearly every weekend from now until the July 31 induction in Cooperstown, N.Y. He's going to have to learn to sign his name differently, adding HOF to his autographs.
"I had never dreamed of making it to the Hall of Fame," he said. "I just wanted to make it to the big leagues. That was really as far as I wanted to go. But once I started playing, and throwing up some numbers, and doing this and doing that, I started saying, "Wow, I'm not doing too bad.' "
Tuesday, in a packed room at the Tampa Palms Golf & Country Club, he pulled on a black Hall of Fame cap for the first time.
"Perfect fit," he said.
Indeed it was.
WADE BOGGS
AGE: 46
HEIGHT, WEIGHT: 6 feet 2, 197 pounds
BORN: Omaha, Neb.
LIVES: Tampa
FAMILY: Wife, Debbie; children, Meagann and Brett
ACCOMPLISHMENTS: Five batting titles. Hit .300 or better in 15 seasons, including 10 straight. Seven consecutive 200-hit seasons. Two Gold Gloves. Twelve-time All-Star.
WHAT GOT HIM IN
3,010 career hits (ranked 23rd all time)
.328 lifetime batting average (ranked 24th all time)
[Last modified January 5, 2005, 00:41:12]
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