A former St. Louis Cardinals star is back on the Baseball Hall of Fame ballot which means we’ll learn soon if this is the year when Carlos Beltrán finally gets above the required 75% threshold.
The National
Baseball Hall of Fame released the 2026 ballot today which revealed 27 candidates including 12 new ones who will now have their chance to enter baseball immortality. Carlos Beltrán is the highest returning vote-getter in this year’s list having received 70.3% last year. In his first year on the ballot in 2023, Carlos received 46.5%, 57.1% in 2024 before nearly getting in the Hall last year.
Here are the newcomers to the National Baseball Hall of Fame ballot this year: Ryan Braun, Matt Kemp, Howie Kendrick, Daniel Murphy, Cole Hamels, Rick Porcello. Gio González, Edwin Encarnación, Alex Gordon, Shin-Soo Choo, Nick Markakis and Hunter Pence.
Returning to the Baseball Hall of Fame ballot along with Carlos Beltrán are Bobby Abreu, Mark Buehrle, Félix Hernández, Torii Hunter, Andruw Jones, Dustin Pedroia, Andy Pettitte, Manny Ramírez, Álex Rodríguez, Francisco Rodríguez, Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley, Omar Vizquel and David Wright.
Carlos Beltrán time with the St. Louis Cardinals was rather brief, but not without significant impact as he was a key part of the 2012 and 2013 teams. He had 32 home runs and 97 RBI’s in 2012 and 24 homers and 84 RBI’s in 2013. Over the span of his nearly 20 year career, he collected 2725 hits and 435 home runs. My favorite moment from Carlos wasn’t his time with the Cardinals as much as I enjoyed the time he was on the wrong end of an Adam Wainwright curveball in the 2006 NLCS. His WAR is higher than a number of other players that are already in the Hall so perhaps this will be his year. We’ll find out January 20, 2026 when the National Baseball Hall of Fame announces this year’s inductees.
