It’s been more than 26 years since Billy Martin died in a drunk driving accident.
The fiery New York Yankees manager fought and drank his way through life, so when the end came during a trip home from a bar on Christmas Day 1989, the only surprise was that a friend was behind the wheel of Martin’s truck. “For some, 61 is young,” Tom Boswell wrote a few days later for the Washington Post. “For Martin it was very old.”
Even in an abbreviated life, though, Martin might rank as one of the best managers in baseball history. While he couldn’t keep a job very long and had a knack for getting fired and re-hired by George Steinbrenner, Martin excelled wherever he went. He had at least 90 victories six times, winning records with five clubs, and just three losing seasons in 19 as a manager.
His .553 career winning percentage is fourth-highest of any manager with at least 10 seasons who isn’t in the Baseball Hall of Fame, behind Davey Johnson, Steve O’Neill and Joe Girardi, according to Baseball-Reference.com.
The Hall of Fame certainly hasn’t forgotten Martin. The Veterans Committee considered Martin four times between 2003 and 2010, before reforming into three committees that meet on a rotating basis. Martin has been on the ballot for the Expansion Era Committee both times it’s met so far, ahead of the 2011 and 2014 inductions. (Here's a list I compiled of more than 1,300 known candidates since 1953.)
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Martin might have the credentials for Cooperstown as a manager and could figure as a candidate when the Expansion Era Committee meets again this fall. But his window for the Hall of Fame might be closing as a crop of more recent, less controversial, and arguably better managers are becoming eligible.
Cooperstown chances: 40 percent
Why: The first thing to know about the Hall of Fame with managers is that it sometimes takes awhile for skippers to get in. The Veterans Committee considered Leo Durocher, another controversial manager, at least 10 times before finally enshrining him in 1994.
Durocher had 2,008 wins, tenth best in baseball history, as well as a reputation for helping develop a young Willie Mays. It might have helped compensate for more unsavory aspects of his case, such as his suspension for the 1947 season for associating with gamblers or his affair with actress Laraine Day.
Martin has a long list of things holding his candidacy back and not as much to compensate beyond winning a lot. There’s his infamous fight with a marshmallow salesman in 1979 and all those firings, so many that Steinbrenner and Martin eventually made a commercial poking fun at it. And who could forget Martin’s pedantic insistence on obscure rules being enforced, such as the length of pine tar on George Brett’s bat in 1983?
Other managers with more amenable personalities than Durocher or Martin have been long-term Hall of Fame candidates as well. Walter Alston was a Veterans Committee candidate five times, Dick Williams at least seven.
When the committee inducted Ned Hanlon in 1996, it might have seemed like a shot out of nowhere, given that Hanlon managed the old Baltimore Orioles of the 1890s. In fact, Hanlon got nominated for Veterans Committee consideration at least 12 times going as far back as 1953.
The Hall of Fame simply doesn’t induct that many managers, with only 23 enshrined currently. For a manager to get in Cooperstown without too much struggle, he’d better inarguably be one of the best managers of his generation.
Such was the case in December 2013, when the Expansion Era Committee last met and unanimously inducted Tony La Russa, Bobby Cox and Joe Torre, who rank as the third, fourth, and fifth winningest managers in baseball history, respectively.
Martin, whose 1,253 wins are 38th best, was also on the ballot and might have looked far outclassed. The secretive committee would only say that Martin received fewer than seven votes out of a possible 16.
This fall, no manager of La Russa, Cox, or Torre’s caliber will be eligible with the Expansion Era Committee, though it will be interesting to see what happens with Jim Leyland, who’s eligible for the first time.
The 15th-winningest manager in baseball history, Leyland made three straight National League Championship Series appearances with the Pittsburgh Pirates, won the 1997 World Series with the Florida Marlins, and went to it twice with the Detroit Tigers.
But he also logged a 54-108 season when he stuck around to manage the Marlins after their fire sale following that World Series, and he had several losing years with the Pirates, totaling a .506 career winning percentage overall. Leyland might need a few tries with the Expansion Era Committee.
The same can be said for Lou Piniella, who didn’t even make the committee ballot when it last met, thanks perhaps to Cox, La Russa, and Torre.
”Piniella may not feel like a Hall of Famer to some people, the same ones who argue that Tim Raines or Alan Trammell or John Smoltz don't feel like immortals,” Joe Sheehan wrote in 2010. “Piniella, like those players, suffers in part by having contemporaries who were among the very best who ever lived.”
Then there’s Davey Johnson, who’s been a Veterans Committee candidate before but not an Expansion Era Committee one because of the unusual timeline of his career. Voting rules hold that a manager either needs to be retired for five years or, if he’s 65 or older, retired at least six months, a rule that dates to Casey Stengel in the 1960s.
The Veterans Committee considered Johnson in 2008 and 2010, giving him fewer than three votes out of 16 each time. Johnson resumed managing in the majors in 2011 after an 11-year break and, like Leyland, retired too soon before the Expansion Era Committee met in December 2013 to be eligible for it.
Johnson maybe doesn’t feel like a Hall of Fame manager either, though he’s got the highest winning percentage of any manager with at least 10 seasons who isn’t in Cooperstown, at .562. That’s equivalent to going 91-71 every season.
Bottom line, Martin looks to have some competition on the Expansion Era Committee ballot this fall. And it will only get more competitive in elections to come as managers like Bruce Bochy, Dusty Baker, and Terry Francona become eligible.
Cooperstown Chances examines the Baseball Hall of Fame case of one candidate each week. Series author and Sporting News contributor Graham Womack writes regularly about the Hall of Fame and other topics related to baseball history at his website, Baseball: Past and Present. Follow him on Twitter: @grahamdude.