John Smoltz believes that Rockies icon Todd Helton belongs in the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Trevor Hoffman thinks so, too.
You’ll get no hemming or hawing from the two Hall of Fame hurlers. No Coors Field qualifiers, either. Just their simple belief that Helton was an extraordinary player who should be enshrined in Cooperstown, sooner rather than later.
Eligible voting members from the Baseball Writers’ Association of America now have their ballots and must cast their votes by the end of December. The class of 2023 will be announced Jan. 24.
“Todd belongs because he was an elite hitter, like a Tony Gwynn or a Larry Walker,” said Smoltz, who was inducted into the Hall in 2015 after a 21-year career that included 213 victories, 154 saves and 3,084 strikeouts.