'Cooperstown Chances' examines the Baseball Hall of Fame case of one candidate each week. This week: Steve Garvey.
Who he is: The word’s been out on Bobby Grich for a while, that in 1992 the former Orioles and Angels second baseman got robbed in Baseball Hall of Fame voting his only year on the writers’ ballot. Grich received 2.6 percent of the vote, likely doomed by his .266 batting average and 1,833 hits. As David Schoenfield of ESPN and Jay Jaffe of Sports Illustrated noted about Jim Edmonds, another one-and-done candidate, no position player who began his career after 1960 has made the Hall of Fame with fewer than 2,000 hits.