The National Baseball Hall of Fame is planning to judge Andre Dawson’s request to vary the cap on his Cooperstown plaque from the Montreal Expos to the Chicago Cubs. Dawson has lengthy believed that Wrigley Field and the intense highlight across the Cubs helped energize and lengthen his legendary profession.
That preliminary alternative of the Expos emblem was made with out Dawson’s approval after the Baseball Writers’ Association of America voted for his induction as a part of the Hall of Fame’s 2010 class. Dawson just lately despatched a letter to Jane Forbes Clark, the chief of the Hall of Fame’s board of administrators, asking for a assessment of his plaque’s design, in response to the Chicago Tribune. Dawson known as it a possibility to “right a wrong.”
The Hall of Fame intends to speak with Dawson as soon as the group really receives his proposal, a Cooperstown official stated Tuesday, and will get the possibility to totally see what it entails.
“My preference all along was as a Cub,” Dawson informed Tribune columnist Paul Sullivan. “I had my reasons, and I think that should’ve been something we sat down and discussed.
“It’s hard for stuff to bother me, to a degree. But this has toyed with me over the years for the simple reason that I was approached with the (announcement) that was going to be released to the press that I was going to wear an Expos emblem. I didn’t agree with it at the time. But for me, getting into the Hall was the most important thing.
“Over time, I’ve thought about it more and came to the (conclusion) I should have had some say-so.”
Dawson, who was drafted by the Expos out of Florida A&M University in 1975, spent the primary 11 seasons of his 21-year major-league profession with Montreal. The synthetic turf at Olympic Stadium battered his physique — 12 reported knee surgical procedures bolstered his repute as a troublesome participant — and the Expos have been inoperative because the franchise relocated after the 2004 season and rebranded because the Washington Nationals.
Dawson famously provided the Cubs a “blank contract” throughout spring coaching in 1987, telling the workforce to fill in his wage. This interval of labor relations was marked by collusion amongst Major League Baseball’s house owners. For $500,000 assured plus efficiency bonuses, Dawson produced 49 residence runs and 137 RBIs for a last-place workforce throughout that prove-it season, turning into the 1987 National League MVP.
That momentum carried into the following stage of Dawson’s profession as an enormously standard determine in Wrigleyville. He carried out at a excessive stage for the Cubs into his late 30s, spent two seasons with the Boston Red Sox and stored enjoying for the Florida Marlins past his forty second birthday.
Disagreements are a part of what makes the Hall of Fame a extra fascinating establishment. The debates over who must be in and who must be neglected — a subject sophisticated by the steroid period — are a part of the offseason dialog across the baseball trade. Greg Maddux felt extra comfy with no emblem on the hat on his Cooperstown plaque as a result of the Cubs and Atlanta Braves have been each so necessary to his legacy as probably the greatest pitchers ever.
Dawson isn’t conflicted anymore, and he received’t be nervous about any remaining Expos followers on the market. His feedback to the Chicago Tribune appeared to shock the Hall of Fame, which is making ready for bulletins subsequent week round its up to date period committee — Lou Piniella, Jim Leyland, Cito Gaston and Davey Johnson are among the many candidates for induction — and the Ford C. Frick Award that yearly honors an impressive baseball broadcaster.
“I realize there will probably be some backlash, but at this point I’m 70 years old,” Dawson informed Sullivan. “Do you think I really care?”
(Photo: Liv Lyons / MLB Photos through Getty Images)
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