On August 29th, 1977, at Fenway Park, Jim Rice clubbed three homers – in the 2nd, 3rd, and 6th innings – but Boston lost to the Oakland A’s anyway, 8 – 7. Rice added a single in the 4th. He became the first Red Sox player to hit three in the same game since Norm Zauchin on May 27, 1955.

Jim Rice played from 1974-1989. He led the league in homers three seasons (1978, 1979, 1983). He was the American League MVP in 1978. But he did not make the Hall of Fame until 2009, 15 years after he retired.

Why did it take so long for a clear Hall of Famer like Rice to finally get in? From what I remember, it came down to personality. Rice did not go out of his way to make members of the Baseball Writers Association (BBWA) feel comfortable. And since it is those very writers who vote for the Baseball Hall of Fame, they were not easy on him.

There is a lot wrong with the way voting works for the Hall of Fame. Rice’s difficulty getting the necessary votes exemplifies just one of the problems.

Looking at Rice’s Baseball Reference Page, we see that he was in every way a clear Hall of Famer. Reading between the lines, we can also see that he was a Black man playing in a notoriously racist city, Boston, covered by old white male baseball writers. Did that have something to do with it?

I suspect it did.