DALLAS — Having waited for the call from Cooperstown for nearly three decades, Dave Parker burst into tears Sunday when he was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame along with the late Dick Allen.
“Yeah, I cried,” Parker said after receiving the news from Jane Forbes Clark, the chair of the shrine in Cooperstown, New York. “It only took a few minutes, because I don’t cry.”
Parker received 14 of 16 votes from the classic era committee at the winter meetings, and Allen got 13. A vote of 75% or more was needed for election.
They will be inducted on July 27, along with players voted in by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America, whose balloting will be announced on Jan. 21.
Tommy John was third with seven votes on a committee that considered candidates whose primary impact was before 1980. Ken Boyer, Steve Garvey and Luis Tiant each received less than five votes, as did Negro League players John Donaldson and Vic Harris.