The Baseball Hall of Fame induction ceremony for 2014 is live on Sunday from Cooperstown as the HOF welcomes some major names in Frank Thomas, Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, Tony La Russa, Joe Torre and Bobby Cox and this will be streaming live on MLB Network at 1:30 pm ET and there will be a special MLB Tonight show and other coverage from the network after there were no living inductees last year.
This class is the biggest one with living members in decades and since the three managers and players are so well known and beloved by many, this will be a special ceremony and induction. Cooperstown has been invaded by thousands of people for the event and while there is weather in the forecast with some rain, the speeches are expected to be emotional with the names that are going in. Thomas was one of the best power hitters and sluggers of all-time, while Glavine and Maddux were dominant pitchers during their careers for the Braves. Their manager Bobby Cox is getting in among a trio of all-time greats with Torre and La Russa.
The ceremony could get moved inside if the rain is bad, but that shouldn't stop how emotional it will be for the members getting in and while they have been asked to keep their speeches to 10 minutes, chances are it will go much longer. The ceremony will have over 50 of the living members of the Hall at the ceremony and it comes as this group will be getting in with plenty of fanfare. Thomas comes in with some monster numbers and he was a clean hitter in the steroid era, hitting over 500 home runs and also putting in over 1,700 RBIs and those are some great numbers.
Both Glavine and Maddux are 300 game winners that played for the Braves during that great division winning streak, while Cox was the manager that handled the team. Maddux was one of the top vote getters of all time with over 97 percent of the vote and he was very impressive during his career with 355 wins. Maddux had a number of one hitters, including a game I saw myself against the Mets in the pouring rain and he is considered to be one of the best pitchers of all-time and he won double digit Gold Gloves consecutively as well.
This group of players and managers have a number of World Series titles, records and major milestones in baseball history and now they will be enshrined in the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown in Upstate New York. The MLB Network has the full wall to wall coverage for the induction ceremony.
Check here for the MLB coverage of the HOF Ceremony from the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown.
