When Ichiro Suzuki waved to the crowd and jogged in from right field at Tokyo Dome in his final moments as a major league player, there was no doubt his next stop was the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York.
When his name appeared on the ballot for the first time, the only question was whether the iconic, trailblazing Japanese outfielder would be a unanimous selection.
Ichiro, who rose to global superstardom with the Seattle Mariners, was elected to the Hall of Fame in his first year on the ballot, but fell one vote short of becoming the second player voted in unanimously. Former New York Yankees reliever Mariano Rivera became the first player voted in unanimously in 2019.
“This challenge started in 2001, and now it's 2025. I can't imagine it would get to this point where I would be today,” Ichiro said on MLB Network. “There was a time I didn’t even know if I would get a chance to play in MLB. So what an honor it is for me to be here and be a Hall of Famer."
The development is historic for Japan, as Ichiro becomes the first Japanese player voted into the Hall of Fame.
Ichiro, one of the 33 members of MLB’s 3,000-hit club, is joined in the Class of 2025 by former pitchers CC Sabathia, who retired with 251 wins, and Billy Wagner, the all-time saves leader for the Houston Astros, who was in his 10th and final year on the ballot.
Former sluggers Dick Allen and Dave Parker were elected via the Classic Baseball Era Committee in December.
This year’s Hall of Fame induction ceremony will be held in Cooperstown on July 27.
Ichiro is now a Hall of Famer on two continents. He was voted into the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame last week.
Instead of joining his former Yankees teammate Rivera as a unanimous selection in the U.S. Hall, Ichiro stands alongside Derek Jeter, another former Yankees teammate, as the second player to miss out by one vote. Ichiro received 393 of 394 votes.
The Japanese superstar was a one-of-a-kind player who focused on contact during an era where players often went to the plate looking to hit home runs.
He finished his MLB career with 3,089 hits and a .311 average across 19 seasons with the Seattle Mariners — where he spent the bulk of his career — the Yankees and the Miami Marlins. He also had 780 RBIs and 509 stolen bases.
In 2004, the Japanese great broke MLB’s all-time single-season hits record with 262, surpassing the previous record of 257 set by George Sisler in 1920.
Ichiro began his pro career in Japan with the Orix BlueWave, recording 1,278 hits in nine seasons. When his NPB and MLB totals are combined, Ichiro has 4,367 pro hits, more than any player in history. After breaking Sisler’s MLB mark, Ichiro held the single-season hits record in both Japan (where he set the record in 1994) and the U.S. until 2010, when the Hanshin Tigers’ Matt Murton surpassed his record in Japan.
Ichiro moved to the Mariners via the posting system after the 2000 NPB season.
He was 0-for-3 in his MLB debut until a bouncing single up the middle. That hit got the ball rolling on a career that took him to the Hall of Fame.
Ichiro was the American League MVP and Rookie of the Year in his first MLB season in 2001 — Fred Lynn is the only other player to win both awards in the same season, doing so with the Boston Red Sox in 1975. He provided an immediate spark for the Mariners, who went 116-46 — tying the MLB record for wins in the modern era — with Ichiro at the top of the lineup.
The Japanese superstar put himself firmly on the road to Cooperstown during a spectacular run in his first 10 seasons from 2001 to 2010. He batted a combined .331 and accumulated 54.8 wins above replacement — third among position players over that period.
He recorded at least 200 hits in 10 consecutive seasons — an MLB record — and won 10 Gold Gloves and a pair of AL batting titles. He was a 10-time All-Star during that span, and his 2,244 hits are the most by an MLB player in his first 10 seasons.
He even made history in the All-Star Game, becoming the first player to hit an inside-the-park home run in the 2007 edition of the Midsummer Classic.
Ichiro could hit the ball all over the field, and his skill at making contact and his speed made him a master of the infield hit, as he often beat throws to first base.
"It was the first guy in my life, I think, that I saw personally change how big league defenders defended," former Mariners teammate Brett Boone said on MLB Radio on Sunday. "Because he would hit a routine ground ball to shortstop and beat it out. I saw big league shortstops playing shortstop differently when Ichiro came to the plate."
He was not much of a power hitter in MLB, with just 117 home runs. That total, though, includes a walk-off shot against Rivera in 2009.
The Aichi Prefecture native is 25th all-time in hits in MLB, and is one of six players with at least 3,000 hits and 500 stolen bases. His 2,514 singles are the sixth-most in MLB history.
He was also an extremely gifted fielder, chasing down balls, making athletic plays at the wall and highlight-reel throws from right field. One of the most iconic plays of his career came when he fired a laser beam from right field to throw out the Oakland Athletics’ Terrence Long at third base in 2001.
Ichiro spent 14 seasons with the Mariners and was inducted into the team’s Hall of Fame in 2022. Since retiring, he has served as a special assistant to the Mariners’ chairman.
Ichiro was the epitome of athleticism and cool, from the unique way he held his bat before getting into his stance to the way he patrolled the outfield. He wore his first name on the back of his uniform, something he began doing after a suggestion from BlueWave manager Akira Ogi in 1994.
He meticulously took care of his body and extended the same care to his equipment, going so far as to carry his bats around in a case that acted as a dehumidifier.
He was immensely popular in Japan, which helped raise the profile of MLB in the country as Japanese fans followed his every move on morning broadcasts of Mariners games.
Robert Whiting, an authority on Japanese baseball, once mused that Ichiro positively changed the way Americans thought about Japanese people.
"It really gave new respect for Japanese, it gave them, I think, a sense of self-worth,” Whiting told The Japan Times in 2016. "Because they'd been too often viewed as these faceless robots who could only make products. There were famous Japanese products all around the world, but there were no famous Japanese people other than an arthouse movie director like (Akira) Kurosawa, who had a limited following. There was nobody on a national scale, in the States anyway."
He was the first position player from Japan, and his arrival was met with curiosity and doubt, including from his new manager, Lou Pinella.
After watching Ichiro, who batted left-handed, repeatedly hit balls to left field during spring training, Pinella wondered if the Japanese enigma could hit it to right. He then challenged Ichiro, who instantly began hitting balls to right. He also hit a home run.
"He rounds the bases, steps on home plate and says, 'Happy now?'" Piniella said, according to a 2017 story on MLB.com. "So I said, 'Do whatever you want.' I recognized then that this was a special talent."
A pair of celebrated pitchers will join the famed Japanese outfielder at July’s induction ceremony.
Sabathia received 342 votes, and Wagner garnered 325, with both clearing the 296 (75% of the vote) required to be elected.
Wagner played for five teams during a 16-year career spent mostly with Houston, where he recorded a franchise-record 225 saves. He finished with 422 career saves and was a seven-time All-Star. He was part of an Astros combined no-hitter against the Yankees on June 11, 2003.
Sabathia pitched for 19 seasons, throwing 3,577⅓ innings during his career. He won the AL Cy Young Award with the Cleveland Indians in 2007 and helped the Yankees win the World Series in 2009. Sabathia was 251-161 with a 3.74 ERA.
Like Ichiro, he was elected in his first year on the ballot, joining a select group to receive that honor.
“It means everything to me," he said on MLB Network. "Just even to go in the Hall of Fame, in general, is a big honor. But to go in first ballot, I know what that means as a baseball player. It’s super exciting.”
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