TAMPA, Fla. -- The Baby Bull finally found his way into baseball's china shop.
Orlando Cepeda, whose productive bat and aggressive playing style made him one of the best players of the 1960s, was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame yesterday along with turn-of-the-century manager Frank Selee, umpire Nestor Chylak and Negro leagues pitching great Smokey Joe Williams.
The Hall of Fame veterans committee chose Cepeda over a list of other players that also included Dom DiMaggio, Joe Gordon, Mel Harder and Bill Mazeroski, even though his career was tarnished by a 1974 arrest and subsequent imprisonment for trafficking marijuana.
Cepeda narrowly missed going to Cooperstown in 1994 when he was named on 73 percent of the ballots submitted by voting members of the Baseball Writers Association of America (BBWAA), coming up seven votes short of the 75 percent necessary for induction in his final year on the BBWAA ballot.
"It's hard to explain the feeling when they told me I was selected to the Hall of Fame," Cepeda said at 3Com Park in San Francisco. "I've been ready for this for 17 years."
"I've been through good things, bad things, but I was very blessed to be born with the talent to play baseball."
Cepeda was known as both the Baby Bull and "Cha-cha" during a career that spanned 17 seasons and included stops in San Francisco, St. Louis, Atlanta, Oakland, Boston and Kansas City. He was the National League Rookie of the Year for the Giants in 1958 and was a unanimous selection for the National League Most Valuable Player Award after leading the Cardinals to the world championship in 1967, finishing his career with a .297 batting average, 379 home runs and 1,365 RBIs.
"He was a great, great player," said Hall of Fame pitcher Juan Marichal, who was a teammate of Cepeda's in San Francisco and is a first-year member of the veterans committee. "He was a great first baseman, a good hitter, a good RBI man and a good leader. When Orlando was traded to St. Louis, it was a great loss."
Nine votes were required from the 12-member veterans committee to elect a candidate in any of the four categories, which include a category for former players, an all-inclusive category for non-playing personnel and special categories for Negro leagues players and prominent baseball figures whose careers date back to the 19th century.
The veterans committee normally consists of 15 members, but former baseball executive Buzzie Bavasi resigned recently and two other members -- sportswriter Leonard Koppett and Brooklyn Dodgers great Pee Wee Reese -- did not attend because of ill health.
Selee (1859-1909) managed the Boston Braves from 1890 to 1901 and the Chicago Cubs from 1902 until tuberculosis forced him into retirement in 1905. In 16 years, he compiled a 1,284-862 record and a .598 winning percentage.
Williams (1885-1946) was considered one of the greatest pitchers in the history of Negro leagues baseball, and gained added fame with appearances in barnstorming exhibitions against some of the most famous major-league pitchers of the first half of the 20th century.
Chylak (1922-1982) was one of the game's most respected umpires during a 25-year major-league career that included six All-Star Game assignments, three League Championship Series and five World Series.
Committee member Yogi Berra remembered Chylak as a restrained, professional umpire who generally got along well with the players, but was in total control of the games he officiated.
"He wasn't forceful, but if he had something to say, he said it," Berra said, "and he would let you have your say. Not like some of the guys these days. You could have your say and then it was over and you got back to the game."
The four inductees will create one of the largest Hall of Fame classes in recent memory, joining Nolan Ryan, George Brett and Robin Yount, who were voted in by the BBWAA in December.
The Associated Press contributed to this article.
Pub Date: 3/03/99