HOF players and managers, broken down by team

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When the Baseball Hall of Fame class is revealed every year, one of the biggest storylines is always: Which team's cap will each player be wearing on his Hall of Fame plaque?

A Hall of Famer going into Cooperstown under a certain team logo typically means that the player defined his career with that franchise, and means that a baseball legend will be tied together with that team forever.

And the Hall of Fame Class of 2026 cap choices were no different -- Carlos Beltrán will go in as a Met, Andruw Jones as a Brave and Jeff Kent as a Giant.

The decision of which team cap to feature on a Hall of Fame plaque used to be solely up to the player. But the Hall of Fame now works in conjunction with inductees to determine the club with which he made his greatest impact on the game.

Players who starred for multiple clubs in their careers can even enter without a cap logo, as is the case with recent Hall of Famers like Roy Halladay (2019), Mike Mussina (2019) and Greg Maddux (2014).

Here's a breakdown of all the Hall of Famers by team -- using the Hall's official cap logo designations for the hundreds of players and managers in the Plaque Gallery -- along with a guess at who could be the next Hall of Fame representative for each club.

(This list excludes Hall of Famers who wouldn't don a Major League team logo, including executives, umpires and Negro League legends like Cool Papa Bell or Josh Gibson. At the bottom of the list are the dozens of Hall of Famers who do not have a team designation for a variety of reasons, including a cap depicted in a position that doesn't show a logo, a blank cap or a lack of a cap altogether, as could often be the case with old-time players.)

ANGELS

Guerrero had a tough choice to make between the Halos and the Expos, but chose the team with whom he won his lone MVP Award in 2004.

ASTROS

Nolan Ryan could have very well been the first Astro, but he opted for the Rangers instead. But the Killer B's -- Astros lifers Biggio and Bagwell -- ushered Houston into the Plaque Gallery for the first time. Wagner, who was elected on his final BBWAA ballot, chose to have an Astros logo on his cap after spending the first nine seasons of his 16-year MLB career with Houston.

ATHLETICS

This is a franchise that feels like it should have more representatives, considering the A's boasted two early dynasties in Philadelphia and are one of just two teams to three-peat as World Series champions in the modern era (1972-74). Catfish Hunter was the ace of those teams, but his later success with the Yankees kept him from choosing a club. The same logic applied to manager Tony La Russa, who won more titles later with the Cardinals. Many early Philadelphia Athletics stars either have blank caps or no caps at all on their plaques.

BLUE JAYS

Alomar came to Toronto alongside Joe Carter in a famous trade involving Tony Fernandez and Fred McGriff, and helped make the Blue Jays into a two-time World Series champion powerhouse.

BRAVES

Atlanta fans have enjoyed one heck of a run recently as the stars of the 1990s Braves dynasty -- Glavine, Smoltz, Chipper and now Andruw -- have made their way to Cooperstown, joining legends like Spahn, Mathews and Aaron. Greg Maddux is the notable exception, choosing to go without a logo after pitching half of his career with the Cubs.

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BREWERS

Yount was a no-brainer as a lifelong Brewer who collected 3,142 hits in Milwaukee. His longtime teammate Molitor might have also worn a Blue Jays cap -- since that was the team he finally won a World Series with in 1993 -- but Molitor instead represented the club with which he recorded roughly two-thirds of his 3,319 hits.

CARDINALS

The Cardinals boast a lot of iconic Hall of Fame inductees from Stan The Man to Gibson to The Wizard of Oz to Rolen. Tony La Russa's three NL pennants and two World Series titles in St. Louis made him a likely candidate, but La Russa went in without a logo due to his early success in Chicago and Oakland.

CUBS

Plenty of Cubs caps are in the Plaque Gallery despite the franchise's 108-year title drought between 1908 and 2016 -- none bigger than Mr. Cub himself, Banks -- but a few old-timer exceptions like Three-Finger Brown, Johnny Evers, and Joe Tinker are not on the list simply on account of their logo-less heydays.

D-BACKS

The D-backs franchise enjoyed pretty quick success when it won a World Series title in its fourth year of existence, and Johnson's induction gave them a Hall of Famer in short order, too. While the Big Unit had his share of success in Seattle, his four consecutive Cy Young Awards in the desert made his cap logo a pretty easy choice.

DODGERS

The Dodgers' Hall of Fame caps cross eras from Brooklyn to Los Angeles, and include some of baseball's most iconic players like Robinson and Koufax. Soon enough, Clayton Kershaw -- a lifelong Dodger -- will join them.

EXPOS / NATIONALS

The franchise's three current Hall of Famers all played in Montreal. Vladimir Guerrero was probably the last viable Expos candidate, but he chose to enter the Hall representing the Angels.

The Nationals don't have a Hall of Famer yet -- that is, a player from the team since it moved to Washington -- but someone like Max Scherzer could go into the Hall of Fame for the Nats.

GIANTS

The Giants have played more modern-era baseball in San Francisco than they did in New York, but both eras of the franchise are amply represented -- from Mathewson to Mays to McCovey and now Kent. The biggest omission here is probably Mel Ott, who is capless on his Hall plaque.

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GUARDIANS

There are shoo-ins like Feller, and then there are others like Thome, who hit 275 of his homers for teams not based in Cleveland -- but that still left 337 for his original franchise, and his cap choice reflects that. Lajoie's popularity caused the Cleveland franchise to be known as the Naps for a brief period in time.

MARINERS

The only way Griffey wasn't going to don a Mariners logo was if his plaque had him wearing a backwards cap. Martinez's candidacy made Seattle fans hold their breath for a full decade, but the sweet-swinging DH finally got in on his last year of BBWAA eligibility. And Ichiro fell just one vote shy of becoming the second unanimously elected Hall of Famer following a brilliant 28-year professional career that included 19 seasons in MLB and nine in Japan.

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MARLINS

The Marlins are still looking for their first Hall of Famer to wear the team's cap. Currently, their best hopes are players like Gary Sheffield, who'd have to get in via an Era Committee, or Giancarlo Stanton, who nearly hit 60 homers in his MVP season in a Miami uniform.

METS

Seaver is the most obvious Met in the Hall, winning three Cy Young Awards in New York and leading the Miracle Mets to the franchise's first World Series championship in 1969. There was some consideration of Piazza wearing a Dodgers cap on his plaque, and there were questions about which cap the newly inducted Beltrán would wear, too. Willie Mays, Nolan Ryan and Gary Carter are among the notable Mets who are in the Hall of Fame with a different team's cap.

ORIOLES

Ripken played his entire career in Baltimore, including all of his MLB-record 2,632 consecutive games streak. His popularity -- combined with Gwynn's -- made Ripken's induction the biggest in Cooperstown history in 2007. Frank Robinson's early success with the Reds made him the only moderately tough decision on this list, but he undoubtedly blossomed as a star in Baltimore. Mike Mussina pitched two more seasons and won 24 more games with the Orioles than he did with the Yankees but opted to enter the Hall with no logo on his cap.

PADRES

Gwynn and Hoffman are San Diego icons, while Winfield surprised many when he chose his original club, the Padres, over the Yankees squad with whom he enjoyed a more successful -- but also contentious -- tenure.

PHILLIES

Many iconic Phillies are here, like Carlton and Schmidt. One notable exception is Grover Cleveland Alexander, whose plaque features a blank cap. Bunning threw a no-hitter in both leagues and won far more games with the Tigers, but the righty went in with a Phillies cap anyway.

PIRATES

Not many teams have a Hall of Fame list as illustrious as the Pirates' across all eras of baseball. But you might notice that one of baseball's best all-time shortstops, Honus Wagner, is not listed above. Wagner played 18 of his 21 seasons in Pittsburgh, but his cap (depicted in profile on his plaque) is blank nonetheless.

RANGERS

Beltré's career wasn't on a Cooperstown track when he joined the Rangers in 2011, his age-32 season. But his next eight years in Texas, which included Beltré joining the 3,000-hit club, made him an easy first-ballot choice. Ryan's choice was an unexpected one, considering that he threw four no-hitters with the Angels and pitched many of his best seasons in Houston. But the strikeout king did rack up his 300th win and 5,000th strikeout in a Rangers uniform.

RAYS

Tampa Bay is the youngest MLB franchise along with the D-backs, playing its first season in 1998, and does not yet have its first Hall of Famer wearing a Rays cap.

RED SOX

Boston has some great ones, with slam-dunk Red Sox Hall of Famers like Williams, Yaz, Boggs, Pedro and Big Papi. There are also a few legends like Cronin, Foxx and Grove who could've just as easily worn a different club's cap, but wear the Sox logo.

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REDS

The stars of the Big Red Machine, Bench, Morgan and Perez, are the core of this group of Reds Hall of Famers. Morgan actually played nearly as many games in Houston as Cincinnati, but those peak years in Cincinnati rank alongside the best by any middle infielder in history.

ROCKIES

Helton spent his entire 17-year career in Colorado, batting .316 and picking up 2,519 hits along the way. The five-time All-Star gained 50 percentage points of voting support from 2020-24, leading to him being voted in with 79.7% of the vote in his sixth year on the ballot. Walker finally broke through in his 10th and final season on the ballot, giving the Rockies their first Hall of Famer. He clubbed 258 of his 383 career homers with the Rockies, while also winning the 1997 NL MVP Award after hitting a league-leading 49 homers.

ROYALS

Brett's name is pretty much synonymous with the Royals franchise, and there was never a doubt about either his election or his cap choice. Beltrán could've gone in as a Royal, his first team, but chose the Mets instead.

SENATORS / TWINS

The Senators have four legends to represent them, led by the Big Train, Johnson, who won 417 games with a 2.17 ERA, 3,509 strikeouts and an all-time record 110 shutouts. All four Senators Hall of Famers were major contributors to the team's only World Series title in Washington in 1924.

The franchise moved to Minnesota in 1961, and since then, Killebrew and Puckett have been no-brainers, while Carew logged five more seasons (and 1,117 more hits) with the Twins than he did with the Angels. Blyleven pitched for five MLB clubs, but he began his career with the Twins and came back to help the franchise win its first World Series title in Minneapolis. Mauer, a Minnesota native and the only catcher to win three batting titles in AL/NL history, was also a first-ballot selection.

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TIGERS

All the Tigers one would expect are listed above, except perhaps second baseman Charlie Gehringer, whose cap is depicted in profile on his plaque. Detroit's Hall of Famers include many early legends of the game like Cobb, with his 4,189 career hits and all-time best .366 batting average.

WHITE SOX

The Big Hurt, Thomas, and his 521 career home runs headlines the White Sox group of Hall of Famers. Missing here are Eddie Collins and all-time ERA leader Ed Walsh, who were both White Sox legends, but each player dons a blank cap from a time before logos were prevalent.

YANKEES

Ruth, Gehrig, DiMaggio, Mantle, Jackson, Rivera, Jeter, and on and on ... the Yankees' Hall of Fame list is a who's who of all-time greats -- including Mo, the only unanimous Hall of Famer. However, look closely at the list above and you'll recognize one glaring omission: Yogi Berra. Berra played 18 of his 19 seasons in the Bronx and was one of the most famous ballplayers on the planet while he wore pinstripes, but the profile view on his plaque leaves no room for the famous "NY" logo.

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CLEVELAND SPIDERS (defunct)

Cy Young himself, the namesake of MLB's top pitching award, is also the Cleveland Spiders' lone Hall of Fame representative. How much did Young mean to the Spiders franchise? After he left following the 1898 season, Cleveland went 20-134 (the worst record in NL history) and folded at year's end.

HALL OF FAME PLAYERS / MANAGERS WITH NO CAP LOGO

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