PHILADELPHIA -- Bobby Abreu has numbers that could put him in the National Baseball Hall of Fame someday. But Saturday, he found himself joining the Phillies’ Wall of Fame.
“When I played here, I learned about the history of this club,” Abreu said. “And looking at that wall, it was impossible not to be motivated to become part of it.”
Abreu made a point to thank a lot of people, but he made a special point to mention former general manager Ed Wade, who traded Kevin Stocker to the Rays for Abreu in November 1997. Abreu finished his career batting .291 with 288 home runs, 1,363 RBIs, 400 stolen bases, a .395 on-base percentage, a .475 slugging percentage and an .870 OPS.
He finished with a 60.0 WAR, according to Baseball Reference.
To put that number in perspective, Edgar Martinez and Harold Baines were inducted into the Hall of Fame last month. Martinez finished his career with a 68.4 WAR. Harold Baines finished his career with a 38.7 WAR.
“I really do think about it,” Abreu said. “There’s some numbers there. Right now, people have more time to see what I did in baseball. I know I don’t have 500 homers, but I did a lot of things in the game that right now people are starting to see what’s going on.”