Expansion Era Committee votes Pat Gillick into Baseball Hall of Fame

Baseball Executive Pat Gillick has been named as the sole candidate voted in by the Expansion Era Committee into the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Pat Gillick, who built three World Series champions and has served baseball for nearly 50 years, has been elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame by the Expansion Era Committee, it was announced today.

Gillick was the lone candidate to garner the necessary 75% of votes cast by the 16-member Expansion Era Committee, which considered a ballot of eight former players, three executives and one manager whose contributions to the game were most significant from 1973 through the present. The Expansion Era Committee held meetings on Sunday in Orlando, site of the baseball winter meetings.

Gillick becomes the 32nd executive to be elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame and just the fourth individual elected whose career has been defined nearly exclusively as a team architect, joining Ed Barrow, Branch Rickey and George Weiss in Cooperstown. Gillick will be joined by any electees who emerge from the Baseball Writers' Association of America voting, which will be announced on January 5, 2011.[...]

Gillick presently serves as senior adviser to the Philadelphia Phillies and has spent nearly 50 years in Major League Baseball, with 27 seasons as a major league general manager. Gillick, who built playoff teams with the Blue Jays, Orioles, Mariners and Phillies, began his major league career with the Houston Colt .45s/Astros from 1963-73, before joining the New York Yankees as scouting director from 1974-76. Gillick joined the expansion Toronto Blue Jays in 1977, building five division winners from 1985-93 and consecutive World Series championships in 1992-93. In three seasons with Baltimore from 1996-98, the Orioles made two postseason appearances. In four seasons shaping the Mariners from 2000-2003, the Mariners won 90 games each season, including an American League record 116 in 2001, with two postseason appearances. In building the Phillies from 2006-2008, Philadelphia won the NL East twice and the 2008 World Series. Beginning in 1983, teams under Gillick's direction as general manager posted winning records in 20 of 22 seasons.[...]

The Results of the Expansion Era Ballot (12 votes needed for election): Pat Gillick (13 votes, 81.25%); Marvin Miller (11 votes, 68.75%); Dave Concepcion (8 votes, 50%); Ted Simmons, Vida Blue, Steve Garvey, Ron Guidry, Tommy John, Billy Martin, Al Oliver, Rusty Staub and George Steinbrenner each received less than eight votes.

Congrats to Pat Gillick.

Similarly, Bill Conlin has been named as the 2011 winner of the J.G. Taylor Spink Award.