The 10 Best MLB Players NOT in the Hall of Fame

The all-time home run king isn't in Cooperstown. Neither is the all-time hits king, the only man with seven Cy Young Awards, or a guy with 696 home runs. The Baseball Hall of Fame holds more than 270 players, and some of the best who ever lived are still outside it.

The rules for this list: retired players only, no one still waiting on a first ballot (sorry, Albert Pujols and Miguel Cabrera), and the ranking is about what they did on the field. Why they're not in is a separate question, and it gets its own paragraph.

10. Sammy Sosa

609 home runs, and the only player with three 60-homer seasons.

Sosa hit 66 in 1998, 63 in 1999 and 64 in 2001. He won the 1998 NL MVP, and for one summer he and Mark McGwire were the most popular people in America.

Then the bat broke. In 2003 a corked bat shattered in Sosa's hands at Wrigley Field. In 2009 the New York Times reported he was on the list of players who tested positive in MLB's 2003 survey testing. On the writers' ballot he never got past 18.5%, and he fell off in 2022.

The Cubs kept him at arm's length for almost two decades. Sosa finally apologized in December 2024, the team put him in the Cubs Hall of Fame in 2025, and Wrigley gave him a standing ovation this August. Cooperstown hasn't followed.

9. Gary Sheffield

509 home runs, a .393 on-base percentage and 9 All-Star teams.

Sheffield had the most violent bat waggle in baseball history and backed it up for 22 seasons with 8 different teams. He won a World Series with the 1997 Marlins and finished in the top 3 of the MVP vote twice.

His problem was BALCO. Sheffield testified that he used a cream from Barry Bonds' trainer without knowing what it was. The writers gave him 63.9% in his final year, 2024. The Era Committee gave him fewer than 5 of 16 votes in December 2025.

8. Rafael Palmeiro

3,020 hits and 569 home runs.

Only 7 players in history have 3,000 hits and 500 home runs: Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Eddie Murray, Alex Rodriguez, Albert Pujols, Miguel Cabrera and Palmeiro. The first 3 are in the Hall, and the last 2 are locks once they're eligible.

Palmeiro's case ended with the most famous finger-wag in congressional history. On March 17, 2005, he pointed at a House committee and said, "I have never used steroids. Period." Four and a half months later he was suspended for testing positive for stanozolol. The writers gave him 4.4% in 2014, and he was off the ballot after 4 years.

7. Shoeless Joe Jackson

A .356 career batting average, 5th-best in MLB history.

Jackson hit .408 as a rookie in 1911 and didn't lose it. Babe Ruth said he copied Jackson's swing.

In the 1919 World Series, the one the White Sox threw, Jackson hit .375 with 12 hits and didn't make an error. He was acquitted in court in 1921 and banned for life by Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis the next day anyway. He died in 1951 still insisting he played to win.

In May 2025, MLB ruled that its lifetime bans end at death, which took Jackson off the ineligible list after 104 years. A Hall of Fame committee can now consider him.

6. Lou Whitaker

2,369 hits, 244 home runs, 3 Gold Gloves and 75 WAR.

Whitaker is the stat crowd's favorite snub, and the numbers explain why. By Baseball-Reference's WAR he is more valuable than dozens of Hall of Famers, including several second basemen. He was the 1978 AL Rookie of the Year, a 5-time All-Star, and the second baseman on the 1984 Tigers.

He and shortstop Alan Trammell played 1,918 games together, the American League record for teammates, and were the Tigers' double-play combination for 19 seasons, longer than any pair in history. Trammell went into the Hall in 2018. Whitaker got 2.9% of the writers' vote in 2001 and fell off the ballot after one year. His one Era Committee ballot, in 2020, got him 6 of 16 votes.

5. Curt Schilling

216 wins, 3,116 strikeouts and 3 World Series rings.

Schilling was one of the great big-game pitchers ever: 11-2 with a 2.23 ERA in the postseason, a co-MVP of the 2001 World Series, and the bloody sock in Game 6 of the 2004 ALCS. By WAR he's the best pitcher of his generation outside the Hall except Clemens.

He was never linked to steroids. He came up short because of what he said after he retired, and the voters said so. He reached 71.1% in 2021, 16 votes short of 75%. He asked the Hall to take him off the ballot, the Hall said no, and he dropped to 58.6% in his final year.

4. Pete Rose

4,256 hits, the most in Major League history.

Rose also played in more games (3,562) than anyone, made 17 All-Star teams at 5 different positions, and won the 1973 NL MVP and 3 World Series. Nobody who played the game ever wanted it more.

He also bet on baseball, including on his own team while managing the Reds. On Aug. 24, 1989, he accepted a lifetime ban, and a rule passed 2 years later kept banned players off the Hall of Fame ballot. Rose died on Sept. 30, 2024. In May 2025, MLB reinstated him. The Classic Baseball Era Committee next meets in December 2027, and for the first time Rose can be one of its 8 candidates.

3. Alex Rodriguez

696 home runs, 3 MVPs and 14 All-Star teams.

A-Rod was a Gold Glove shortstop who became a 3rd baseman who became one of the 5 best players of all time by the numbers. He is 5th on the all-time home run list, and his 117.4 WAR is one of the 20 highest totals ever.

He was also suspended for the entire 2014 season, 162 games, for his role in the Biogenesis scandal. He is still on the writers' ballot. He reached 40% for the first time in 2026, a long way from 75%.

2. Roger Clemens

354 wins, 4,672 strikeouts and 7 Cy Young Awards.

Nobody else has won more than 5 Cy Youngs. Clemens won his first in 1986 and his last in 2004, at 42. He is 3rd all-time in strikeouts and 9th in wins, and he's in any serious conversation about the best pitcher ever.

His name was all over the 2007 Mitchell Report. He denied it to Congress, was charged with perjury, and was acquitted on all counts in 2012. The writers topped out at 65.2% in his final year, 2022, and the Era Committee gave him fewer than 5 of 16 votes in December 2025.

1. Barry Bonds

762 home runs, 7 MVPs and 2,558 walks, all Major League records.

Bonds was a Hall of Famer before anyone suspected him of anything. He had 3 MVPs and 8 Gold Gloves before 1999. Then, from age 36 to 39, he put up 4 seasons that don't look real even now: 73 home runs in 2001, a .609 on-base percentage in 2004, and 120 intentional walks that same year. Pitchers gave up.

By Baseball-Reference he has more career WAR than any position player except Babe Ruth. He also sits at the center of the BALCO case. The writers gave him 66% in 2022, his final year. In December 2025, the Era Committee gave him fewer than 5 of 16 votes, and under a rule the Hall adopted that year, that keeps him off the next ballot in 2028. The best hitter most people alive have ever seen is still waiting.

Honorable mentions

Tommy John: 288 wins over 26 seasons, and the surgery named after him has saved thousands of pitching careers. He's the only person on this page who changed the sport off the field for the better.

Manny Ramirez: 555 home runs and one of the best right-handed hitters ever. Two failed drug tests ended his candidacy. He got 38.8% in 2026, his last year on the writers' ballot.

Mark McGwire: 583 home runs and 70 in 1998. He admitted to steroid use in 2010 and fell off the ballot in 2016.

Who did we miss? Who belongs in the top 10 that isn't here? Tell us in the comments.