Editorial of July 31, 2025

Sunday in the Park

It’s over. Another milestone is in our collective pocket. Last weekend, here in Cooperstown, we, and a healthy number of visitors, once again celebrated a handful of very accomplished athletes as they were inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame, an event that—along with all the trimmings that have evolved and developed and been perfected as the years have crept by—is able each year to grab the attention of a multitude of baseball fans as well as, of course, those particular fans who spend a good part of their lives cheering for, and probably these days betting on, the specific teams of the inductees.

The Class of 2025, which consists of a substantial handful of great baseball athletes, was duly honored last Sunday, in between occasional drizzles and a fiercely hot sun. Three singular stars—CC Sabathia, Ichiro Suzuki and Billy Wagner—stepped up to plate before an immense national television audience, beside 52 returning Hall of Famers and in front of thousands of baseball fans (the crowd was estimated at 30,000) in a ceremony that honored their lifetime achievements and exemplary devotion to the sport.