Henderson and Rice Elected to Hall

From MLB.com Barry M. Bloom:

The doors to Cooperstown swung open on Monday for Rickey Henderson and Jim Rice.

Henderson was the all-time leader with 1,406 steals and 2,295 runs scored. Widely considered to be the greatest leadoff hitter ever, he was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in his first time on the ballot with 94.8 percent of the votes cast by the Baseball Writers' Association of America.

"I feel great about it," said the 50-year-old Henderson during a conference call on Monday. "I love the game and I wanted to continue playing. It came to a time that I had to stop. It's been five years and they chose me to go into the Hall of Fame. So I couldn't be any more thrilled or pleased."

Here's what Rice had to say:

"Be patient and wait until the last out."

"If you look at some of the people in the Hall of Fame, my numbers are compatible," he said. "Why it took so long, I don't know. The only thing I can say is that I'm glad it's over with. I'm not going to bad mouth any writers or what have you. I'm just looking forward to today and to things to come."

Congrats to both Henderson and Rice, even though I don't think Rice deserves to be there.

Here's the complete voting results:

Player	Total Votes	Percentage
Rickey Henderson	511	94.8%
Jim Rice	412	76.4%
Andre Dawson	361	67.0%
Bert Blyleven	338	62.7%
Lee Smith	240	44.5%
Jack Morris	237	44.0%
Tommy John	171	31.7%
Tim Raines	122	22.6%
Mark McGwire	118	21.9%
Alan Trammell	94	17.4%
Dave Parker	81	15.0%
Don Mattingly	64	11.9%
Dale Murphy	62	11.5%
Harold Baines	32	5.9%
Mark Grace	22	4.1%
David Cone	21	3.9%
Matt Williams	7	1.3%
Mo Vaughn	6	1.1%
Jay Bell	2	0.4%
Jesse Orosco	1	0.2%
Ron Gant	0	0%
Dan Plesac	0	0%
Greg Vaughn	0	0%