New Effort To Have Dick Allen Enshrined In Cooperstown In Full Swing
By Mike DeNardo
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Baseball inducts its latest class of Hall-of-Famers today. And there's a new effort to have former Phillies slugger Dick Allen enshrined in Cooperstown.
His petulant behavior may have turned off the writers who passed him over. But Richard Allen Jr. says his dad Dick Allen belongs in the Hall of Fame.
"He was known for controversy, but the numbers -- people were looking at the controversy more than the numbers," he said.
A group backing Allen for the Hall of Fame kicked off their effort Friday at Ashburn Field at FDR Park in South Philadelphia. The group has prepared a 55-page presentation aimed at convincing baseball's Golden Era Committee that the 1964 Rookie of the Year and '72 MVP belongs in the Hall.
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Rich Ashburn Jr. remembers watching Allen hit long home runs at Connie Mack Stadium.
"When Richie came up to hit -- to me it was like watching God hit a baseball," he said.
Historian Bill Jenkinson says there's no doubt Allen was misunderstood.
"I think the more people understand who Dick Allen really was, the more inclined they'd be to vote for him," Jenkinson said.
Baseball's Golden Era Committee will decide.
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