Brian Downing Marquee

He came up as a catcher who could not hit, took up serious weight training in the late 1970s when the game still believed it made players slow and tight, and rebuilt his body and his swing around it. Everyone does it now. He hit .326 in 1979 and made his one All-Star team.

Twenty seasons gave him 2,099 hits, 275 home runs, 1,073 runs batted in and 1,197 walks — more walks than all but a handful of hitters of his time — with a .267 average. He led the American League in walks in 1987, at thirty-six, when he also hit 29 home runs.

He caught 675 games and played 777 in left field and finished as a designated hitter, thirteen seasons of it with the Angels, for whom only Garret Anderson and Tim Salmon have played more games. He batted with his feet nearly facing the pitcher, an open stance so extreme that coaches used photographs of it as a warning. The 1998 ballot gave him two votes of 473.