Staff Report

New York Yankees manager Joe Torre is among the 42 candidates on the National Baseball Hall of Fame's 2007 Veterans Committee ballots, the Cooperstown-based shrine announced Thursday.

The 84-member Veterans Committee will receive ballots for players and composite selections (managers, executives and umpires) this January. Torre is one of 27 former major leaguers on the players ballot. Former Yankees manager Billy Martin appears on the 15-person composite ballot.

Veterans Committee voting runs January through February. Results will be released Feb. 27. Candidates who earn 75 percent of the votes will be enshrined during the 2007 Induction Ceremony, which is scheduled for July 29 at the Clark Sports Center. Veterans selections will be honored along with Baseball Writers' Association of America electees, if any, July 29. Results of the BBWAA voting will be announced Jan. 9.

The complete players ballot is as follows: Dick Allen, Bobby Bonds, Ken Boyer, Rocky Colavito, Wes Ferrell, Curt Flood, Joe Gordon, Gil Hodges, Jim Kaat, Mickey Lolich, Sparky Lyle, Marty Marion, Roger Maris, Carl Mays, Minnie Minoso, Thurman Munson, Don Newcombe, Lefty O'Doul, Tony Oliva, Al Oliver, Vada Pinson, Ron Santo, Luis Tiant, Joe Torre, Cecil Travis, Mickey Vernon, Maury Wills.

The complete composite ballot is as follows: Buzzie Bavasi, August Busch Jr., Harry Dalton, Charles O. Finley, Doug Harvey, Whitey Herzog, Bowie Kuhn, Billy Martin, Marvin Miller, Walter O'Malley, Gabe Paul, Paul Richards, Bill White, Dick Williams, Phil Wrigley.

Four players (O'Doul, Oliver, Travis and Vernon) were added to the 2007 ballot. Elston Howard and Smoky Joe Wood were dropped. Biographies of each 2007 candidate are available at the Hall's website, http://www.baseballhallofame.org.

The final candidates were selected by a BBWAA-appointed screening committee of 60 BBWAA members, two writers from each of the 22 major league cities with one team, and four writers from Chicago, New York, Los Angeles/Anaheim and the Bay Area, each of which has two major league teams. Each writer was asked to select 25 individuals from a list of 200 players and 60 managers, umpires and executives.

Simultaneously, a six-member screening committee of Hall of Fame members independently selected five players. Two of those players were not selected by the BBWAA Screening Committee and have been integrated into the final list.

The original list of players, which includes all eligible major leaguers to have played in at least 10 seasons, up to and including the 1985 season, encompassed more than 1,400 players.

The Veterans Committee's next vote will be for eligible players in 2009. Managers, umpires and executives will be up for consideration again in 2011.

The Veterans Committee is made up of the living Hall of Famers (61), Ford C. Frick Award winners (14), J.G. Taylor Spink Award winners (8) and John McHale, a grandfathered member of the former Veterans Committee whose term expires after 2007.

No one received the required 75 percent in the first two votes by the new Veterans Committee, in 2003 and 2005. In the last vote, Hodges and Santo received 65 percent, each falling eight votes shy. Oliva and Kaat were the only other players to appear on more than half of the ballots.

In the composite vote, held every four years, Harvey received 48 votes in 2003, falling 12 short. O'Malley was next with 38 and Miller had 35.