It's high time Hodges got his due

The Baseball Hall of Fame Veterans Committee announces the results of its voting on February 27 and if there's any justice, Gil Hodges will finally be enshrined in Cooperstown.

Late last year ground broke in Flushing for a new stadium for the New York Mets. At the time several area sportswriters as well as Bill O'Reilly opined that the new facility, designed as an homage to the old Ebbets Field, should be named after Brooklyn Dodger great Jackie Robinson. Robinson's breaking the color barrier in big league baseball remains a monumental achievement, one appropriately recognized when his number 42 was retired throughout the majors in 1997.

But I've always thought that Gil Hodges, the onetime Dodger slugger who would later manage and propel the Amazin's from zeroes to heroes in 1969, represents a truer link to the Mets' Brooklyn roots. CitiBank has put up a wad of cash for the right to the moniker, "Citi Field." CitiBank would do itself some great PR by changing it to "CitiBank's Hodges Field." Under the official name, appropriate recognition of the sponsor would be accorded, while us Met fans could call our new home "the Hodge," after our late, great and much-loved manager. How cool would that be?