Bill White to receive Hall of Fame’s Buck O’Neil Lifetime Achievement Award

By Canadian Press on March 9, 2026.

COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. (AP) — Former National League President Bill White will receive the Buck O’Neil Lifetime Achievement Award from baseball’s Hall of Fame on July 25.

The 92-year-old, a former star player and broadcaster, will be honored during the induction weekend, when Carlos Beltrán and Andruw Jones enter the hall along with Jeff Kent, the hall said Monday.

White hit .286 with 202 homers and 870 RBIs from 1956-69 for the New York and San Francisco Giants (1956, ’58), St. Louis (1959-65, 1969) and Philadelphia (1966-68). He was a six-time All-Star (eight if the years of double All-Star Games are included).

He was a New York Yankees broadcaster from 1971-88, then became baseball’s first Black league president when he succeeded A. Bartlett Giamatti. White served in the office from 1989-94.

White will be the seventh to receive the award, instituted in 2007 to honor those who broadened the sport’s appeal and whose character, integrity and dignity is comparable to O’Neil, who died in 2006 and was inducted into the Hall in 2022. O’Neil (2008) received the award along with Roland Hemond (2011), Joe Garagiola (2014), Rachel Robinson (2017), David Montgomery (2020) and Carl Erskine (2023). The award is given no more frequently than every third year.

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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb

The Associated Press

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