Steroid era HOF voting...

[JimH5]

Induction weekend in Cooperstown is enormous, both for the village the Hall of Fame itself. They need to have induction ceremonies every year.

 

So to think that they can go 5 or 8 or 10 years without inducting players from an era is just unrealistic. And they can't just rely on the Joe Gordon and Billy Southworth-type of inductions to get people to visit. They need contemporaries.

 

I suspect that there will be lots of players from this era--those without direct connections to steroids--inducted. Jeter, A-Rod, Maddux, Glavine, Smoltz, Manny, Piazza, Pudge, Griffey, Randy Johnson, Pedro, Mariano Rivera, Frank Thomas, Jeff Kent, Chipper, Biggio.

 

But for Bonds, Sosa, McGwire, Clemens, Palmeiro. . .I can't see the BBWAA electing those guys.

[Thurston Fluff]

It has always bothered me that many people think Andro was some sort of illegal substance or that it is the same as taking anabolic sterioids.

 

The reason I brought up the Andro think is because someone said Mac wasn't playing When steroids was banned not that it was illegal to use. That was clearly not the case since he was so insistent that it wasn't a banned substance.

 

What's really interesting to me is that if you adjust for context, Barry Bonds & Roger Clemens are arguably the best hitter & pitcher to ever play.

 

 

 

Without steroids they were not the best of their era let alone ever. If you look at the 90's when Bonds wasn't on roids he was no where near the player Griffey was. If you take away the steroids he was not as good as Pujols in the 2000's. If he was never the best while he was playing he cannot be the best of all time. I do not believe Griffey has ever used and there have been no accusations about Pujols who has played at his usual level after testing.

Clemons has a host of players that are as good as he was if you subtract the years of performance enhanced play in what should have been the twilight of his career. Where some guys like Johnson, Maddux, Glavine, Pedro all using steroids? I don't know but they have not been linked to them and I do not think all of them were yet they all were just as good as Clemons if you take away the roids.

You have a good point that some are probably in the HOF with the assistance of roids but to say it's a roided up Barry vs a roided up everyone else discounts the players who did it right and were still good enough to be in the hall.

[Invader3K]

The sad thing about Clemens and Bonds is that, assuming they did do steroids, but not for the majority of their careers, they still would have been considered great players, and both are probably no doubt HoFers. Now neither of them may even get in.