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Block UserIt was just announced that the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York will be enshrining two players in July. The honorees will be Cal Ripken, Jr., who spent his entire career with the Baltimore Orioles, and lifetime Padre Tony Gwynn. On the surface, their induction is a no brainer. Both men achieve the 3,000 hit mark. Ripken, for one, was credited with saving baseball after the calamity of the 1995 player's strike by breaking Lou Gehrig's record for consecutive games played. Gwynn meanwhile won eight batting titles in his career. In an ordinary year, it would have taken zero explanation for why they were voted in...but as it turns out, this is no ordinary year.
Overshadowing Ripken and Gwynn is another player whose name appeared on the ballot for the first time this year. While Ripken nearly set a record by appearing on 98.5% of the ballots and Gwynn was given the green light on 97%, Mark McGwire's name was checked on only 23%. Like Ripken, McGwire was credited with "saving baseball" when his historic chase for the single season home run record (along with Sammy Sosa's competition) fueled a media frenzy that made the sport interesting again. During that Summer of 1998, McGwire not only caught Roger Maris' 61 home run mark, he shattered it and achieved a mark that many believed would never be caught again when he smashed home run number 70 on the final day of the season. This was not the first time McGwire had achieved records. As a rookie in 1987, "Big Mac" (as he was affectionately referred to as throughout his playing days) set a rookie record of 49 home runs, missing his shot at becoming the first player to hit fifty in over a decade when he missed the final weekend for the birth of his first child. He then became the first player to hit more than thirty in his first four seasons. In all, had it not been for missing most of three seasons to injuries, as well as retiring early due to injuries, McGwire likely would have smashed the career record for bombs. Teams McGwire played for were also more successful due to his presence. Unlike Ripken and Gwynn, McGwire does have a World Series ring. Without a doubt, McGwire was always a bigger draw than either of the players who cruised into the Hall this year.
The odds of McGwire ever joining them is slim, though. While his press conferences in 1998 were fawned over, the same men who deified him then have made him a pariah due to another interview that was less to their liking. In 2005, the U.S. Senate held hearings about steroids in the game of baseball, mainly because of an investigation that had uncovered a lab that provided the illegal drugs to Barry Bonds. There was also a "tell all" book from a disgraced former teammate of McGwire that implicated "Big Mac" as a steroid user. During the hearings, McGwire basically pled the fifth amendment and was prosecuted in the courtroom of public opinion. Other players called in to testify, and certainly just as guilty, adamently denied any wrongdoing. One player, Rafael Palmerio, was later caught in the newly instituted drug testing. However, since these players went on the record (likely perjuring themeselves), they have been given more lenience.
At the heart of the matter is that these players played in a flawed generation. McGwire's rookie year of 1987 saw an explosion in home runs. In all, twenty-eight players surpassed the thirty home run mark. Only thirteen had done so the two years prior. Cracking the top-50 in the sport required at least 26 bombs. To explain light hitters like Matt Nokes and Mike Pagliarulo being able to smash more than thirty home runs, the conspiracy theorists hatched up a story about Rawlings wrapping the balls tighter. Major League Baseball laughed off the loony suggestion and ignored the actual cause (all players developing forearms like Popeye) of amazing home run production. And why wouldn't they? The fans loved watching the majestic blasts and the media enjoyed writing about them. Seats were filled constantly and new stadiums popped up like Starbucks.
No player filled those new seats better than the goliath known as Big Mac. His arrival in a visiting town did for baseball what a Michael Jordan road trip did for basketball. In a world of steroid popping players, where former defensive specialists were a threat to clear the bases on a hung slider, none of them held a candle to Mark McGwire. Yet the most dominant player of the generation will be punished while those who did the same, with fewer results, will probably get their invite to Cooperstown.
Which brings me to the current inductees: Why do they deserve enshrinement? If McGwire is disqualified because he is known to have taken a supplement called Andro (which was not only allowed by MLB, but legal to buy at any mall front vitamin store) and suspected of taking worse--why are Ripken and Gwynn above suspicion of cheating? Ripken played in more than 2,600 consecutive games without ever taking a break. It was rare for him to even come out of a game early. Who is to say he never took a steroid cycle to improve his recovery time and help him get over the sprains and strains that kept other players from making the same achievement? Tony Gwynn was never a big power hitter, but he was known to use an extremely tiny bat to make sure his bat speed was good enough to spray singles. Could he have corked his bat to give him an even lighter bat? Obviously, I have no proof of either of these things, but there should be a cloud of suspicion in this extremely cynical era we live.
Then, of course, there are the other players who played during the time frame McGwire shook fear into opposing pitchers. My favorite player, Kirby Puckett, saw his home run numbers explode in the late eighties after beginning his career as a doubles hitter. Perhaps he had some chemical help. Nolan Ryan somehow managed to get better as he reached his fourth decade of life. Steroids certainly could have helped his body recover quicker between starts. Should every player who took the field from 1987 to 2001 have their plaque removed?
As I see it, the Baseball Hall of Fame's purpose is to honor the greatest players of every generation. Ty Cobb and Babe Ruth were enshrined even though their behavior was certainly upsetting to the fanbase of their time, because their exploits on the field were greater than their contemporaries. Now, the voters want the Hall to become an arbiter of moral values. In that case, only Dale Murphy and his boy scout behavior is probably the only player who belongs. Of course, he again was denied admittance this year--which is probably just as well, he had some suspicious home run spikes once the steroid era began. As the current precedent shows, suspiscion is all it takes.
