Americans, for the most part are very provincial when it comes down to the HOF; you don't see Sadaharu Oh in the hall,for example or other players from other leagues. No, you see them from MLB primarily, as if it is the end all and be all of baseball.
Look at the people who are allowed to have a vote (sportwriters) and most importantly, who is not, (experts, historians and former players) So it turns into a defacto popularity contest with the most congenial players getting in-the writers favorites. Personally speaking,if Mike Lupica has a vote, I'd campaign that it be taken away from him because he knows nothing about the damn sport.
So we've got a bunch of writers who are still hung up on their childhood dream back in the '50's, when baseball was "pure"(yeah, right) and today's players can't possibly hold a candle to them, even though they are bigger, stronger and faster than they were back then. They hold players sacrosanct that have'nt been culturally relevant in over 70 years...Babe Ruth played his last game in 1935, for crissakes, anybody who saw him then is either dead, or very, very old.
Henry Aaron played his last game in 1976...30 years ago...and somebody tell Billy Crystal that Mickey Mantle is dead and Roger Maris is dead too...get over it. And they wonder why nobody is watching? Baseball is a business, a business that had better get culturally aware quick, before it becomes totally irrelevant. Take the sport out of the museum and stop ripping the product and the players because some guys want to take a trip down memory lane, nobody is feeling that.

It's that time of year, writers will be picking who will go into the Hall of Fame. In my opinion the Hall of Fame was and is for great players. It has been turned into a popularity contest or a time for swelled head writers to climb up on the poolpit and judge who has been deemed worthy to enter the club of the so called best ever. If a player is one of the greatest players to ever play the game, then he should be voted into the hall. I don't care what he did after or during his playing career off the field. Pete Rose bet on baseball while a manager, if it is against the law put him in jail, ban him from baseball fine. But how do you hold the career hits leader out of the group of the very best players, Pete Rose is without question in this group. Mark McQuire is in that group, Barry Bonds is in that group. If they did something wrong, fine them kick them out of the game whatever, just don't tell me that the Hall of Fame is where the best Baseball players go when they retire, because not allowing these three in or the many others because they were either guilty or suspected of wrongdoing, clearly shows that some of the best players are being left out. This is what is making the baseball Hall of Fame laughable to younger people, like me. O.J. Simpson is in footballs hall of fame and deserves to be there despite the fact he also deserves to be in jail. Quit mixing America's past time for politics baseball or let someone else do the picking. Salem would be proud.