The Baseball Writers Association of America and the National Baseball Hall of Fame has hit a crossroads.
Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds entered their first year of eligibility for the Hall of Fame and have sent the baseball world into confusion and debate.
Clemens is known as the best pitcher of his generation, winning 354 games, seven Cy Youngs, one Most Valuable Player award and ranking third on the all-time strikeout list with 4,672. Bonds is the all-time home run king and also won seven MVPs while ranking third in MLB history with a career 158.1 wins above replacement.
But both have been suspected to have taken performance-enhancing drugs.
The dominant pair was denied on their first opportunity for enshrinement, with only 37% of writers deeming them worthy of a plaque in baseball’s most hallowed grounds. That’s well short of the 75% necessary for induction.
Many writers including Fox Sports’ Ken Rosenthal, ESPN’s Pedro Gomez and Sports Illustrated’s Tom Verducci didn’t vote for Bonds, Clemens or any player who was linked to PEDs. They felt that it gave the players an unfair advantage and that people who cheat shouldn’t gain entrance into Cooperstown.
But while they feel they’re protecting the sanctity of the Hall of Fame, they contributed in providing baseball with one of its lowest moments of the past decade (which is saying a lot) as not one player was voted in.
Craig Biggio, who is only the third member of the 3,000 hit club to not be elected on the first ballot, Jeff Bagwell, who was one of the premier first baseman of the 1990s and Mike Piazza, who is arguably the best offensive catcher of all time, were all casualties of the BBWAA’s indecision about what to do about steroids.
While many writers make valid arguments about keeping PED users out of the Hall of Fame, they’re also erasing a part of baseball’s past.
Granted, it tainted the game greatly and an asterisk should be placed on those woeful years. But history happened and can’t be erased, regardless of punishments doled out in college sports.
That was a dark time for the sport, but it still happened and the game can’t forget its mistakes. The writers seem to be taking a golden opportunity to educate the public about the steroid era and flushing it down the drain.
CBSSports’ Jon Heyman, who didn’t vote for Bonds or Clemens, tweeted that he was proud of the way he and other writers “stood against steroids.”
What Heyman fails to recognize, besides the fact that he wrote a column in 2011 advocating for Bonds’ entrance to Cooperstown, is that voting for the Hall of Fame is not about taking moral stands. It’s about determining who the best players in baseball’s history were and recognizing them.
The BBWAA, which contains myriad writers who haven’t covered the sport in decades, has a good deal of selfish members who want to make the vote about themselves and, as Heyman said, “take a stand.”
Next year, Greg Maddux, Frank Thomas, Tom Glavine, Mike Mussina and Jeff Kent will be in their first year of eligibility and are considered by many as first ballot Hall of Famers. That presents a problem for voters as they can only vote for 10 players each year.
Deserving players like Biggio, Bagwell, Piazza, Curt Schilling, Edgar Martinez and “suspected” PED users now have a markedly lower chance of being recognized because of the BBWAA’s incompetence.
As for Clemens and Bonds? Well, for the near future, it appears the only way they’re getting into the Hall of Fame is by buying a ticket at the front door.
ch203310@ohiou.edu
