Cal, Tony, Mark and the Hall

There were no big surprises in the announcement on Tuesday of this year's Hall of Fame inductees: Cal Ripken, Jr. and Tony Gwynn. Two marvelous players, among the very few great players who spent their entire careers with one team. Their play, their demeanor, and their approach to the game put the lie to the constant harping from fans and critics alike during the 1980s and 1990s that things were somehow better during a mythical "good old days" which, in fact, never existed.

Of course, the other big story was the exclusion of Mark McGwire, and his terribly poor showing in his first year of eligibility. And here is where things start to get really tricky: while there were a few writers who had the audacity to claim that they didn't vote for McGwire because his statistics didn't merit a selection, that's a pretty ridiculous argument - we all knew that someday a 500 home run hitter might get excluded, but 583 dingers is a pretty high standard in any book. I don't think there's any doubt that it all boils down to the steroids. In all likelihood most voters simply decided that, without them, McGwire never would have come close to having numbers that would make him a legitimate Hall-of-Famer. And they're probably right.

The acid test, of course, will be Barry Bonds. If you accept that he probably began taking steroids in the late 1990s, you also have to accept the fact that had his career ended in 1998 due to injury, he would have breezed into the Hall, with 3 MVP awards to his credit. Will the combination of chemical enhancement and boorish behavior keep him out? Only time will tell, but one thing for certain is that whatever happens, we're due for a lot of moralizing on both sides of the issue.