Hall of Hypocrisy

I have in my hand a ballot for the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association Hall of Fame.  Who gets my vote. Well, I think this one guy plagiarized a story, at least that's what I heard... no, no charges ever brought up specifically...but too bad: I think you cheated, so I'm not voting you in.

Welcome to Mike Piazza's world. 

Piazza has more home runs than any catcher in history.   He had a career average of .308.  But there were rumors that maybe he used steroids. (This because someone saw pimples on his back once.)  He's a Hall of Fame player.  Not this year. 

And this takes me to one of the most self-righteous, sanctimonious classes of people in media: the Baseball Writers of America.  

These guys -- and yes, it's still very much a boys club -- are the Supreme Arbiters, the Keeper of the Keys, The Protectors of the Realm of Cooperstown.  If they don't like you, you don't get in. At least not initially.  If you were not nice to them in the locker rooms, you don't get their vote.  They get to pick apart and analyze and condemn players all they want, though when anyone has the temerity to question them, they show themselves to be very thin-skinned.  

And I've not even mentioned the steroid voting. 

As the era of the Juicers' Eligibility begins -- really, it started with Mark McGwire -- this year's class put several notorious names on the ballot: Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Sammy Sosa.  A number of others from the era were also on the ballot, notably Piazza.   None of them got the votes they needed. 

In broad terms, people have questioned the exclusivity of the group that votes: why can't broadcasters be allowed to vote, for example? What I find particularly absurd is the condemnation being heaped on the juicers by the very writers who praised them for their greatness before finding out about steroids.  They didn't investigate the issue.  They all mocked Jose Canseco's book -- which has turned out to be more truthful than anyone could comprehend at the time.   They wrote glowing columns about the 1998 home run race between McGwire and Sosa. Daily News columnist Mike Lupica wrote a book about the chase.  But when the truth came out, did he recant?  Would it matter if he did?

Lots of guys in the media have admitted that they dropped the ball.  Often, they paint the brush a bit broader: hey, MLB didn't do anything about the problem, either.  Excuse me: they're in business to make money, and home runs sell tickets.  What sells newspapers? Controversy.   Should the players have not cheated? Sure, though as we know, the Steroid Era had a lot of murky water as far as what was acceptable and what was not.  Should Baseball have tried harder to figure out what was going on instead of counting receipts in 1998? Absolutely.   Likewise: journalists should have done a better job of seeing what was going on.

I don't wish to defend cheaters.  Nor do I believe that the writers are as guilty as the juicers.  But what I am saying is that their credibility as judges of this era is tarnished.  Indeed, perhaps that should be the standard for the writers: I think you didn't do a good enough job reporting on steroids in baseball, therefore you lose your vote.   Except who gets to decide that?

 Lupica has said on his radio program that if he thinks a player took steroids, he's not voting for him.  That's easy enough to do in the case of Bonds and Clemens, though not as easy as it is for admitted or caught juicers like Rafael Palmeiro. And a lot harder in the case of Piazza.   And what standard of proof is needed for a reporter?  Probably not the same as a court of law -- where Clemens was acquitted -- but where is the line?  Is it fair simply not to vote anyone who played in this era, regardless of proof?  And what about the five voters who sent in blank ballots to "send a message": how fair is that to Jack Morris, whose career ended before the Steroid Era allegedly began?  (The math, as it turns out, would not have mattered for Morris, but it's the principle I'm getting at here.) 

Here's another example of the arbitrariness of the voters: while so much has been made of Bonds and Clemens, how they had both been great and then juiced in their later years, how is it that Clemens got 8 more votes than Bonds?  Can there be 8 writers who think Clemens is innocent while thinking Bonds to be guilty?  Or is it a matter of personality: some guys like Clemens and don't like Bonds, who was rarely cordial to the media.  Or is it a matter of race?  (It's a subtle, subtle thing, kids.  You can say you're not a bigot, but the subtle prejudices can come out in odd places.) 

In the absence of confessions or drug tests -- which will be the case for a lot of players for a while -- can we simply treat each candidate case by case?  I'm not certain we can. 

There is no question that one fear the writers, and especially the Hall, have is that they will vote players in who later admit to juicing (or who later are found out to have, admission or not).  They see what's happened to Lance Armstrong and don't want that for the Hall.   First of all, there may be a couple of juicers already in.   Second, if you feel that passionately about it, make the Hall pass a resolution declaring that players who get in but who are found to have juiced will be removed.  It's what Cooperstown wants to avoid, but is the alternative -- letting no one in for the next decade -- really any better? 

A final point on the economics of this.  Certainly the Hall doesn't want taint on it, nor does it want no new members.  What's very important to think about is that for a player, getting into the Hall of Fame is like an ATM (thanks to WFAN's Mike Francesa for the analogy and the overall point).   To get in the Hall gives a player a chance to make lots of money from personal appearances and memorabilia signings.   For older players who never made the outrageous sums of money that the likes of Bonds and Clemens have made, that's a big deal.   Should that make a difference for those players who made so much money the past 20 years? Maybe not, but it's an illustration of how important the Hall of Fame voting is -- and why we need to ask questions about this process. 

How would I have voted? I would have put aside the steroid matter and look at the baseball card.  There are many reasons why McGwire  hit 66 homers in 1998.  Steroids.  The "live ball" era.  The dilution of pitching talent due to the addition of two new teams to MLB.  (There were two new teams added the year Roger Maris hit 61.)  We also don't have a full account of who did steroids.  And we can't simply blame it on position players, not as long as we keep talking about Clemens.  You want to give the juicers their own special wing, go right ahead. 

But the outrage the writers are showing is just as smug as Claude Rains in Casablanca shouting, "I'm Shocked -- SHOCKED! -- to find that gambling is going on here!" (while collecting his winnings as the arrests begin)  Hall of Hypocrisy, for the lot of em: players, organizations, and media.