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MLB 2013

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Jeff:
HOF announcement today, time to start up the new thread.

It'll be really interesting to see what happens today with Bonds and Clemens.  I'm expecting both to come in around the 40-50% mark, but we'll see.

I'd like to see the Killer B's get in together, but I have a feeling that Biggio alone may be the only one (if any) that get in today...

(ps. can't forget to include the usual MN-homerism HOF voting rant here for Jack Morris  - '91 game seven is still the greatest game of baseball I have ever had the chance to watch.  8))

Mikey D:
BBWAA sure made their thoughts known - no roiders in their sacred Hall...

Jeff:
It was sort of interesting to see the separation - the guys with PED whispers (Bagwell, Piazza) around 60%, the guys who were probably HOFers before they doped up (Bonds, Clemens) around 40%, and the guys with PEDs confirmed (Sosa, Palmiero) down at 10%.

Having Maddux on the ballot next year (355 Ws, 3371 Ks, 3.16 ERA) will really drive the PED point home for Clemens (354 Ws, 4672 Ks, 3.12 ERA) since Maddux is basically Clemens without the steroid revival (those extra three Cy Youngs).  I'm sure Clemens will be pissed next January when Maddux is a first ballot HOFer and he's still sitting on the couch waiting for the call.  :P

P-Siddy:
I'm a conspiracy theorist as it is, but I think those PED guys were used by the league to boost ratings after the strike damaged their reputation.  What a better way to generate interest and get people back into baseball by having the chase for the home run record.  I don't know if PED was encouraged by the league or if they turned a blind eye to it just so they could get people in the seats again, but that's my feeling on the matter.  Now that these guys took one for the team, they are being shunned for doing it.  And how could the league not know this was going on?  One season McGwire is a 'puny' guy, the next he's a powerhouse.  Sad.

Nicklab:
I don't think that there was some grand conspiracy by the owners and MLB to have players start taking PED's.  The players are responsible for their own actions, especially if they were taking a substance with the intended goal of boosting their stats.

That being said, I think the owners and MLB turned a blind eye to PED's.  Especially when you look at all of that buzz that surrounded both Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa during the season when McGwire broke the home run record that Roger Maris had held since 1961.  A lot of sports writers looked at that home run chase as the thing that saved baseball after their last strike.  The owners and league may not have forced the players to take PED's, but at the very least they were complicit.

As for the baseball writers who vote on the Hall of Fame?  They excel at being curmudgeons over who should be in the hall, and who should not.  But then, the Baseball Hall of Fame does have a higher level of cred than pretty much any other Hall of Fame for professional sports, and that's because of the selectivity of the HoF voters.  I think you had to expect that the writers would make a statement like this with some of the most high profile players who were linked to PED's.  Even guys with phenomenal career numbers.  They routinely make these statements with guys who have HoF numbers, but aren't regarded as the elite of the HoF and won't vote them in on the first ballot.

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