k, thanx pintfan, that's what I thought too.

Nothing like a good llama nuts thread to pass the time on a pleasant African evening.

Are you having an African evening booger? Where are you? 

Bonds out. No need for an objective litmus test.

As someone who has an autographed picture of Bonds (who was amazingly nice to both my Dad and I at a game in 1989), I'm somewhat impartial.  But let me just say this, Barry Bonds was the greatest hitter I've ever seen.  I was amazed by Griffey Jr's grace in CF and home run power.  I've been continually impressed by Miggy doing Miggy things, and what Pujols has done over his career.  But Bonds was in a class of himself.  He used steroids.  They kept him healthy, and allowed him to put up numbers unmatched except for Babe Ruth in the history of the game.  To blame a single man for a culture of using is very short-sighted and unjust.  To properly put steroid users in context, you have to judge them against their peers, and Bonds has more MVP's than anyone in the history of the game.

As to effect of steroids, it's unquestioned that the main benefit was the ability to heal/stay healthy combined with increased nutrition/weight-training methods.  Steroids do not make you stronger (which was a crushing blow to a 12 year old me who was given them after an allergic reaction).  Players that use them like Bonds/McGwire/Sosa/ARod still work their *** off to get in the type of shape to do the amazing things they do.

And I believe expansion and a boom in really talented players coming up had much more to do with the inflated numbers as opposed to steroids.  If you look back at all the major sporting leagues (NBA/NHL/MLB...NFL is somewhat an outlier) they all experienced huge offensive numbers once TV money dictated an expansion.  By adding several new teams, the available starting pitching/pitching pool was diluted, and with smaller, more offensively themed parks being built.

In addition, with the introduction of Television and MLB national coverage and increased player salaries, you had a generation of American players that were drawn to the game that might now gravitate towards football, basketball or soccer.

In finale, Bonds is a HoFer.  And while most people get on their moral high horse about the alleged illegality of steroids in America, a far greater injustice is the amount of money trying Bonds without garnering a single standing conviction (tens of millions of dollars).

disagree..he admitted using steroids in his trial..he said he did not know they were steroids...they could not prove intent.
  regarding the size of his head..he thought he was wearing a lot of cheap hats that shrunk.

Posted by slainte on 6/2/2015 5:38:00 PM (view original):
Bonds out. No need for an objective litmus test.

With all due respect, slainte - and I mean it, you're a good competitor and owner imo - I think objectivity is exactly what is needed.  Where is the line?  Steroids, out.  Use a corked or doctored bat, in.  Scuff or use illegal substances on the ball, in.  Gamble, out.  Etc., etc.  It all seems rather arbitrary, especially when the benefits of said 'cheating' are decidedly debatable. 

I'd put them all in, and frankly have never understood what the big deal was.

Bonds and Clemens were the two greatest players I have ever seen, possibly the two greatest ever. To keep them out of the Hall of Fame, in my opinion, is silly, petty, and demeaning to the whole concept of what a Hall of Fame is.

Gambling is a special circumstance; anything that would conceivably lead you to lose a game or perform below your best intentionally should warrant automatic exclusion.

If Clemens' performance had not picked back up after the trade to Toronto and had Bonds' numbers remained at 40-40, great as that is (and it is great), would you still say contrarian23 that they were the best you had ever seen? 

I saw Griffey Jr. about whom no one has suggested steroid use. Why doesn't he get consideration among the best ever? Because he ended up with an injury and in the shadow Bonds? 

Was Clemens better than Greg Maddux without steroid use? 

I don't see why open cheating, resulting in changing the outcomes of games, pennant races, Cy Young Award and MVP awards, and the record books themselves does not bother you. 

If it were done in an election or in industry or in academia? I have failed students for plagiarism in my classes (in the age of Google, you use Turnitin or you end up with Wikipedia instead of students doing the work) and have voted to expel students from universities when serving on university-wide academic councils as a department chair for this kind of thing. 

I don't see why it should be tolerated in baseball. Someday, the greatest player that ever played the game, better than Babe Ruth will come along and will hit maybe 64 home runs in a season and 756 in a career. And no one will give a damn. Tell him (or her) that it's okay.
 

I find it hard to believe that someone would hit 64 in a season and 756 in a career and no one will give a damn ... but I get your point, hyperbole aside.

My only point above was, where is the line?  You and I, Prof, are off an age we recall Reggie Jackson's glorious rookie season - at least until he broke a bat and it was corked.  Do we eschew any and all future accomplishments of his, strip him of the sobriquet Mr.October and arguably the single greatest batting achievement ever, at least in World Series play, because he corked his bat as a rookie?

No, it is possible that he should have been suspended in 1969 though - he ended up third with 47 homers, but halfway through the season seemed on track to hit more than 61. Had he broken the record using an illegal bat the record should not have been awarded him and he should have had to miss half of the next season suspended. 

I haven't seen any evidence that his later achievements in the postseason or regular season after 1969 involved anything illegal. In fact I suspect that his batting accomplishments are muted by his having played in one of the lowest-scoring eras post-deadball in baseball history. 

But I also see your point. The whole thing is a mess now, having never been perfect, it is true. But I don't see how you can have competition without penalties that are genuine disincentives for cheating - for anything outside the rules that gives you an advantage. 

It is also true that many of the previous records were set by people with unfair advantages that were collective: the highest batting average ever will never be broken either, and not because Hugh Duffy used an illegal bat, but for all sorts of other reasons having to do with the pre-deadball era batting rules and techniques, the relative lack of competition in the leagues and the fact that 1894 was right up there with 1998 as an over the top hitting season. 

All the records before 1947 were by players playing collectively under unfair competition. BUT there records against each other in each of these situations reflect the fact that all of those who were competing did so under the same conditions and rules. The spitball was legal for example, or only whites could play. But these rules applies to the whole league. 

Now we have people doing things that are banned individually for their own achievement  - I have, by the way, never heard Bonds say "I would do anything to help the Giants win, so I did", or Clemens say "I was willing to risk my own health taking steroids to bring a championship to my team and our fans". 

Say what you want about Pete Rose, who I consider a more tragic example (still would keep him out of the Hall, but his batting record is absolutely clean as a whistle in contrast and is an incredible achievement), while he probably bet on games he played in, I am pretty sure he never bet against his own team, though even the possibility that his gambling debts put him in a position where his creditors could have demanded that of him is why he is banned. Still, I don't think he was "me first". 

Regarding Rose, especially as he was a manager, gambling is huge.  Let's be generous and say he never bet against the Reds while he was managing, but let's say he bet ON them.  You have 10 Large riding on the game; are you going to manage in a way that is best for the team, or are you going to do everything you can to win that night?  The answer is obvious; the presence of a large bet on a game has too much potential to influence managerial decisions, even if you are betting on your own team.

(Side note on Rose - imo, he was the ultimate 'me first' player.  When his consecutive game hitting street ended, he complained loudly that the pitcher should have thrown him more hittable pitches.  Rose was all about Rose).

And I think you get my point mentioning Reggie: some are willing to make exceptions - Reggie didn't do anything we know of after the corking so he's cool, but ANYTHING Bonds/McGwire/etc. did before they started juicing cannot be considered (not picking on you, pointing out inconsistencies in others' arguments) - but that hardly seems right.  Especially when there has been no evidence that juicing did more than help one heal faster.  If that's your criteria, ban antibiotics.  And why are steroids bad, but zeaxanthin is OK?  There's something that has been shown to provide an advantage, and one that falls exclusively to the batter.

Rose did become all about himself later, I agree and we agree that the betting, even if he bet on his own team, was worse than any steroids. 

If we could identify a point (probably with educated guessing looking at the start of anomalous stats) where HOF candidates started doping and then find that they did have HOF numbers even excluding or extrapolating their numbers for the steroid years, then maybe. Bonds would certainly make it then, Clemens likely, McGwire and Sosa likely not. 

But while I understand the scientific argument that steroids only help heal, they also prevent tiring, so someone can keep lifting weights beyond the usual capacity.  The actual strength is not enhanced, but since the arms don't strain with the greater weight, they have the same effect. 

No way you go from 40 HRs to 73 overnight, and gain hat sizes (!) by merely healing from injuries faster. On top of which, this approach puts the BLAME for every pennant not won, every great season not had on every player that did not take steroids during that period, preventing themselves and their teams from competing effectively. Chumps. 

Not a good message to send for the future. I can tell you, living in a country where this is EXACTLY the mentality of the average citizen, how utterly corrosive it is to the social fabric: no one here pays taxes because everyone else avoids them. No one is going to be a chump. At times you can't walk on the sidewalk for all the cars parked there illegally, since everyone parks illegally (and the authorities never tow or give out tickets), so everyone parks there to not be the one at a disadvantage. 

Everyone gets a job through personal contacts with their relatives and every relative with any contact at all favors relatives because this is how everyone else does it, so anyone competing on the basis of merit is a loser. Everyone joins some political party, hoping that this is the one with the right connections with bosses at their workplace, or the agency they need something from etc. so the parties are just exchanges for personal favors. Throw in the mafia in the mix and you have a society that does not go forward at all. 

I have told people here that in the United States they put you in jail for avoiding taxes and since Italians think that the US is the libertarian capital of the world, their dream of a state-free society, they are shocked by what seems like totalitarian repression to them. No one goes to jail for not paying taxes in Italy. Or for corruption in politics, and so nothing gets built, planned, done, without bribes being paid. 

This is why the rest of the world does not understand why the US government was upset that the heads of FIFA took bribes in the tens of millions of dollars from poor countries like South Africa to put the World Cup there. Lack of character is normal in the global economy. 

So at the risk of being harsh and keeping a few millionaires out of the Hall of Fame, I would say let's err on the side of character. 

one of the biggest reasons that the steroid era ****** me off...baseball is the one and only sport among baseball..basketball..football hockey..tennis...and boxing where you could with absolute validity compare players across the eras..try comparing football players from 1920 or even 1970 to today..cant..hockey even from 1970 to today..cant..basketball ..before and after 1979.......with a few exceptions....boxing .heavyweights..before after 1960..
   only in baseball does sim truly work.....players are the same..look the same..play the same..it was all comparable...steroids threw a monkey wrench into a beautiful fluid heritage.