This question has reared its metaphorical head once again, after retired major league pitcher Roger Clemens emerged from a federal courthouse in Washington late yesterday afternoon, having been acquitted of multiple counts of perjury, obstruction of justice and making false statements before Congress.
Now, I'm not going to address the question of whether the United States federal government should have been actively involved the past decade in having Clemens, Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, Rafael Palmeiro, and other MLB athletes (a) testify before Congress and/or (b) put on trial for their alleged (and in some cases, proven) use of anabolic steroids, performance-enhancing drugs (PED), or human growth hormones (HGH) during their playing days at this time. That's another argument for another day.
Instead, I'm focusing on the baseball end of things - specifically, whether players caught or strongly suspected of using some form of synthetic assistance to "gain an edge" and create a not-truly-equal playing field belong enshrined in Cooperstown.
Which circles me back to my opening question.
Let's look at Clemens' professional resume, since he's currently the most prominent victim / scapegoat / idiot / holier-than-thou diva (choose one, or more) who represents the face of MLB's Steroid Era.
From a purely (OK, "purely" might be a stretch, but work with me here!) statistical standpoint, Clemens ranks among the greatest players ever to take the field. During Clemens' 24-year career, "The Rocket" was one of the most dominant pitchers in major league history, tallying 354 wins (the ninth-most all time), a 3.12 earned run average (ERA), and 4,672 strikeouts (the third-most all time; only Nolan Ryan and Randy Johnson have more). An 11-time All-Star and two-time World Series champion, he won seven Cy Young Awards during his career, the most of any pitcher in MLB history (three with the Boston Red Sox, two with the Toronto Blue Jays, one with the New York Yankees and one with the Houston Astros). He won the 1986 American League Most Valuable Player Award, posting a 24-4 record with a 2.48 ERA - the last starting pitcher to be named MVP until Detroit's Justin Verlander in 2011.
Baseball, more than any other sport, is all about single-season and career stats. If you're a rabid baseball fan, you know what these numbers represent.
And then on December 13, 2007, everything changed, when The Mitchell Report - a study conducted by U.S. Senator George Mitchell - was released, uncovering many prominent baseball players who allegedly took performance-enhancing drugs. Clemens was the top name in the report.
The Mitchell Report was, in part, a follow-up to former MLB slugger José Canseco's 2005 tell-all book, Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant 'Roids, Smash Hits & How Baseball Got Big. Along with admitted to using anabolic steroids, Canseco claimed up to 85% of major league players took steroids, a figure disputed by many in the game. In his book, Canseco specifically identified former teammates McGwire, Palmeiro, Jason Giambi, Iván Rodríguez and Juan González as fellow steroid users, and admitted that he injected them. Canseco was also cited in the Mitchell Report.
Clemens has vehemently denied ever taking steroids or HGH, but has been criticized and scrutinized by the media and the public ever since. The federal government got involved in the situation as Clemens testified in front of Congress on February 13, 2008 that he never took performance-enhancing drugs. The USFG has twice prosecuted Clemens for lying in his testimony, and is batting 0-for-2; the first ended in a mistrial last year, and now he's been acquitted in court.
But the damage has been done. Clemens' reputation has been tarnished and destroyed, and who knows if he will ever be able to recover from it.
Again, from a career statistical standpoint, Clemens should be a shoo-in. But the questions linger in the wake of his numbers after leaving Boston following 1996. Coming off a 10-13 season with the Red Sox in 1996 (when Boston General Manager Dan Duquette claimed Clemens was “entering the twilight of his career”), the following happened:
1997 (Toronto): 21-7 record, 2.05 ERA, 292 strikeouts, winning the "Pitchers Triple Crown (wins, ERA, strikeouts), winning the AL Cy Young Award.
1998 (Toronto): 20-6 record, 2.65 ERA, 271 strikeouts, again winning the "Pitchers Triple Crown (wins, ERA, strikeouts), again winning the AL Cy Young Award.
2001 (New York, age 38): 20-3 record, 3:51 ERA, 213 strikeouts, again winning the AL Cy Young Award.
2004 (Houston, age 41): 18-4 record, 2.98 ERA, 2.98 ERA, 198 strikeouts, winning the NL Cy Young Award.
2005 (Houston, age 42): 13-8 record, 1.87 ERA (leading the NL), 185 strikeouts, placing third in the NL Cy Young Award voting.
Overall, Clemens went 162-73 after leaving Boston, with a better-than-average ERA, an amazingly high number of strikeouts, and a ton of accolades. But the Mitchell Report - which mentions Clemens' name 82 times - states former trainer Brian McNamee injected Clemens with a steroid during the 1998, 2000, and 2001 baseball seasons.
During his post-aquittal press conference, Clemens noted he "put a lot of hard work into that career”, reiterating the claim he made on 60 Minutes on January 6, 2008, when he addressed the allegations. (That night, he told Mike Wallace his longevity in baseball was due to "hard work" rather than illegal substances and denied all of McNamee's assertions that he injected Clemens with steroids, saying that they "never happened".)
Of course, no one ever accused Clemens of being a slacker.
But the problem Clemens is going to have, when it comes to reaching the Baseball Hall of Fame, is that the crimes for which he was acquitted yesterday had nothing to do with whether he did or didn’t use steroids - and, despite the court verdict, there is still considerable evidence he was a cheater.
The real thing Clemens needs to be concerned about will be the fifth point of the ballot eligible voters receive every winter from the National Baseball Hall of Fame. It's there in clear, concise language: "Voting shall be based upon the player's record, playing ability, integrity, sportsmanship, character and contributions to the team(s) on which the player played."
In other words, cheating counts - against you.
It's the character clause that will cause trouble. It already has for a number of other retired players who are already allowed to be on the ballot (Clemens isn't eligible until 2013, five years after his retirement). In his sixth year on the ballot, McGwire (the first player to hit 70 home runs in a season) received 19.5 percent of the vote in December 2011 - the lowest total he's garnered in the six years he's been eligible (the minimum percentage to gain entry is 75 percent). Palmeiro - one of only four men to have more than 3,000 hits as well as more than 500 home runs in a career (which should have gained him a near automatic admission to Cooperstown) - was only able to get 12.6 percent. And in 2013, the Hall of Fame ballot will feature three men who by all statistical measure should be voted in on the first ballot: Bonds, Clemens and Sosa.
Clemens seems very confident that the Court of Law verdict will translate effectively with the Court of Public Opinion and the Court of HOF Voters. But he might want to review baseball history, in particular the statement MLB commissioner Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis issued the day after the eight Chicago “Black Sox” were acquitted of throwing the 1919 World Series: “Regardless of the verdict of juries, no player who throws a ballgame, no player that undertakes or promises to throw a ballgame, no player that sits in conference with a bunch of crooked players and gamblers and does not promptly tell his club about it, will ever play professional baseball.”
Even though Shoeless Joe Jackson, one of the greatest hitters of all time, was acquitted in court, he never played another game in the majors, and there is no plaque for him in the Hall of Fame. This looms large for Clemens and Bonds, in particular.
Now, some writers have argued the sportsmanship clause (which is unique to the MLB HOF ballot) should be removed, and voting should be based entirely on the empirical evidence of each candidate. There is some merit to this position; after all, how can one take a sports Hall of Fame - which is supposed to represent the best of the best - seriously when, in all likelihood, the career home run leader (Bonds), career hits leader (Pete Rose), first-ever to 70 homers (McGwire), first-ever to 60 without leading the league (Sosa), and most Cy Young Awards (Clemens), among other statistically great players - aren't enshrined? Buster Olney, ESPN’s leading baseball voice, noted post-acquittal he “was already going to vote for Clemens, for the same reason that I have always voted for Mark McGwire and Rafael Palmeiro: The institution of baseball condoned the use of performance-enhancing drugs for almost two decades with inaction. To hold it against a handful of individuals now is, to me, retroactive morality.”
If anything, I think a special wing of the HOF should be devoted to the Steroid Era. It's a significant part of MLB history, and should be told as part of the story - just as wartime baseball, the Negro Leagues, and other "eras" have been part of its fabric. To ignore the sins and errors of the past would be a travesty; even NASA has a section of its museum dedicated to the space shuttle tragedies and Apollo XIII. However, while noting some of the more outstanding examples, only the Era should be discussed as a historical commentary. The players should not be officially inducted.
And the same holds true for Jackson, Rose, and others who cheated the game and its integrity, even if it wasn't through the use of chemical enhancement.
As it stands today, no one is going to get into the Hall of Fame with a checkered past in regards to performance-enhancing drug use. Clemens, Bonds and Sosa - among others - have that stigma, and based on the recent voting for tainted-past players, it seems very likely they will join McGwire and Palmeiro in a club whose membership is growing despite no one wanting to be part of it.
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