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P.O. Sox: White Sox idle, but the mailbag is active
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I’m never going to be open minded about the cheats in baseball. Never. That any of them ever received even 1 vote is disappointing and Sheffield is in that class. That some of them received quite a few votes is sad. I’d vote for Pete Rose before any of the cheaters. Frankly, unless there’s proof that Rose cheated while he was playing, I feel he should be in the Hall.
I know the purity of the game is long gone but I’ll hold on to that part of it until I die. And if it gets too overbearing then I will just quit following the sport.
I won’t ever trust the Astros. I will always feel they’re still cheating and was saddened when they won the World Series. There are few teams I despise but the Astros have joined the cubs and packers on that list.
Bonds will never be HR king in my mind. The McGwire/Sosa side show is forever bullshit. All the numbers those asswipes put up in their career are not allowed in my baseball interests, in my love of the sport. And any commish that was aware and did nothing, any manager that was aware and did nothing are scums of the earth.
Other than that………………………………
I find it interesting baseball writers voted Bonds MVP seven times when his bat was driving clicks and viewers (benefiting them) and then wouldn’t vote for him once he was retired. Keeping him and Clemens out of the hall had drawn more interest every year than the new guys on the ballot.
It’s a lot more clear that Bonds was juicing now than it was when he was winning the MVP’s. Even if people knew, nobody had any proof unlike today, as MLB turned a blind eye. I think that’s why people could vote for him them and not now.
I’m not condoning him nor would I vote for him. But I will say this. A juiced up Barry Bonds is the most badass hitting machine this game has ever seen, or may ever see. I remember when he hit that monstrous homer vs the Angels (Percival) in the WS, and you could read Tim Salmon’s lips in the dugout “I’ve never seen one hit that far”. Again, not justifying him at all, he should never get in the HOF. But as a freakishly good hitter, even if that was artificial, he truly was fun to watch for a time!
I vote for Bonds simply because he was freakishly good before the roids. Take out the roid years and he was still amazing.
He was great before, true, unlike Sosa. But being great already hardly gives him a free pass for his choices.
Right.
The sad part is that Bonds would likely have made the hall without the juice. Despite that, I would still oppose letting him in now.
I admire the passion. For a long time I shared your view about the cheats. Now I’ve softened to the point that I would admit to the HoF those who would be “reasonably certain” to have been admitted had they not taken steroids. I think Bonds and Clemons probably meet that standard. McGwire, Sosa and Ramirez probably don’t. Another approach would be to discount their WAR by 20% and see how they compare on JAWS
That era was like Cher’s face. Fake.Remember Brady Anderson? Decent hitter, a little power and then 1996 he hits 50 HR’s.
Bonds could have hit HR’s just using his fat head. Sosa and McGwire too. Most of them. And then they lied. And lied.
And like Qubort mentioned, the writers aren’t without fault in this. They fed the monsters and then took them down.
I will always admire someone like Frank Thomas who spoke out against it a lot even though some people thought he was a user. Turns out he was just great.
Frank was noisy about steroids because he wasn’t using, but his accomplishments were obscured by people who did. I once saw a photo of Frank when he was like 10 years old, and he was huge even then. I think he just got the right genetics.
And not to pile on La Russa but I believe he brought McGwire in as hitting coach for the Cardinals awhile back. I had forgotten that. So La Russa probably knew McGwire was cheating and did nothing and then when it was common knowledge what had gone on he brings him in to be hitting coach.
Bah.
If TLR didn’t know that Canseco and McGwire were cheating in Oakland, then he was outright negligent or they were much more clever than I would expect. I don’t believe he never heard the rumors.
If you think the White Sox are bad at baseball things wait until you see them try to design and build the tech infrastructure needed for a streaming service.