It didn't start out to be a point/counterpoint, but that's what it has become.
Ron Cook is a good friend, one of my journalistic mentors and a great colleague both here at the Post-Gazette and at 93.7 The Fan. We have spent many of days working together in various press boxes all over the country, and I have enjoyed his work pretty much since my fascination with newspapers began in my teens in the mid-1980s.
There are many things he and I agree on, but when it comes to the Baseball Hall of Fame, we couldn't be further apart. He believes nobody that ever was even rumored to take steroids should be in the Hall of Fame; I couldn't disagree more with this. And when it comes to Barry Bonds in the Pirates Hall of Fame, I think he is absolutely wrong as well.
Bonds should be in the Pirates' Hall of Fame and should be one of the members in the inaugural class. There are no two ways about it. But before we discuss Bonds, let's do a quick history lesson.
I've often said it is a sham that the same baseball writers who waxed poetic in real time about the home run chases of the late 1990s and early 2000s all seem to have a short memory. The home run chases really saved baseball and brought it back after the idiotic players strike of 1994 almost killed it. The baseball writers, many of whom are Hall of Fame voters, all know it, as do the managers and baseball executives at the time.
They wrote glowing story after glowing story about the chases and voted for all these guys to win MVP awards and various other awards. They did so knowing that something was completely off about these guys out there who suddenly had biceps and forearms like Popeye after he ate a can of spinach. Nobody believed the home run chases were not fueled by something greater than Wheaties and milk, yet they all continued to cover it incessantly and without question.
That is until Barry Bonds started breaking records. And then it became personal because Bonds was a jerk to just about everyone he came in contact with, and that's especially true about sports media. I truly believe that if Bonds were not involved in the discussion, all of the steroid guys who should be in the Hall of Fame would be in the Hall of Fame. But with Bonds, it is personal for most of these guys, and they hide behind some flimsy, nonsensical interpretation of the "integrity clause" to keep him out.
That's my own opinion of it, and reasonable and intelligent people can disagree and be civil about it. At the end of the day, it is a sports argument — nothing personal, just a disagreement. And as disingenuous as I think the "steroid guys cheated the game" argument is and as much of a farce as I think the "integrity clause" is, I will at least listen to these arguments.
In a sport where people of my color weren't allowed to play until 1947, shouldn't every accomplishment prior to that be tainted and thus not worthy of being honored? And if the steroid era is recognized as some sort of tainted era full of cheaters who lack integrity, why exactly is the man who turned a blind eye to it and enabled it, Bud Selig, in the Hall of Fame?
They saved his game, he gets the credit and they get punished. Come on, man, what kind of a dog and pony show is being put on here?
That brings me back to Bonds.
Bonds didn't take steroids and wasn't accused of it during his time with the Pirates. He didn't "cheat the game," and even though he was a meanie to some reporters, he played the game the right way every night. He wasn't able to get to the Pirates over the top in the playoffs, but he carried them to three straight division titles — their only division titles since 1979, by the way. He was an MVP in every sense of the word during his seven seasons with the Pirates.
You cannot construct a list of the Pirates' three best players of all time without Bonds' name on it. And I could make an argument he is No. 1 on that list, though longevity matters and he was only with the team for seven years.
If the integrity clause for the Hall of Fame makes baseball writers feel better about themselves for holding a grudge and making it personal against Bonds, fine. But that doesn't apply to the Pirates Hall of Fame and Bonds because he didn't take steroids when he played for Pittsburgh.
You don't have to like Barry Bonds, but what he did in a Pirates uniform was spectacular and he deserves to be honored for those seven years of his career before the steroids controversy surrounded him.
He should be in the main Hall of Fame, but there is at least a flimsy and hypocritical argument to keep him out. There is no argument other than "I didn't like him" to keep him out of the Pirates Hall of Fame, and that means there is no argument.
