After thinking about it a bit, I think Raffy will still get into the HOF, but I’m sure there will be a bunch of doubts. Jason Stark had a bunch to say on this issue in his column on ESPN. Check it out. My favorite quote from him:
Would I vote for a guy with 3,000 hits and almost 600 homers for the Hall of Fame? Yeah, I would. On the first ballot. And every ballot.
It’s some kind of commentary on the bizarro world we live in these days that stuff like this is now a subject for serious debate. But steroids have done that for us.
Jason also feels that when it actually is time to vote on Raffy for the HOF, the 5 year period after a player retires will probably cool off a lot of people’s thoughts. Right now it’s a hot issue, people are passionate about it, but I suspect it won’t be that “big a deal” in 2010 (assuming Raffy retires after this year). Although, I wonder what kind of heat a team may take for signing Raffy in this offseason, assuming he wants to continue. His contract is up after this season.
Also, it appears that the Rangers have cancelled a pre-game ceremony meant to honor Raffy when the Orioles visit town this weekend. I can’t say I’m surprised by that.
I didn’t notice this newer post when I commented on the old one. So I’ll just repeat that the steroid finding calls into question all of Raffy’s statistics. For a guy like Raffy whose only HOF credentials are his statistics, and because we now don’t know how much is legit, I’d say HOF should be doubtful.
Esp. since Canseco is now more credible on this subject than Raffy. For all we know, Raffy’s been on the stuff for 10+ years now.
I’m sorry, even given what’s transpired, I can’t see how this automatically makes Canseco credible. Can’t help you there.
Is it good for Palmeiro? Hell no, but I will NOT subscribe to the knee jerk reactions I see online about how Canseco now got everything right.