I wouldn’t take back 1998. Not a chance. That was the year I became a baseball fan. That season, Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa shattered the record books, both breaking Roger Maris’ long-standing record of 61 home runs in a single season. McGwire finished with 70, Sosa with 66. It still ranks as the most exciting baseball season of my lifetime.
Neither McGwire nor Sosa are in the Hall of Fame. Neither are Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens, who appeared on the ballot for the first time this year. In a move by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America, the group tasked with inducting players each year, none of them were voted in because of their alleged use of performance enhancing drugs.
The announcement on Jan. 9, that not a single player would be inducted this year brought back the biggest sports issue of the 2000s: steroids in baseball. And it begs the question: should steroid users be allowed into the Hall of Fame?
The popular answer is no. But I say yes. Now, I’m not so ignorant as to suggest that Bonds and Clemens did not use steroids. But we need to stop acting as if they were the only ones. For every Bonds, Clemens or Sosa, there’s a Mike Lansing or Tim Laker – more obscure players who used steroids not to become superstars, but simply to forge out a Major League career long enough to make a living. Is Bonds more guilty than Lansing because he was a better player? Absolutely not. And it’s been going on longer than anyone thinks.
Baseball players have been using testosterone and amphetamines since long before the so-called Steroid Era. According to the Mitchell Report, the result of a 21-month investigation into the use of anabolic steroids in MLB, the government first determined steroids to be widespread in baseball as early as 1973.
Former MLB pitcher Tom House admitted to using steroids his entire career, which lasted from 1971 to 1978. Pud Galvin is known as the first MLB player to admit to using steroids, which he did as early as 1889. Galvin is in the Hall of Fame. Perhaps voters should think about that the next time they cast their ballots.
Yes, we should get steroids out of the game. But we should not penalize the guys who happened to play when the media decided they didn’t like steroids. Eric Gagne, former Major League pitcher, wrote in his book that 80 to 85 per cent of players were using steroids during the 1990s and 2000s. So do we celebrate the small minority of players who didn’t use performing enhancing drugs? Or, do we wonder why in the world those few didn’t?
Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens were the greatest hitter and greatest pitcher of their generation, respectively. For that, they need to go into the Hall of Fame. I’m not advocating for steroids. They are illegal and to use them is cheating.
But cheating has been going on in baseball since the game has been played. We need to move on, and make sure history doesn’t repeat itself. But first we must celebrate that history. We can’t erase an entire era. Let them in.