Since the Mitchell report was released last week there has been much controversy surrounding players, steroids and the Hall of Fame. In my opinion players should still be able to be elected to the hall regardless of whether or not they were named in allegations, tested positive or admitted taking any performance enhancing drugs. At this point, the wool pulled over the publics' eyes for so long, is now being lifted and we are just now seeing that steroids is such a widespread issue. With that said, there is still a lot that we don't know and the reality is, we have no clue exactly how many pitchers and hitters have taken steroids. How can you keep one player out that allegedly took steroids when half of the pitchers that he faced were also likely on steroids? Everyone could be on it, so it is unfair to judge which players get in and which players do not simply because they had the unlucky misfortunate of testing positive or being ratted out by the Mitchell report or other sources.
It has to be an all or nothing approach. Either all players during the "steroid era" are allowed in or no one is. It is unfair to put it in the hands of the voters and allow them to pick and choose which players get in during the era. It is impossible to speculate on which players were on it, then deduct their stats according to how long they were on it, what pitchers they faced were on it and etc. etc. This alone may be enough evidence to allow all players into the hall just based on the clerical and media nightmare this investigation would create.
Unfortunately for our generation, baseball's best hitter Barry Bonds and best pitcher, Roger Clemens have arguably taken steroids. They also have faced each other so since they were supposedly both on steroids, that makes it an even playing field. If we really knew who has used steroids I think we would be shocked to see how many of these same situations where a juiced up pitcher was facing a juiced up hitter.
Also, athletes in all sports including baseball have been using some form of performance enhancements throughout the eras. Do you seriously think that Babe Ruth, an out of shape partier, hit 715 home runs on beer and chicken alone? Many other players from other decades have admitted to taking "greenies," which are basically a form of speed to keep their games sharp during their long and rigorous seasons. Are we going to ban them from the hall of fame because of this illegal advantage they had?
I don't support using performance enhancing drugs and I do feel they ruin the integrity of the game. At the end of the day however, baseball is ultimately a form of entertainment. During this past era we have seen some of the best baseball played for the past century. We saw three different players break a long standing single season home run record and an explosion of home run statistics across the board making the game more exciting to watch.
Steroids does not make a bench warmer turn into a hall of famer. Of all the players that used steroids, most of them probably would have made the hall of fame regardless. Steroids turns average players into good players, good players into great players and great players into hall of famers.