Mark McGwire Eligible for Hall of Fame for First Time in 2007

With Bruce Sutter having become only the fourth reliever inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, thoughts turn to 2007, when guess who becomes eligible for the first time?

Some guy named Mark McGwire. Remember him? It's hard to believe that soon it will be five years since "Big Mac" retired from the St. Louis Cardinals. McGwire is the first big-name player in the steroid era eligible for the Hall.

Are McGwire's accomplishments - he ranks seventh on the all-time home run list with 583 - worthy of induction or should he be excluded because of his alleged steroid use?

The baseball writers will make the call - nobody else - and this should be an interesting story to follow next winter because it marks the first time that kind of moral dilemma enters the equation. The same will be true for other players down the road - Sammy Sosa, Rafael Palmeiro and eventually Barry Bonds. A player needs 75 percent of the vote to get in.

Hopefully, the controversy surrounding McGwire won't become too much of a distraction because two more worthy candidates also are eligible for the first time - Iron Man Cal Ripken Jr. and Tony Gwynn. Ripken, who broke Lou Gehrig's consecutive games played streak, is a lock to get in, and Gwynn probably as well.

Last March, the Associated Press conducted an informal survey, asking some writers how they would vote. The results were not good for McGwire. Of the 155 voters queried, only 65 said they would definitely vote for McGwire. Some of that obviously was a visceral reaction to McGwire's hideous performance at the congressional hearings on steroids. McGwire did more tap dancing than Fred Astaire ("I'm not here to talk about the past") and many saw the stonewalling as an obvious sign of his guilt, though in fairness McGwire has been proven guilty of nothing.

When the Hall of Fame class of 2007 is announced, two years will have passed since those Congressional hearings. Maybe some of the anger toward McGwire will have lessened or maybe not. Maybe the writers will still hold McGwire's pathetic performance on Capital Hill against him.

It's remarkable how much McGwire has faded from public view. Prior to his appearance on Capital Hill, McGwire vowed he would be a spokesman on steroids. But after he embarrassed himself, the man seemed to go into hiding, which, according to many, is another sign of his guilt. Maybe he's in the witness protection program.

It wasn't like that in 1998, when McGwire was a beloved figure. The Great Home Run Race with Sosa, his friendly rival, captured the imagination of a nation, helping people forget the strike of just a few years earlier. McGwire and Sosa were seen as really, really good guys who embraced the pursuit of Roger Maris' record in the true spirit of competition. They said the right things, acted the right way. Behaved as true professionals. Class all the way. How things have changed. In retrospect, it seems clear baseball buried its head in the sand because all the home runs were great for business.

Personally, I wouldn't vote McGwire into the Hall of Fame, and it hasn't nothing to do with his alleged steroid use. Despite all the prodigious home runs, I think he was a one-dimensional player. Mediocre fielder at best and an average hitter (.263 career average with less than 1,700 hits). But I know that's probably a minority view. All things being equal, the 70-home run season in 1998 alone would probably be enough to get McGwire into Cooperstown.

What the writers have to ask themselves is do they want to reward someone who is an alleged cheater? If McGwire did cheat, his 70 home-run season (later surpassed by Bonds) is forever tainted and so is every other record achieved in this era.

There also is a kneejerk reaction to have baseball commissioner Bud Selig expunge all the records of the alleged cheaters, but that is a hopefully vague and arbitrary endeavor, impossible to implement. How do you quantity the effect possible steroid use had on the records achieved by the players? You can't, so you can't take away the records, as tarnished as they may be.

Fans are frustrated because it seems baseball can't do anything to these alleged cheaters. Barry Bonds has his fame, a whole lot of money, and unless the government comes up with enough evidence to put him in jail either on perjury or tax evasion charges, some time next year he will become the all-time home run king. Bank on that. Bonds will play until he is 50, if necessary, to own that record.

But there is something the baseball writers can do. If they feel they need to make a moral stand, if they feel McGwire needs to punished, they can keep him out of the Hall of Fame. Those writers wield a lot of power.

Admit it. Wouldn't you love to see the look on McGwire's face next winter if he finds out he didn't get enough votes? Would be that payback for his arrogance, or what?