Wiedmer: Hall of Shame continues for Bonds and Clemens

Former Boston Red Sox star David Ortiz, center, celebrates his election into the National Baseball Hall of Fame with his father Leo Ortiz, left, Hall of Famer Pedro Martinez, second left, and Fernando Cuzza, right, moments after receiving the news, Tuesday, Jan. 25, 2022, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. (AP Photo/Manolito Jimenez)
Former Boston Red Sox star David Ortiz, center, celebrates his election into the National Baseball Hall of Fame with his father Leo Ortiz, left, Hall of Famer Pedro Martinez, second left, and Fernando Cuzza, right, moments after receiving the news, Tuesday, Jan. 25, 2022, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. (AP Photo/Manolito Jimenez)

One new member.

That's all the Baseball Writers Association of America saw fit to let into the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, this year when the voting was announced at 6:15 Tuesday night.

So come July 24th, COVID-19 willing, Boston Red Sox slugging great David "Big Papi" Ortiz will join such timeless names as Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, Hank Aaron, Lew Gehrig, Derek Jeter, Bob Gibson and Joe DiMaggio as a Hall of Famer, while the Steroid Cowboys Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds are rejected a final time by the BBWAA.

If there is sweet justice in that, so be it.

But is there? A New York Times article once linked Ortiz to steroids - a charge he vehemently denied - and those allegations never stuck to him in the way they did to Clemens and Bonds. Maybe that's because they weren't true. Maybe that's also because Ortiz - who smacked 541 homers in his career - never rubbed folks in the media and elsewhere the wrong way as Clemens and Bonds so often did. We may never know, and that's OK, I suppose.

What we do know is that Ortiz lifted one of the most star-crossed professional sports franchises in history to its first World Series title in 86 years. Then he helped the BoSox win two more Fall Classics, including a boffo MVP performance in the 2013 World Series against the St. Louis Cardinals.

Beyond that, Ortiz was always sweetness and lightness as opposed to a player such as Bonds' darkness, a bright smile rather than an arrogant, sullen stare.

We're supposed to be unbiased in the media, but we're also human. As evidence mounted of Bonds artificially improving his bat speed and strength through chemicals - such an unfair advantage eventually leading him to overtake the beloved home run king Hank Aaron's once-seemingly safe 755 total round-trippers (Bonds finished with 762) - the resentment toward him grew.

"You cheater," we all screamed, at least those of us who could print our words on newsprint or voice them over radio and television. You may officially break Aaron's record, but you should never reach the Hall of Fame for such deceitful behavior.

And such a mindset is not without merit. Especially since integrity, sportsmanship and character are all supposed to be considered when a member of the BBWAA votes for a particular player.

Given the lengths Bonds and Clemens both used to circumvent the rules, then lying about it, it would be difficult for anyone to argue they possessed so much as a milligram of the preferred integrity, sportsmanship and character to enter the most prestigious Hall of Fame in all of professional sports.

So now, unless a veterans committee or some other Hall of Fame voting group lets them in, they're out. Forever. The BBWAA's rules state you have 10 years on the ballot - down from 15 in older times - and you're done unless let in by a different committee later on.

But what to do about the stunning performances of Bonds, Clemens, the disgraced gambler but all-time hits leader Pete Rose? What of pitcher Curt Schilling, who also failed this year to get the necessary 75 percent of the vote in his final year on the ballot?

Should someone build a Hall of Shame in their dishonor? Is there some middle ground we can reach on this that allows future generations of baseball fans to learn of the vast accomplishments of Bonds, Clemens, Rose and Schilling without them being officially honored as Hall of Fame members?

Let's be clear. Not every member of the Hall lived a life of integrity, sportsmanship and character. There were racists, philanderers, bullies, jerks. Admittance always has and always will be largely tied to performance on the field.

And had performance-enhancing drugs been available in the time of Ruth or Ty Cobb or Mantle, only a fool would say none of them wouldn't have used them. Back in the 1960s and early 1970s, players reportedly took amphetamines by the handful to find the energy to get through an afternoon game following a night contest. Athletes have always looked for an edge. Steroids just became a bigger edge for some than anyone could have imagined.

Beyond that, MLB was only too happy to ride the 'Roidland Express when the PED poster boys Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire lifted the sport out of its post-1994 strike malaise throughout the long, hot, bulging biceps summer of 1998. It's pretty common knowledge that everyone inside the sport - including then commissioner Bud Selig knew something unnatural was happening here, but after a couple of lean financial years, the sport was raking in the dough again, so let's worry about integrity, sportsmanship and character at a later date. Oh, the blinding light of the almighty dollar.

As Ortiz was soaking in his selection Tuesday evening, he said of his road from the Dominican Republic to Cooperstown, "What a sweet and beautiful journey it's been."

And whether deserved or not, what a sour and ugly decade of failed bids for Bonds and Clemens. Chalk one up for integrity, sportsmanship and character, flawed though the lenses through which the BBWAA voters viewed their careers may be.

Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.

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