Quote:
Originally Posted by Orcin
Fair enough. For me, all great baseball players should be in the Hall of Fame.
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I definitely agree with this when it comes to Bonds and Clemens who, if they were taking steroids, were cheating to win. Baseballers who gamble on the games they play, or who consort with gamblers who gamble on the games they play, put themselves in the quite possible position of cheating to lose. To me, it's immaterial whether there is any evidence of their cheating to lose. The very act of consorting with the gambling element in connection with their games is enough to cast a reasonably high degree of suspicion on them. So if a player gambles on the game he's playing and gets caught, everyone knows what he's going to get, and he gets exactly what he deserves, which is permanent banishment from baseball as proscribed.
That is different from the Hall of Fame, of course. It's possible for the Hall of Fame to disassociate themselves from Baseball and induct players who have been declared permanently eligible. It's their decision to not do that, though, which is their right as an independent organization. But if the Hall of Fame were to change course and say, you know what, we no longer care about the permanently ineligibility thing, we're going to let Pete Rose in anyway? I think that would be highly unusual, but again, that would be their decision as an organization. But even if the Hall of Fame were to do that, I don't think Pete Rose will, or should, ever be removed from Organized Baseball's permanently ineligible list.