Posted by Mac on 1/10/2008, 12:38:08, in reply to "Re: Still No HOF for Mac in 2008"
Travis, your response is by far the most intelligent of any posted by the people on this message board. You make a couple great points, but your argument, in the end, falls back on being a huge personal fan of McGwire, not, indeed, his real talent. As you point out, there are many, many ways to measure the greatness of a player (although you simply state "hitter"). All of these must be considered when taking into account one's worthiness for HOF induction. You are absolutley right that Mr. McGwire has the best home runs per at bat ratio for a career, but in several other key hitting and fielding statistics, he falls short of being great. The HOF is for the greatest, and not just in a single category. "No automatic elections based on performances such as a batting average of .400 or more for one (1) year, pitching a perfect game or similar outstanding achievement shall be permitted." While a career achievement of the best home runs per at bat ratio is certainly a more worthy achievement than pitching a perfect game, it clearly does not guarantee induction into the HOF. You have to do more than that, and as you clearly state, he wasn't a well-rounded player. He could adequately play first base. While he may have been able to "catch the ball... basically all that's required of a first baseman" as you state, that is not all that is require of a HOF first baseman. And please do not get me started on the DH (certainly you won't find any with as few hits as Mark McGwire getting elected to the HOF anytime soon).
I was not, in fact, overly fascinated by the home run record chase of 1998. In fact, I was a little disappointed in MLB for clearly promoting what was a very solo achievement in a team sport by two charismatic players (one of whom admitted to using performance enhancing drugs, even though they may not have been against the rules in baseball at the time, and the other who pretended to not speak english well enough to answer questions about performance enhancing drugs but was using an illegally corked bat anyway).
Was Mark McGwire a good baseball player? Absolutely! Did he help his teams to some achievement? Yes. Was he a great power hitter? Undeniably great. Was he a well rounded player? No. Did he use performance enhancing drugs? Clearly. Does he have the statistics to match/surpass those already in the HOF? in a shockingly small number of categories he does, but in a surprisingly large number of areas, his numbers fall way short. Does he belong in the HOF? In my opinion, no. Fortunately for all the Mark McGwire lovers out there, not everyone agrees with me. 128 of the people who matter when it comes to the HOF disagree with me. Unfortunately for the Mark McGwire lovers out there, the overwhelming majority of those who do matter don't even get a chance to think about his performance enhancing drug use before they realize that while he was a great power hitter, he really didn't have the numbers anywhere else to qualify for the HOF.
It is refreshing, Travis, that you argue about his HOF candidacy based on what he did on the field and leave the controversy about drugs out of it.
For the reast of you, with your heads stuck in the sand, the steroid controversy is not the only reason Mark McGwire was not elected to the HOF again. Look at the numbers...
Okay, I can understand most big fans of the guy won't be able to look at the numbers objectively. While I won't say I am a big fan of Big Mac (he stole my nickname), he was always interesting to watch (notably, this is not a qualification for HOF candidacy) as he was a pure hitter. He usually provided the fan with one of the three most pure outcomes of an at bat -- a walk, a strikeout, or a home run.
Peace
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