Timm,
I agree about Pete Rose. Maris..oh well.
Actually, my son is much more into it than I am. He got Nolan Ryan to sign a ball for him, Bob Feller too. Ted Williams was always there.
If you ever get a chance to come to NY, I'll put you up. C'town is pretty nearby. My best favorite is Mr October.

DTS: One of my longtime dreams is to visit Cooperstown! Sounds like your son has a good collection. Of course....you'd have to put me in the right wing of your house,lol

Timm,
That could easily be arranged. The right wing is yours. I'll even clean it. take your pick of the three bedrooms there.
Also, I'm about an hour and a bit from Toga.
Fly in to Albany and I'll pick you up.

maguires's #'s just aren't good enough to warrant getting in. so he set the home run in a season record--that will forever have a ? next to it...other than that, his stats aren't great--and hofer's should have great #'s.

read the paper today, and the writer said 500 runs isn't quite the magic # it used to be.

big mac has 1100 fewer hits than bill buckner, 1000 less than tim raines, 400 fewer than todd zeile. fewer runs than fred mcgriff, joe carter, and andres galarraga. one gold glove, struck out once every 3.8 at bats and hit better than .300 once--that one time was when he played more than 100 games in a season. (all from todays ark dem gazette)...

there is a cloud of suspicion. you can't help but wonder if those 500 runs were aided. if so, what the heck is so special about it??

I think it's because MLB did such a lousy job on rules and testing up til 2003,and completely looked the other way about "greenies" for forever! All of a sudden, everyone is under suspicion....ex post facto....I just don't think you can throw the entire generation of MLB numbers out the window. 2003 and forward...everybody is warned, rules and suspensions laid down, play ball!

i think you're right. but maybe (and i'm really just throwing this out here to get some feedback) the combo of ?'s about the legitimacy of his HR's, combined with less than HOF #'s elsewhere, was what kept him out of contention this year.

are voters also waiting to see what happens with bonds? is MM worried at all-could he be involved in any way with any of this? i haven't heard anything that makes it look like that--but i'm not the biggest baseball fan either....

that doesn't make sense.
cal ripken deserves to be in there, no question in my mind. why shouldn't it have been unanimous?? very illogical.

Besides, I wouldn't believe Canseco under any circumstances! Mcguire had the Jars of Andro in his locker for the world to see...and made public statements to warn kids not to mess with any stuff without a doctors visit!

A message for MM....to be sure!

Honestly, without the roids, McGwire = Dave Kingman.

They should really have a panel to disqualify voters. Think about looking at that ballot: Ripken- well 19 all star games, 3,000 hits, 400 hr, changed the position winning three gold gloves, two mvp...nah, just not hall material.

Or Gwyn: Eight- freaking EIGHT- batting titles. Never finished outside of the top 10 in hitting over a full season in fifteen seasons. Five gold gloves. But he wasn't a power hitter, right? Come on.

Gwynn is one of the best pure hitters to ever play the game. He got fat at the end but even fat he could still hit...period. HE was a good all around player for a long time before getting fat. Phenomenal hitter.