I'm not holier than thou on the issue of steroids in baseball. My take is, how much did roiding, in my estimation, boost a particular suspect player's career. If I think I can reasonably factor that out, AND get some contrition, I will at least be open to voting a player into the Hall of Fame.
For example? Rafael Palmeiro is a "high borderline," still, with 350 HR, 450 2B, and a WAR around 55 or so. Raffy probably goes .360/.500/.860 on OBP/SLG/OPS. 1,500 runs and 1,700 RBIs. Of course, his oWAR might fall below 60. That's the hesitation point. Is Raffy a higher-grade Harold Baines without steroids? I wouldn't argue against that. But, he at least gets consideration.
Mark McGwire? I estimate that he'd be down to 450 HRs, and would lose a ton of walks, and so lose OBP and lose massively on OPS and OPS+, reinforcing his one-dimensional nature, so a no. Knock his OBP down to .380, his slugging to .550 and then his OPS to .930. His runs fall to 1,100 and his RBIs to 1,300. About 450 HRs. NOT a HOF career. That's a high-grade Dave Kingman or not a lot better.
Other players? As far as prime suspects, and doing some "redacting"?
Sammy Sosa is not a steroid-subtracted HOFer. Barry Bonds is. Roger Clemens is.
But, let's have confessions. Not just by the individuals. Bud Selig and Gene Orza need to step to the plate, pun intended, and hit a clean one out of the park.
That said, how much of an influence were steroids, on the batting side?
I'd say they're worth 30-40 percent of the power explosion. The Costa Rican baseballs after Rawlings moved its factor from Haiti? Maybe about the same. So, let's say 70 percent there. Maple bats 10-15 percent?
Continued squeezing of the strike zone? 10 percent? Miscellaneous factors, 5-10 percent.
Anyway, I'd love to hear more thoughts.
2 comments:
Some people will grill me, but how much does it factor at all, and, should it be illegal?
Is caffeine a performance enhancing drug? Or Creatine? Or Protein? Or that stuff Barry would shoot into his arm so he could keep playing? (not steriods, can't remember the name)
My take is this.
It is so inconclusive it's laughable. Unless every major leaguer, or a controlled study group, takes steriods, how can you guarantee if enhances the performance of every player?
It makes me wonder how many players out there, took steriods, had crappy careers, but we never heard about them because they didn't have big years.
Sammy, Barry, Roger Clemens, were all incredible talents with or without steriods. Sure, it might have made a difference, but should it be illegal to enhance your performance?
That's the question in my mind because players do it all the time.
Well, it's true, we don't have scientific controls, and logically, it's true, people can have selective memories. It's a problem in research reporting, even.
But, we do, in a sense have "controls." Look at Palmeiro, and Bonds, hitting more HRs per year after 35, not just 30, than below. We can compare them to the thousands of previous MLB players who didn't do that!
That said, I don't disagree on Barry and Roger? Sammy? Different question. Good? I'd say yes. Great? I'll disagree.
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