My mock Hall of Fame ballot: multiple former Atlanta Braves named

Let’s Start with the Cheating Bit

(The start of this won’t sound a lot like a Hall of Fame discussion, but we’ll get there.)

This week, I have heard a considerable amount of discussion about the Houston Astros and their scandal. At least one source is calling it the worst cheating scandal in sports history, and others aren’t straying too far away from similar words.

Why is that? Many will suggest that the results of their cheating were not universally or obviously successful, and therefore the impact wasn’t that severe. In that 2017 season that this allegedly started, the Astros were using the trash can technique to relay signs and that could only be used at home, yet the team’s road record was better.

What we don’t know (yet) is whether some other technology/method might have been employed to help them on the road.

What we do know is this:  the Astros tried and persisted in trying for multiple seasons, multiple years, and quite likely into the playoffs (which may include the ‘whistling’ reports from this season).

Do other teams do this? Maybe… the Apple Watch episode seemed to reveal issues with the Red Sox in 2017. That got a stern warning from the Commissioner of Baseball… though it appears that klaxon fell on deaf ears in Houston.

Let me be clear:  cheating – whether that be on the level of an organization, a team, or an individual – is not a victimless crime. This is simply because at its root, cheating is done for one purpose: for cheater to have an unearned advantage over a rival.

This is not about “all’s fair in love and war”. Certainly in war, you’re trying to defend literal life and country, so yes: that’s a wholly different discussion.

But when the topic is gaming or sport, cheating smacks of selfish gain that is the result of operating outside the rules of the game, skill, decorum, and honest competition.

When you cheat, an advantage is gained… one that can elevate you, but at the expense of someone else.  There is no isolated activity: if you make a 25-man roster, there’s another player who comes off that roster. You win and someone else loses – with the loser being the victim.

Think that’s hyperbole? In the case of the Astros’ scandal, somebody actually did the research and found NINE major league pitchers who were cut after getting victimized by the Astros in 2017 alone.

About the Hall

This premise also applies to a Hall of Fame discussion. You are certainly free to argue that great players would have been great without steroids. You are free to suggest that Barry Bonds might have been a Hall of Famers without steroids, but let’s wonder together whether he would have actually ended up with better numbers than, say, Fred McGriff or Dale Murphy or Lou Whitaker under those circumstances.

I would argue back that some of these players apparently felt they needed to continue juicing regardless of these arguments and therefore… we’ll never know. But I would also offer up McGriff, Murphy, and Whitaker as possible HOF ‘victims’ of the PEDs that others used.

You’re also free to argue that we don’t know everyone who was using performance enhancing drugs. I accept this.

But that same principle applies in real-life criminal situations as well: we don’t stop prosecuting car theft simply because we don’t know everyone who steals cars. We catch as many as we can – and prosecute them – in the hopes of deterring future crime.

If it were in my power – it’s certainly not as this is a mock exercise – I would refuse to bestow the highest honor in Baseball to anyone strongly associated with cheating. Such actions would do nothing to punish the behavior… and in fact, doing so would only encourage future bad actors..

I am fully aware that I won’t catch everyone in this manner. There’s also a threshold of behavior that is tough to measure. We’ll get to a couple of those cases as my ballot is discussed later.

It is because of uncertainty, rumor, and hearsay that I would have to lean more toward innocence than guilt. But where there’s undeniable guilt… no chance for those players.

That’s enough of the preliminaries… let’s now get to that ballot.