I made the mistake of flipping to ESPN this morning (some might stop this sentence here, but I'll proceed) just in time for "Old School/New School," that horribly horrible segment featuring nothing but dim-witted rancor and shouting between Stephen A. Smith and the only man who can make Stephen A. sound halfway intelligent, Skip Bayless. They were "discussing" Rafael Palmeiro's Hall of Fame credentials. Bayless, who once suggested in print that Walter Payton wanted to die at age 45 of a debilitating liver disease, had this to say (I'm paraphrasing):
"This is not the Hall of Very Good - it's the Hall of Fame! Palmeiro is not one of those rare extraordinary talents."
There's a legitimate argument here on both sides. As Bayless pointed out in a rare moment of rationality, Palmeiro's only made 4 All-Star teams, and never finished in the top 5 in MVP voting. But let's look at some other numbers: This is his 18th full season in the bigs, and at age 40, he's hitting .267 with 12 homers and 40 RBI while helping to anchor a surprising O's team. For his career, Palmeiro has a .289 average with 563 home runs and 1815 RBI. He has 2992 career hits, meaning that, before the All-Star break, he will become only the fourth man in history with 500 homers and 3000 hits. The other three? Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, and Eddie Murray - sure-thing HOF'ers, all.
Palmeiro was implicated in the steroid scandal by Canseco's book, his longevity is due in part to many years at DH, and he's played in hitter-friendly parks his whole career. But "not an extraordinary talent"? The baseball graveyard is littered with the remains of many short-lived sluggers, who cracked 40 or 50 homers once, or knocked in 130 and hit .300, only to flame out a few years later. Palmeiro continues to play at a high level, and has for years. A man that's been this good for this long, who's 9th all-time in home runs, 26th in hits, and 16th in RBI?
Punch your ticket for upstate New York, Mr. Palmeiro. You've earned it.
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3 comments:
I didn't see the segment but I can tell you that Woody Paige is as bad as Stephen A. Smith and Skip Bayless. Woody Paige is probably over 50 and is trying to look cool with that fashionably messy hair. I hate Woody Paige and I hate ESPN for ever coming up with the idiotic show "Around the Horn" which put Paige on TV instead of leaving him in print.
Of course, I haven't tackled the issue at hand. Is Raffy a Hall of Famer? I say yes, only because of the 3000 hits. The 500 homers don't impress me and the DH'ing for several years is always going to be a strike against in my book. However, anytime you can get 3000 hits and join a list that has Hammerin' Hank and The Say Hey Kid as its two principal members, you've earned a trip to Cooperstown.
I say he totally deserves HOF status. Raffy will easily have 3000 hits. Also I think that he retires with 600 HRs, he needs just 37 more and I think that if he hits 15 more HRS this year, then the Os will resign him to play next year. Once he gets into the league with Hank and Willie with 3000 hits and 600 HRs, I think he gets into the hall easily. If Raffy doesn't deserve to be in, why should Mac get in?
And I forgot to mention also that Raffy played 1B for the Cubs, Texas and Baltimore for the better part of his career. He only moved to DH when he went back to Texas in 2000 and even played primarily 1B last year with Baltimore. Out of his 18 seasons, I would say that he played 1B primarily in all but 4 of those.
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