Tony Gwynn and Cal Ripken just got elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Mark McGwire did not. Time for a little log rolling.

Back on November 28, our own Jamie Chisholm ripped the Globe's Bob Ryan for saying he'd vote for Gwynn and Ripken, but there's no way he'd let McGwire in because he used steroids, and well, the other two didn't. How does Ryan know? Because in 1995, McGwire's power numbers went way up. Chisholm continued:

But what about the fact that Gwynn's batting average did the exact same thing? In 1988, at the age of 28, Gwynn hit .313. The next year, his average went up to .336 but that blip was followed by seasons of .309, .317 and .317, the last coming when he was 32. But all of a sudden at 33, Gwynn apparently found something that allowed his average to skyrocket to .358. At 34, Gwynn hit .394. At 35, he hit .368 followed by seasons of .353 and .372. But Gwynn wasn't on steroids because there's a completely logical explanation why a 37 year old Tony Gwynn was hitting 59 points better than the 28 year old Tony Gwynn. Because you know that Gwynn wasn't on steroids. Because you know. Because you have proof.

And Ripken's consecutive game streak? Obviously the result of Cal's legendary work ethic. There's no way that Ripken was around steroids. Not in Baltimore. Not when he was surrounded by class guys like Brady Anderson, Manny Alexander and Rafael Palmeiro. Those three guys may have been teammates of Ripken's back in 1996 but Cal had nothing to do with steroids. Cal had nothing to do with Anderson's 50 homerun season. There's no reason to assume that Cal collected more total bases and posted a higher slugging percentage in 1996 than he had in the five previous seasons with the help of anything other than good old fashioned elbow grease. That's just Cal being Cal. Because you know that Ripken wasn't on steroids. Because you know. Because you have proof.

Good points all. Now all the self-righteous members of the BBWAA will have to struggle through the rest of their lives knowing they've finally let tainted players through the Pearly Gates of baseball heaven.

Slightly off the topic, I thought when Jim Rice retired, he was two or three good seasons away from being good enough. In 1986, he was 3rd in the AL MVP voting, but after that his performance dropped off the map. Just because the guys who came after him juiced up and he didn't, I stil l think he's a near miss.