As to the steroid users..... it was pretty endemic of the times, so in many ways the playing field was even.
Tell that to some hitter who did not cheat and use roids. Then had to compete against roided pitchers to put up the numbers (probably reduced by hitting against roided pitchers) they did and then have their honest numbers ignored because they paled in comparision to the 60s and 70s HR rates of Bonds, McGuire, and Sosa, etc.
You see it is not just that we are faced now with having top compare the career numbers of these cheaters with the all time greats. I remember Eric Chavez in an interview talking once about how his flirting with 30 HRs was totally ignored because it was nothing compared to the 50+ historic seasons being put up by roided cheaters.
Arod has no chance of being the first of the roiders to get in the hall. If Bonds and Clemens are not going to be forgiven by the voters Arod will not and should not. His best chance is to hope that given enough time voters memories fade and they vote in someone like Bonds or Clemens. After that then you will have the inevitable lowering of standards as other voters will say cheater Bonds is in and cheat big Mac was not much worse so let him in, Sosa was never proven via public test so let him in. Then finally by comparision to these the argument gets made Arod was not much worse and therefore also deserves a pass and a vote.
Frankly as I get older I have grown less tolerant of the whole lowering of standards fiascos becoming so common in all sectors of our society. Everything is overlooked because we do not hesitate to start down the slippery slopes and no matter how bad anyone messes up we can always point to someone else and say he wasn't quite as bad as that Hitler, Mussolini, or Hannibal guy so let's not hold that little bombing misunderstanding against him.
Maybe Cobb and others gambled and cheated. Maybe more than just the Black Sox fixed games. But that should not be the point. At some point we should become more involved as a people and start raising standards for inclusion among those we lift up as the all time greats among us.
I do not know if Arod has 3 more seasons in him. With the DH he just might. He might even have 4 since all he will have to do is swing the bat 4 or 5 times a game. Health from here on should not be a hindrance. And as long as he can continue to hit at least .260 and deliver 25 HRs and 75 RBI there will be someone willing to give a contract. We see that repeating every year. Melky had no trouble getting a contract. Cruz got his. It is just too easy to say he served his time he now deserves same consideration/compensation as everyone else so we'll just pretend he is now clean and hope to high heaven he has learned his lesson and doing all the things he is supposed to in order to hide and cover up his usage so our team can benefit from juiced enhancement.
Arod said he was clean. Then he said well yes I tested positive when I was in Texas but only because I felt pressure to live up to the contract. But I have never used since joining the yankees. Then he got caught again. Then he covered it up. Fought with arrogance the inevitable punishment for his use throughout his entire time with the yankees. He sat out a year. Now he is back. Says he is clean. But if even one of you believes a word of that I have portable chair I would like to give you absolutely free, and while I am at it I want to lower your interest rates as well. I would rather just pretend Arod is a fairy tale figment of our collective imagination this year as pretend I believe for one minute he is performing clean with no help from anything.
And if you want to call me a hypocrite go ahead. You will certainly have no trouble finding plenty of posts from his days in Texas and when he first joined the yankees when I was naive enough to believe his claims of being clean. You will find plenty of things to quote where I was naive enough to defend him publicly. But with all the evidence that has piled up even someone with a thick skull like mine has to finally catch on, realize the truth, and dismiss him. I no longer even believe he was clean in Seattle. His numbers have been inflated with PED for his entire career. Take that away and he might not even be Alan Trammel.