What is the HOF to you?

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To me it is a museum that shares the history of the game. I think it should put the best of the best in to show individual stories and careers. Even those who have "cheated." They helped shape the games history.

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The baseball HOF is just weird to me. As it stands, the all time leaders in hits (Rose) and home runs (Bonds), as well as the likely #2 in home runs (A-Rod, TBD) and one of the greatest pitchers in baseball history (Clemens) aren't in there or probably never will be. Not to mention that the top 3 leaders for home runs in a season - Bonds, McGwire and Sosa - probably won't make it. Not saying it's right or wrong, it's just amazing to me.

It'd be like if Don Shula, Brett Favre and Emmitt Smith all weren't in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

I'd let all of the steroid guys in. They threatened the most revered record in sports - the HR King - and that's what got them. But what they did was ignored for years and probably no worse than the speed freaks of the 60s.

No Rose.

The greatest players. Period.

Barry Bonds hit those home runs, didn't he?

Pete Rose has the most hits in MLB history right?

I hate all this "which cheating is ok" BS. Not to mention the fundamentally flawed system of allowing those already in to stay in, regardless of personal lives since it wasn't covered back then. Players doing coke during games, etc.

I'm down for steroid suspensions, but you don't get to retrospectively diminish accomplishments. If Lebron travels every game and doesn't get called, they don't throw out his championships due to his cheating.

I hate all this "morality of the game" stuff, because it is so subjective. Bonds was a prick to the sportswriters during his playing days. Now those writers are withholding the greatest accolade from one of the greatest hitters ever.

It is up to the MLB and umpires to catch cheating and punish it before games happen. If they don't do their job, it is their fault. Can't change the past, so don't try to.

If a pitcher has an illegal substance on him during the game in the 5th inning, they don't "void" the first 4 innings. They throw him out of that game and give him a suspension. Why should some stupid sportswriters get to void his first 4 innings?

It is the BASEBALL HOF...not the Moral HOF.

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I hate all this "which cheating is ok" BS

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Right. All cheating is for the same purpose, intent to circumvent the rules. Gaylord Perry doctored the ball his entire career. He even wrote a book about it, and he's in. What kind of shite is that?

How they have him in the HOF but they say others aren't allowed in makes their HOF a joke.

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To me it is a museum that shares the history of the game. I think it should put the best of the best in to show individual stories and careers. Even those who have "cheated." They helped shape the games history.

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Agreed. Rose, McGwire, ARod all should be in the Hall.

I am going to catch flack for this and really do not care. I think the HOF has turned into the Hall of Very good.

It is my belief, that a HOF'er is a guy who you wanted to watch play. Who at one time (for a marked time) was the best player or top 3 in the game at his position.

I sometimes think we take longevity into account.

Is player X who has 2000 hits but only played 11 years not as good as Player Z who ended up with 3,000 hits but played 19 years? Also I get numbers are a way to track players, but saber-metrics and fantasy baseball has sometimes diluted what we call a great player. Not all things are equal and sometimes we want to make them equal.

I know I am in the minority of this opinion. I am not saying numbers and advanced stats are worthless, but they are not the end all that some have made them out to be.

I think the blowhard old sports writers that control the baseball hall of fame need to get over themselves. Like you and others have said, I view it as a museum showcasing the history of baseball. I could care less about Rose betting or any of the steroid guys and am so sick of hearing about all of it I could scream.

Let them all in, ultimately it was baseballs fault for not catching the steroid guys in the act and letting them compile all the numbers they did, so get off the collective high horse and let the guys with the stats to be in, in .

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I am going to catch flack for this and really do not care. I think the HOF has turned into the Hall of Very good.

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I hate this view, which is becoming more and more popular. first off, it's wrong. It has never been harder to get elected to baseball's Hall of Fame than right now, except for the late 50s to early 60s, when voting only took place once every two years, creating an insane backlog.

But right now, the living players not in the Hall might be better than a team of living players in the Hall. Last year's election helped, putting in a record 4 guys, which might mean we're moving into a new era in which we deal with the backlog caused by the recent heightened standards and the closing of the back door of the Veterans Committee. Only 15 players were elected by the BBWAA in the 00s.

Essentially, I just view it as a mean-spirited and myopic view of the game. If anything, we should err on the side of inclusion, not exclusion. And it's not like we're cramming in borderline guys (well, other than Jim Rice, but that had more to do with the reactionary older voters resenting the statheads' growing influence).

The last 10 players elected to the Hall by the BBWAA have been Alomar, Blyleven, Larkin, Glavine, Maddux, the Big Hurt, Biggio, the Big Unit, Pedro, and Smoltz. Probably the worst player on that list is Blyleven, and he ranks 5th all time in strikeouts and is widely considered to have one of the best curveballs in MLB history. Who on that list lowers the standards of the Hall?

Hall of Fame cases should be about proclaiming players' greatness, not about tearing them down. I think the bigger problem is how nasty and mean it has become.

We still have to elect the greatest offensive catcher ever, maybe the best hitter and pitcher of all-time, and one of the five greatest leadoff hitters ever. I'm not saying loosen the standards, but I think we need to start recognizing the players who HAVE met the standards of the Hall, yet still aren't enshrined.