Ivan Rodriguez retiring. Cooperstown?

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2012/baseball/mlb/04/18/ivan-rodriguez-retirement.ap/index.html?sct=hp_t2_a6&eref=sihp

Sounds like he's doing one of those one-day contract to retire kind of things next week.

Is Pudge a Hall of Famer?

The good:

-- 311 home runs
-- record 13 Gold Gloves as a catcher
-- 14-time All-Star
-- MVP
-- At least one ring, with the Marlins


The bad:

-- Played for the MFYs
-- Played in Texas with lots of roid users.
-- Returned one spring with Detroit amazingly smaller and never hit as well.
-- Played for the MFYs


Ordinarily I'd say he's a first-balloter. But if Bagwell can't get in, I can't see them making an exception for Rodriguez.

The bad:

[Frayed Knot]

Yes

[metsmarathon]

if bagwell can't get in, they should close the fucking place down.

without looking at any numbers, i'd say pudge should be a hall of famer. good-to-excellent offensive catcher, premiere defensive catcher, long career.

[Ceetar]

wasn't he in the Mitchell report or something? I can never keep all these lists straight.


Probably should be in, yes.

[TransMonk]

Yes.

[Edgy MD]

Indubitably. Best defensive catcher of his generation and he had more hits and more homers than Rusty Staub.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Yep.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Should be an easy in.

[MFS62]

Yes
Later

[Edgy MD]

Hits by Catchers (Total Hits in Parentheses)

1. Iv�n Rodr�guez: 2,749 (2,844)
2. Jason Kendall: 2,160 (2,195)
3. Carlton Fisk: 2,145 (2,356)
4. Bill Dickey: 1,969* (1,969)
5. Ted Simmons: 1,908 (2,472)
6. Gary Carter: 1,907 (2,092)
7. Mike Piazza: 1,906 (2,127)
8. Gabby Hartnet: 1,877* (1,912)
9. Bob Boone: 1,808 (1838)
10ish. Ernie Lombardi: 1,792* (1,792)
10ish. Mickey Cochrane: 1,652* (1,652)
10ish. Johnny Bench: 1,646 (2,048)
* Hits by position unknown. Total probably lower.

Pretty cool to have three guys within two hits of each other.

[Valadius]

Absolutely.

[stevejrogers]

Ceetar wrote: wasn't he in the Mitchell report or something? I can never keep all these lists straight. Probably should be in, yes.

Canseco's book. But Bagwell and Piazza have never been mentioned anywhere (well, except for Murray Chass' work with Piazza), and yet Bagwell has gotten lumped in, and I'm pretty much expecting the same to happen with Piazza as well.

OE: I meant Murray Chass. Whom started the "blog that isn't a blog" after ending his print career.

[nymr83]

Rodriguez is a NO DOUBT hall of famer, but you never know who gets branded a steroid user and kept out.

[Edgy MD]

Piazza has acknowledged briefly using andro early in his career, and then stopping because he didn't see a drastic change in his muscle mass. Something helped him make a drastic change, because he put on 20 pounds before the 1998 season.

Then there's Bitter Murray Chass and the bacne. That was triggered by a crap Joel Sherman column saying he wouldn't bet on Piazza's cleanliness.

Jeff Pearlman had this in his book about Clemens:

As the hundreds of major league ballplayers who turned to performance-enhancing drugs throughout the 1990s did their absolute best to keep the media at arm's length, Piazza took the opposite approach. According to several sources, when the subject of performance enhancing was broached with reporters he especially trusted, Piazza fessed up. "Sure, I use," he told one. "But in limited doses, and not all that often." (Piazza has denied using performance-enhancing drugs, but there has always been speculation.) Whether or not it was Piazza's intent, the tactic was brilliant: By letting the media know, off the record, Piazza made the information that much harder to report. Writers saw his bulging muscles, his acne-covered back. They certainly heard the under-the-breath comments from other major league players, some who considered Piazza's success to be 100 percent chemically delivered.

Plus the legendary Reggie Jefferson outing was there:

"He's a guy who did it, and everybody knows it," says Reggie Jefferson, the longtime major league first baseman. "It's amazing how all these names, like Roger Clemens, are brought up, yet Mike Piazza goes untouched."

"There was nothing more obvious than Mike on steroids," says another major league veteran who played against Piazza for years. "Everyone talked about it, everyone knew it. Guys on my team, guys on the Mets. A lot of us came up playing against Mike, so we knew what he looked like back in the day. Frankly, he sucked on the field. Just sucked. After his body changed, he was entirely different. 'Power from nowhere,' we called it."

When asked, on a scale of 1 to 10, to grade the odds that Piazza had used performance enhancers, the player doesn't pause.

"A 12," he says. "Maybe a 13.

I'd hate to have to prosecute a guy with jut that to go on, but neither is it remotely true that Piazza has "never been mentioned anywhere." He (and his possible steroid use) have been mentioned in plenty of places. Here, for instance.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

I'm not out to catch anyone, I don't think it ought to affect his perceived greatness or whatever, and wouldn't base any suspicions on bacne but if Piazza wasn't using I'd be shocked. The friggin guy hit opposite field line drives over the fence off his fists with regularity, was a historically great offensive performer in an era of great offensive performers and widespread, legal PED use. I mean, duh.

[ashie62]

Yes...Piazza also

[Ceetar]

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: I'm not out to catch anyone, I don't think it ought to affect his perceived greatness or whatever, and wouldn't base any suspicions on bacne but if Piazza wasn't using I'd be shocked. The friggin guy hit opposite field line drives over the fence off his fists with regularity, was a historically great offensive performer in an era of great offensive performers and widespread, legal PED use. I mean, duh.

yeah, but that's a different argument. Everyone was using (and the tone of those arguments by former players sounding all sanctimonious about it like players chatting about what other players took. If they did, it wasn't in a condescending manner it was in a "how do I get some of that?" manner) I don't know if 'shocked' would be the right work, but yeah I guess I'd be more surprised if guys like Piazza and Jeter and Rivera and Benitez and Hampton and pretty much anyone that was playing in the late 90s wasn't using than if they were.

But in terms of trying to get into voters heads about what constitutes 'suspected' juicer? Does Pearlman and Chass count?

And not only does it count, but does degree matter? Do they induct Piazza because he's clearly not Clemens and Bonds? Or is that why Bagwell gets in next year?

[stevejrogers]

Edgy DC wrote: I'd hate to have to prosecute a guy with jut that to go on, but neither is it remotely true that Piazza has "never been mentioned anywhere." He (and his possible steroid use) have been mentioned in plenty of places. Here, for instance.

I meant that more in the line of anywhere in a seemingly legit fashion beyond idle columnist/radio host speculation.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Guys like Bonds, McGwire, and Clemens caused a high-profile embarrassment to the game. If any or all of them fail to make the Hall, it will be easy to see that that's the reason why.

Bagwell and Piazza are in a different category. They've just been whispered about, but never failed a test (that we know of), were never subpoenaed, and never formally charged with anything. If the whispers and suspicions are enough to keep someone out of the Hall of Fame, then Jeff Bagwell is in trouble. And so is Mike Piazza.

[TransMonk]

Benjamin Grimm wrote: If the whispers and suspicions are enough to keep someone out of the Hall of Fame, then Jeff Bagwell is in trouble. And so is Mike Piazza.

And nearly everyone who played the game between 1994-2004.

[Edgy MD]

SteveJRogers wrote: Edgy DC wrote: I'd hate to have to prosecute a guy with jut that to go on, but neither is it remotely true that Piazza has "never been mentioned anywhere." He (and his possible steroid use) have been mentioned in plenty of places. Here, for instance. I meant that more in the line of anywhere in a seemingly legit fashion beyond idle columnist/radio host speculation.

No, actually you said "anywhere." And then changed your post later to disclude Murray Chass. I also include an author who quotes two witnesses, one named and one un-named, and Piazza himself, who acknowledged using andro. That's not nowhere. It's not much but it's not nothing either.

[MFS62]

Funny how YLDBs suggest Piazza was a user because of bacne, but never question Paul O'Neill. Aside from the frequent temper tantrums that might be attributed to 'roid rage, his skin looked like a topographic map of a lunar landing site.


Later

[ashie62]

I'm going with they all used and start from there.

So, I hold nothing against the whisper guys and the rest? Put em in. Rose and Shoeless Joe in.

It's not church.

An yes..I cheat at golf.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Ashie disqualifies himself from the Golf Hall of Fame.

[Frayed Knot]

Piazza as dirty wouldn't shock me in the slightest either, but it's these kinds of statements being passing off as near proof that muddy the discussion more than clarify it.

"There was nothing more obvious than Mike on steroids," says another major league veteran who played against Piazza for years. "Everyone talked about it, everyone knew it. Guys on my team, guys on the Mets. A lot of us came up playing against Mike, so we knew what he looked like back in the day. Frankly, he sucked on the field. Just sucked. After his body changed, he was entirely different. 'Power from nowhere,' we called it."

All fine, except that his "power from nowhere" started with his first full season in the minors at age 22 and was evident virtually immediately from day 1 in the majors.
When, exactly, was "back in the day"? High School? Junior College? Shit, I put on some 25 pounds of (non-excess) weight between the ages of 18 & 22 or so and never even touched a bar-bell much less a steroid.

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

Frayed Knot wrote: Piazza as dirty wouldn't shock me in the slightest either, but it's these kinds of statements being passing off as near proof that muddy the discussion more than clarify it. "There was nothing more obvious than Mike on steroids," says another major league veteran who played against Piazza for years. "Everyone talked about it, everyone knew it. Guys on my team, guys on the Mets. A lot of us came up playing against Mike, so we knew what he looked like back in the day. Frankly, he sucked on the field. Just sucked. After his body changed, he was entirely different. 'Power from nowhere,' we called it." All fine, except that his "power from nowhere" started with his first full season in the minors at age 22 and was evident virtually immediately from day 1 in the majors. When, exactly, was "back in the day"? High School? Junior College? Shit, I put on some 25 pounds of (non-excess) weight between the ages of 18 & 22 or so and never even touched a bar-bell much less a steroid.

Bingo. This is deplorable journalism on Perlman's part. If you are going to accuse someone of such a thing, you need to back it up. Typical of the cheap shot, anonymous courage stuff we see in sports reporting today. And note that this guy is offering no real evidence here other than "everybody knew." Oh, how so? Did Piazza tell them? Did they see him inject?

[Edgy MD]

Yeah, I objected to it at the time, and I don't return to it now to indict Piazza, only to dispute that notion that nothing has been mentioned anywhere.

[Ceetar]

It's such an easy cop-out too, because Piazza obviously wasn't good 'coming up' necessarily, as he was a really low round draft pick. Sure, it could've been something artificial (although you don't really see fringe guys become top players even among the confirmed) but it could've been simply he figured it out, he put the work in he wasn't doing before being drafted, he had a late growth spurt in him, etc.

[Edgy MD]

Piazza was certainly good coming up.

[Ceetar]

Edgy DC wrote: Piazza was certainly good coming up.

not in '89 or '90 necessarily. Age 22 season though was a big jump, and that seems a good age for it too, supplements or not.