Baseball fans certainly know who Joe Morgan is -- or was. He was the second baseman on the Big Red Machine of the Cincinnati Reds back in the 1970s, arguably the best Major League Baseball team of all time.
Besides Morgan, Johnny Bench, Tony Perez, and Ken Griffey Sr., would go on to be inducted into the Hall of Fame. And on merit alone, Pete Rose certainly deserves a plaque as well. That was quite the loaded line-up. All manager Sparky Anderson had to do was put a different pitcher on the mound every day and turn them loose. You or me could have done that job.
As we know, the latest class of Hall of Famers was recently revealed and the names Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens weren't on the list. Like with Rose, though for a different reason, the debate rages on as to whether Bonds and Clemens deserve induction. On merit alone, it's a no-brainer. But ah, that pesky steroid thing.
In the interim, somehow Joe Morgan got appointed to the board of directors of that same HOF -- vice chairman, no less. A pretty spiffy, high falootin title.
But he messed up. Bad.
In fact, he qualified as an outright bonehead.
While the Baseball Writers Association of America (BBWAA) , the very people that do the voting as to who gets in, was pondering their ballots, Morgan sent them an email. In said missive, he discouraged them from voting for "steroid users".
That was out of line. WAY out of line.
The Hall, including Morgan, has absolutely no business trying to influence the writers (voters) one way or the other.
The HOF is basically a museum of baseball greats and memorabilia. A bit like Madame Tussaud's famous house of wax. The difference is -- the Tussaud people get to decide who gets molded and who doesn't, while the Hall has no say so whatsoever regarding its inductees. They are there as merely curators of the building, to guide tours, provide information and, of course, collect the admission fees. Cha-ching. There's always a cha-ching.
Morgan became a bonehead when he tried to taint that process. We will never know to what degree he succeeded. That rests solely in the minds of the voters. They might not know themselves how much they were swayed -- or not -- by that email. But it would be foolish to assume it had no effect at all on their deliberations. Of course it did.
That's without getting into the can of hypocritical worms the HOF already has more than it's fair share of unsavory characters enshrined (see previous blog post -- The HOF Case for Roger and Barry -- stage right).
Morgan overstepping his bounds and advocating "steroid users" shouldn't be admitted might be a bit akin to him suggesting Hispanics, or Republicans, or Catholics, or anybody that lives in California should be denied as well.
Regarding Clemens and Bonds, they were never PROVEN to be "users" anyway. Just a slew of allegations.
While Morgan may well have thought he was doing the "right thing" with his email, in fact it amounted to no more than attempted discrimination. And as mentioned above, it was none of his business to begin with -- vice chairman or not.
It is totally up to the writers/voters to make up their own minds. Even if they want to vote for a proven PED user/abuser, that's their call. Not Morgan's or the Hall's. They're supposed to count up the votes, and if a guy reaches the 75% threshold, start carving him a plaque. Period.
While Morgan is a worthy HOF member himself, board or no board of directors, he needs to shut up and go back to whatever it is a vice chairman does.
It appears he's taking the "vice" in vice chairman WAY too seriously.
Idle thought.
I wonder if old Joe still has that nasty twitch after all these years?
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