Mark McGwire Eligible for Hall of Fame for First Time in 2007

With Bruce Sutter having become only the fourth reliever inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, thoughts turn to 2007, when guess who becomes eligible for the first time?

Some guy named Mark McGwire. Remember him? It's hard to believe that soon it will be five years since "Big Mac" retired from the St. Louis Cardinals. McGwire is the first big-name player in the steroid era eligible for the Hall.

Are McGwire's accomplishments - he ranks seventh on the all-time home run list with 583 - worthy of induction or should he be excluded because of his alleged steroid use?

The baseball writers will make the call - nobody else - and this should be an interesting story to follow next winter because it marks the first time that kind of moral dilemma enters the equation. The same will be true for other players down the road - Sammy Sosa, Rafael Palmeiro and eventually Barry Bonds. A player needs 75 percent of the vote to get in.

Hopefully, the controversy surrounding McGwire won't become too much of a distraction because two more worthy candidates also are eligible for the first time - Iron Man Cal Ripken Jr. and Tony Gwynn. Ripken, who broke Lou Gehrig's consecutive games played streak, is a lock to get in, and Gwynn probably as well.

Last March, the Associated Press conducted an informal survey, asking some writers how they would vote. The results were not good for McGwire. Of the 155 voters queried, only 65 said they would definitely vote for McGwire. Some of that obviously was a visceral reaction to McGwire's hideous performance at the congressional hearings on steroids. McGwire did more tap dancing than Fred Astaire ("I'm not here to talk about the past") and many saw the stonewalling as an obvious sign of his guilt, though in fairness McGwire has been proven guilty of nothing.

When the Hall of Fame class of 2007 is announced, two years will have passed since those Congressional hearings. Maybe some of the anger toward McGwire will have lessened or maybe not. Maybe the writers will still hold McGwire's pathetic performance on Capital Hill against him.