Mike Wilner as I was told, was verbally abused by Bob McCowan when Wilner was asked if Palmeiro should one day be in the Hall. Wilner said he should be, but not on the first ballot.

He'd get into the Hall on the first ballot without the steroids, so to discount his first ballot status seems about right.

I think Palmeiro would have been an interesting case WITHOUT the steroids issue; I was waiting to hear the arguments to keep a 600-homer, 3300-hit guy OUT of the Hall.

But I think opinion has been split on him, even here at Batter's Box, well before the recent controversy came to light. For instance, see this article before the 'roid raging when he was on the doorstep of 3000 hits; earlier than that, Raffy was the first 1B profiled in Mike Green's "Hall Watch" series.

The opinion is decidedly mixed -- it's certainly not clear that he was a no-brainer first-ballot guy before all this. Incidentally, I am in the "duh, of course he goes in" camp.

I was firmly in the 'put him in' camp before, now I go with the 'make him wait' group even though I generally don't agree with the whole 'first ballot' bit.

Palmeiro was solid, but dang does his career look like it took off with his meeting Canseco in Texas. I'd probably be more in favour if he had been like McGwire in front of congress instead of all fire and brimstone, then confessed once caught. I can forgive if one asks for it, hard to when they refuse to admit the problem (thus why I was OK with Ben Johnson competing again after getting caught and why I think he got a raw deal from the IOC and the rest).

When you look at Palmeiro's numbers, this is a guy who was never leading stats and breaking records, but someone who was consistently a very good player, which is something difficult to do. Steroids aside, it would have been a very good thing if he had gotten into the Hall, and shown that the Hall of fame is a place for everyday, solid contributors.

VBF -- I think Don Sutton has already blazed that trail. In fact, I think Palmeiro the hitter is a good comp to Sutton the long-career, consistently excellent but never Koufax pitcher.

I hate this conversation and i think its a really hard question. And i lost all respect for Raffy for lying to the fans and then trying to lie is way out. But,

Are we to assume he is the only player who is good enough for the Hall Of fame to use steriods? He was the only one that got caught. And since testing was done only this year, we can only speculate on what others did before him.

Now, i am not accusing anyone of anything, but we cannot guarantee that guys like Nolan Ryan, or Ricky Henderson,or even Eddie Murray, that they did not use steriods. Since i don;t have a vote(yet) i think the voters will see what happens to Big Mac first, and then they will decide what to do with Raffy. It may not be on the first ballot, but he will get in. I can't believe i am saying this, but it would be unfair to keep him out. He played in an era where steriods were encouraged and part of the game. and he put up numbers that only 3 before him did, and that belongs in the Hall.

I hate it. I really do. But baseball created this mess and now they have to fix it. you cannot punish ONE player for doing what many others did.