I’ve never gotten very worked up about Hall of Fame politics. I’m way more concerned about which left handers will be in Detroit’s bullpen come April.

Also, by my Tiger-partisan lights, Jack Morris and Alan Trammell deserve a place and like a lot of Detroiters who have big chips on their shoulder, I suspect that they’d be there, or at least closer to there, if they had spent their careers in, oh, say New York. (Morris, of course, did have very significant moments playing elsewhere and they are critical to his case; Trammell spent his entire career in Detroit.) Heck, I’d put Lou Whitaker in the Hall of Fame. Go ahead and laugh. That’s just how I am about the Tigers.

As for McGwire, I think it’s indisputable that he’s one of the greatest hitters ever to play the game. He might have been a bit more durable and a bit more consistent, but at his prime he was a force of nature. This is obvious from a quick glance at his numbers. (Andy: Your sentence “But for the eye-popping 583 career home runs, his numbers are mediocre” reminds me of the old quip: “Except for that, how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?”) And McGwire’s duel with Sosa was great fun to watch. When baseball really needed it, he gave the game a shot in the arm. Or maybe that’s not the best way of putting it.

If McGwire ever gets in, it will be after Pete Rose. Maybe someone should open a “Rogue’s Gallery” on the other side of Cooperstown, for McGwire, Rose, Barry Bonds, and Shoeless Joe Jackson.