Raffy Strikes Out

  For years, until yesterday, Rafael Palmeiro was one of the good guys. He was a role model: A pretty ordinary looking athlete who developed a beautiful swing and came to the ballpark every day ready to contribute. He was never the biggest star on his team, rarely made the All-Star game even as a backup. But by steady excellence he put together some of the best career stats in the history of the sport, culminating two and a half weeks ago with his 3,000th hit. The numbers made him a lock for the Hall of Fame.

    But he blew it. He has done something that didn't seem possible: He has made himself less credible than Jose Canseco.

    More precisely, he has turned into Pete Rose. Except no one ever questioned how Rose got more than 4,000 hits. Rose broke a rule and lied about it; it appears that Raffy has done the same -- more on whether he lied in a second -- only in his case his entire athletic career is contaminated.

   Raffy says he never took steroids intentionally. He claims he made a mistake, that he accidentally ingested steroids, that he doesn't even know how they got into his body. (Boz suggests that he sat too close to Jose Canseco at that congressional hearing.) He hints that he took something that wasn't prescribed by a doctor. The front-page story today suggests that a protein supplement can get contaminated with steroids. But Raffy had a chance yesterday, during a long statement in a conference call to reporters, to explain how, exactly, a guy who is on a national anti-steroids committee could inadvertently take steroids, and he whiffed. "There will be issues I can't address based on the orders imposed on me by the basic agreement and the arbitration process," he said. But as I understand it, the confidentiality requirements were put in place by the player's union to protect the players. It's hard to imagine that the rules prevent Palmeiro from volunteering a full explanation of what happened. The only conclusion is that the facts, if known, would not help his case or his public image. He thinks he can ride out the storm, thanks to verbal support from Peter Angelos and, of all people, George W. Bush. So I guess we're supposed to imagine that poor Raffy ate some bad Wheaties.

    People are going around saying that Palmeiro always seemed an unlikely steroid abuser, because he doesn't have the classic, overbuilt, ripped physique. This shows us that we don't actually know what a steroid abuser looks like. And when you go back into Palmeiro's career stats, you have to wonder if the juice turned him into a power hitter. Palmeiro began his career as someone who hit a lot of singles and doubles. In his first full season, 1988, he hit 41 doubles and just 8 home runs in 580 at-bats. The next year he again had 8 home runs. In 1991 he finally showed some power, with 26 home runs, but the next year his total dropped to 22. Finally, going into the 1993 season, having played five full seasons and two partial seasons and amassing a grand total of 95 career home runs, something changed. He hit 37 home runs, with a slugging percentage of .554. What turned a singles-doubles hitter into a slugger? Hard work? That beautiful swing? Did he just mature? Or did he get a boost from Dr. Canseco? It's impossible to know the truth at this point. But it's also impossible to ignore the fact that Canseco came to Texas in late 1992. The Chemist! Canseco says he personally injected Palmeiro with steroids.

    You're a sportswriter, you have a Hall of Fame ballot. What do you do with Raffy now?