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Roy Halladay on Hall of Fame: "No Clemens no Bonds!"

Doc voiced his thoughts on Hall of Fame legitimacy just before sunrise.

By Justin Klugh
Eric Hartline-USA TODAY Sports

You can forget sometimes that January, with its plummeting temperatures and lack of holidays, serves as anything but a graveyard for the less-used days of a year. But in each year's first month, we're reminded that January is actually the time when baseball writers and analysts talk about the Hall of Fame, which of course leads to endless debate over PEDs in baseball, and in turn winds up serving as a graveyard for some people's dignity.

There are people who hand in Hall of Fame ballots that clearly, almost purposefully, contradict their previous statements; people who use debate over the process to mock the #blacklivesmatter hash tag; people who threaten to hand in blank ballots every year just to get back at bloggers for a perceived wrong; people who use a baseball topic to start comparing people to ISIS (those last two were actually the same guy).

It's become a silly, disreputable process, one of the remaining schisms between a generation of baseball analysts who feel the Baseball Hall of Fame is sacred ground and they are the Honor Guard chosen by Baseba'al to walk it, and another generation of fans who have watched Cooperstown lose its grandeur over the years thanks to the overzealous sanctimony of the first group. Or, you know, a third group that feels your particular feelings.

Wherever you stand on players getting or not getting into the Hall of Fame, stand there. The "danger" lies in writers with votes who consider themselves detectives as well, and refuse to vote in players whom they personally suspect of cheating, despite not having real proof. While some fans have stopped caring, to many players (and fans) it remains the sport's highest honor - but all it takes is the misfiring of an old man's pistons to keep the truly elite out of baseball Valhalla.

Look at me; this was a post about Roy Halladay, but Hall of Fame season can get everybody into such a sputtering emotional state their thoughts are easily derailed. Feeling strongly leads to the vocalizing of opinions, and last night, at about three in the morning, Roy Halladay hopped on Twitter and made his known.

Everybody loves Roy Halladay. Well, probably not Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds now, but most people.

Halladay gained his reputation through years of hard work that most people would not even be able to comprehend mentally, let alone execute physically. He forced his way through baseball in the beginning, working and evolving to become the playoff no-hitter-throwing legend that he is. Debate on his own Hall of Fame candidacy began almost the second he stepped away from the game - probably before. The notion of guys using PEDs to cut across that process probably sticks in his craw.

And now, we know how he feels. Maybe it's how you feel, too, and maybe it isn't. Even if you disagree with him, you can't argue with the success he's achieved thus far.

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