If a sport is going to have a hall, it should be modeled after baseball’s hall.
Last Sunday was one of baseball’s big days of the year–Hall of Fame day in Cooperstown NY. Yes, it was a day about baseball and its glorious stars, but it was also a day about the Hall.
There are other halls in other cities, but none of them compares to what baseball has at Cooperstown.
Entrance requirements are steep. You can’t get inducted until you’re out of the game. And getting in is as much about the inductee—his character and standing–as it is about performance. You have to have both.
There’s an indisputable decorum associated with baseball’s hall. Compare it to other halls in major sports, especially the Naismith Hall (basketball), and you’ll see what I mean.
2018 MLB HOF inductees (photo, Arizona Sports)
How so? Basketball’s inductees can be active in the game. And there are rules-violators, too, even serial cheaters.
For a hall to really be a hall (as I see it), it needs to respect, honor, and elevate the game. Cooperstown does that.
There are issues for sure. Whether or not to induct Pete Rose is one. How to respond to “The Steroid Years” is another. But even those gnarly issues are debated openly–and with the right focus, too. It’s about what’s best for the game.
Rarely, if ever, does Cooperstown face a foolish issue, like the NFL Hall is confronting currently. This year, inductee Terrell Owens will conduct an ‘alternative’ induction ceremony rather than attend the formal induction ceremony in Canton. What makes it foolish? The debate about whether it’s good or bad is mostly about Owens and his personality, not about what’s best for the game.
Baseball isn’t perfect. Recent social media missteps by young players are embarrassing. The Commissioner’s observations about Mike Trout’s ‘reluctance’ to market himself seem misplaced. Players continue to be suspended for PEDs.
But those matters aren’t about The Hall. The Hall is something different, something more. It’s about tradition. It’s about aura.
And nothing else in sports comes close.
