Hall of Famer Barry Larkin discusses steroids

Now that he has been voted into the Hall of Fame, former Reds shortstop Barry Larkin will "leave that up to the pros" to decide who deserves similar status in the future.

Next year, the taint of performance-enhancing drugs will loom over first-time Hall consideration for a handful of big-name players -- Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and Sammy Sosa most prominent among them.

"All I can interject," Larkin said after Tuesday's midtown news conference celebrating his pending induction into Cooperstown, "is what I thought of these guys as players, and if these guys, in my opinion, were the best during my era. But as far as their induction, I'll leave it to you guys ."

Larkin, 47, a 12-time All-Star who retired in 2004, reminisced about his almost-football career, his near-trade to the Mets in 2000 and his pride in playing the position he considered occupied by baseball's best athletes.

He recalled Michigan coach Bo Schembechler showing up at the school's baseball practice to boo Larkin after he decided to leave the football team. And how the potential Mets deal died with the lack of a three-year commitment "and they had some guy named Reyes coming up."

As for the steroid cloud? "Playing against some of these guys, they were the best, period," Larkin said. "I can't wait to see what [writers] say about their candidacies."

When he was playing, Larkin said: "There were instances where there were a couple of guys that I went, 'What in the world is this guy doing?' There were a couple of instances where I know that guys came to me and talked about the situations they were in and things they had to do in order to feed their families.

"But when we talk about steroids, talk about the juiced era, most of the attention goes to the guys who got bigger and hit home runs. How about those guys that it wasn't so obvious, that were able to hang on to that slider just that much longer and make that ball break, so instead of hitting the ball off the sweet spot, you miss the sweet spot by that much.

"When I think about it, living through it, it's not about what . . . hitters did to try to make their numbers better. It's me, personally, my confrontation with the guy. I faced pitchers.

"If a guy hit a ball to shortstop, regardless of whether he was on it or not, he hit me a ball to shortstop. But that pitcher who threw that ball that moved up my barrel that much that I missed it, those were the guys I was concerned about."