Keeping Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens out of Hall of Fame is wrong

David Ortiz, on his very first try, was elected Tuesday night into the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens, appearing for the 10th and final time on the BBWAA ballot, were shut out again.

The affable Big Papi also did something neither of those other two managed during their Cooperstown-worthy careers: Be outed on an MLB survey list as testing positive for a PED.

That last part doesn’t matter all that much to me. I voted for Ortiz and believe him to be a deserving Hall of Famer. That 2003 survey was supposed to be anonymous, before MLB entered the penalty phase of the sport’s shiny new PED program, yet somebody leaked Big Papi’s name anyway.

It hasn’t been publicly revealed why Ortiz flunked the test and even commissioner Rob Manfred has attempted to discredit the whole matter, issuing what amounts to a presidential pardon for one of baseball’s most charismatic stars.

"We had someone coming out with this one list that you don’t know what anybody tested positive for," Ortiz said Tuesday night on a Zoom call with the media. "All of a sudden, he was pointing a finger at me. But then we start being tested and I never failed a test. What does that tell you?"

Very little, actually. Except for maybe this one thing: Penalizing Hall of Fame candidates for PEDs has become comically selective, and in the cases of Bonds and Clemens, hilariously so. Both were allowed to stack their trophy cases, all the while unimpeded by MLB.

Bonds became the most feared hitter in baseball history, finishing as the home run king with 762 bombs and seven MVP awards. Clemens collected seven Cy Youngs as well as an MVP, and is third all-time with 4,672 strikeouts. In the final BBWAA count, here’s what those resumes were worth: Bonds wound up with 66% of this year’s vote, well short of the 75% threshold, and Clemens earned 65.2%.

It took them both a full decade just to climb into the 60s. Ortiz got to 77.9% on the first ballot. He’s no Mariano Rivera (unanimous in first year) or Derek Jeter (all but one of the 397 votes). But Papi still didn’t have to endure some ceremonial slap on the wrist for that PED thing and be forced to wait a few more years. (Mike Piazza, dogged by his own nebulous steroid suspicions, wasn’t elected until his fourth try.)

You could say that the BBWAA was starting to warm up to Bonds and Clemens. After all, they did get two-thirds of the vote, and if the Hall of Fame hadn’t unilaterally shortened the eligibility term from 15 years to 10 back in 2014 — a move no doubt executed with PED scofflaws in mind — maybe Bonds and Clemens eventually grind their way to Cooperstown.

Instead, the Hall got what it wanted, by proxy of the BBWAA passing judgment on two of the game’s immortal talents, an embarrassing slight for a museum meant to chronicle the history of the sport. But don’t take our word for it. Listen to a newly minted Hall of Famer, who got the question everybody was thinking only minutes after receiving the phone call himself.

Shouldn’t Barry and Rocket be sharing the stage with you in July?

"Barry Bonds separated himself from the game at the highest level," said Ortiz, going as far as to describe him as an idol. "I know that there’s a lot of things going on, but to me, the guy’s a Hall of Famer, way before everything, all the talk. Same thing for Rocket.

"When I see these guys, to be honest with you, I don’t even compare myself to them. Not having them join me at this time is something that’s hard for me to believe because those guys, they did it all."

Despite the voting process being turned into a social-media Thunderdome every winter, the BBWAA traditionally gets it right. When the dust clears, the worthy candidates are ticketed for Cooperstown, and we all move on to the next steel cage match on Twitter.

But a Hall of Fame without Bonds and Clemens isn’t right. It’s ridiculous. And don’t hold your breath for any corrections from the upcoming special committees. The Hall gets to pick the former players, executives, coaches and media on those 16-member panels. I’m not expecting many Bonds and Clemens allies in those groups — like Harold Baines got — if they’re even made eligible come December. I’d also anticipate those committees to be much harsher on those two than the BBWAA, whose PED hard-liners will be losing ground to younger voters in coming years.

"My family and I put the Hall of Fame in the rearview mirror 10 years ago," Clemens said in a statement Tuesday night. "I didn’t play baseball to get into the Hall of Fame."

But Clemens played it at an elite level for more than two decades, just like Bonds did. Everyone knows that. And the Hall is worse off for not recognizing it.

By David Lennon

dave.lennon@newsday.comDPLennon

David Lennon is an award-winning columnist, a voter for baseball's Hall of Fame and has covered six no-hitters, including two perfect games.