Rafael Palmeiro-Last Word On Steriods

Before I talk about Palmeiro I need to talk briefly about career arc and how players age. This will make sense when I talk about Palmeiro. Since we have over 100 years of baseball stats we have learned how a player ages, especially batters. As a general rule players performance improves until they reach a peak at their age 27 season. They then have close to peak performance for a couple of years and then their performance deteriorates into their 30s. Not every player follows this rule but its been proven to be close to a statistically fact. There are two situations that may have an effect on this rule 1.If a players home park changes-this is an obvious one. Anyone who goes say from Coors to Petco will see a drip in their numbers regardless of age. 2.If a player gets traded to a team with a much better lineup that scores alot more runs

So what does this have to do with Rafael Palmeiro? Yesterday I was talking with Howie about players from the steroid era and if they should be considered for the Hall of Fame. He brought up Palmeiro and said he has two magic numbers for the hall, 3000 hits and 500 Homers. I said Palmeiro is difficult to evaluate because we don't know when he started juicing. In a moment of brillance he said why don't you check to see when Jose Canseco got traded to Texas? What I found was very interesting. So without further ado, just the facts

Palmeiro started playing everyday with the Cubs on his age 23 season. For the next couple of years, between his age 23-27 season he averaged 16HRs 77RBIs 361OBA 449SLG Then in 1993 Canseco joined Palmeiro in Texas. For the next 10 seasons, his age 28-37 seasons he averaged 39HRs 115RBIs 382OBA 561 SLG. This career arc is VERY rare. Actually it almost never happens. As for his ballparks he went from one good hitters park to another. And both offenses were pretty similar.

So looking at this if I was a betting man I'd say Palmeiro started juicing in 1993. If his career followed a normal pattern a good comp would have been Mark Grace. Palmeiro probably would have hit for slightly more power. But Grace was a much better defensive 1st basemen. So as much as I like Gracie hes no Hall of Famer