Afternoon Baseball

ESPN.com - MLB - Roberto Alomar retires

He's definitely a Hall of Famer, despite the most staggering collapse since Dale Murphy and Jim Rice. Most of that is because he played 2nd base, and his stats add up. Plus, he retired before his batting average could drop below .300 lifetime (something Mickey Mantle did not do, and regretted it the rest of his life).
He's a Hall of Famer, but will be remembered much more as a me-first player -- and not just because of the John Hirschbeck spitting incident.
For such a great player, he played for four teams just in his prime (five if you count the Mets). He always liked to jump ship when the seas got rough (leaving Toronto after '95, Baltimore after '98, Cleveland after '01, and playing none-too-hard in the Mets 2002 disappointing campaign -- he hit .340 in July 2002 as the Mets went 15-11 to climb back into contention, but only .233 after as the Mets closed 20-35).
That doesn't set him apart from many players, of course. And he didn't fall apart because he stopped caring, but more because he lost his speed and stopped hitting lefties (.204 in 2002 vs. .290 vs. righties).
But he is making the Hall for being a great player in his own right, and not for his influence. Despite that, let's recognize his great play and his two World Series rings and his graceful exit from the game.