Unfortunately for Biggio, many younger folks will only remember the ineffectual player who hung on well past usefulness. He was a very, very good player for a very long time. I believe that Bill James even had his career ranked ahead of Griffey's when he wrote his Win Shares book(s).

Interesting ... of Biggio's 10 Most Comparable players at BBRef, seven are in the HOF, one will be when eligible (Alomar), one should be (Whitaker) and one really isn't all that comparable (Pinson).

Of his 10 Most Similar through Age 40, six are in the HOF, one is permanently ineligible (Rose), one is not yet eligible but probably should get in (Larkin), and two aren't all that similar (Finley, Staub).

I never thought of Biggio as a HOF guy until about four or five years ago, but it seems like a slam dunk now.

Unfortunately for Biggio, many younger folks will only remember the ineffectual player who hung on well past usefulness.

I really don't think so.  He was still a very good player in 2005; in 2006 and 2007 he was a replacement-level player, but no worse.

For reasons that escape me, I recall seeing Biggio very early in his career, possibly even in his debut (when he drew a walk and later scored on a HBP, which seems familiar), and picking him as one of those random guys I'd follow in the boxscores, despite having little attachment to either the Jays or Expos. He always seemed to be at AB short (in the old days before walks were listed in the paper boxscore, you had to piece together whether a guy sacrificed, walked, or got hit), which struck me, at an impressionable age, as a good thing. In his first full year (1989), Biggio scored more runs than he had hits in a game a dozen times; he was Rickey Henderson-lite, except he played tougher defensive positions. Stole bases, played in a brutal hitting park on astroturf for half his career, had an unfortunate tendency to slump in October, but was a key reason the Astros made it there so often.

Runs being one of the most unappreciated stats (yes, it's team-dependent, I don't want to start a sabremetric flame war), I'll note Biggo will retire 12th or 13th in Runs scored, and the next one to catch him will probably be Alex Rodriguez...the HR list may be under constant revision, but only Bonds and Biggio are active in the top 50 in Runs.

If I recall correctly, there was a time in the 90's, must have been post-Alomar at 2b, that the Jays heavily pursued Biggio as a free agent. That being in the days when a 4 year, $24m contract was seen as the upper end of the salary spectrum...

I hope his elbow protector goes into Cooperstown, too...

That was unnecessarily snarky -- Biggio's a HOFer on his merits. We're in a remarkable era right now -- I can think of 25 active players who would either be first-ballot HOFers today, or are easily set to become legitimate Hall of Famers before they retire (assuming no Alomaresque complete late-career collapses.) In no particular order:

Derek Jeter, Manny Ramirez, Ichiro Suzuki, Mike Piazza, Alex Rodriguez, Ivan Rodriguez, Barry Bonds, Ken Griffey, Jeff Kent, Craig Biggio, Frank Thomas, Sammy Sosa, Gary Sheffield, Andruw Jones, Omar Vizquel, Roger Clemens, Pedro Martinez, Greg Maddux, Randy Johnson, Tom Glavine, Mike Mussina, John Smoltz, Mariano Rivera, Trevor Hoffman, and Billy Wagner. Of this group, only Clemens, Bonds, Sheffield, I-Rod and Sosa have had any links to steroid use, and that may not matter as much in five to ten years' time.

I just pulled these names out of BB-Ref -- no infringement on Mike Green's Hall Watch (TM) implied or intended. ;-)

Chipper Jones is pretty well set up.  Carlos Delgado and Jim Thome are too, and actually have better cases than Sammy Sosa, in my view. 

We are fortunate to be watching some of the greatest pitching ever- Clemens, Pedro, Randy Johnson and Maddux throwing at the same time is roughly the equivalent of seeing Mays and Mantle, and the next level (Mussina, Glavine, Smoltz and Schilling) probably surpasses Duke Snider.

I'd disagree with a few names on Jordan's list, but his point still stands. I'm not sure yet how I feel about Sosa. Vizquel probably will make it on his defence and longevity, but I'm not convinced it overcomes below average offence. Also, I wouldn't vote Ichiro in now (and I would for basically every other player on his list), but talk to me again once his new contract expires.

I cut Thome at the last minute from my list -- not that I think he's undeserving per se, but I suspect he'll get lost in the forest of sluggers this generation has put forward -- the new Fred McGriff, basically. Chipper was an oversight. I'm a little worried that Carlos may be hitting that Alomar wall, and if he doesn't recover, could end up a borderline guy like Thome.

It's going to be awfully hard to keep the player with the 5th-most homers in history -- more than Mark McGwire and 30+ Hall of Famers -- out of Cooperstown.  By the time Sosa is eligible circa 2012, the steroid witch hunt will have ended and voters will have decided they've "punished" McGwire enough. By the time Bonds becomes eligible around 2014, he'll walk in on the first ballot. There'll eventually be an acceptance that the Hall recognizes what players did, not what they "shouldn't have normally been capable of doing."

Ichiro should continue his current output for at least a few years yet. But even if he doesn't, I can see the voters taking his Japanese league performance into account and voting him in on a hybrid basis. I think he'll also get extra points for being the first true MLB star from Japan and opening up the majors to talent outside the Americas. If that trend holds, I can see a case being made someday about the three players who changed baseball: Ruth, Robinson and Ichiro. (Just noticed at BB-Ref -- Ichiro is 71-for-75 in stolen bases since the start of 2006.)