DEAD END OF THE ROAD TO COOPERSTOWN?: MCGWIRE GETS NO HALL PASS.

Byline: MATT MCHALE

A year from now, the face of performance-enhancing drugs in baseball will not be Jason Grimsley or even Barry Bonds.

It will be Mark McGwire, who won't be walking to the podium in Cooperstown to join the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Next summer, McGwire was expected to join Tony Gwynn and Cal Ripken in one of the most prestigious classes in history.

Instead, Grimsley's revelations last week about the use and distribution of human-growth hormones (HGH), steroids and amphetamines during his career will heighten awareness and take down a lot of people, including McGwire.

Like Bonds, there is a good chance there never will be enough evidence to connect drugs to McGwire. But unlike Bonds, McGwire faces an induction vote in December by members of the Baseball Writers Association of America.

Who knows where the debate will be when Bonds is ready to go in. Players must be retired five years before they are eligible for induction.

But right now, McGwire's hulking, some say grotesque, figure at the plate, plus his evasive answers last year in front of a Congressional investigation on steroids, suggest the 245 home runs he hit between 1996-99 (an average of 61 per season) were aided by illegal substances.

He also could be included on a list of a half-dozen players Grimsley allegedly gave the feds in April, early in their investigation. Grimsley, a journeyman right-hander who once pitched for the Angels, said ``boatloads'' of players used his source to purchase HGH. Those names have not been revealed but they will come out.

For some time, a big part of the Hall of Fame issue has centered around whether the player would have gotten in if his numbers were not allegedly boosted by technology.

The vote here: Bonds was a future Hall of Famer the day he first stepped on a major-league field. Although McGwire set a rookie home-run record in 1987 (49), his induction did not seem certain until he hit 70 home runs in 1998 as a member of the St. Louis Cardinals.

He does not get in, even though his achievement was unprecedented and the excitement of his race with the Chicago Cubs' Sammy Sosa and his appreciation of the Maris family helped revive baseball four years after a labor dispute canceled the World Series.

Three years later, hobbled by a bad knee, McGwire walked away from the game. He has been pretty much invisible since, making brief appearances in St. Louis.

But it seemed every effort to distance himself from the controversy only made it worse.

Within a year of retirement, his incredible bulk was gone, which raised suspicion. His clumsy responses to drug-related questions made him look guilty.

McGwire's former manager, Tony La Russa, always had backed his player, but after that damning visit to Congress, La Russa no longer seemed so zealous.

Remember, true guilt might never be known. There is no definite test to detect HGH, which Grimsley said has been in baseball for years but became especially popular after commissioner Bud Selig started cracking down on steroids.

The Major League Players Association never has allowed blood testing to be included in the collective bargaining agreement. It is inconclusive whether blood tests can detect HGH, but urinalysis definitely does not work.

The union has given up a lot of ground in the past year when it comes to the penalty phase of drug testing. It knew its members could not win in the court of public opinion without changes.

It probably never will, regardless of whether McGwire is excluded from the Hall of Fame based on real evidence.

Fans seem to hold baseball to a higher standard than football, basketball, track and field or even hockey.

Some conspiracy theorists think McGwire planted the supplement Androstenedione in his locker in 1999 for the media to find. It was legal at the time and tame compared to the HGH being discussed now.

Naivete didn't work with Bonds' explanation of his steroid use and it didn't work with McGwire.

Not then, not now, not next summer.

One more thing: In response to last week's column was a phone call from former Dodgers first baseman Eric Karros, who said he was not on the April 1998 trip to Milwaukee on which veterans did not protect rookie Paul Konerko from a prying media after a tough night at the plate.

``I was back in L.A. on the DL with a knee injury,'' Karros said. ``There are a lot of things you can throw me under the bus for during my career, but that was not one of them.''

Another reader said he was certain Mike Piazza already was gone from the team. Piazza was traded to the Florida Marlins on May 14, 1998.

CAPTION(S):

2 photos, 7 boxes

Photo:

(1) Mark McGwire might have a hard time making it to the Hall of Fame because of the perception he used performance-enhancing substances.

Dave Kaup/AFP/Getty Images

(2) no caption (Cole Hamels)

Box:

(1) DAILY NEWS/CBS 2/KCAL 9 SPORTS CENTRAL POWER RANKINGS

- Matt McHale

(2) THEY SAID IT

(3) WHO'S HOT

(4) WHO'S COLD

(5) ROOKIE WATCH

(6) NOTES

(7) SERIES OF THE WEEK