OAKLAND — Jose Canseco was, in his words, an emotional wreck. He certainly played the part. His voice cracked. His tears flowed.
He never thought this day would materialize.
“What I accomplished here, what we accomplished as a team and, of course, with everything that I’ve been through — the steroid book, the steroid era, the whole combination,” Canseco said, “for the Oakland A’s to even consider putting me in the Hall of Fame, to me, it was a shock. When they called me, I thought it was a joke.”
This was no joke. Ahead of the final Bay Bridge Series, Canseco, Miguel Tejada, Terry Steinbach, Bill King, Dick Williams and Eddie Joost were officially inducted as the sixth Oakland A’s Hall of Fame class. And if Canseco had any lingering doubt that this was real, those doubts officially washed away when Tony La Russa, his former manager and “second dad,” adorned him with a green jacket.
“I wish I could give … a forearm bash to everybody,” Canseco said.
La Russa being the one to introduce Canseco was not insignificant. The two, for a litany of reasons, haven’t always had the smoothest relationship. But on Saturday, La Russa showered Canseco with praise.
“He had one of the highest baseball IQs of any player I’ve managed over the many years,” La Russa said.
If La Russa knew Canseco for his brain, the baseball world knew Canseco during his prime for his braun. In nine total seasons with the A’s, Canseco slugged 254 home runs, became the first member of the 40-40 club and won the 1988 MVP. Along with Steinbach, who slugged 132 homers over 11 seasons in Oakland, Canseco and the A’s won three American League pennants and won the 1989 World Series.
Canseco has manufactured no shortage of drama over the last four-ish decades, both during and after his playing days. But on this afternoon, he was afforded the privilege of basking in a sea of admiration.
“I thought it was an April Fool’s (joke),” Canseco said. “I was like, “How the hell am I going to be inducted into the Hall of Fame? I thought in my mind there’s no way I actually deserve it, but I’m real happy that I’m here.”
When Steinbach was asked if there was a particular memory of Canseco that comes to mind, the backstop quipped, “You have to get more hard drive to go through those stories.” In addition to reminiscing about Canseco’s talent, Steinbach recalled a time during spring training when the hitting group was discussing RBI situations.
“Jose goes, ‘Every time I come to the plate, it’s an RBI situation,’” Steinbach laughed. “At first, we laughed. But then we go, ‘You know, he’s right!’”
Tejada and the A’s never reached the pinnacle during his time in Oakland, but the “Moneyball” A’s teams of the early-2000s continue to leave a lasting impact in the Bay Area and beyond.
In seven seasons with the green and gold, Tejada became the franchise leader in home runs (156), RBIs (604) and slugging percentage (.460) among shortstops, winning the 2002 AL MVP in the process. Before Scott Hatteberg’s famous walk-off home run to give the A’s a 20-game winning streak, Tejada orchestrated back-to-back game-winners to give Oakland its 18th and 19th straight wins.
“When I signed with Oakland out of the Dominican Republic, I never believed that this day would happen,” Tejada said. “I played this game hard every day and enjoyed (the game), but I never thought I was going to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.”
In roughly two months, with the A’s headed to Sacramento at season’s end, the memories that Canseco, Steinbach and Tejada produced will be all that’s left of major-league baseball in Oakland.
“At a point in time, I think the fans realized it was run strictly like a business. It really was,” Canseco said. “It wasn’t about the fans. It wasn’t about putting together a winning product. It was about making money. I think organizations get caught up in that, no buts about it. That’s just the way they ran it. It looks like now it’s time to make a move, it’s time to go somewhere else and get a new start.”
“For myself, this is where I grew up: in this stadium, in this city,” Tejada said. “There’s a lot of fans here, a lot of people that like to come to the stadium and I feel very sorry for them.”
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