I hesitated. I vacillated. I fluctuated. I scratched, spat, sucked on sunflower seeds, adjusted my cup (coffee), wiped dirt from my palms onto my pants, tried to do what a ballplayer would do. I dug in, waggled my pen, stared at my baseball Hall of Fame ballot like I'd like to kill it.

Do I vote for HIM? No, he cheated and got caught. Do I vote for HIM? I don't know .... he was just suspected of cheating. How about HIM? No, he didn't get enough hits. But what about HIM? He got a whole lot of hits, but was he as good as HIM?

This guy's on the ballot for the first time. Whereas that guy's on it for the 15th and last time. This guy's a jackass, a jerk. Oh, man, though, could he hit. This guy's a pleasure, a prince. But he sure couldn't hit like that guy. And, whoa, that guy could pitch. So could this guy, but sure wasn't that guy.

I voted. I mailed it. I even stuck a Willie Stargell forever stamp on the envelope, although the postage was already on it.

I waited. I wondered. Who would make it? Barry Bonds, yes or no? Roger Clemens, yes or no? Mike Piazza? Sammy Sosa? Craig Biggio? Jeff Bagwell? Jack Morris? Maybe none? NONE??? Yes, I kept hearing as the December 31 vote deadline passed, very possibly not a one.

Wednesday, the news came. The non-news. Whatever you want to call it.

Yes, the answer was no. No to all.

No to the man with 762 home runs. No to the pitcher who won 354 games. No to the hitter who got 3,060 hits.

Bonds (762 homers, most ever) struck out. He needed 427 votes. He got 206. Eight other guys on the ballot got more votes than he did.

Clemens (354 wins) got lit up. He got 214. Three other pitchers got more votes than he did.

Biggio, (3,060 hits) came closest. He got 388, fell a mere 39 votes shy of a date in Cooperstown, New York, with a nice, bronzed bust and plaque. It was like he won all the electoral votes he needed except Florida and Ohio. He gave it a great shot. Maybe next time.

I could try to justify it. I could try to explain it. I won't. I can't. It is an election. Everybody has a right to be wrong. A total of 569 ballots were cast. Five were turned in blank. I guess those voters have their reasons, bizarre as they are. A total of 37 names were on the ballot. No one won. I don't know why. I can't tell you why one of those 569 voters gave a yes to Aaron Sele, a pitcher who won 148 games. I have no problem with Aaron Sele, but if he is a Hall of Famer, I am the husband of the Duchess of Cambridge.

Will I reveal my own vote? No, I won't.

Not even whether I voted for Clemens and Bonds?

OK, dammit, I did.

I am not necessarily proud of it. I was not 100% sure which way to go. I crunched the numbers on a number of the candidates, tried to weigh their qualifications, make up my mind if a guy was a Hall of Famer or merely wonderful. No such crunch was necessary for Clemens or Bonds. Their stats were insane. Off the charts. I generally know a Hall of Famer when I see one, and whenever I saw those two guys, I saw two.

But each had an asterisk.*

* Not a real asterisk. A make-believe asterisk. Or more of a question mark, I guess. Cheater? Charlatan? Liar? Fraud?

Neither of them, in my opinion, were proven beyond a shadow of a doubt to have broken baseball's laws and rules. We can do the "you know and I know they did" thing all day long, but neither Barry Bonds nor Roger Clemens was ever banned, suspended or disciplined by Major League Baseball for being a steroids cheat.

Others got caught red-handed. Busted. Banished from the field for a specified period the way Hall of Fame candidate Rafael Palmeiro was and the way future Hall of Fame candidate Manny Ramirez was. I can't look the same way at the accused the way I do at the convicted.