But, both of those things could be directly impacted by performance enhancing drugs. I.E. he hit for power because of the steroids, thus he was pitched around a lot. It might not be the case, but you should be able to see why people would think that. What a ridiculous argument about the walks. He was such a dangerous hitter that pitchers felt they had to pitch around him (which is a point that I contest anyway- it is NOT always a decision by the pitcher that leads to a walk, there is such a skill as plate discipline and working a count), but that means that he isn't necessarily all that good because the only reason he got on all those times was because he was pitched around. backwards logic anyone? by that reasoning someone could hit a homerun literally every time they came to the plate, causing pitchers to eventually walk him literally every time he came to the plate. that person, by your reasoning, wouldn't be a great hitter at all because the only reason he was getting on all those times was because pitchers were afraid to pitch to him. So you don't think that there was a correlation between his power and the amount of times that he walked? No more than him being able to lay off balls and crush strikes. Pitchers didn't just fear him because he could hit the ball a mile, they feared him because he wasn't exploitable. There's a reason pitchers pitched to Dave Kingman and didn't pitch to McGwire.