COOPERSTOWN, NY - Temperatures may fall below the freezing level, but there is always the feeling of summer time here. It’s always baseball season, regardless of the slew of closed shops in this small town located in upstate New York.

Green Christmas wreaths hang outside the brick façade, welcoming visitors to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. No special skills or talent level is required to step inside and explore the slew of exhibits that honor the game’s history and celebrate the greatest players of all time.

While the museum itself is open to all, induction is limited to the very best to ever don a professional uniform. This year’s hall of fame class will be announced on Jan. 9, and should contain even more controversy than usual.

Tony Gwynn and Cal Ripken, Jr. are among the most accomplished of the 17 players on the ballot for the first time, with each standing a good chance of getting elected in their first year of eligibility.

Ripken, a two-time MVP for Baltimore, played in a record 2,632 consecutive games and complied 3,184 hits, 431 home runs and 1,695 RBI primarily as a shortstop. Gwynn won four batting titles and qualified for 15 All-Star games in a 20-year career with San Diego in which he record a .338 lifetime batting average.

The 2006 class contained only one former Major League Baseball member: Former Cardinal and Cubs reliever Bruce Sutter. Joining him was 17 electees in a special election to honor the contributors from the Negro leagues and pre-Negro league era. This year, there will not be a special election, though the 2007 class could be memorable for a different reason.

Mark McGwire is also on the ballot for the first time, making a strong case for inclusion with his 583 career home runs, including a career-high 70 in 1998 that temporarily set a new single season record. Those numbers lost some of their luster due to the recent questions about possible steroid use inflating those statistics, though nothing has been proven so far.

The former A’s and Cardinals first baseman refused to answer most questions about possible drug use when he went before a Congressional committee in March 2005, adding fuel to the unconfirmed rumors from sources like Jose Canseco, who said he injected McGwire with drugs while the two were teammates in Oakland.

Some view McGwire’s eligibility as the Hall of Fame’s test case for dealing with “the steroid era.” The current exhibits mention little about accusations of performance enhancing drugs when it comes to modern players. The museum’s Nov. 27 press release does not mention anything about the controversy in McGwire’s brief biographical text or in the initial part of the release.

Voting will be entrusted to members of the Baseball Writers' Association of America who have been with the organization for at least 10 years. Some of the approximately 575 voting members already went on record to say they will not vote for McGwire because of doubts his slugging accomplishments were achieved naturally.

Candidates need to be named on at least 75 percent of the ballots for entry who else wait their turn next year. Should McGwire fall short, it is possible players that have been on the cusp of inclusion for the last few years could finally get the needed push to be inducted.

Former Red Sox outfielder Jim Rice, who won the MVP in 1978, fell 53 votes shy of making it last year. But with concerns about some of the other players on the ballot, like McGwire, Canseco and the late Ken Caminiti, Rice could finally have his number called this time around. Canseco wrote a book about using steroids and Caminiti admitted before his death that he used performance boosting supplements during his career, including his 1996 MVP season.

Rice finished with 382 home runs and 1,451 RBI in a 14-year career with Boston, numbers that are comparable with some Hall of Fame outfielders but still are not in the same echelon as the likes of Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, Ted Williams and Stan Musial.

Of the 18 first baseman currently enshrined, McGwire’s home run total exceeds all of them. The next closest is Harmon Killebrew, who hit 573 homers. Despite the wide statistical gap when it comes to pure numbers, players like Rice and Don Mattingly could be helped by the fact they are viewed as “clean” players who earned their awards and numbers without any help from outside sources.

Rice is facing his 13th year on the ballot, while Mattingly is in his seventh. Most baseball writers say it would be a major upset if Gwynn or Ripken don’t make on the first try, but drug suspicion and the steroid era could be the opening players like Rice and Mattingly need to finally break through and get the 75 percent come the first week in January.