  A scenario of heavy resonances, called massive Hagedorn states, is proposed
which exhibits a fast ($t\approx 1$ fm/c) chemical equilibration of (strange)
baryons and anti-baryons at the QCD critical temperature $T_c$. For
relativistic heavy ion collisions this scenario predicts that hadronization is
followed by a brief expansion phase during which the equilibration rate is
higher than the expansion rate, so that baryons and antibaryons reach chemical
equilibrium before chemical freeze-out occurs.
