Friday, March 31, 2006
Barry Bonds, Bud Selig, and "Cheating"
After some good, but heavy, stuff about Iran and the irrational search forequality, its time to turn to less important matters: baseball, steroids, and moral superiority.
Bud Selig recently announced that Major League Baseball is launching an investigation into the use of steroids. The probe will only go back to September of 2002, since before then, performance enhancing drugs were perfectly legitimate under the rules of MLB.
This investigation comes closely on the heals of a revealing book detailing Barry Bonds' alleged steroid use from 1998 through at least 2003, during which he hit better than anyone could ever imagine any player ever hitting.
The book and investigation lead me to doubt how I feel about steroid use. It initially strikes me as blatant cheating. Players who use the juice are disrespecting the history and tradition of America's pasttime, a game that is as much about history as it is about the present. They are trampling on a sport that has given me lifelong pleasure as a fan. But just when it starts to get a bit dusty in the room, I remember two things.
First, Bud Selig is a jackass. There have been rumors of steroid use long before this investigation, long before they were banned in 2002, and long before Barry Bonds became BARRY BONDS. He did nothing. After all, chicks, and paying fans, dig the long ball. When did Bud finally act? Not when Giambi admitted use, not when the Senate embarrassed Mark McGwire and Rafael Palmeiro, not when the new testing policy turned up plenty of positive results in the first two years. No, there was no reason to act. Not until public pressure mounted to the point where he would look like an incompetent boob if he did nothing. Hey, Bud, we all know you are an incompetent boob already. Why try to change that now?
The other point I keep coming back to, and the far more important one, is this: players have cheated since the beginning of baseball. Here is a list of a few examples. For some modern stories of non-steroid cheating, check out this site. It has gone on forever. Pitchers scuffing the baseball or applying various ointments to get unnatural movement on their pitches. Hitters corking their bat. Hell, even Babe Ruth did it.
"Wait just a minute," you say. "There is a difference between stealing signs or scuffing the ball and altering your body to make you better."
Well, then, how about "greenies," a form of amphetamine widely used by baseball players since the 50's. Willie Mays supposedly took a liquid form called Red Juice. Even today, many clubhouses have separate "players' coffee" and "coaches' coffee." Guess why the coaches don't want to drink from the wrong pot? And, speaking of coffee, why not rule out caffeine, since it is known to be a mood altering drug.
Lets take this a step further. How is a drug that improves physical performance different from lasik eye surgery? That's ok, right? What if a player had surgery to shorten some tendons and muscles to allow for quicker movements? Is that going too far? How about a kid who, since he was short for his age, had parents put him on growth hormones, only to later discover he would have developed to a normal size on his own, just a little more slowly than their friends. The person is now a 7 foot center in the NBA - did he cheat?
The only difference is that some forms are legal and some are illegal. Are they illegal for a good reason? That's debatable. But they were not banned by Major League Baseball. Even if Barry Bonds came out and said, "Yes, I injected everything you can think of for 5 years, including my record setting seasons," what would you have done? Asterisks in the record book? Erase his numbers completely? What about Ruth the bat corker? Do we also delete just about every statistic from the 1970's, since it is very likely that most players were on amphetamines or, perhaps, cocaine. In fact, why not erase every stat of a player who had some coffee during his playing days.
My point is this: Everyone needs to get down off that horse. Most people are riding it a bit to hard; it needs a break. Lose your outrage - it is not very becoming. We were fortunate to see some amazing baseball over the last decade, and none of it was due to anything that hasn't been done before, nor was it against any of MLB's rules. Come back down to earth, think about what makes you feel better than Barry Bonds, and think about what that says of you.
Bud Selig recently announced that Major League Baseball is launching an investigation into the use of steroids. The probe will only go back to September of 2002, since before then, performance enhancing drugs were perfectly legitimate under the rules of MLB.
This investigation comes closely on the heals of a revealing book detailing Barry Bonds' alleged steroid use from 1998 through at least 2003, during which he hit better than anyone could ever imagine any player ever hitting.
The book and investigation lead me to doubt how I feel about steroid use. It initially strikes me as blatant cheating. Players who use the juice are disrespecting the history and tradition of America's pasttime, a game that is as much about history as it is about the present. They are trampling on a sport that has given me lifelong pleasure as a fan. But just when it starts to get a bit dusty in the room, I remember two things.
First, Bud Selig is a jackass. There have been rumors of steroid use long before this investigation, long before they were banned in 2002, and long before Barry Bonds became BARRY BONDS. He did nothing. After all, chicks, and paying fans, dig the long ball. When did Bud finally act? Not when Giambi admitted use, not when the Senate embarrassed Mark McGwire and Rafael Palmeiro, not when the new testing policy turned up plenty of positive results in the first two years. No, there was no reason to act. Not until public pressure mounted to the point where he would look like an incompetent boob if he did nothing. Hey, Bud, we all know you are an incompetent boob already. Why try to change that now?
The other point I keep coming back to, and the far more important one, is this: players have cheated since the beginning of baseball. Here is a list of a few examples. For some modern stories of non-steroid cheating, check out this site. It has gone on forever. Pitchers scuffing the baseball or applying various ointments to get unnatural movement on their pitches. Hitters corking their bat. Hell, even Babe Ruth did it.
"Wait just a minute," you say. "There is a difference between stealing signs or scuffing the ball and altering your body to make you better."
Well, then, how about "greenies," a form of amphetamine widely used by baseball players since the 50's. Willie Mays supposedly took a liquid form called Red Juice. Even today, many clubhouses have separate "players' coffee" and "coaches' coffee." Guess why the coaches don't want to drink from the wrong pot? And, speaking of coffee, why not rule out caffeine, since it is known to be a mood altering drug.
Lets take this a step further. How is a drug that improves physical performance different from lasik eye surgery? That's ok, right? What if a player had surgery to shorten some tendons and muscles to allow for quicker movements? Is that going too far? How about a kid who, since he was short for his age, had parents put him on growth hormones, only to later discover he would have developed to a normal size on his own, just a little more slowly than their friends. The person is now a 7 foot center in the NBA - did he cheat?
The only difference is that some forms are legal and some are illegal. Are they illegal for a good reason? That's debatable. But they were not banned by Major League Baseball. Even if Barry Bonds came out and said, "Yes, I injected everything you can think of for 5 years, including my record setting seasons," what would you have done? Asterisks in the record book? Erase his numbers completely? What about Ruth the bat corker? Do we also delete just about every statistic from the 1970's, since it is very likely that most players were on amphetamines or, perhaps, cocaine. In fact, why not erase every stat of a player who had some coffee during his playing days.
My point is this: Everyone needs to get down off that horse. Most people are riding it a bit to hard; it needs a break. Lose your outrage - it is not very becoming. We were fortunate to see some amazing baseball over the last decade, and none of it was due to anything that hasn't been done before, nor was it against any of MLB's rules. Come back down to earth, think about what makes you feel better than Barry Bonds, and think about what that says of you.
# posted by Anonymous @ 4:43 PM 
Comments:
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I most say you make some very good points. However, I disagree that we should all just look the other way when someone cheats simply because people have been cheating forever. Would you let a murderer go free simply because murders have been taking place since the start of mankind? As far as I know MLB does not have a rule against murdering other players during a game, does this make it ok? I agree that people have been cheating in baseball since the start of time but this still dosent make it accetable. As a fan who pays his hard earned money to watch baseball I think I have the right to complain about Barry cheating. And yes it is cheating even though baseball did not ban steroids, it's cheating because it's illegal under federal law so honest players won't use steroids because they don't want to break the law, this gives people like Barry Bonds a huge advantage against the rest of the compettition. I honestly don't care if Barry is punished or not, but as a fan I feel I have the right to express my anger against cheaters. Also it's not just Barry Bonds, I lose respect for any athelete who cheats weither it's steriods or stealing signs.
# posted by 
: 8:23 PM
: 8:23 PM
You have a point. I may have gone too far - anger is ok. I don't think cheating is acceptable and think baseball should take steps to get rid of it as much as possible. But what really makes me cringe is the suggestion that Bonds' or McGwire's numbers should be wiped out of the record books. If we went about this honestly, we would erase hundreds or thousands of players statistics. They don't even need an asterisk - we'll all remember that Bonds may not have hit so many home runs without the juice, and we should remember that Mickey Mantle may not have had his numbers without greenies, or that players today might not have done so well without their special "coffee." There is no way to clean the books - we just need to remember and put everything into the context of a history of cheating.
# posted by : 11:28 PM
: 11:28 PM
I personally blame MLB much more than any one individual for steroid use. The Mitchell investigation into past use is utter bullshit and only happening because Barry Bonds is getting towards 755. To go back and erase the records of one person is totally bogus, especially because we have no idea how much steroids actually help. Yes some big names have been under heavy suspicion but other players, such as Matt Lawton and Alex Sanchez, have been caught and arent exactly world beaters. Giambi seems to have resurrected his career without roids. Was Bonds using them in '04 when he had an OPS of .1400 (and there was testing?)
There are so many unanswered questions, so many different stories coming out with minimal credibility, and going back and trying to recreate who did what when is a fruitless exercise that is bad for the game. Selig has no credibility, and team management (which obviously condoned this or at minimum looked the other way.) is accepting no blame. Go back and read Moneyball about the relationship between the A's and the Giambi bros. How does that look now?
Selig and company need to focus on keeping the game clean from now on rather than following the lead of ESPN's need to fill 24 hours of news and Congress' to bully athletes that make more money and are bigger stars than they are. But he is a spineless turd, so that will never happen.
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There are so many unanswered questions, so many different stories coming out with minimal credibility, and going back and trying to recreate who did what when is a fruitless exercise that is bad for the game. Selig has no credibility, and team management (which obviously condoned this or at minimum looked the other way.) is accepting no blame. Go back and read Moneyball about the relationship between the A's and the Giambi bros. How does that look now?
Selig and company need to focus on keeping the game clean from now on rather than following the lead of ESPN's need to fill 24 hours of news and Congress' to bully athletes that make more money and are bigger stars than they are. But he is a spineless turd, so that will never happen.
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