Big shout out to Mess for giving me the best view on this whole Arod scandal since the news broke:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/09/opinion/09glanville.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2
It is a refreshing take on Alex Rodriguez – in many ways, he was the anti-Bonds – someone who tried to make everyone like him.
But I want to get down to the REAL issues with all of this steroid news.
First off, if you are one of those positive tested players, you have to be upset. The players didn’t have to change the Collective Bargaining Agreement(CBA) to put testing in. They agreed, on very specific terms that identities wouldn’t be released.
This goes against the very spirit of that agreement. Glanville writes:
There is a lot of outrage out there about Alex. Not surprising. But what really surprises me is the lack of outrage about how a confidential and anonymous test could be made public. We seem to gloss over the fact that these players voted to re-open a collectively bargained agreement in a preliminary effort to address the drug problem. When privileged information is shared it effectively hurts anyone who has expected privacy in any circumstance, just as when someone made Britney Spears’s medical records public.
The 2003 test was only supposed to assess whether the number of players using performance-enhancing drugs exceeded a certain threshold. If it did, as part of the agreement, a full drug policy would be instituted in the following testing year. One that was more comprehensive with penalties. This was at least a step in the right direction.
Would you be happy if your personal medical records were released without your permission?
But Glanville brings up a great point – baseball’s drug culture. How can Bud Selig put an asterisk on 762 or keep Bonds out of the hall of fame when MLB is just as guilty for this era as the players and dealers themselves.
Think about it – your dream is to be a major league player. You are close, but just not quite good enough. But all the players good enough as using, why wont you try it? I am sure there are plenty of players who missed out on a major league career because of their integrity, and I salute them for that - but I can’t blame the players for breaking down and using based on the times.
And can we stop with this keeping players out of the hall of fame business? This is ridiculous. So because Barry Bonds tested positive for steroids AFTER he had: won 8 gold gloves, 3 MVPs, and an ESPY for male athlete of the year. He was the first 500/500 player, the first 400/400 player, the epitome of a 5 tool player.
Jason Stark says he won’t make it to the hall:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/09/opinion/09glanville.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2
It is a refreshing take on Alex Rodriguez – in many ways, he was the anti-Bonds – someone who tried to make everyone like him.
But I want to get down to the REAL issues with all of this steroid news.
First off, if you are one of those positive tested players, you have to be upset. The players didn’t have to change the Collective Bargaining Agreement(CBA) to put testing in. They agreed, on very specific terms that identities wouldn’t be released.
This goes against the very spirit of that agreement. Glanville writes:
There is a lot of outrage out there about Alex. Not surprising. But what really surprises me is the lack of outrage about how a confidential and anonymous test could be made public. We seem to gloss over the fact that these players voted to re-open a collectively bargained agreement in a preliminary effort to address the drug problem. When privileged information is shared it effectively hurts anyone who has expected privacy in any circumstance, just as when someone made Britney Spears’s medical records public.
The 2003 test was only supposed to assess whether the number of players using performance-enhancing drugs exceeded a certain threshold. If it did, as part of the agreement, a full drug policy would be instituted in the following testing year. One that was more comprehensive with penalties. This was at least a step in the right direction.
Would you be happy if your personal medical records were released without your permission?
But Glanville brings up a great point – baseball’s drug culture. How can Bud Selig put an asterisk on 762 or keep Bonds out of the hall of fame when MLB is just as guilty for this era as the players and dealers themselves.
Think about it – your dream is to be a major league player. You are close, but just not quite good enough. But all the players good enough as using, why wont you try it? I am sure there are plenty of players who missed out on a major league career because of their integrity, and I salute them for that - but I can’t blame the players for breaking down and using based on the times.
And can we stop with this keeping players out of the hall of fame business? This is ridiculous. So because Barry Bonds tested positive for steroids AFTER he had: won 8 gold gloves, 3 MVPs, and an ESPY for male athlete of the year. He was the first 500/500 player, the first 400/400 player, the epitome of a 5 tool player.
Jason Stark says he won’t make it to the hall:
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/story?columnist=stark_jayson&id=3892788
Jason - cut the whining Many eras of baseball include scandals – hell, Wikipedia has a page dedicated to baseball scandals!
Jason - cut the whining Many eras of baseball include scandals – hell, Wikipedia has a page dedicated to baseball scandals!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Baseball_scandals .
I think listening to my daily fix of the Junkies (http://www.junksweb.com/main.shtml), they said it best:
“The Hall of Fame is going to be filled with guys like Jim Thome – and you might wanna test him!”
They pretty much laid out the entire solution I think is necessary – this is a black eye for baseball, and it is an era we just know will be regarded as the steroid era. Really, other than the fact these guys were cheating, does it really need to be treated any different from the dead ball era-a time in which other's are compared to differently, based on the culture/game? What about the era where ballplayers took care of their bodies with whiskey and women rather than supplements and trainers?
Does Rickey Henderson’s stolen base record deserve an asterisk because he played during a time cocaine was flowing in major league clubhouses? Tim Raines once said he slid headfirst so he wouldn’t break the coke vials in his back pocket.
NO. No, no and no. The main reason this witch hunt kills me is while they are in fact trying to flush steroids from the game, many people have suggested up to half the players in the game were using at one point, with Jose Canseco having the biggest guestimate at 85%.
So if somewhere between 50-85% of the players were using, then you cannot drop the hammer on a select few to justify your stance on it now. Hell, before the program that Glanville writes about started, I do not believe there was a specific rule in the MLB handbook outlawing steroids, just a provisional clause stating that any substances illegal by US law was also illegal in MLB.
So players lik
e Bonds, ARod, etc, have to suffer, even though they were just a product of their times. You don’t think either took notice of the McGwire/Sosa home run chase? The attention and love thrown their way for reaching the mark? Read Game of Shadows – it was practically the reason Bonds started, according to the book: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_of_Shadows
I want to make this clear – I feel fooled, duped, bamboozled. I thought I was watching the greatest hitter of all time break that home run record, not just a great player who had chemically enhanced himself to be the best. But at a time when I am sure pitchers were juicing just as much as the hitters, ballparks are made to be home run havens, and MLB turned a blind eye to this until reporters starting breaking stories, you can’t single out the guys that you caught in a test that was supposed to be confidential, especially when the problem extended way beyond them.
While doing a little research on this topic, I stumbled upon two things - one was that Bud Selig is contemplating punishing ARod, and the other was a piece Howard Bryant wrote for ESPN.
So Bud, you are thinking about punishing a player for failing a test in which it was guaranteed confidential and non-punishable. You are a joke if you are seriously considering this.
I'll wrap it all up with Bryant, who sounds like more of a leader that Selig:
I think listening to my daily fix of the Junkies (http://www.junksweb.com/main.shtml), they said it best:
“The Hall of Fame is going to be filled with guys like Jim Thome – and you might wanna test him!”
They pretty much laid out the entire solution I think is necessary – this is a black eye for baseball, and it is an era we just know will be regarded as the steroid era. Really, other than the fact these guys were cheating, does it really need to be treated any different from the dead ball era-a time in which other's are compared to differently, based on the culture/game? What about the era where ballplayers took care of their bodies with whiskey and women rather than supplements and trainers?
Does Rickey Henderson’s stolen base record deserve an asterisk because he played during a time cocaine was flowing in major league clubhouses? Tim Raines once said he slid headfirst so he wouldn’t break the coke vials in his back pocket.
NO. No, no and no. The main reason this witch hunt kills me is while they are in fact trying to flush steroids from the game, many people have suggested up to half the players in the game were using at one point, with Jose Canseco having the biggest guestimate at 85%.
So if somewhere between 50-85% of the players were using, then you cannot drop the hammer on a select few to justify your stance on it now. Hell, before the program that Glanville writes about started, I do not believe there was a specific rule in the MLB handbook outlawing steroids, just a provisional clause stating that any substances illegal by US law was also illegal in MLB.
So players lik
e Bonds, ARod, etc, have to suffer, even though they were just a product of their times. You don’t think either took notice of the McGwire/Sosa home run chase? The attention and love thrown their way for reaching the mark? Read Game of Shadows – it was practically the reason Bonds started, according to the book: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_of_ShadowsI want to make this clear – I feel fooled, duped, bamboozled. I thought I was watching the greatest hitter of all time break that home run record, not just a great player who had chemically enhanced himself to be the best. But at a time when I am sure pitchers were juicing just as much as the hitters, ballparks are made to be home run havens, and MLB turned a blind eye to this until reporters starting breaking stories, you can’t single out the guys that you caught in a test that was supposed to be confidential, especially when the problem extended way beyond them.
While doing a little research on this topic, I stumbled upon two things - one was that Bud Selig is contemplating punishing ARod, and the other was a piece Howard Bryant wrote for ESPN.
So Bud, you are thinking about punishing a player for failing a test in which it was guaranteed confidential and non-punishable. You are a joke if you are seriously considering this.
I'll wrap it all up with Bryant, who sounds like more of a leader that Selig:
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/story?columnist=bryant_howard&id=3899274
That is probably the most fair and balanced view I have seen on this topic - which of course mirrors mine. Lets hope more people start looking at this rationally, rather than just throwing players under the bus because they were one of the few unfortunate souls to be cheating who got outed by a confidential test.
That is probably the most fair and balanced view I have seen on this topic - which of course mirrors mine. Lets hope more people start looking at this rationally, rather than just throwing players under the bus because they were one of the few unfortunate souls to be cheating who got outed by a confidential test.
No comments:
Post a Comment