Steroids in Baseball pt.2 (Bonds, Giambi, Sheffield, BALCO, etc.)

"I believe a large majority of power hitters were drug-assisted over the last 10 or 15 years," Yesalis said, "and I'm outraged by it."

Yep. Please to replace "power hitters" and "10 or 15 years" with THE ACTUAL WORDS that will make that sentence less laughable.

But, of course, (I think someone else made this point, probably Alex) as long as you're not officially breaking the rules, anything's fair game, and any advantage that can be exploited will be exploited for the sake of making the big bucks and winning the big game, whether it be hitters erasing the back line of the batter's box or GMs looking the other way when players are supposedly using not-yet-illegal performance-enhancement drugs.

[x-post]

Yeah, I conveniently forgot that bit about him saying he "had a feeling". Still, I'd love to know what this "feeling" consisted of - whether it was him eyeballing Caminiti in the locker room, or players and coaches whispering about needles and vials. And, regardless, what's the point of coming forward like this if you have no damn proof (and no book to sell)? And, again, if you have this "hunch", and you're concerned (as he should've been), why not follow it up? Coming forward like this, acting powerless and distraught, when you were in a position to affect change, is not the brightest thing one could do.

It's impossible to say whether Towers knew about Caminiti's cocaine habit. Did he ever show up to the park high, or in no condition to play? It's not that hard to keep a drug addiction secret from the people you work with.

if it was really a big deal to Towers, the Padres could've done some tests on their own to make sure this shit wasn't going down.

I don't think so. A ballclub can't just pull a player aside and force him into doing medical tests of their own choosing. I'm fairly sure that the MLBPA's CA doesn't allow that. In the 80's, everyone was worried about cocaine, and the drug testing policy was basically nonexistant. I think guys like Steve Howe kept getting suspended due to things like prior probations, or disappearing on two day drug binges. MLB was doing very little to keep drugs out of the game, because the policies weren't in place.

MiR OTM. Of course, most ballclubs wouldn't want to either, but even if they did I don't think an individual ballclub could have administered a testing program without it going to court and causing a huge union stink.

That's not the case with steroids, because steroid-related health issues take years to develop. Degenerative injuries get worse over months or years, and it's impossible to prove definitively whether they're naturally occuring or a result of steroid use.

I WILL NOT HEAR OF IT!!! STEROIDS HAVE ONLY BEEN IN BASEBALL SINCE 1999-2000!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(*year of Alzado's retirement from the NFL)

If a guy signs a contract and three years into it he develops some freak degenerative hip or back injury like Belle/Vaughn/Giambi did, there's no possible way to conclusively connect such an injury to steroid use in a way that is legally binding. You could never firmly say "steroids caused this injury" in a way that would convince an insurance company.

Major League Baseball players of course stayed far away from the chemicals for almost 20 years*.

*except for Ken Caminitti and Jose Canseco.

If Bonds isn't juiced, then he's a freak of nature. And as gygax said, if he is juiced then he's still a freak of nature because his body hasn't disintegrated like the body of every other steroid user has. (granted, if he didn't start taking steroids until he was 35 or so, then it's different from the more typical cases, i.e. where guys start in their 20's and fall apart by age 35).

This has little to do w/ the steroid thing, but since I thought of it: has Bonds had back problems? I know Canseco & McGwire (& other power hitters) have had back issues up the wazoo because of the way they swing & the stress their technique caused. They were fine early on, but I know both Bash Brothers were waylaid by back problems (& other things) later on, especially McGwire (who was all sorts of busticated before he retired). The only Bonds injuries I can recall involve his hammies & ankles...?

Hey, you're right!

And said what? Make accusations? Offer assistance? Obviously Caminiti would have said that everything was fine, denied everything, said that there were no problems, etc. What would have been accomplished?

xpost

Schuerholz has suspected Braves of steroids use

> By GUY CURTRIGHT
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
> Published on: 03/01/05

Lake Buena Vista, Fla. -- John Schuerholz admits he suspected over the years that a few Braves players were using steroids. He even confronted several, he said Tuesday.

"Yes, I was in that position, and yes I did," Schuerholz said, not divulging names. "But I suffered the same frustrations that all other general managers did.

"If we had our suspicions, all we could do was ask the player, and if the player said no, we were done. We had nowhere to go. Our hands were tied behind our backs.

"We had no capability of testing a player to validate or verify whether a guy needed help to get off performance-enhancing drugs."

Schuerholz's revelation comes after San Diego general manager Kevin Towers said he thought Ken Caminiti, briefly a Brave in 2001 at the end of his career, was using steroids when he won the National League MVP award with the Padres in 1996.

"I want to make this clear: As general managers, we didn't turn our heads away from players who might be using steroids because it was a benefit to us," Schuerholz said. 'No, if we turned our heads, it out of frustration because there was nothing we could do about it. Sadly, we didn't have the authority to test players or fix the problem."

Now, baseball does have a drug testing policy with meaningful penalties, and Schuerholz thinks that management and players alike will benefit.

"It's the best thing that could have happened for the integrity of the game," he said. "It's too late coming, but I'm glad that we've finally got here. It's the right path.

"Sure, it could be stronger, but it's a good start. I think the players and the union will realize how beneficial it is. We had to clean things up."

The new drug agreement goes into effect on Thursday with random year-round testing. First-time offenders will be suspended for 10 days without pay, although the public outing might be the greater penalty.

Catcher Johnny Estrada, the Braves' player representative for the union, is confident that the new policy will work, and he said that general managers shouldn't be blamed for anything that happened in the past.

"It was out of their hands," Estrada said. "They didn't have any right to do anything. It was against the agreement between the union and management."

Well, that settles that!

I think this is notable because this is the first non-MVP caliber player admitting he was a user.

Any of these players could be screwed if they are asked point blank whether or not they used steroids. If they deny the allegation in front of congress and then evidence comes up to the contrary, they could be held in contempt of congress.

it'll be entertaining no matter what because i don't doubt jose, big hurt and curt schilling will testify.

i like henry waxman, is that so wrong?

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/7132563/

that's prolly the media's fault, not congress'. i mean, i don't check roll call but i don't doubt they'll have hearings involving other sports as well. baseball's just the big one these days.

The New York Daily News had a 5.5 page baseball section today, and 5 pages on steroids. I've got no clue if Giambi is mended, all I know is his brother admitted to taking roids. I don't know how Sheff's shoulder is healing, because all I read about is him getting pissy when asked about steroids. Who is Tony Womack? Carl Pavano? Who cares? They're not implicated for steroids use.

Please stop.

btw, did you know that HE'S RETIRED?!?!?!?

Bunning:
``When I played with Henry Aaron and Willie Mays and Ted Williams, they didn't put on 40 pounds of bulk in their careers, and they didn't hit more homers in their late 30s than they did in their late 20s. What's happening now in baseball isn't natural and it isn't right,'' said Bunning.

Henry Aaron
HRs age 25-29: 202
HRs age 35-39: 203

Ted Williams
HRs age 25-29: 95
HRs age 35-39: 145

Willie Mays
HRs age 25-29: 163
HRs age 35-39: 123

Hey one out of three ain't bad, it's like batting .333!!!

Aaron at 25-29 - park factor ~90s, Aaron 35-39 - park factor of 105+

sen. bunning is a jackass, always has been.

He was factually and logically correct in his statement - perhaps a first for Bunning.

If he would have clarified and put your words and your analysis into his statement, then and only then would he be closer to factual and logical legitimacy (along with choosing better phrasing). Unfortunately, he didn't and the quote is false information.

Um, no. As I pointed out, adjusting for the fact that he WASN'T IN BASEBALL and then got injured, Williams more than beats his late-career numbers and Aaron went from a serious pitchers' park to homer-friendly Atlanta-Fulton County (whatever the name of that place was). Meaning they both were better power hitters (based solely on home runs) early in their career.

They didn't experience sudden power surges with their bodies in decline, unlike modern players.

I wouldn't expect Bunning to run to baseball-reference.com to check Williams' age while he was in the service - are you going to argue that it would change his statement whatsoever for Bunning to say "from the ages of 23-24 and from 27 to 28 and then 30 since he was injured"? (In which case, as I said Williams more than exceeds his late-career total.)

If you put Williams in the league for those years and you put Aaron in Atlanta-Fulton County, all three hit for more power during their youth. Which is exactly what he said, and illustrates his point - it's not normal for human beings to gain muscle mass and bat speed and skill as they hit middle-age after ten or more years of physical wear from performance. A fluke (player or season) here and there, okay.

Yeah, god forbid a state senator to actually fact-check and research the subject at hand.

Here's my point, milo: All three of those guys hit a shitload of homers after age 35. Barry Bonds has too. Bunning's opinion is irrelevant and ain't worth shit.

I'm amazed that some people believe this asshattery when it's patently obvious that every male athlete in virtually every power/skill sport puts on significant bulk throughout their careers. Shit, I've put on 25 pounds in the last ten years from a combination of excercise/weights/getting older(OMG!!!!) -- maybe I'm on the juice?

Which is, you know, Bunning's point and he's correct.

We still don't KNOW who took WHICH illegal stuff for HOW LONG (cept maybe Jose, I'm sure his sequel will have receipts), and how exactly it affected their performance. This is pissing in the wind, not a cup.

Jim Bunning is ancient, seems to be completely bonkers and lives in his own little dream world. His handlers let him in front of a microphone only once or twice during his re-election campaign last fall and he still managed to say his opponent Mongiardo looked like one of Saddam Hussein's sons and had people beat up his wife at a political picnic which was attended by over 3000 people, which of course never happened. I keep expecting to see Burnning start walking around in either his baseball uniform or an aluminum foil hat on his dome any day now. If anyone in this nation could use some performance enhancing drugs, Jim Bunning is the one.

Stence OTM, too. But that goes w/out saying re: Bunning.

http://www.businessofbaseball.com/docs.htm#SteroidHearing

Woman Tells of Bonds, Steroid Use and $80,000

By CAROL POGASH, NY Times

A woman who says she had a nine-year relationship with Barry Bonds said yesterday that he told her several years ago that he was using steroids. The woman, Kimberly Bell of San Jose, Calif., also said that Bonds had given her $80,000 in cash and advised her how to deposit it in different bank accounts to avoid detection by the authorities.

Bell testified in San Francisco last week before the federal grand jury that is investigating the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative steroid case. The San Francisco Chronicle reported Sunday that she had told the grand jury about what she said was Bonds's use of performance-enhancing drugs and about their financial dealings.

Bell was given full immunity in her testimony, an arrangement that required approval by the Department of Justice, her lawyer Hugh A. Levine said yesterday.

In a telephone interview yesterday, Bell talked about what she described as her relationship with Bonds. She declined to discuss what she told the grand jury.

Bell, who said her relationship with Bonds began when they met at a Giants game in July 1994, said he paid for a house for her in Scottsdale, Ariz., through autographing baseballs.

"The money couldn't come from his salary, because his wife would know," Bell said in the interview, which was monitored by Martin Garbus, another lawyer representing her.

Bonds bundled the cash he received from signing baseballs to give her the $80,000, mostly in $100 bills, as a down payment for the house, Bell said. He advised her to open accounts at four banks, she said, and he told her to deposit no more than $9,999 at one time. She said she did so a number of times over the course of a year.

"He told me, the bank has to report $10,000, so it can't be that much," she said. Federal law says that if an individual makes a bank deposit of $10,000 or more in cash, the bank must report the transaction to the government. Bell did not say if she knew whether Bonds had reported the income.

People charged with deliberately attempting to evade federal taxes can face up to five years in prison. The penalty for filing a false return is up to three years in prison. If Bonds did not report the $80,000 as income, he might have saved about $35,000 in taxes.

"We don't know enough about this, but if there's $80,000 he didn't pay taxes on, I would say he's in trouble," said Joseph Bankman, a professor of tax law at Stanford University Law School. "There's probably not a lot of wiggle room there. In that case, it's not like steroids; it's like a light switch. It's either on or off. Either he did report it or he didn't."

Michael Raines, Bonds's lawyer, said Bell had been trying to extort Bonds. In letters over the last two years, Raines said, Bell demanded money from Bonds and implied that she might go public with her accusations about his use of steroids. Raines also said Bell was trying to use the news media to promote a proposal for a book she wants to write.

Bell spoke in the interview about the accusations that Bonds used steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs.

"Continuously, each year - before each spring training especially - he would ask if things on his body looked bigger than the year before," she said.

Bell said Bonds had worried about looking bloated. "He was obsessively, in my opinion, worried about it," she said. "Barry used to have very cut abs, like washboard abs. After a while he was just a massive muscle, solid and bloated. His upper body had definitely changed."

She said Bonds had told her in late 1999 or early 2000 that he was taking steroids orally.

Bonds told the Balco grand jury in December 2003 that he believed a substance that he had received from his trainer, Greg Anderson, was flaxseed oil, The Chronicle has reported.

Levine said of Bell: "Clearly, she is a woman scorned. They would be foolhardy to base a perjury indictment on her testimony alone."

Several baseball players were punished a decade ago for failing to report income from autograph signings. Among them were Duke Snider, the former Brooklyn Dodger, and Darryl Strawberry, the former Met. Snider received two years of probation and a $5,000 fine for failing to report $100,000 in income; Strawberry was sentenced to six months of house arrest for failing to report $350,000.

Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

Panico tells me, "With steroids and an aggressive, intelligent approach to training, I could take a guy like Giambi, who can hit for average, and maybe add eight to twelve feet to a ball that he's gonna hit properly." In terms of EqA, the widely used metric Davenport created, the discrepancy between Giambi's expected performance and his actual one has been exceeded by only three players since 1990: Edgar Martinez, Barry Bonds, and Mark McGwire. And no other player in Major League history has ever increased his EqA six years running, as Giambi has."

TAMPA, Fla. -- Tampa Bay Devil Rays outfielder Alex Sanchez was suspended 10 days for violating major league baseball's new drug policy, the first player publicly identified under baseball's tougher rules.

Major League Baseball announced the suspension Sunday. It begins on Monday.

Sanchez said he was surprised by the suspension, adding that he uses milkshakes and multivitamins to build his energy -- and blaming the positive test on something he bought over the counter.

"I'm going to fight it, because I've never taken steroids or anything like that," Sanchez said.

Sanchez said he was drug tested while he was with the Tigers.

It has been an emotional month for Sanchez. The center fielder was reunited with his mother for the first time in 11 years in mid-March. Five days later, he was released by the Tigers.

Sanchez had frustrated Detroit with his sloppy play in the field in the past, and did again during spring training.

Sanchez left Cuba on a raft 11 years ago, leaving his family behind. On March 10, Sanchez reunited with his mother and brother in Miami, where he has a house with his wife and twin boys. Sanchez's mother and brother escaped from Cuba by boat and spent time in Mexico and Texas before traveling by bus to Miami.

Besides Sanchez's defensive shortcomings, he also struggled to get on base when a bunt or single didn't get him on first base -- a big problem for a leadoff hitter. In 365 games, he has drawn 68 walks. His career batting average is .292 over four seasons in the majors with a .327 on-base percentage.

Sanchez batted .322 in last season, but his on-base percentage was just .335 because he walked just seven times and he played just 79 games because of leg injuries.

In 2003, he stole 52 bases in 101 games with the Tigers and 43 with the Milwaukee Brewers.

Sanchez had a $1.35 million, one-year contract that was not guaranteed. By releasing him before March 18, the Tigers owe 30 days' termination pay, $221,311, instead of 45 days' termination pay, $331.967.

Information from The Associated Press and SportsTicker was used in this report.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2029037&num=0

What will be rarer in this week's media, acknowledging the *possibility* of false positives in steroid testing or that the Pope wasn't universally beloved among Catholics?

For us to even begin to discount steroid announcements because of the possibility of false positives requires evidence that there are substances (specifically, in Sanchez's case and claims, substances found in OTC supplements) which provide a false positive for the specific substances banned in baseball.

'Science isn't 100% reliable' is a copout, not an argument. I honestly don't understand your desire to ignore and/or defend steroid use at every turn.

If not, I'd guess a number of players were still using it which should mean a number of false positives.

xpost - haha, yeah, he just testified that he used stuff that kinda-sorta looked like the cream and the clear that just happened to be provided by the same guys distributing the cream and the clear - but he didn't KNOW... don't try to dress up Barry's testimony.

The crazed Steroid Patrol just isn't interested in standards of proof. Pardon me while I check on Braden Looper.

re: perjury - I kind of figure that Bonds' trainer gave him the dope, said "You don't want to know what these are" and Barry was smart enough to leave it at that, giving himself (increasinly im)plausible deniability.

But it's a lose-lose game of semantics, to try to claim that his vagueness is a logical reason to ignore the shocking similarities between the substances used by Giambi and Sheffield and those Bonds admits to using.

It pisses me off that the union (who I'm usually behind 110% in baseball) isn't acting in the best interests the majority of its members.

xpost - I doubt independents were tested. They aren't part of the national baseball association that governs the major-minor system and team placement (or else most of the indies couldn't exist, they're too close to affiliated minor-league teams).

Elvis Avendano, Oakland Athletics
Lizahio Baez, Texas Rangers
Oscar Bernard, Chicago Cubs
David Cash, Chicago Cubs
David Castillo, Oakland Athletics*
Troy Cate, Seattle Mariners
Robinson Chirinos, Chicago Cubs
Ryan Christianson, Seattle Mariners
William Collazo, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
Francisco Cordova, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
Renee Cortez, Seattle Mariners
Matthew Craig, Chicago Cubs
Jason Diangelo, Colorado Rockies
Jose Espinal, Chicago White Sox
Willy Espinal, Texas Rangers (released)
Omar Falcon, Seattle Mariners
Alexander Francisco, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim (released)
Paul Frisella, St. Louis Cardinals
Jesus Guzman, Seattle Mariners
Justin Hatcher, Texas Rangers
Clay Hensley, San Diego Padres (released)
Javier Herrera, Oakland Athletics
William Hogan, Seattle Mariners
Kervin Jacobo, San Diego Padres
Ryan Leahy, Los Angels Angels of Anaheim
Baltazar Lopez, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
Robert Machado, Texas Rangers (released)
Jesus Medrano, Chicago Cubs (released)
Jacobo Meque, San Diego Padres (released)
Damian Moss, Seattle Mariners
Luis Perez, Oakland Athletics
Kevin Reinking, Chicago Cubs (released)
Christopher Russ, Texas Rangers (released)
Mayobanex Santana, Oakland Athletics (released)
Nathan Sevier, San Diego Padres
Darwin Soto, Seattle Mariners (released)
Carlos Vasquez, Chicago Cubs
Neil Wilson, Colorado Rockies

* 60 days, third offense.

And 4 MLB parks set Opening Day attendance records. Obv this issue is a potentially lethal crisis like the media says...

"Sources tell me that another list for teams that train in Florida will be forthcoming this week with between 60 and 80 names. Again, the substances were not released to the public, although one source let me know that the teams are told the substance that triggered the positive, meaning that while it is not publicly reported, it will likely be difficult to keep confidential. The positive rate surprises me, but we don't have the substances, which makes it difficult to assess if substances that were recently added to the list or have long half-lives were the problem. Also, among the tests were one that was done in the off-season and one that was a third offense, resulting in a 60-day penalty."

He also says Sanchez' "tainted supp" defense will not hold up, as he tested positive for a Schedule III steroid (ie, unambiguous stuff).

The Beam in Your Eye
If steroids are cheating, why isn't LASIK?

i guess it's related to the tommy john surgery thing, where players often come back stronger than before, except with the eye surgery, it's not exclusive to people with an injury or ailment. it seems like medical performance enhancement is ok if it's "surgery," but not if it's medication...
another interesting point is the topic of vision enhancing contact lenses. (mcgwire had custom lenses that let him see 20/10)

i wonder how much of the controversy is just based on an ideal of a baseball player not needing to be a top physical specimen - people don't like when meatheads bulk up and break the records of the 'old guys that did it the right way.' it seems like the increase in home runs are the bigger deal - eye enhancements aren't perceived as something to help you hit the ball further, so nobody complains about them... which is kinda ridiculous anyway, in light of the assertion that pitchers juiced as much as hitters.

anyway, this is kind of a tangled post, but the more i learn about it, the less patience i have for people jumping all over the steroid issue.

Of course, the key word being bandied about re: steroids isn't "medication"; it's "DRUGS".

[Dirty Sanchez xpost]

Was Lou Piniella trying to say something w/ Sanchez batting 3rd for a week? & was that thing he was saying something like, "Me stupid"?

the health point is addressed a little bit in the article, talking about hgh being approved for use by children who are too short. of course, a lot of the 'roids are seeming to really mess some people up, but there is the question of what happens as the chemists get better, and side effects are reduced. i mean, if there is minimal health risk, does that make it ok?

[xpost - i'm too longwinded]

isn't creatine not harmful like anabolic steroids?

The people (for instance, me, Alex, Blount) who have voiced a health objection aren't the people asking for records to be wiped.

Creatine was made illegal last year by Congress last year, so I assume there are some kind of side-effects down the line.

(anyone see the NYTimes article about how Orrin Hatch fought tooth and nail to exempt DHEA, which his son just happens to lobby for and whose manufacturer has a major presence in Utah?)

i'm not casting aspersions on anyone here and don't subscribe to the wipe the records clean approach...i happen to think if the technology is available, use it. i mean obviously, the downside of steroids are well-documented and they should be banned, but is there enough of a sample set to judge and has enough time elapsed wrt other performance-enhancing technologies that they really ought to be definitively ruled out?

i don't know...just throwing that out there.

Anyway, I meant to link this (free) Prospectus article by Nate Silver 3 weeks ago:

http://baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=3881

"...We DO have some evidence on this issue, and the evidence does not support the prevailing opinion...

*The Big Hairy Mess Theory. While performance-altering substances do exist, there is not a fine line between improved nutrition, legal supplements, their quasi-legal variants, and explicitly illegal steroids. Moreover, the benefits of these substances is not universally positive, but will vary substantially based on the particular substances that a player takes, his training habits, and his underlying physiology. In some cases, the impact might trigger a tipping point and be substantially positive, but in many others it will be marginal, and in other cases still, like that of Jeremy Giambi, it might be deleterious. While 'steroids' might be responsible for some of the global gain in offensive levels, their impact on the competitive ecology of the game is ambiguous, and not readily distinguishable from the more routine sorts of discrepancies that have been present from the first days of the game, like differences in equipment or coaching.

It is my belief that the latter theory is closest to the mark..."

Of course. Is anybody here saying that they shouldn't be banned? The disagreement is to what degree steroids can affect performance.

Milo -- fair enough, then you could have just said so and not directly criticized the BP article that Morbs cited.

there's no disagreement here as no one on ilb has said steroids affect performance! man we do this everytime, it's tedious.

"wes helms didn't play well tonight, not that i want to name names."

huh.

Or, as one of the BP guys said (quoted earlier in the thread), steroids might make the difference between a few warning-track flyouts and home-runs over a player's season. You have to be able to regularly hit them to the warning track for that to matter.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/baseball/bal-roids0422,1,1187727.story?coll=bal-sports-baseball

and idle speculation (bob ryan has written a column making not so veiled suggestions that nomahhh is the latest victime of 'roid decline).

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A13894-2005Apr24.html

will saletan on the nfl hearings and the cluelessness of congress...

http://slate.msn.com/id/2117568/

http://www.mesomorphosis.com/articles/carroll/radio-silence.htm

"The screeching voices of talk radio were left silent, the witches not worth the wood to burn them. Instead of changing the story’s plotline or changing their now-challenged opinion of how ‘their game’ had ‘lost its integrity’ due to these ‘juiced-up sluggers,’ they merely ignored the evidence and looked for other witches.

On the night the first suspension was announced, while most of America was trying to watch baseball’s best rivalry, Joe Morgan, lead analyst for ESPN’s national telecasts and the author of the oh-so-appropriately titled 'Baseball for Dummies', was pointing out that baseball was not releasing the type of substance that resulted in the positive test. Morgan ignored the fact that he couldn’t tell Winstrol from Winn-Dixie and once again railed against common sense, personal privacy, and anything else that didn’t fit the approved storyline of 'steroids is bad.'

...As fans watched the Red Sox and Yankees play in high definition, as they saw more home runs in the first week of 2005 than they had in years previous, and as they bought more jerseys, hats, and tickets than they had in history, it was hard to say that the offseason cloud of steroids, the so-called 'weak policy' that came in an historic agreement between the owners and players, and positive tests had hurt the game. It barely seemed to hurt Alex Sanchez or any of the minor league players that came up positive under an admittedly confusing minor league testing program...

If the fans don’t care, why do journalists, talk radio hosts, and TV personalities? The steroid controversy has never been about the health of players, the integrity of the game, or even saving our children from the dark cloud of illegal substances. It’s been about telling a story they controlled. They just didn’t get the casting right this time."

i mean...seriously.

"Put me on the record as saying that's ridiculous--I mean, until they come up with a list of banned substances. They still don't know what you can buy over the counter and what you can't buy."
--Dodgers catcher Jason Phillips

On top of that, it's unnecessary (we're up to what, five major-leaguers who tested positive? do we need to up the punishment on them?) and doesn't address the real problem with all American professional-sports testing, which is that they're not thorough enough and in baseball's case ill-defined.

Another criticism (and I'm surprised that people aren't making a bigger deal of it): Bud wants amphetamines on the banned list. Essentially, he's outed baseball's not-so-carefully-kept amphetamine secrets. What will the old-timers have to say about *that* when questioned about "the way things were in their day"?

Full denial? That is, if the media even dares to broach the topic and pierce the hallowed aura of Willie, Hank, Schmidt, etc.

Vic Conte is to plead guilty to Steroid distribution/trafficking

Barry Bonds changed his opinion to doubtful for his return this season.

OMG I JUST AGREED WITH JOHN ON SOMETHING

Everybody in MLB could confess to using steroids tomorrow and there would still be people saying "I'm glad Bonds is gone -- let's play ball".

Heredia became the 11th major league player suspended for steroids. The announcement came Tuesday.

Traded from the Yankees to the Mets during the offseason, Heredia appeared in only three games before going on the disabled list in April with a strained left thumb. Doctors then found an aneurysm in his left shoulder after he began having circulation problems and he missed the rest of the season following surgery.

Heredia is 28-19 with six saves in 511 career games -- all but two in relief.

[ADMIN: Thread continues here: http://ilx.wh3rd.net/thread.php?msgid=6219556 ]