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February 10, 2009

HgHirp

If I was going under the knife, and there was a pill that the doctor could take to make him better at his job, wouldn’t I want him to take it?

If the Kyd’s teacher could inject something we give to cancer patients, and he’d be a better teacher for it, wouldn’t I want him to take it?

We’re okay when a baseball player shreds his shoulder, heads down to Alabama and has a tendon from his knee placed in his shoulder, and comes back throwing harder. That’s some how natural, and okay. But drugs make for an uneven playing field. That makes sense.

Our government is spending millions of dollars to prosecute Barry Bonds, and is going to do the same to Roger Clemens, because these guys lied about using banned substance. Yet when a US Senator has to with drawl from a cabinet post because he forgot to pay some taxes, we give him a pass. Oh, and we’re in a bit of a recession right now, maybe spending millions of dollars to catch a drug user in a lie.

What’s the deal with these steroid stories coming to light just in time to maximize the black eye it gives baseball? I read a great book, by Mike Lupica, in 1999. He documented how a great home run chase between Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa helped to save baseball after the work stoppage in the mid ‘90s. He’s supposed to be a reporter, yet he never thought to dig around, even though we all knew Mac was taking Andro that year? Now I read his columns where he’s bashing Alex Rodriguez and all other steroid users, now he’s taking the high road. The accomplishments we’ve seen in the past 15 years or so are tainted, and were obtained under false pretense, but what about the checks he cashes from benefiting from both sides of this story?

In 2003 baseball ran conducted some random drug testing, with the agreed upon plan that if more than 5% tested positive, baseball would implement baseball drug testing. It was all supposed to be confidential, and by all accounts, the results were kept separate from anything that could identify who they belong to. Allegedly, 104 tested positive, and only one name has been released. This should outrage us more than anything. With Bonds, we’ve seen leaked grand jury testimony, and now we have confidential drug tests leaked.

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