Steroid probe may make for longest season - (to tell or not to tell, before Congress?)

JEWISH WORLD REVIEW.COM ^ | MARCH 15, 2005 | MICHAEL GOODWIN

[freeholland]

The congressional hearings on steroids have the potential to be one of the most important events in baseball's long history. More important than any lockout or union strike. More important than the 1980s' epidemic of cokehead players. You might have to go all the way back to the Black Sox scandal to find an event of equal meaning. The reason is simple: The use of steroids, like the fixing of the 1919 World Series, goes directly to the integrity of baseball. Any time there is doubt about the final results, about wins and losses, batting averages and home runs, every player, every game is under suspicion. That's where baseball is right now — under a huge, dark cloud.

Cleaning up this mess is not going to be pretty. Congressional hearings are blunt instruments. The truths that emerge often do so only after shameless grandstanding by politicians.

The hysterical hell-no-we-won't-go threats are a sure sign of how ugly the facts are. The revelations will be damaging, even devastating, to everybody involved. Who used steroids, who knew about it and when — all are likely to be laid bare. The cheaters and the liars will be exposed — on national television.

I say bring it on. Baseball has done everything it could to hide its dirty laundry. Even while players started bulking up like Popeye and home run balls took off like missiles, fans were told it was all because freaks like Barry Bonds and Mark McGwire had this wonderful "work ethic." Bull poop.

[freeholland]

Also recommend "Committee on Steroids" by George Will in today's JWR.

http://jewishworldreview.com/cols/will031505.asp

"The one witness eager to testify is Canseco, who is flogging a book in which he accuses many players of using steroids. Jeff Merron of ESPN.com read the book — has Canseco done that? — and found: Canseco says that during spring training 2001, when playing for the Angels against the Mariners and their second baseman Bret Boone, "I hit a double, and when I got out there to second base I got a good look at Boone. I couldn't believe my eyes. He was enormous. 'Oh my God,' I said to him. 'What have you been doing?' 'Shhh,' he said. 'Don't tell anybody.' "But in five Angels-Mariners games that spring, Canseco never reached second base."

[taxesareforever]

The players should continue to tell Congress to get lost. Actually, they should tell them that they have more important work to do and to quit with the publicity stunts.