In case you haven't heard the news burning up the airwaves and the net, Mark McGwire has finally admitted to using steroids and HGH. The main reason I believe he is doing this now is to avoid a media frenzy as he reenters baseball as the St. Louis Cardinals hitting instructor. A sort of "get this outta the way now" thing. The main question I have is, if he was afraid of indictment if he confessed this to Congress in 2005, what is different now? Is there a statute of limitations on this I don't about? As for the Hall of Fame, I don't think this admission means much. He probably went from a 5% share of the vote to maybe 25%, way short of what he needs to ever get in. Looks like the last two shoes to fall will be Sosa and Bonds but I'm not holding my breath. So what do you guys think about all this?
2 comments:
I'm not going to advocate that players take steroids or HGH but players do all sorts of things to enhance their performance. They lift weights, they drink raw egg milkshakes (well, Rocky Balboa did), they wear the same underwear while on a hitting streak. Why is the line drawn at steroids? Is it because they are dangerous (are they?), is it because they work (do they?), is it because not all players have equal access (why not?, they are all rich). Is it because steroids make athletes not look like normal human beings? Does Randy Johnson take steroids? Does he look like a normal human being?
I guess I'm not happy about the whole thing because taking steroids has long been considered cheating and I really dislike people who cheat, especially talented people. The only way I could hit a baseball out of a major league ball park would be to cheat somehow. A guy like McGwire has a God given talent for hitting baseballs out of ballparks. So why does he have to cheat? OK, he says he was injured, took the stuff to help him get better, to justify his huge contract. Maybe so, but he should have quit if he couldn't perform, not cheat.
I kinda agree with Buster Olney's take on the steroid era which is, most players took something, accept that the numbers are inflated, and still recognize the players who excelled given that most of their peers were on something also. I think you should just let all of them use whatever they want or have olympic style testing.
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