I took a sickie on Tuesday and went for a nice bike ride, made some lunch, and worked on a lab report from home. I had the radio on, and Talk of the Nation wouldn't shut up about steroids in baseball.
The final conclusion seemed to be pretty simple: baseball has to clean up its act, get a testing procedure in place, they'll catch the cheaters and baseball will be clean again. (Interesting aside: Babe Ruth ate ground sheeps' testicles by the plateful; presumably the testosterone allowed him to keep his girlish figure whilst eating all those hot dogs. Maybe it also helped him hit home runs. No word on whether sheeps' testicles are considered controlled substances.)
Maybe baseball knows what its doing. But in case they don't, and they actually plan to implement a real testing program with the goal of actually catching people, here is a warning. Don't do that, baseball. It will be bad for your sport and it won't make you look any better. Baseball doesn't have a doping problem, it has an image problem. It needs a feel good, but fake, drug program that will make us all happy that America's past time is chaste and unblemished, like our own zit-free national forehead. (That was sarcasm...I'm not sure if that analogy really works.)
If baseball actually implements a program designed to "catch" "cheaters", it will find that the initial purge of dopers will leave not a clean game, but one in which the payoff of a little chemical help is suddenly higher. Some will take the bait, and some will be caught again and again.
Face it. When you pay people lots of money to do things that they can do better and get paid more for if they just do something against the rules, some will break the rules. This will be somewhat deterred by a testing program with stiff consequences. But it will not go away. If you want your drug problem to go away, you must ignore it. If you want your drug problem to get smaller, your image problem will get proportionally bigger. You decide which problem you prefer.
Face it, America. Those guys are good at baseball. But they're not THAT good. Shouldn't we really be worshiping the scientists instead?
Comments (9)
I took a sickie yesterday and most of today, but I mostly slept. You'd think having taken a flu-shot would've given me some protection. Hopefully I'll be better tomorrow.
By the way, I hope they legalize sheep testicles in MLB... but only sheep testicles.
Posted by teddy | February 12, 2009 9:11 PM
Posted on February 12, 2009 21:11
Yeah, I'll all for eatin' balls. Don't get me wrong - I don't think they should legalize drugs in any sports. I think they're dangerous and they make it unfair for people who want to play clean. The point I'm trying to make is, there's no such thing as an effective testing program that doesn't make your sport look bad. Cycling is obviously the example here.
My guess is, baseball doesn't care about its drug problem, only its image problem. Therefore, it will solve the image problem,and enact an ineffective drug program that's not really designed to catch anyone. Which is a bummer, but how could we expect them to do differently, when the public reacts with this OMG HOW EVIL HOW COULD YOU DO IT THINK OF THE CHILDREN!! when it is confronted with information that's been so obvious for years?
Posted by Katie | February 24, 2009 5:45 PM
Posted on February 24, 2009 17:45
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Posted by Sigrid Poplawski | September 15, 2010 10:03 AM
Posted on September 15, 2010 10:03
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Posted by Zachariah Cheatham | September 15, 2010 11:23 AM
Posted on September 15, 2010 11:23
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Posted by Giovanni Pushaw | September 15, 2010 11:45 AM
Posted on September 15, 2010 11:45
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Posted by Myoplex Lite | October 11, 2010 6:08 PM
Posted on October 11, 2010 18:08
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Posted by EAS Myoplex | October 11, 2010 6:23 PM
Posted on October 11, 2010 18:23
Hi, quality article. Nothing like a good protein shake! With my body, on top of eating healthy protein instead of snacking, I've discovered that the real way to get rid of them is just to get my entire body fat percentage to under 9 percent. I have generally been a follower of a Paleolithic regimen. It's much more natural and how what we're most adapted to follow. Take a look at it sometime and drop me an email with your opinions. Anyhow, cool site - I'm subscribed to your RSS feed now so I'll check in more often!
Posted by Myoplex Protein Powder | October 11, 2010 6:34 PM
Posted on October 11, 2010 18:34
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Posted by Myoplex Lite | October 20, 2010 1:38 AM
Posted on October 20, 2010 01:38