BASEBALL
	12.6.04 The Steroid Scandal It came as no surprise to me when the public found out last week that Jason Giambi had admitted to a Grand Jury to taking steroids.  It also came as no surprise to me that it was reported that Barry Bonds also admitted to taking steroids, although he claimed that he didn't realize that they were steroids at the time.  I have written an article previously about how Barry Bonds' career statistics have a suspicious spike in them. So it turns out that what many of us had assumed, that some of the more prominent power hitters in the game were using performance enhancing drugs, is true.  I don't feel vindicated by this fact, I feel saddened by it, and horrified that some of my favorite players were probably accomplishing their amazing feats through cheating (say it ain't so Mr. McGwire). But now the media is jumping up and down like big red-assed baboons pointing at a shiny object in the sky.  They want justice and they think justice can be accomplished by an asterisk, or by taking away some trophies.  This is an odd situation, though, and you just can?t erase a little bit of history in an attempt to find justice.  If, for example, Jason Giambi was stripped of his MVP award, would they give it to the second place finisher?  Are we certain that he wasn't on steroids?  What about all the pitchers that Giambi hit homers off of, are we going to adjust their ERA?  They shouldn't have their lifetime stats worsened because Giambi was cheating, should they?  But maybe they were on steroids, too. Or let's say we put an asterisk in the record books next to Barry Bonds' single season homerun record.  The asterisk will denote that while Mr. Bonds has the record, he achieved it by cheating.  Are we then supposed to disregard that season and consider McGwire's 70 homers the record?  Oh, but he was probably on steroids, so that should get an asterisk, too.  So then Sammy Sosa's 66 is the record, but he was probably on steroids, too.  It could go on forever.  And, although I doubt anyone will come close to hitting 73 homeruns in a season for the rest of my lifetime (especially since they've really started to crack down on steroids), baseball just can't ignore that it happened.  An asterisk accomplishes nothing. Another aspect in all of this is the inherent hypocrisy.  Cheating happens in baseball all the time.  Players get caught cheating in baseball all the time, but no one suggests the same drastic measures as have been suggested about Giambi and Bonds.  Gaylord Perry won 314 games, two Cy Young awards, played in five all star games, and was inducted into the Hall of Fame.  Perry was accused of cheating many times throughout his career and was even caught a couple of times.   After he retired he flaunted how he had cheated throughout his career by showing interviewers his methods for putting a foreign substance on the ball.  No one has ever suggested that we take away Perry's Cy Young awards or boot him out of the Hall of Fame.  Perry's cheating is viewed as charming, a nod to old school baseball where a guy with inferior talent scrapes and claws and because of his desire (and a little Vaseline - wink, wink) he is able to compete with the big boys.  Meanwhile, Giambi and Bonds are viewed as villains with needles taking the shortcut to greatness. I don?t like Giambi and Bonds.  I have no respect for either one of them anymore.  At this point, though, I don't think that Major League Baseball can punish or censure them in any way.  I think they should be tested performance enhancing drugs, as should every major leaguer, and I think they should be scrutinized, but MLB's policy has always been that if you didn't get caught doing it, it isn't cheating.  They will be hard pressed to change that stance now.
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