So a few more names dropped off the 100-plus PED user list from around 2003. We already knew about Manny Ramirez... and David 'Big Papi' Ortiz showed up too. Predictably, people are once again quaking in their wingtips, and even saying that the Boston Red Sox need to give back their '04 & '07 rings.
Fans who follow the game closely, or claim they do, are less and less concerned about the whole issue. The ones most outraged about Ortiz and Ramirez are people who hate the Red Sox. They always thought that it was strange that the Yankees appeared to be getting picked on and witch-hunted.
Proof that fans only care when it's a team other than them.
Now it's flipped 180 degrees. And it's hard to believe that this isn't some kind of plan. Why these two names; why this team and none other? Does anyone really think this is an accident? And while we're asking questions: where are all the West Coast teams on this list? I suppose only northeastern baseball players use performance-enhancers.
One day, major professional sports are going to allow human growth hormones/PEDs. They're already coming into everyday society, like it or not. Doctors will figure a way to keep us healthier and living longer, and they will naturally trickle into sports.
Hearing this destroys the serious baseball fan, heretoforementioned as the Purist. The Purist is an endangered species; more than that, he's obsolete. Especially the ones who happen to be part of the media.
The fans just want to be entertained, no matter what, Purist says with curled lip. (As if this is a bad thing.) This was proven the day after Ortiz's name appeared in the sports section at the end of July, when Big Papi hit a homer. The crowd stood nearly unanimously and cheered.
The Purist treats the game of baseball as his blankie. He's going down fighting. He takes it personally when players use. Noted baseball fan George Will said of Barry Bonds in 2006, "Most people who care about baseball wish that Bonds had never played and hope he never does again." Here's hoping Will lives long enough to see Spider-Man's head on the bases, the outfield grass cut in a webbing lattice, and the Green Goblin throwing out the first pitch.
As late as December '07, baseball egghead Tim Kurkjian said of NY Yankee Andy Pettite: "A guy who used HGH a couple of times [is different from] using anabolic steroids. HGH helps in recovery. It doesn't make you bigger and stronger technically so I would be really surprised if a suspension followed this..."
The egghead may be overcooked. Just read that statement, and feel the Need To Believe in the game floating within. (And remember that Pettite, like every other user to date, lied repeatedly, inexorably leaking the truth as he was smacked with evidence.) Will and Kurkjian sound like little boys who got that blankie snatched. Is HGH/PED using cheating, or isn't it? Does it depend on who the appointed grandmasters of baseball personally like? Who decides any of this? You do.
But while we're in this moment, smelling the dying roses of summer, I am looking ahead to modern players' Hall of Fame considerations. The obvious issue of legacy is waiting for them, and for us. Will we still have the scent of Pete Rose hanging around?
There's a direct line from Pete Rose's lifetime suspension for betting on baseball (while still a dugout manager), straight to PED users. Even casual fans know that the lifeblood of baseball is streaked with things that don't line up with its All-American, noble athlete, mom n' apple pie image.
Spitballs and illegally-cut baseballs. Upper pills back in the 1970s. Corked bats. Sign-stealing. The issue of wholesale segregation up until the mid-20th century.
I'm sure I've left a few items off that list. And cheating won't ever be washed out of baseball, no matter how many tests players take. No matter how red-faced the old-timers get about modern hardball. Baseball is only noble on the outside--in the minds of nostalgics. It's like a weird, slightly-too-ripe fruit that'll crumble with a good whack of the bat. Hmm, kinda reads like I'm describing most people's idea of America. Or of humanity.
The major difference is that Pete Rose's mistakes came as a manager. The integrity was missing, but he didn't change stats or outcomes. PED users (and the other cheaters mentioned above) have done it as players.
The irony is, if not for Charlie Hustle's arrogance toward his questioners and accusers... if, to get in his head a moment, he'd just admitted guilt even if he thought it was wrong to do so... he'd be a HOFer already. We like to build people into emperors, and then we like to tear them to shreds. And we especially love it when they 'bare their souls.'
If that means anything anymore. Public apologies and visible victimhood are just more commodities. Another way to get people looking at you. And hopefully buying whatever it is you're selling.
Fans who follow the game closely, or claim they do, are less and less concerned about the whole issue. The ones most outraged about Ortiz and Ramirez are people who hate the Red Sox. They always thought that it was strange that the Yankees appeared to be getting picked on and witch-hunted.
Proof that fans only care when it's a team other than them.
Now it's flipped 180 degrees. And it's hard to believe that this isn't some kind of plan. Why these two names; why this team and none other? Does anyone really think this is an accident? And while we're asking questions: where are all the West Coast teams on this list? I suppose only northeastern baseball players use performance-enhancers.
One day, major professional sports are going to allow human growth hormones/PEDs. They're already coming into everyday society, like it or not. Doctors will figure a way to keep us healthier and living longer, and they will naturally trickle into sports.
Hearing this destroys the serious baseball fan, heretoforementioned as the Purist. The Purist is an endangered species; more than that, he's obsolete. Especially the ones who happen to be part of the media.
The fans just want to be entertained, no matter what, Purist says with curled lip. (As if this is a bad thing.) This was proven the day after Ortiz's name appeared in the sports section at the end of July, when Big Papi hit a homer. The crowd stood nearly unanimously and cheered.
The Purist treats the game of baseball as his blankie. He's going down fighting. He takes it personally when players use. Noted baseball fan George Will said of Barry Bonds in 2006, "Most people who care about baseball wish that Bonds had never played and hope he never does again." Here's hoping Will lives long enough to see Spider-Man's head on the bases, the outfield grass cut in a webbing lattice, and the Green Goblin throwing out the first pitch.
As late as December '07, baseball egghead Tim Kurkjian said of NY Yankee Andy Pettite: "A guy who used HGH a couple of times [is different from] using anabolic steroids. HGH helps in recovery. It doesn't make you bigger and stronger technically so I would be really surprised if a suspension followed this..."
The egghead may be overcooked. Just read that statement, and feel the Need To Believe in the game floating within. (And remember that Pettite, like every other user to date, lied repeatedly, inexorably leaking the truth as he was smacked with evidence.) Will and Kurkjian sound like little boys who got that blankie snatched. Is HGH/PED using cheating, or isn't it? Does it depend on who the appointed grandmasters of baseball personally like? Who decides any of this? You do.
But while we're in this moment, smelling the dying roses of summer, I am looking ahead to modern players' Hall of Fame considerations. The obvious issue of legacy is waiting for them, and for us. Will we still have the scent of Pete Rose hanging around?
There's a direct line from Pete Rose's lifetime suspension for betting on baseball (while still a dugout manager), straight to PED users. Even casual fans know that the lifeblood of baseball is streaked with things that don't line up with its All-American, noble athlete, mom n' apple pie image.
Spitballs and illegally-cut baseballs. Upper pills back in the 1970s. Corked bats. Sign-stealing. The issue of wholesale segregation up until the mid-20th century.
I'm sure I've left a few items off that list. And cheating won't ever be washed out of baseball, no matter how many tests players take. No matter how red-faced the old-timers get about modern hardball. Baseball is only noble on the outside--in the minds of nostalgics. It's like a weird, slightly-too-ripe fruit that'll crumble with a good whack of the bat. Hmm, kinda reads like I'm describing most people's idea of America. Or of humanity.
The major difference is that Pete Rose's mistakes came as a manager. The integrity was missing, but he didn't change stats or outcomes. PED users (and the other cheaters mentioned above) have done it as players.
The irony is, if not for Charlie Hustle's arrogance toward his questioners and accusers... if, to get in his head a moment, he'd just admitted guilt even if he thought it was wrong to do so... he'd be a HOFer already. We like to build people into emperors, and then we like to tear them to shreds. And we especially love it when they 'bare their souls.'
If that means anything anymore. Public apologies and visible victimhood are just more commodities. Another way to get people looking at you. And hopefully buying whatever it is you're selling.
