PopTop
08-03-2005, 04:06 PM
Really enjoyed Dierker's column about all of the steroid mess that has hit the fan this week. I highlighted a few lines below.
Larry Dierker / Houston Chronicle (http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/sports/bb/3293803)
On Monday night, in the wake of the Rafael Palmiero steroid suspension, C-SPAN ran a replay of the congressional steroid hearing. I saw it for the first time.
The players who testified were Jose Canseco, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, Rafael Palmiero and Curt Schilling.
I was surprised, to say the least, that the inquisitors continued to hammer away on the subject of major league players knowing what their teammates take and don't take. All but Canseco said that they never saw a teammate take steroids. Schilling said that he had never even seen a steroid. I believe him.
Barry Bonds and Palmiero shifted the blame to their personal trainers, stating that they didn't know what they were taking. I believe them too, but I also believe that they didn't want to be told what they were taking.
The questions seemed to suggest that players sit around drinking beer and passing the steroids around like candy. This is ludicrous.
When I was managing, the only medicines I knew about were those prescribed by the trainer.
It wouldn't have surprised me if some of the players were taking illegal substances, but I didn't expect them to show me. In fact, I would be surprised if they shared this secret with a teammate. Perhaps with best friends under a vow of secrecy, but not with the whole team. Why? Because it's illegal, and they wouldn't want anyone to know about it.
Remaining competitive
Now that we know it is still an issue, I suppose the commissioner's office and the union will have to draft a plan with stiffer penalties.
Most players would favor this because they don't want to take the drugs, and they especially don't want to have to compete against players who do.
I was talking to an old teammate, Kenny Boswell, last weekend about the issue. He said that if steroids were available when he was playing, and he knew a lot of players were taking them, he would have, too. I probably would have taken them, too. That's the most insidious part of the problem. A player who doesn't want to get juiced feels like he has to just to compete.
Easy to come by
My son was home from college on Monday. Because he does a lot of weightlifting, I asked him if he knew anything about steroids. Turns out, he knows a lot about it.
He told me he could get steroids easily on the street and that a lot of young guys take them just to make their bodies look "cut."
He told me that some are designed to add bulk and others to add strength without bulk. That could be the case with Palmiero, who does not look like a body builder. Bonds and Sosa got a lot bigger from one year to the next. McGwire got bigger over an eight- or 10-year span. When the steroid allegations were fresh six or seven years ago, I only suspected the guys who got really big. Now I wonder if I was naive.
If you can get stronger without getting bigger, you will not look like a "cheater." If this is the case, steroid use could have been prevalent.
Still, I believe that most players would rather depend on their own God-given talents. That's why many of them are speaking out. They don't want to have to do something that is illegal and could endanger their health just to make a living. Would you?
I'm still not inclined to overreact because I don't believe that this is an epidemic. But I advocate tougher testing standards and harsher penalties now.
Let milestones stand
I'm not worried about the record books. There are all kinds of things that have influenced the records already.
No serious fan will need an asterisk to tell him that the great Sosa-McGwire homer race of '98 was a debacle. Every good fan knows that Babe Ruth played a 154-game schedule, and Roger Maris had a 162 game slate. Everyone knows that for the first 20 years of the last century the baseball itself was "dead" and that very few home runs were hit for that reason. Every good fan knows that rosters were depleted during World War II and that the caliber of play declined. Thirty years from now, every good fan will know about the steroid years. The records can stand. They're only numbers on paper, anyway.
The important thing is that everyone knows that it is foolish to take steroids. It is also important that the professional athletes in our culture send that message to our children right away.
Larry Dierker / Houston Chronicle (http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/sports/bb/3293803)
On Monday night, in the wake of the Rafael Palmiero steroid suspension, C-SPAN ran a replay of the congressional steroid hearing. I saw it for the first time.
The players who testified were Jose Canseco, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, Rafael Palmiero and Curt Schilling.
I was surprised, to say the least, that the inquisitors continued to hammer away on the subject of major league players knowing what their teammates take and don't take. All but Canseco said that they never saw a teammate take steroids. Schilling said that he had never even seen a steroid. I believe him.
Barry Bonds and Palmiero shifted the blame to their personal trainers, stating that they didn't know what they were taking. I believe them too, but I also believe that they didn't want to be told what they were taking.
The questions seemed to suggest that players sit around drinking beer and passing the steroids around like candy. This is ludicrous.
When I was managing, the only medicines I knew about were those prescribed by the trainer.
It wouldn't have surprised me if some of the players were taking illegal substances, but I didn't expect them to show me. In fact, I would be surprised if they shared this secret with a teammate. Perhaps with best friends under a vow of secrecy, but not with the whole team. Why? Because it's illegal, and they wouldn't want anyone to know about it.
Remaining competitive
Now that we know it is still an issue, I suppose the commissioner's office and the union will have to draft a plan with stiffer penalties.
Most players would favor this because they don't want to take the drugs, and they especially don't want to have to compete against players who do.
I was talking to an old teammate, Kenny Boswell, last weekend about the issue. He said that if steroids were available when he was playing, and he knew a lot of players were taking them, he would have, too. I probably would have taken them, too. That's the most insidious part of the problem. A player who doesn't want to get juiced feels like he has to just to compete.
Easy to come by
My son was home from college on Monday. Because he does a lot of weightlifting, I asked him if he knew anything about steroids. Turns out, he knows a lot about it.
He told me he could get steroids easily on the street and that a lot of young guys take them just to make their bodies look "cut."
He told me that some are designed to add bulk and others to add strength without bulk. That could be the case with Palmiero, who does not look like a body builder. Bonds and Sosa got a lot bigger from one year to the next. McGwire got bigger over an eight- or 10-year span. When the steroid allegations were fresh six or seven years ago, I only suspected the guys who got really big. Now I wonder if I was naive.
If you can get stronger without getting bigger, you will not look like a "cheater." If this is the case, steroid use could have been prevalent.
Still, I believe that most players would rather depend on their own God-given talents. That's why many of them are speaking out. They don't want to have to do something that is illegal and could endanger their health just to make a living. Would you?
I'm still not inclined to overreact because I don't believe that this is an epidemic. But I advocate tougher testing standards and harsher penalties now.
Let milestones stand
I'm not worried about the record books. There are all kinds of things that have influenced the records already.
No serious fan will need an asterisk to tell him that the great Sosa-McGwire homer race of '98 was a debacle. Every good fan knows that Babe Ruth played a 154-game schedule, and Roger Maris had a 162 game slate. Everyone knows that for the first 20 years of the last century the baseball itself was "dead" and that very few home runs were hit for that reason. Every good fan knows that rosters were depleted during World War II and that the caliber of play declined. Thirty years from now, every good fan will know about the steroid years. The records can stand. They're only numbers on paper, anyway.
The important thing is that everyone knows that it is foolish to take steroids. It is also important that the professional athletes in our culture send that message to our children right away.