Saturday, April 30, 2016

Just When You Thought the Game Was Getting Clean


Just when you thought Major League Baseball was finally starting to get ahead of this whole steroids and performance enhancing drugs thing you find two players getting suspended at the Major League level for 80 games each. In recent weeks the Toronto Blue Jays first baseman Chris Colabello was suspended for 80 games while vehemently denying any use and any allegations while the Miami Marlins second baseman Dee Gordon was also popped on a failed drug test this week. This game is not getting any cleaner the drugs are just getting harder to detect and the players are getting sneakier which could complicate things when the two sides go sit down at the table to talk about the subject and a new collective bargaining agreement this winter.

It’s not just the Major Leagues that are struggling with PED use and suspensions but it’s minor league baseball as well. You can go on Baseball America once a month and see the list of two or three, sometimes even four or five, players that got suspended that month for PED use. You know why? In the minor leagues it’s almost worth the risk to do it at least once. I’m not condoning the use of steroids nor am I making it out to be okay that they are using it but some players you have to remember are international free agents. They left everything they had and everything they knew to come here on the off chance they may make it to the show and they have very little to lose and the world to gain by using and not getting caught. The Major League players should know better especially MLB players like Dee Gordon who just signed a monster contract extension with his club.

Truth be told the game may never be clean because the world will never be free of dirty people looking to cheat the system and exploit anything and everything with every opportunity that they can. We are living in a world where people will cheat and exploit something as simple as a video game or a math test. We are living in a world where lawyers can be vilified but at the same time they can rise to fame and stardom, remember Johnny Cochran? We are living in a world where if you’re not cheating you’re not trying and if you’re not trying you’re not feeding your kids as well as the next guy. I may be over simplifying this thing but I am only doing so to prove a point and that point is this. The game will never be clean. Every time we think it’s clean we read about someone getting popped for drugs and steroids. We just have to deal with it.


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Sorry for the Capatcha... Blame the Russians :)