Baseball & Steroids

Palm Sunday

I just watched the replay of Thursdays hearings on C-SPAN before the House Government Reform Committee. They have begun to have the desired effect with the players and the owners agreeing to drop the punitive option of a token fine, so that all players found to be using steroids will be suspended. This was an action promised during the course of testimony, so this is not really a significant development. What remains to be seen is whether the current progressive scheme for punishment will be made more strict, which was the real concern of the committee.

The only other conclusions I draw from the hearings is that 1.) players who excelled from the late 1980s through the early 2000s will porbably only be considered to be the best of their era (the "steroids" era) and not the best of all time, and 2.) it is nearly certain that Mark McGwire will not be elected to the Hall of Fame on the first ballot.