Black Sox Scandal II

A few weeks ago, after his (well-paid), disastrous finale against the Indians, The Rocket trudged off the mound and virtually all of us knew he was destined for the Hall of Fame. Now, look at this brilliant assessment from Boswell at Wash Post link

An excerpt:
"Now, Roger Clemens joins Barry Bonds in baseball's version of hell. It's a slow burn that lasts a lifetime, then, after death, lingers as long as the game is played and tongues can wag. In baseball, a man's triumphs and his sins are immortal. The pursuit of one often leads to the other. And those misdeeds are seldom as dark as their endless punishment.

Shoeless Joe Jackson, an illiterate outfielder who hit like a demon in the 1919 World Series, but neglected to blow the whistle on his crooked teammates, died with his good name as black as their Sox. Pete Rose, who bet on his team, but never against it, finally confessed. It could be good for his soul, and buys him dinner at my house any night, but may never get him into Cooperstown. Now, they have company: two giants of our time, just as humbled, though no less tarnished."

Guilty Until Proven Innocent?

OK, OK, this IS a Marlins blog, but it's the off-season and BB is the biggest story in baseball (now that the Yankees have doomed their future for a decade with A-Rod). Some more thoughts:

French sez: His story seems weird to me. Can Bonds really be so arrogant and stupid that, even after meeting with lawyers before his grand jury testimony, he goes in there and lies in a way that they can prove? The guy's got a lot to lose--forget about the baseball, he's a very wealthy man.

If Anderson didn't talk, how are they going to prove that Bonds lied when he said Anderson didn't inject him? If Anderson didn't talk, then the prosecutors seemingly behaved in a pretty sleazy, if not outright unethical way, by telling the judge that his cooperation was essential to the prosecution, and leaving him in prison for a year, and then proceeding to indict without Anderson's testimony.

This could be a federal prosecutor (the replacement for the one the Bushies fired) clearing his desk of a mess he inherited, and saying we ain't gonna waste any more time or resources on this, lets just go with the evidence that was not formerly thought to be sufficient to indict. It could also be the beginning of a whole bunch of indictments, stemming from that pitcher in Arizona (Grimsley?) the clubhouse attendant of the Mets, and whatever else they've been working on. We just don't know.

None of this has anything to do with baseball, of course, except that the reason baseball is the National Pastime is the way in so frequently intersects other aspects of our national life.

Dorsch sez: And why did they wait for four years after his testimony to accuse him of perjury?

French sez: The juxtaposition of Selig talking about a banner year, and ARod getting his gigantic new deal at the same time that others are writing about how this is about to be a terrible scandal and going to permanently damage baseball is kind of interesting. Steroids are bad for people who take them, and have devalued some major records in the sport. We certainly look at players and their achievements differently than we did before ... But it seems like you'd have to say they've been good for the business! Like I said, weird.

Look at the Indictment

The whole BB indictment is online now at sfgate.com and probably other places. Balco was collecting "biological specimens" from players for testing and feds have those specimens (labeled BB), which by DNA can be tied to Bonds. One test is for Nov. 2000. Others for early 2001. The indictment is for lying, not for taking drugs. Bonds first testified "not that I know of," but then emphatically denied he had taken during his run up to the single-season record mark. This "cream" and flax seed oil were later, he said. He testified that the trainer never gave him a shot. (There could be people who saw him getting a shot.) And if Greg Anderson has flipped or will flip .... Black Sox were found innocent at trial, but ML Commissioner still banned them for life.

French sez: On the subject of PEDs: There is abundant rigorous proof that anabolic steroids increase muscle mass and strength. There is also lots of proof that baseball players have used steroids illegally. However, there seems to be little or no medical evidence that HGH increases strength. Not only that, it would be very difficult to do the medical research that would establish whether HGH could actually benefit baseball players--what medical ethics review group would approve a study on healthy young people taking a hormone with such severe long term side-effects?

Why is MLB spending $500 K to develop a test for HGH? Why don't they spend the money instead telling people that: 1. Unlike steroids, there is no proof that it will increase your strength, and 2. The side effects are really really awful?