Schilling weighs in
Curt Schilling has recently posted at length about the Mitchell Report and drug use in baseball; it’s a good read. My honest not-being-an-asshole-for-five-minutes take on the subject is that the Mitchell Report did have one major positive effect: it made it clear that use of performance-enhancing drugs (that’s it, fuck it; I’m saying "steroids" from here on, and you can just intuit that I mean all performance-enhancing drugs) is not a black-and-white issue as it has been portrayed in the past. Sure, there are the black-and-white players – the Jose Cansecos whose entire careers were fueled by steroids, and the people on the other side who were too principled or maybe just too scared ever to consider drug use as a means of improvement. But in between those obvious, clear-cut cases are players – a whole lot of players – who, as Schilling says, made a mistake.
There’s little question in the minds of fans these days that Canseco is a worm. He never would have been a viable major-leaguer without the steroids, and after his drug-fuelled success ran out, he turned around and ratted out all the friends and associates who were also involved. There’s not a lot of love these days for Barry Bonds, largely because he’s spent so many years being a complete penis to everyone around him, and now, hey, the joke’s on him. Public opinion is turning against Roger Clemens, too, since I think people resent his years of smarmy "I’m only great because I work hard; everybody else is just lazy" bullshit. But what about Brian Roberts, who took one shot of steroids years ago and then decided it was wrong? What about Andy Pettitte, who used HGH once to recover from an injury? Both men have admitted their crimes. Both have apologised. There is no evidence that either is still using, and no reason to believe that either was a serious enough user that it’s had major effects on his career. Clearly both men are guilty, but I don’t think very many people would support the idea of a ban from the game and/or the Hall for either of them.
Maybe I’m just too optimistic, but I would like to think that most of the steroid-users in baseball are more like Roberts and Pettitte: they’re people who succumbed to pressure and made a bad decision, then realised it was a bad decision and stopped. Hell, any middle-schooler in the country can tell you about the power of peer pressure – if "everybody’s doing something," it can be very difficult to resist. Baseball needs a comprehensive drug policy, independent testing, and a fair and consistent way of handling players who are found guilty. But more than that, it needs not to become so bloodthirsty that the Robertses and Cansecos of the world are regarded as one-and-the-same.
Oh, and, Roger Clemens? Quit your bitching. Your detractors convicted you in the "court of public opinion" you appear to be so afraid of years and years ago. According to one Clemens-hater I spoke to (holy shit, this guy does research for his sweary baseball posts? What a fucking loon), you were pretty much proven guilty when you threw that bat at Mike Piazza all those years ago. Remember that? Roid rage, my man.
