Wow ... this Big Papi article was pretty cool ...

[Hootie]

I like how he puts it all on the line:

http://espn.go.com/boston/mlb/story/...-took-steroids

[The Franchise]

Why doesn't the MLB contract out to a company to make their own supplements and require the players to take those?

['Hamas' Jenkins]

Cool just like Rafi Palmeiro, I guess. The mother****er got popped, said he never "knowingly" took steroids as a cop-out, then said he was never informed of a positive test despite the union informing everyone of their positive tests.

Amazingly, the broken-English speaking mother****er is now able to pen an essay defending himself? The guy is as full of shit as his obviously ghostwritten screed.

I'd actually be able to respect him if he hadn't gone the Clemens/Palmeiro/Armstrong route, but he's too much of a ****ing coward to do that.

[Rudy tossed tigger's salad]

Blah blah bullshit

-Ryan Braun

[WhawhaWhat]

[CoMoChief]

Who cares...its a game. If they want to cheat and juice up their bodies with all of these unnatural hormones etc and then die 20yrs after they're done playing due to heart liver or kidney failure then let them do it. We're fans. We're paying to watch entertainment. What better entertainment is there than to watch these guys crush HR's over the wall? I mean is there a second records book kept in the PGA for the era of wooden clubs compared to the space aged carbon graphite neutron sticks PGA players swing with today? MLB has a viewer problem, the downside to baseball to some people is there is too much non-activity. Well, add more HR's to the game and people will start to notice and won't care about the inactivity. In my lifetime there wasn't a better time in baseball than to watch the season HR record chase between McGwire and Sosa. They 100% most certainly deserve to be in the HOF regardless of what they were caught using or doing. Steroids don't improve hand-eye coordination either which really is about 90% of batting.

[pr_capone]

Originally Posted by CoMoChief

Who cares...its a game. If they want to cheat and juice up their bodies with all of these unnatural hormones etc and then die 20yrs after they're done playing due to heart liver or kidney failure then let them do it. We're fans. We're paying to watch entertainment. What better entertainment is there than to watch these guys crush HR's over the wall? I mean is there a second records book kept in the PGA for the era of wooden clubs compared to the space aged carbon graphite neutron sticks PGA players swing with today? MLB has a viewer problem, the downside to baseball to some people is there is too much non-activity. Well, add more HR's to the game and people will start to notice and won't care about the inactivity. In my lifetime there wasn't a better time in baseball than to watch the season HR record chase between McGwire and Sosa. They 100% most certainly deserve to be in the HOF regardless of what they were caught using or doing. Steroids don't improve hand-eye coordination either which really is about 90% of batting.

It may not improve hand-eye coordination but it can skew the numbers dramatically.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0919164815.htm

Date: September 24, 2007
Source: Tufts University
Summary: Steroid use by a Major League Baseball slugger may produce only modest increases in muscle mass and bat and ball speed but still boost home run production by 50 percent or more, according to a new study by Tufts University physicist and baseball enthusiast Roger Tobin.

BA is at the lowest it has been since 1972... and 20 points down from the steroid era. The use of steroids can increase muscle mass and bat speed allowing the hitter to take more time to identify the pitch and its trajectory which increases the likelyhood that they will make contact with the ball.

http://www.foxsports.com/mlb/story/o...ids-era-092914

The final numbers are in, and Major League Baseball's batting average hasn't been this low since Richard Nixon was in the White House, a gallon of gasoline cost 55 cents and the designated hitter was a radical proposal limited to spring training experiments.

Big league hitters batted .251 this year, down two points from last season and 20 points lower than the Steroids Era peak in 1999.

There is a VAST difference between the advancement of wooden clubs in golf to people mutilating themselves in order to enhance their performance for the sake of that paycheck or that glory.

[DJ's left nut]

Well since Hamas beat me to both the Palmiero 'indignance' rebuttal as well as the suspension of disbelief required to believe that David Ortiz ever said something like "I've won three World Series since MLB introduced comprehensive drug testing" I'll just go with this:

No, you don't deserve to be in the HOF because you're a goddamn slow-pitch softball player playing baseball for a living. No DH in the history of ever should be in the HoF. You could have a lifetime batting average of .400 with an OPS of 1.200 and I wouldn't support a ****ing DH as a HoFer.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by CoMoChief

Steroids don't improve hand-eye coordination either which really is about 90% of batting.

I had this argument with reerunian years ago, but by the time people get to the big league level, everybody has otherworldly hand-eye coordination.

90% of batting isn't about hand-eye coordination - it's about being able to get an object with significant mass (the bat) through the hitting zone in the blink of an eye and to do so with consistent timing/mechanics.

Additional strength creates the ability to move that mass faster and with more control. As such, you're able to wait just a hair longer to commit to your swing, giving you better pitch recognition. With more strength you're not straining your body as hard to swing the bat so you're able to direct the head of the bat and better maintain your swing plane. With more core strength you're able to coil all that energy from your legs into your back and when you release through impact, it's all going into the ball.

Yes, steroids make a HUGE difference in how major league hitters are able to hit the ball. They wouldn't help you or I because we don't have the threshold hand-eye coordination to succeed. But every last one of these guys do. The marginal benefits from steroid use are huge.

[MIAdragon]

Originally Posted by CoMoChief

Steroids don't improve hand-eye coordination either which really is about 90% of batting.

It does improve vision, and strength thus allowing you to recognize the pitch sooner and move the bat through the zone quicker. Now greenies on the other hand WILL improve hand eye coordination.

Is Ortiz totally "clean" probably not. That said if he did test positive it would have come out already.

[Hootie]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Well since Hamas beat me to both the Palmiero 'indignance' rebuttal as well as the suspension of disbelief required to believe that David Ortiz ever said something like "I've won three World Series since MLB introduced comprehensive drug testing" I'll just go with this:

No, you don't deserve to be in the HOF because you're a goddamn slow-pitch softball player playing baseball for a living. No DH in the history of ever should be in the HoF. You could have a lifetime batting average of .400 with an OPS of 1.200 and I wouldn't support a ****ing DH as a HoFer.

this is completely off point but ... do you think Barry Bonds is a HOFer?

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by Hootie 2.0

this is completely off point but ... do you think Barry Bonds is a HOFer?

Last week? Sure. This week? No.

Truthfully, I've never really been able to pin myself down on him. McGwire? No. Sosa? No.

Bonds? The guy was just an incredible ballplayer before he even pondered using steroids. Then again, once you start trying to draw lines at what someone did before steroids vs. after, you're getting close to trying to argue degrees of efficacy among those that used it. If one guy was a HoFer before he used, then maybe another guy didn't actually get much benefit from them while he was using and should be a HoFer. You're cutting lines exceptionally thin there.

To avoid that kind of line drawing, you essentially have to see steroid use in terms of a binary rule - either no penalty or a death penalty. At that point I have to get to either A) I don't care if you used them - in which case McGwire and Sosa are in or B) If you used them at all, you're out - in which case Bonds is out. As are Clemens and A-Rod, who'd have both been HoF players even without steroids.

So I'm either left with a HoF that has Palmiero and McGwire or I have one that doesn't include Bonds, A-Rod and Clemens. Frankly, I'm a small hall guy anyway so in the end, I'd say keep all of them out.

But like I said, I really see both sides of this one. I even understand the people that make the 'if you were a HoFer before 'roids' argument - I just think it's too speculative and logically inconsistent.

[Mr. Laz]

Originally Posted by CoMoChief

Who cares...its a game. If they want to cheat and juice up their bodies with all of these unnatural hormones etc and then die 20yrs after they're done playing due to heart liver or kidney failure then let them do it. We're fans. We're paying to watch entertainment. What better entertainment is there than to watch these guys crush HR's over the wall? I mean is there a second records book kept in the PGA for the era of wooden clubs compared to the space aged carbon graphite neutron sticks PGA players swing with today? MLB has a viewer problem, the downside to baseball to some people is there is too much non-activity. Well, add more HR's to the game and people will start to notice and won't care about the inactivity. In my lifetime there wasn't a better time in baseball than to watch the season HR record chase between McGwire and Sosa. They 100% most certainly deserve to be in the HOF regardless of what they were caught using or doing. Steroids don't improve hand-eye coordination either which really is about 90% of batting.

Como is wrong


deja vu?

[Hootie]

Barry Bonds is the best baseball player I've ever seen and #2 isn't even close.

[WhawhaWhat]

Did David Ortiz admit to more than he realized with his Players’ Tribune editorial?

Here’s something fun to think about: David Ortiz Players’ Tribune editorial in which he said that “nobody in MLB history has been tested for PEDs more than me” may be an admission of more than Ortiz realizes.

Under the Joint Drug Agreement, all players are, at the outset anyway, tested twice a year. According to Section 3(A) of the JDA, your urine is tested (a) once in spring training; and (b) once randomly during the regular season.

In addition to those mandatory drug tests for all players, there are additional random ones set forth in section 3(A)(2). Specifically, (a) 3,200 urine specimen collections of randomly-selected players at unannounced times in-season; and (b) 350 urine specimen collections at unannounced times during each off-season.

So, what that means is 2-3 and, if you’re unlucky, four drug tests a year. Plus the new HGH blood tests, which happen once a year for all players, in spring training.

Unless, that is, you have tested positive for something in the past. In that case, section 3(D) comes into play, and that involves up to six additional unannounced urine tests during the season and three additional blood tests:

A Player who is disciplined under Sections 7.A, 7.B, 7.C, 7.E, 7.F or 7.G, or has otherwise violated the Program through the use or possession of a Performance Enhancing Substance, Stimulant or DHEA, shall be subject to the following mandatory follow-up testing program, administered by the IPA . . .

People inside the game refer to those players who have the stepped-up, post-discipline testing as being “in the program.” Just yesterday the Daily News referred to this in the case of Alex Rodriguez, who is now subject to stepped-up testing.

So let’s go back to David Ortiz. He claims he’s been tested 80 times in the decade or so there has been drug testing. That’s an awful lot of testing, especially when you consider that the blood testing just started last year. And that, until last year, the number of in-season random tests was less than half of what it is now. Given that a player not “in the program” gets, at most, four tests a year and more likely 2-3 (less before last year), what possible basis could there be for Ortiz to be tested as often as he claims he has been other than a previous positive test?

“But wait!” I hear you claiming, “He’s all but admitted that he is on the list of players who tested positive in the 2003 survey testing, so this isn’t news.” True, but no players were put in “the program” as a result of the 2003 survey tests. Indeed, the very existence of the 2003 survey testing was premised on their being no discipline for anyone at all. That’s why it was called survey testing. And, at any rate, the rules for stepped-up testing weren’t even written yet by then. No, to be “in the program,” Ortiz would have had to have another positive drug test, after the survey testing began.

“But wait!” I hear you saying, “Ortiz has never been suspended!” Also true. He has not been. But, until very recently, players were not suspended for first offenses for amphetamines. They were put into mandatory drug counseling, not suspended. And their names were not released to the public. They were, however, subjected to “the program” and its stepped-up testing. It says so right there in Section 3(D).

So, we’re left with two explanations. Either Ortiz is grossly exaggerating how often he has been tested — possibly by a factor three or four — or Ortiz is telling the truth, he has been tested as often as he claims and the reason for it is that he is or has been “in the program” for previous drug offenders and we just didn’t know about it.

If neither of those is the case, well, David Ortiz should call his union rep immediately and file a grievance rather than spending his time writing editorials about how ho-hum all of this stepped-up drug testing he has been subjected to really is.