Fellas,
While I agree that the Mitchell Report has opened up this "steroids era" of baseball, I have to aruge that if MLB had it to do all over again, they would again turn away. Why?
Because STEROIDS SAVED BASEBALL!
Following the 1994 strike, baseball was at an all-time low. Attendance was down, ratings plummeted and fan appreciation/support was suffering?
What brought baseball back from the 1994 depths to the pinnacle that it is at today?
Steroids. Home Runs. Record Breakers.
Where would baseball be without the 1998 race for 61 between McGuire and Sosa? Without the Chase for Aaron? Without the small ballparks, juiced balls, juiced players, corked bats etc.? Baseball knew. They didn't care. They wanted to go to any means necessary to save the game.
Ian is correct. Fans will boo and complain, but they still fill the seats no matter who "breaks the rules". We all sit here and complain about the users and give attention to the Mitchell Report, but baseball welcomed the steroids era. While the records may be tainted, Selig believe that is a small price to pay for the resurrection of the National Pastime.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
yeah but it has to stop sometime. Just like letting kids get away with stuff at home and in school because it is easier just leads to bigger hassles for the people who finally have to discipline them, the more we let this culture of acceptable cheating go the harder it will be to go back to being honorable.
Besides, Cal Ripken Jr. brought a lot of people back to baseball and he wasn't roiding, all he needed was Chan Ho Park to groove him a fastball in an all-star game
I love that just a few months ago, we were discussing how baseball is disappearing from the national consciousness. Now, we are talking about steroids having "saved" baseball.
We are so fickle.
So, the question is:
What did steroids save baseball from?
Saying that steroids saved baseball from the 94 strike is the same principal as saying that giant flesh-eating gorillas saved us from our venomous cobra problem. Yes, the venomous cobras are gone. Now what do we do about the gigantic, flesh-eating gorillas.
All kidding aside, however:
Would people have come back without the steadily increasing HR distances and record-shattering seasons? Maybe, maybe not. Baseball is nothing if not a holdover of a bygone era. It's a slow game in a fast-paced world.
But I think the question we fail to ask when we claim that steroids saved baseball is actually this one: Were the steroids a coincious effort by players to draw in fans? Or were they an effort to improve their performance in a more limited field, specifically their numbers when contrasted with other players?
I submit that any player who was willing to needle up wasn't doing it to impress little Jimmy from down the block. He was doing it to throw faster, run harder, and jump higher than someone who was competing for what is ultimately a finite (though it doesn't always seem that way) dollar amount.
Steroids are a by-product of greed and a competitive culture run riot, and MAYBE they did indirectly bring baseball back from the brink, but ultimately, they came from a darker place than a desire to defend our nation's pastime from falling quietly into that good night. Which is why I think it's wrong to say the fans who watched it happen share some culpability. Sure, it seems obvious now, but hindsight is 20/20.
Blame the players association for protecting those who were doing wrong, blame the owners for encouraging it, blame the league for having evidence and looking the other way.
But I don't think you can say that the fans share a level of wrongdoing here.
Post a Comment