Is 600 Really All That Tainted?
Seriously?
I would expect this from maybe a Boston newspaper but the Daily News? I’m a little shocked they went this far. Normally the New York Daily News is known for being very “pro-Yankee,” at least in my view, but they printed this on their back page on Wednesday, the day Alex Rodriguez crushed his 600th career home run.
A New York newspaper, instead of looking past all of the steroid drama, took down one its own players. I thought we had gotten past all this nonsense, but apparently not.
Up until this point, I haven’t been particularly vocal about my stance on steroids and performance enhancing drugs in the sport of baseball. Since the Daily News fired this little salvo and reopened Pandora’s Box, I figured this would be the perfect opportunity for me to offer my opinion on the use of PEDs/steroids in baseball.
First of all, I in NO WAY condone the use of any kind of illegal drug or steroid. In my life I have never tried drugs and I don’t plan on ever using drugs. I took a health class in high school and fully understand how harmful drugs and steroids can be and how they can steer a life in the wrong direction.
If you call writing a drug, it’s what I’m addicted to.
As far as steroids are concerned, I think no player/athlete should ever use them. Just like any other drug, there are consequences that come with using them, and they project adverse effects on the body. From what I have learned about them, they increase muscle mass, strength, and stamina.
That sounds great but…
Steroids also shrink private parts, cause jaundice, baldness, tumors, and heart failure.
They are like an evil super-villain, who starts off as your friend and then gradually turns on you; that’s probably the best way to describe them. They seem like they are going to help you and all of the sudden they rip your body from the inside out. Overall, it’s not a good idea to use them and there’s a good reason they are banned from basically every sport in this country.
On Dec. 13, 2007, the Mitchell Report was released, naming 89 Major League Baseball players who used steroids and/or performance enhancing drugs at least once in their careers. To first clarify how the report was formed, George Mitchell, a former U.S. Senator, conducted a 21-month investigation into the use of steroids and human growth hormones in baseball.
Among the more known players named in the Mitchell Report were Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte, Jason Giambi, and Barry Bonds.
All of these players have had outstanding careers in baseball. Clemens has won seven Cy Young Awards and Pettitte is a five-time World Champion. Giambi is a former Home Run Derby Champion and Bonds is the all-time Home Run King.
They all have done great things…and it’s all thanks to steroids, right?
I refuse to believe it.
Clemens, Pettitte, Giambi, and Bonds have all at some point in their career taken steroids–which is their own fault and their own poor decision-making. They were all exposed by Mitchell, but so were a large number of other players–players who have taken steroids and done practically nothing with their careers.
Consider former Yankee reliever Jason Grimsley. He was named in the Mitchell Report and was reported to have purchased HGH and diet pills from Kirk Radomski, a known illegal steroid distributor. According to the Mitchell Report, Grimsley used steroids from 2000-2005 and spent over $35,000 on drugs.
Now take a look at his career numbers while using steroids:
Grimsley was 42-58 in roughly 17 major league seasons. His ERA ended at 4.77 and he struck out 622 batters all-time.
Can you really compare that to Pettitte, or even Clemens for that matter?
Although Pettitte and Clemens were using steroids, their numbers were way above where Grimsley’s were. I truly feel that their numbers were better simply because they were better; they had more talent than Grimsley whether they used steroids or not.
Steroids probably help a pitcher more than a hitter in terms of strength and stamina, but going back to Rodriguez…
How much did the steroids help him? Is there a statistic that tells us how much better steroids made A-Rod? Did using them make him 50% stronger or 75% faster? Did steroids make him 25% more likely to hit a ball out of the park?
Did Rodriguez’s use of PEDs really enhance his performance?
As of this moment, there’s no way of knowing. In Rodriguez’s case, the only way to (maybe) determine if steroids really helped him is to look at his numbers when he was allegedly using them, which was 2001-2003–his three year stint with the Texas Rangers.
2001: 52 Home Runs, 135 RBIs, and a .318 batting average.
2002: 57 Home Runs, 142 RBIs, and a .300 batting average.
2003: 47 Home Runs, 118 RBIs, and a .298 batting average. (Won the MVP)
Obviously he had stellar numbers during his steroid-using years, but he had stellar numbers without steroids as well. Consider A-Rod’s numbers post-steroids.
2004: 36 Home Runs, 106 RBIs, and a .286 batting average. This year, although he was off the juice, was his first year playing in New York. I don’t credit his discontinuation of steroids for his dip in stats. I credit getting acclimated in the big city for his decline in power numbers–they went back up the following year.
2005: 48 Home Runs, 130 RBIs, and a .321 batting average. (Won the MVP)
2006: 35 Home Runs, 121 RBIs, and a .280 batting average.
2007: 54 Home Runs, 156 RBIs, and a .314 batting average (Won MVP)
2008: 35 Home Runs, 135 RBIs, and a .302 batting average.
2009: 30 Home Runs, 100 RBIs, and a .286 batting average.
Even Rodriguez’s numbers after his stoppage of using steroids have been relatively consistent. Not counting 2010, he still averaged nearly 40 homers and almost 125 RBIs per year post-steroid usage. In laymen’s terms, he was still an amazing hitter after he stopped using drugs.
In fact, he was a standout hitter before he began using steroids, too.
At 18 years old, Rodriguez made his MLB debut with the Seattle Mariners. He played 65 games in his first two seasons from 1994-95. He only hit five homers in those 65 games and knocked in a total of 21 runs. In his first full season (1996) at 20 years of age Rodriguez smacked 36 homers, drove in 123 runs, and batted a mind-blowing .358.
Bottom line: he was good before taking steroids, he was good while he took steroids, and good after he stopped taking steroids.
Now consider F.P. Santangelo, an outfielder who played for four MLB teams from 1995-2001. Santangelo was named in the Mitchell Report and he, like Grimsley, received HGH from Radomski. His career numbers:
21 Home Runs, 162 RBIs, and a .245 career batting average.
There is just no comparison. Rodriguez and Santangelo both used steroids and who had the better career? Of course the answer is A-Rod, but Santangelo used steroids, right? So he should have crushed at least 400 home runs in his six-year career, right? Steroids make every player a home run hitter, right?
Wrong. I just can’t believe it.
Along with differences in statistics, another good reason I feel steroids can’t help a hitter is hand-eye coordination. If you take the skinniest, wimpiest, most uncoordinated person on the planet and put him on the most high-powered super steroids, will he be able to hit a baseball 450 feet?
I really doubt it.
There are so many factors that go into being a great baseball player. In the baseball world, they are called “tools.” The tools are:
1) Hitting for average,
2) Hitting for power
3) Base-running skill/speed
4) Throwing ability
5) Fielding ability
Now, can steroids completely make up a five-tool player? If they can, someone please explain to me how exactly it’s possible. Coordination and mental preparation are just as important as the physical aspect of the game of baseball.
I understand that steroids can increase physical attributes of the body, but I don’t feel they can artificially construct a five-tool player. Many players like Santangelo, who were named in the Mitchell Report, possessed maybe two or three of these tools. Rodriguez, who admitted steroid use in February of 2009, has all the tools.
Players can take all the steroids they want, but it can’t give them all the tools.
There just isn’t any way to tell how much better steroids make a player. Until a statistic is released that gives a number or percentage that reveals how much better steroids make a player, I just can’t believe they do anything to boost a baseball player in terms of their regular skills.
You can compare any ballplayer who has taken steroids, and their numbers are inconsistent. Whether you compare Clemens to Grimsley or Rodriguez to Santangelo, no one (with proven fact) can say steroids make a baseball player better.
I understand that they increase physical parts of an athlete’s body, meaning that their stamina and strength are better off. But ‘roids cannot help with hand-eye coordination or any other mental aspect of the game.
Nothing has been proven in terms of consistent baseball numbers and steroids, but what has been proven is that they are harmful–to the career, the public image, and the body. They taint records, at least in everyone’s eyes, because steroid users are regarded as cheaters.
Do I feel A-Rod is a cheater? Well if he is, then there’s hundreds and hundreds of other cheaters out there with him. They do not suffer the same fate as Rodriguez because most of them are now forgotten. Rodriguez only suffers because he is still in the spotlight and in the middle of everything that is Major League Baseball.
However what has been proven is that medically, steroids can and will harm the body. All the athletes, professionally and going as far down as the high school level, will one day regret using drugs as a means to becoming a better athlete.
Sure, it may take awhile; they may regret it when they are in a wheelchair or lying in their casket, but they will one day look back and say, “I should have thought better of it.”
I’m sure Grimsley and Santangelo–who never did make it huge–are regretting it right now.
When it comes to steroids, the best thing to do is stay away. If you take them your image will be tainted, your body will betray you, and you might not even become a better athlete anyway.
Yankee Yapping 