Mark McGwire finally confessed to using steroids, but NOT human growth hormones. Who the fux really cares? EVERYONE that was anyone was doping in bigtime sports for at least the past twenty years. How else does a top level Olympiad champion like Florence Griffith Joyner have a heart attack in her 40’s? Or another pro baseball slugger, Ken Caminiti, also suffer from a heart attack only a few years after retirement. The truth is that most sports fans don’t give a shit whether their team’s top player uses steroids or cocaine or Advil-coated Tic Tacs. We just want our favorite teams to win.
McGwire’s confession doesn’t make him any more or less courageous than when he was an active player. He did it for the glory and the money. McGwire’s about to return to the game as a coach and he doesn’t want the spectre of his past to slow down his money machine. I don’t fault McGwire for getting his paper right. He’s got his weedcarrier Tony LaRussa maintaining the story that the Athletics and the Cardinals lockerrooms were all clean spaces. That’s a crock and Albert Pujols is now a steroid suspect in my book. The real crooks however are still the MLB owners.
The MLB owners made money hand over fist for the last twenty years from cable tv contracts, merchandising and licensing and of course ticjets sold at their ballparks. The owners pushed the players to destroy their bodies, but we still don’t discuss this on a mainstream level, only in the blogs is this idea even broached. If the owners were as contrite as they want the players to appear maybe they would give back some of the billions that they made over the last ten years. When it comes to sharing their money the MLB owners have nothing but love for the fans.
Nothing but love.
I refuse to believe that the top brass in MLB didn’t know these guys were using steroids. At the time baseball was in trouble and nobody was watching. Then McGuire & Sosa started smacking balls (do I need to say pause) out the park & people started watching again. Baseball was exciting again, then Canseco fuxed everything up cause he wading getting that paper no more. Why doesn’t anyone bring up Brady Anderson when speaking about steroids in baseball. His contract year he hit over 50 homeruns. Got a big contract, then never hit more than 19 homeruns.
Let me stop rambling, but DP you are correct my friend. The players did it for the glory and the money; and we don’t care as long as they keep the game exciting & my team keeps winning. A-rod for the win. Peace.
follow the la russa trail..pujols is probably juicing too
I saw Pujols on ‘Shaq Vs”. Shaq is arguably the biggest man in America. Dude hit like 11 homers out of 20 pitches or some shit. I refer to believe anything other than Shaquille O’neal can sqaush a cantalope with one hand. He probably can’t even jack-off. [||].
This dude Pujols cracked homer after homer after homer, half the size of Shaq & I’m sure nowhere near as “strong”. Dude was knocking the ball OUT OF THE PARK, back to back. Shaq’s shit didn’t even go into the stands.
I’m no expert on baseball, & surely not performance enhancing drugs, but it’s definitely something to think about.
Hell, I have my questions about Lebron sometimes.
indeed….. TG
I think the owners……players AND the sports writers were all in collusion…..and they acted in their own financial best interest and didn’t write about how men were doing things that hadn’t ever been done in the HISTORY of the sport.
now the writers are acting like they weren’t part of the sham………….it’s all Shull Bit!!
they have the NERVE on talk radio to talk down to Mcgwire..
only Max Kellerman had the heart to speak on this stuff back then…and he said his editors told him to fall back….
I was a big Carl Lewis fan growing up…cause he was the best…..from the same state….etc.etc…plus I ran track too
people told me for years all these “grand conspiracy theories” about how he’s dirty and the powers that be covered for him because he generated money and his show sponsor,Nike spent so much on advertising ,etc.
said they covered for his positive drug tests,etc,etc.
I thought it was all just hot air……
Lo and behold I’m watching the steroid documentary “Bigger, Stronger”….and not only do they confrim that story…they speak to Carl Lewis himself who was copping pleas.
story broke a few years ago, but track and field just isn’t a big sport over here so nobody cared..
Lewis and other americans failed drug test at the 88 trials…they made a fake excuse and let him run…… he lost to Ben Johnson…. and then they didn’t cover up for Ben and stripped him of the gold….
so a doper(lewis) lost to another doper..but they dq’d the second doper and gave the medal to doper number 1
Grands… I dig what you’re saying but I have to say that size isn’t everything [||] with this stuff. Case in point – GOLF. If you haven’t seen from random photos here I’m no small fry, and played college football. I just got into golf and on a good day at the range with my limited skill I can crack one about 225 yards. Then I’ll see some 5’9″ 160 pound dude two stalls over launching them like 250+. So there is an art to hitting a baseball as well as a golfball that goes beyond pure braun….
With that said, I think 80% of the dudes in MLB “cheated” at some point. You’re supposed to break down like Ken Griffey Jr. Not dominate until you’re 44…
40
what you’re saying makes sense…..but mlb dudes are not hitting a stationary object….
they’re hitting something traveling at them at upwards of 100 mph and causing it to travel 100s of feet in the opposite direction…
@40
No doubt. I’d never take anything away from the science & math of baseball. I’m just saying though, but I hear you totally. I think in sports, period, there’s more going on than the average fan speculates.
Darryl Strawberry did an interview, & he was saying the best games of his career was when he woke up from a coke binge & played high as a kite. Indeed, “performance enhancing drugs” take all shapes & sizes.
Again – I’m not making excuses for the tomfuckery of The Steroids Era, just talking about the pure mechanics of a swing and the impact it can have.
I think if I remember 12th grade physics correct all that transfer of energy of the colliding objects allows for it to go further… I remember reading an interview with Ken Griffey Jr. (who lives in the same Isleworth community with El Tigre) saying that Tiger Woods had consistent warning track power when he took batting practice once with him. He said with a hitting coach Tiger could hit home runs…
I mean Josh Gibson had nothing but moonshine, pigfeet, and greens, and probably hit against greater pitchers than your average MLB’er at the time, and his estimated home runs of 900+ are Paul Bunyan/John Henry like…
So has the power of a chemical allowed more people to possess this ability? Yes. But its still a very achievable skill by a human being.
I do think MLB needs to have an “Amnesty Commission” a la post-Apartheid Saathavreeka (South Africa). Everyone benefited/suffered from it, and MLB needs to accept its role, make amends, and keep it moving…
Dig on this…
Mad team owners in various sports own news outlets from television to print. The Red Sox owners also own the Boston Herald. The Cubs owners also own the Tribune and Rupert Murdoch owns the Dodgers and Faux fux’n news network.
The owners have determined what would be newsworthy and reported by their outlets. The fans were pitched to a fevered frenzy and they filled the seats to admire the longball [ll] feats.
Some athletes were brazen because the owners falsely emboldened them. Trainers (read: steroid weed carrriers) were granted all kinds of lockerroom access and traveling privileges. Steroids were rampant.
It wasn’t until some high school kid got fuxed the fux up off the juice that the public backlash was generated. By then the owners had made billions and the players were surreptisiously thrown under the bus.
Murdoch sold the Dodgers a couple of years ago D
But, yeah, I’ll never put the blame solely on the athelete when someone else made way more than the athelete off of his/her “talents”
Cosign Rob.
They call that shit “sports entertainment”. It’s version of the TI is not different than any other entertainment field.
DP-
I remember that story about the high school kid.
Any Dominican Athelte = Steroid User
that last pic looks like two pro wrestlers not baseball players. who still watches baseball anyway i watch that shit when i can’t fall asleep.
also Mark McGwire you was crying like a bitch at least say you was jucing like a man. not with tears and snot hanging out your nose fool. YOU MAKE ME SICK
Rob,
Thanks for the Murdoch info. My point being is that sports teams and the media are in bed together since the same parties own them both.
This is why athletes can get thrown under the bus so totally when they run afoul of management. Its how Manny Ramirez was demonized thru the efforts of the Red Sox media partner and people were convinced Jason Bay was an equal substitute.
The one thing the media can’t do yet is win ball games
BigNat,
Mark McGwire stays crying and people stay buying it.
This truly proves one thing…Ken Griffey Jr. is a first ballot HOF’er.
Well McGwire still won’t be a HOF’er. His careers numbers are powdered milk.
The league knew the deal. Fresh off of a labor strike, lost gate $, no merchandising paper, it was a requirement to restore “America’s pastime” to it’s original state. Whoever was close to a record was urged to “take the clear”, “do it for the fans” type of talk. Sh*t last year I knew who was on that list.
And that guy who has had 3 elbow surgeries and plays in the Loo is on there. McGwire is gonna help identify all Cardinal ‘roid ailments with his new job. Who else would be better?
I’m surprised no one talked about how The Marlins HAD to raise their payroll. The Fed whistle was about to be blown on how they had the franchise on malnutrition mode to keep pocketing the revenue sharing money, and yet MLB isn’t saying a word about Pittsburgh.
$yk,
That’s a good point that I will have to open as we get closer to baseball season, but you mentioned the team’s that keep their payroll artificially low by purging their talent for draft picks and minor leaguers.
As long as these teams own media outlets we won’t ever hear the truth from the broadcaster booth.
I mean at least the Marlins try to fake the moves by staying competitive but the Pirates give up in mid-May.”As long as these teams own media outlets we won’t ever hear the truth from the broadcaster booth. ”
Like a Steve Phillips, former GM of a franchise, doing game commentary?