Legacies Destroyed. Who's to Blame?

by Ronster22 on Dec 14, 2007 9:49 AM EST in New York Yankees News

I admit I wasn't much concerned about the Mitchell Report. I'd heard rumblings like everyone else that it was going to name names, but in my opinion it was 'roids under the bridge. As fans, I felt we'd moved on.

Then came Black Thursday and my opinion changed.

Now suddenly I care, but not for reasons some might think. Am I upset at those 80+ players who in effect cheated the game I love? Yes. Should their legacies be stricken from record books like Joe Jackson? No, and I'll tell you why ...

This whole mess is on Bud Selig. He's the head of the snake, and it needs to be cut off, immediately.

Following the players' strike the game was in trouble, and like God breathing life into Adam, ol' Bud needed to do something similar with the great game of baseball. So he gathered his high-priced marketing team and pulled out the stops--focusing on making the current crop of stars "larger than life", "eye-catching in their exploits on the field." Guys like Sosa, Big Mac, Clemens, Ripken, Gwynn, Bonds and others suddenly appeared in marketing campaigns transforming into robots tearing out of their uniforms as they weilded flaming bats, or threw laser beam pitches.

Credit to Bud, it worked ... the game made a sparkling return when during that one special September Sosa and Big Mac held the nation captive. It came back when Ripken broke the Iron Horse's vaunted record. It came back when during the All-Star game we saw homage being paid to past greats on the field of dreams.

It was all a fraud--perpetuated by Bud Selig. Selig knew about the steroids. So did the owners, trainers, coaches and reporters. All looked the other way.

But it's on Bud Selig, the man who boldly declared that he would move swiftly in this case enroute to restoring baseball's integrity. Well, Bud, how about starting with you?

Start by coming clean to the fans. Tell them what you knew and how you let this runaway train crash headlong into the legacies of many of the games great stars. This is not so much on them as it is on you, Bud. You speak of integrity, then step up, be a man, and step down.

Take some ownership in this debacle. Share in the pain and humiliation that many of these players now feel--afterall, you are the one who let it happen. You opened the door.

It sickens me to see you standing at a podium with all the slickness of a tv preacher making promises to the fans and demands on the players. The sad thing is that underneath your $3000. suit beats a heart of a coward who knows he sold out the game and some of its greatest stars.

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Amen, brother

Well said.

by anaconda on Dec 14, 2007 10:01 AM EST reply actions

The problem is

that Bud could never decide how he felt about it. He was and was not going to be on hand for Bonds breaking the record. He did and did not suspect that steroid use was widespread. He loved and hated the attention. He talked out of both sides of his mouth.

And the report is just as unbalanced. It names only a few clubs because those trainers were under investigation. It is not a sweeping indictment of baseball. Rather it's a sweeping indictment of a few teams. Not surprisingly, the team that Selig loves to hate, the NY Yankees. Not that his hatred of the Yankees had anything to do with the report but the fact that he won't say, "Hey I'm sure there are others but these are the ones we found out about." No, he won't say that and Mitchell won't say that.

My issue is not even that my team took a hit or that Rocket took a hit. My biggest concern is Andy Pettitte. I just love the guy and even if he strayed into HGH use to try to repair an elbow, does not deserve the way this is being played out.

The biggest issue I have is what is NOT there, who is not named. Just because you are not in the report does not mean you did not use. Just because you are in the report doesn't mean you did. In other words, the report is useless.

It should have been "steroid use was rampant and now we will implement testing and punishing users." without naming names. To name some and not all is a sham. To name names with no evidence other than some guy facing prison time with no corroboration is a sham. To ruin legacies and HoF chances for a few is a sham.

I love my Yankees. I love Andy Pettitte. I am very dismayed by the portrayal of the report and the inconsistencies and issues of the report.

If it were a fair report and named a zillion players on every club and Pettitte and Clemens were among them, so be it. If there was corroboration or some shred of irrefutable proof, so be it. I would be the first one screaming for their heads.

But it's not. It's a farce. And it's a farce that affects the team I love and players I love. And I hate it.

Yes, baseball needed to address this but address it in a way that is fair to all and not unfair to a few. This was just as choppy and inconsistent and ridiculous as all of Selig's behavior.

The fans deserve better.

"The secret of managing is to keep the guys who hate you away from the guys who are undecided." -Casey Stengel

by bxgrl1 on Dec 14, 2007 10:09 AM EST reply actions

Agreed

Did you know that Mitchell sits/or sat on the board of directors for the Red Sux? Hmmm, I wonder why there were no Sux mentioned other than Mo Vaughn? What about Veritek, Martinez, Papi, Kevin Millar (when he was with the team)? What about Timlin?

It was biased. It was a farce. It was a hit job ordered by the big don, Bud Selig.

"Baseball is the background music of my life." -George Will

by Ronster22 on Dec 14, 2007 10:19 AM EST up reply actions

Don't forget

Gabe "Au Natural" Kapler

Fear the Evil Empire

by pfistyunc on Dec 14, 2007 10:48 AM EST up reply actions

"Did you know...?"

Yeah, like we haven't heard that a thousand times. Let's see, George Mitchell, you can trust him with state secrets and the Northern Ireland peace accords, but you can't trust him with the information about which baseball players bought steroids from this guy. You'll pardon me if I don't cover my mouth while I yawn.

The reason Mitchell didn't include any current or former Red Sox other than Vaughn, um, and also Gagne, Clemens, Stanton, Lansing, Manny Alexander, Jose Manzanillo, Jeremy Giambi, Donnelly, Mercker, Donnels, is that he didn't have evidence from Radomski about any other Red Sox. This is all based upon the testimony of one steroid supplier; not every user got their stuff from him. These imagined conspiracies involving George Mitchell absolving his team (except, you know, naming multiple players from his team) are really, really undercooked.

Plus: Pedro Martinez?! Why not add Bronson Arroyo to the list?

by Jack Roy on Dec 14, 2007 2:30 PM EST up reply actions

Kapler you got a point with, though

Although if he used steroids, he never got too much out of it other than the swimsuit calendar pics.

by Jack Roy on Dec 14, 2007 2:33 PM EST up reply actions

Here's the problem....

It's not necessarily Mitchell's fault, but he was the wrong guy to head this investigation in the first place because of his ties with another major league team.

Honorable or not, it's a major conflict of interest and Selig did a splendid job of screwing up the investigation before it ever started.

Ronster is absolutely right. Selig should take the fall because he's just as guilty as anyone of letting all of it happen.

A decade ago, he just didn't care because the big power numbers, attendance records, and the season of 1998 that saved baseball. He chose to look the other way and now he's going to stand at that podium and grandstand like he had nothing to do with creating this monster.

He should have quit while he was ahead since he wasn't roasted in the report. Instead, he decided to play his righteous card.

Selig is by far the worse commissioner of the four major sports.

by anaconda on Dec 14, 2007 7:52 PM EST up reply actions

There's enough blame to go around....

The users, the managers, Selig, the fans who cheered it all on.

I don't like Selig, but it's hard to argue that he's doing the worst of the four. Baseball's hugely successful now, more people are attending games than ever before, opening markets in Japan and China, yada yada yada.

by Jack Roy on Dec 17, 2007 12:10 PM EST up reply actions

Agreed

Baseball is healthier financially and more popular than it has ever been. Meanwhile, the NBA is a travesty and most people aren't aware that the NHL still exists.

Fear the Evil Empire

by pfistyunc on Dec 17, 2007 2:55 PM EST up reply actions

It wasn't all Selig

Since you're a Yankees fan and Pettite was named, I'll assume you're still in shock. I feel for you. Pettite was one of the true Yankees and should not have involved.

But don't blame Selig for that.

He helped create the atmosphere for it. But so did the owners, the management, the GMs and managers, the team doctors. Heck, Clemens appears to have personally gotten Pettite involved. If you want to direct your anger at a specific person, that might be a good place to start.

The report had to name names to have bite. For the players union, team management, doctors, players. It wasn't pretty the way they did it, but Mitchell didn't create the mess-- and it's a magnificent mess indeed.

I suspect this is only the tip of the iceberg. In time, more stories will come out as the player cohesiveness deteriorates. And all of that will be because of the Mitchell report-- nothing else.

The fans are guilty too because they wanted to believe their guys are clean, even when they weren't. I guess we all played a part in it.

by toshiro on Dec 14, 2007 10:39 AM EST reply actions

The issue is not

that there were a lot of others involved; it's that they didn't stand up at a podium yesterday pointing their finger and promising to take swift action. Mitchell recommended no player be disciplined, but Selig is continuing to perpetrate the farce Ronster alluded to by saying he may take action against select players.

Please. Selig needs to stop pandering, stop pretending to be outraged and stop pointing fingers. He needs to stand up and accept responsibility. These guys are only the tip of the iceberg. Bottom line, everybody did it. And everybody did it under Selig's watch, in a climate he refused to change. Even if he were a bit slow to get wise, he was still about 3 years late taking any significant action.

And right now, he has the gall to throw guys like Pettitte under the bus? Forget it. I will not give Selig the benefit of the doubt. He needs to take the blame.

I always feel pressure. What I don't have is fear. -- El Duque

by LateInningRelief on Dec 14, 2007 10:55 AM EST up reply actions

Selig is the man

The man needs to stand up and take the hit.
There's accountability all over the place, but he's got to stand up and accept responsibility before anyone else. It happened on his watch.

"Baseball is the background music of my life." -George Will

by Ronster22 on Dec 14, 2007 11:21 AM EST up reply actions

Selig

"He helped create the atmosphere for it. But so did the owners, the management, the GMs and managers, the team doctors. Heck, Clemens appears to have personally gotten Pettite involved. If you want to direct your anger at a specific person, that might be a good place to start."

As the commissioner of baseball, he is in charge of every person you allude to, hes got to take more responsibility.

The whole report is just irresponsible. Naming some names and not others is misleading. Lumping all these guys together is misleading. While they both are cheaters, I dont think you can characterize Clemens' use and Andy's use in the same way.

To bill this thing as a huge deal and as baseball's attempt at getting to the bottom of the steroids issue is misleading. The only new-ish information came from two guys they interviewed from new york. Im sure if they interviewed people in other major league towns they list would be larger.

by seanp23 on Dec 14, 2007 11:40 AM EST up reply actions

My problem

is that not once in his press conference did Selig take a shred of responsibility. It was all fire and brimstone, and "I will act" and all that crap. If anyone winds being punished out of this it is stupid. You would have thuoght that Selig was holding a bunch of positive test results the way he was carrying on. But all he has is this report based on hearsay and circumstantial evidence.

I personally don't give a rats ass what happened in the past. No asterisks, no punishments for past behavior. Clean up the game now, make the testing proccess more aggressive and move forward positively.

You don't realize how easy this game is until you get up in that broadcasting booth. -Mickey Mantle

by NumberSeven on Dec 14, 2007 11:01 AM EST reply actions

On the Mitchell Report

I think Sen. Mitchell did best he could under given circumstances. Nobody, even baseball experts, thinks that the report is far from complete. I absolutely agree that the players nameds by the report committed wrongdoings, but they may have gotten a short-end of the stick. NYY has more players on the report because of their former trainer who blew the whistle. It would be impossible to dig even deeper, but I would tend to think that the names on the report probably contains less that 10~15% of all the players who have used HGH or other drugs.

by yankeesintexas on Dec 14, 2007 11:20 AM EST reply actions

No beef with Mitchell ...

outside of the fact that he was biased. Regardless of his position with the Sux, he needed to shine a light there as well. It strikes me that he looked the other way if you had "Boston" scrawled across your chest.

I do suspect there are hundreds of players who are probably still using undetectable substances. It's all terribly sad.

But again, Selig needs to shoulder much of the blame and he's been vacant--cowardly.

"Baseball is the background music of my life." -George Will

by Ronster22 on Dec 14, 2007 11:55 AM EST up reply actions

Again....

.... the Mitchell report only goes on the testimony of one supplier. Radomski doesn't appear to have had any contact with Boston and therefore couldn't offer any testimony about current Red Sox (but multiple former Red Sox). It's not Mitchell burying his head in the sand; the available witnesses didn't have any evidence relating to Boston. It "strikes" you that "he looked the other way"? What evidence could you possibly point to that Mitchell did anything of the sort?

by Jack Roy on Dec 14, 2007 2:37 PM EST up reply actions

Actually

It's two suppliers, both from the NY area. I dont think its conspiratorial to suggest that had Mitchell investigated other team trainers, like say in Boston, he would have a much more balanced, and thus reliable, report.

by seanp23 on Dec 14, 2007 3:14 PM EST up reply actions

Agree entirely.

But what's being suggested above is that Mitchell did have evidence of Boston players using and declined to investigate. Which is (a) a different thing entirely and (b) completely unsupported by any actual evidence.

by Jack Roy on Dec 14, 2007 3:24 PM EST up reply actions

I think the problem

most of us have with the whole thing is that it was sold to us as an in depth look at baseball across the board. What we actually got was a rehashing of old information with new revelations based on two guys from new york.

why didnt Selig have Mitchell go from club to club and have the GM's and scouts give him all the information he needed? Because it would implicate him and all the other higher ups in baseball.

I dont know if anyone heard it but on the fan this morning they read a scouting report on Gagne that epstein requested that was published in the boston herald. Here is the pertinent part:

The scout, Mark Delpiano, responded: `Some digging on Gagne and steroids is the issue. Has had checkered medical past throughout career including minor leagues. Lacks poise and commitment to stay healthy, maintain body and reinvent self. What made him a tenacious closer was the max effort plus stuff.

Every team has scouts with this information and it is much more reliable than a couple guys busted for selling 'roids.

by seanp23 on Dec 14, 2007 3:43 PM EST up reply actions

Anybody feeeling motivated?

If one wanted, say, to call for Selig's resignation, this site allows you to easily create an online petition.

Could probably get a good start just posting diaries on all the SportsBlogNation sites.

This would get more momentum coming from a more credible source than me. Any takers?

I always feel pressure. What I don't have is fear. -- El Duque

by LateInningRelief on Dec 14, 2007 1:23 PM EST reply actions

The New York papers

are calling the Yankees' championships into question. Now I'm ready to run right over and throw a brick through the Times' brand new windows.

I wrote to the Daily News, the Post and the Times and said don't you GET IT that the supplier was connected to NY and that is why NY players are the majority implicated? Don't you have some duty to stand up for NY area teams. You numbskulls.

And even if Pettitte took HGH in 2002 I really don't recall the championships after that. Even if Clemens was juicing on the Yankees I don't believe he won championships all by himself. Oh wait, it was him and Knoblach and Justice (who also denies any use) all by themselves who won it. Right. And Mike Stanton, even though he was suspected AFTER his Yankee years, well he was part of it too.

The misreporting is CRIMINAL and tabloid-ish. They should be sticking up for the NY players and calling the report into question but instead have fed a bunch of lies to the public.

Yellow journalism is worse that juicing in baseball.

"The secret of managing is to keep the guys who hate you away from the guys who are undecided." -Casey Stengel

by bxgrl1 on Dec 14, 2007 4:16 PM EST reply actions

The whole league

was involved. Not just the Yanks. I believe the playing field was level because all teams had roid users. This report is a joke, We need to find out who Curt Shilling's suppier is!!!

by NWYankeefan on Dec 15, 2007 11:53 PM EST up reply actions

scam of the century

the Report is a hoax, a scam. It was a classic case of rip-off (reportedly somewhere between 20 and 60 million dollars).

Selig went outside the organization presumably to get an unbiased investigation and one that would put an end to the huge concerns over drugs in baseball.

What did he get? An open ended report that is full of holes and more questions than we started with. It uses the questionable conversations of potential criminals in a clubhouse as a starting point. These locker room boys/drug dealers would implicate their grandmas to save their own skin...so why not throw prima donna millionaire athletes under the bus...

Mitchell says lets put it behind us and not prosecute. Of course...we don't want to stand up to your questions nor do we have real evidence that would hold up in court.

I am disgusted. Still a fan of the game, just disgusted with the way Selig and Mitchell and many others think we are idiots.

We did better 'cause we got better...Yogi

by mickey07 on Dec 14, 2007 5:10 PM EST reply actions

Read Dan Shaughnessy's article in the Globe

Shaughnessy is a Red Sox reporter who hates on the Yankees all the time, but he has written a great article on the issues with Mitchell and Selig and the report.

"The secret of managing is to keep the guys who hate you away from the guys who are undecided." -Casey Stengel

by bxgrl1 on Dec 14, 2007 5:45 PM EST reply actions

Did we give up when the Germans bombed

Pearl Harbor?

No!

The only thing to do now is to win number 27.

"The secret of managing is to keep the guys who hate you away from the guys who are undecided." -Casey Stengel

by bxgrl1 on Dec 14, 2007 6:02 PM EST reply actions

Ah, nothing like a good

Animal House reference to put things in perspective.

by anaconda on Dec 14, 2007 6:48 PM EST up reply actions

Got Sox?

Anyone interested on commenting directly to Mr. Mitchell regarding his one-sided, speculative report, here is his email address.

george.mitchell@dlapiper.com

Got Red Sox?

by jtword on Dec 14, 2007 8:38 PM EST reply actions

Get me Selig's

& I will spend the weekend writing a missive to rival Paul's epistles.

I always feel pressure. What I don't have is fear. -- El Duque

by LateInningRelief on Dec 14, 2007 9:00 PM EST up reply actions

That's one reason

I liked Shaughnessy's article. I know this man is a die-hard Red Sox guy and HE took issue with the lack of Red Sox in the report and the overwhelming number of Yankees (even guys who were allegedly juicing after they were Yankees are still identified as Yankees) and the bias. If Dan Shaughnessy is calling it into question, you know there's problems.

"The secret of managing is to keep the guys who hate you away from the guys who are undecided." -Casey Stengel

by bxgrl1 on Dec 14, 2007 11:46 PM EST up reply actions

You can't blame Selig

without mentioning every owner in the game. They're the ones who put Selig into "power". He can't do anything without their approval. Selig is a puppet on a string.

I don't really buy this notion that homeruns "saved" baseball. It helped, but this stuff helped much more:

The Wild Card (introduced while Selig was "in charge"). Yankees vs. Mariners jump started everything we all take for granted now.

Interleague play (Not as popular as it was when first introduced, but it still puts a lot of asses in the seats. Also intro'd by Selig).

The Yankees. The team no one in the country is neutral on became great again. Mac and Sammy were a huge story in '98, but so was the 125-50 NYY.

The Red Sox became great again at the same time.

The Mets also started winning again.

The northeast is the pulse of baseball. It's not a coincidence that MLB blew up when the above 3 teams started winning 90 plus games a season.

Michael Jordan retired and the NBA went into the shitter, forcing a lot of otherwise distracted sports fans to pay more attention to MLB during the winter and spring.

by matthaggs on Dec 15, 2007 12:28 AM EST reply actions

completely agree

The homerun chase was overrated. The yankees saved baseball that year. New york in general makes or breaks sports. Its no coincidence that the height of hockey popularity was when the rangers won the stanley cup. The same can be said for the NBA. The knicks have been absolutely atrocious and no one cares about the NBA. If you put LeBron on the Knicks, or at least make the Knicks relevant- the NBA is back in action again. The NBA could have survived Jordan retiring if they had a decent team in new york.

Its no wonder they play frank at the end of yankee wins: If you can make it here, youll make it anywehre.

by seanp23 on Dec 15, 2007 12:56 AM EST up reply actions