Now that I have your attention, I would like to point out two pieces that, if you do not read them and at least attempt to engage with their analysis, will cause reasonable people to henceforth dismiss you when you make blanket claims about the ethics and the efficacy of steroid use in baseball:
- Eric Walker’s comprehensive analysis of the ethics, health risks and, most importantly, performance effects of steroids and other performance enhancing drugs, with copious references to the relevant scientific literature on the subject; and
OK, I’ll cut you slack if you don’t read the entirety of Walker’s piece. It’s long, it’s difficult, the page design kind of sucks and it’s not exactly as engaging as detective novel. But at the very least read Posnanski’s overview and then at least explore Walker’s piece here and there to test some of the assertions.
For those of you who don’t plan on doing either, at least take away this much: essentially none of the claims people make about what is so “obvious” about PED use are, in fact, obvious. Yes, there are still ethical hazards — and, of course, rule breaking — associated with PED use by ballplayers, but such things (a) are not as hazardous as we are led to believe; and (b) PED use does not logically and inevitably lead to the conclusions you so often hear about home runs and other hitting records being fraudulent.
Posnanski in particular makes some excellent points about the history of baseball juicing — as opposed to baseball player juicing — that seem like a far more obvious source of the new home run marks. And as I and so many others have said so many times, the fact that the home run boom came around the same time as large-scale expansion and a spate of cozy, home run-friendly ballparks coming online is criminally underplayed when the subject of home runs and baseball comes up.
I know that many of you don’t care what anyone says about these subjects and that you’ll continue to call all of the home run marks of the past 15 years fraudulent or worse. Just know that if you do, such arguments will be (a) counter to the empirical evidence; and (b) a function of your willful ignorance on the matter.
I do my best to limit the discussion of religion and politics on this blog. If you ignore the relevant data on PEDs and baseball and still spout off about it, however, you’re essentially arguing religion and politics.
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- Old Gator - Aug 6, 2010 at 11:42 AM
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Well, this report does for the entire steroids debate pretty much what the collapse of the Soviet Union did for the settled geopolitics of the late 20th Century. It’s all up for grabs now. Mark, Barry, Roger….start writing your acceptance speeches. Except maybe for the fact that sports journalists will be doing most of the voting, and they’re notoriously dense, stupid and biased, you’re all shoe-ins now.
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- APBA Guy - Aug 6, 2010 at 11:59 AM
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It was never as simple as getting as big as an offensive tackle, then grabbing a bat and swinging. Barry Bonds, who worked out about a mile from here, said repeatedly you still have to hit the ball. Steroids can’t do that for you. Of course they did help him train longer, bounce back from training faster, and as a consequence get stronger. But he, like McGwire, shortened his swing and got quicker to the ball as his career progressed. His pitch recognition improved. And his plate discipline became incredible. I used to sit in the stands and marvel at his ability to work pitchers, something he had long before the juice effects became really obvious. I remember one at bat against Mark Leiter in 1998. Mark had nothing by the 3rd inning (sorry, Phils fans) and Bonds came up with the bases loaded. All 3,000 of us at the Stick (it was ok in the sun, during the day), just knew he was going to blast one. He worked Leiter into a hitter’s count and got an 85 mph (seriously) mushball and launched it. Crowd went crazy. But the takeaway was how he laid off a low outside strike and two other close balls to get that mushball. He knew Leiter had nothing, but that he didn’t want to walk him, so he waited, then pounced. Fantastic.
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- Preston - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:03 PM
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I’m copying over the comment I posted on Joe’s blog, since I’m too lazy to write a new one.
I went to that article a little skeptical but willing to be convinced, and I leave it wholly unconvinced. Overall, it seems like he’s oversimplifying, particularly in the power splice graph. I was also bothered by the fact that he doesn’t even explain what the so-called “power factor” is that he’s graphing.
He’s flat out wrong at another point, when he states that the distance a batted ball travels depends solely on its speed when it leaves the bat – clearly, the spin on the ball is another factor. This isn’t particularly relevant to the steroids issue, but it’s not helpful to the credibility of the study. More significantly, though, he fails to consider that faster bat speed (which might logically result from increased upper body strength), regardless of how it affects power, allows a batter to wait longer on a pitch and therefore square it up better.
Finally, his analysis of the kids situation is a vast oversimplification – kids may not have been taking steroids because players were their role models, but that doesn’t mean that increased pro steroid usage didn’t significantly increase adolescent awareness of steroids, whether as aids in sports or in muscle-building to impress the girls.
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- John_Michael - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:05 PM
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Of course they help them hit HRs. Or why else would they do it? Just like not stepping on chalk lines, praying, pointing to the sky, and eating chicken before every game. If there weren’t benefits to the players, they wouldn’t do them. Jeez.
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- Trevor B - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:07 PM
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I’d like to see somebody come up with a list of the homer-iest parks in the major leagues. Spout it out with different variations of avg amount per year, per month, etc and then compare it to where guys like Bonds, A-rod, Big Mac, Sosa, Griffey, etc etc played most of their careers. Although I believe PED use accounted for more homers, it wouldn’t be anymore than 10% at the max. Good points were made in this stuff though Craig.
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- -Slap- - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:08 PM
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Amazing that apologists still exist for these obviously inflated numbers. For those too dim to understand baseball. Steroids increase your reaction time. Batters who are able to wait longer on a pitch have a huge advantage. Do the math and stop wasting your time on nonsense.
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- Simon DelMonte - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:08 PM
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Can I say how much I love JoePo? The number of prominent sportswriters who would link to such a report and then offer thought provoking commentary is painfully small.
I read through a lot of the Walker report. I find some of it a little dubious – I think I want to see more research disproving the effects of ‘roids on healing – but Walker echoes a lot of my own thoughts about steroids over the years. Especially in regard to health risk and the hypocrisy of banning steroids and allowing other things to be legal. And he gets a lot of credit for crunching the numbers.
I have long said this: when everyone seems to agree about something, there is cause to stop and examine things. (I call this the Tonkin Gulf Effect, since those three lone senators who voted against the rest on the Tonkin Gulf resolution were the only ones who got it right.) From the day that John Ashcroft made made his first public statements about the evils of steroids, I found myself questioning the universally held beliefs about them. I am glad to see that my doubts are well founded and that I am not alone in my willingness to question.
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- -Slap- - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:10 PM
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Preston completely destroyed Joe’s specious argument in the span of a single paragraph.
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- hoffch04 - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:20 PM
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and you revealed your willful ignorance in the span of a single sentence.
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- AdamK - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:20 PM
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John_Michael, please read the web page, particularly the Eric Walker one, before you make comments like that.
The only reason that people are prone to think that steroids make a big difference in baseball is because they have sucked up this bogus message that the media has been peddling for the past 5-8 years. In the Eric Walker piece, he is summarizing the research of 5 independent scientists all studying the matter from different angles, in other words, those conclusions are not his own. I’m not going to stand here and say that steroids had no effect, but I will say that I think their effect has been vastly overstated, especially in terms of a human being’s ability to hit a round ball traveling 80-95 mph. My wish is that everyone would just take a minute and read the facts instead of regurgitating the same old tired arguments from the past 5 years.
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- dlf - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:20 PM
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Improve reaction time? I think you mean the amphetemines that players have been taking since — at least — the 1960s. I know of no medical literature that indicates that steroids (or hGH) increase reaction time.
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- Paper Lions - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:21 PM
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They are called empiricists, not apologists. Unless you think everyone decided to roid up at the same time in mid-1993, there is no correlative data between HR rates and PED use in baseball.
You are one of the willfully ignorant referred to above.
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- Paper Lions - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:23 PM
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This is picking at the details and ignoring the meat of the argument. If that is the best you can do, you still have not explained in any way shape or form how the data are consistent with PED use.
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- Largebill - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:26 PM
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I’m not a doctor and didn’t even stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night, but it seems like there is some ignorance both from crowd that tries to attribute all of the spike in homers to steroids and the opposite crowd that claims steroids does not help hit home runs. In layman terms the primary benefit is in muscle recovery. For body builders steroids allow for more lifting because you don’t need the days off between workouts. The improved recovery is why more relief pitchers have tested positive than other positions since testing started. As to the home run surge, anyone who follows the game and does not let emotion cloud their judgment will recognize there were several factors that lead to greater home run frequency and no one cause should get all the credit or blame. A major factor in my opinion is the fact that batters take a different approach with two strike today than they did in the past. Used to be players were embarrassed by striking out and would choke up and make sure they made contact. Now most guys are swinging hard regardless of the count. Having said that, I don’t completely ignore the affect that strength has on hitting for power. Yes, a player needs eye/hand coordination and bat speed to hit. However, hitting for power take more than just getting the bat on the ball. In the 70′s a few players started weight lifting and it has expanded to where now every team has a strength and conditioning coach. Teams and players are working on strength for a reason. Stronger guys can hit the ball harder than weaker ones and baseball is a sport requiring great endurance. Being in optimum condition pays off during the dog days of August. Steroids can help both with making strength training quicker/more effective and it can help with recovery. Any attempt to quantify the benefit is a waste of time. It isn’t 0% and it obviously isn’t 100%.
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- ben s - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:31 PM
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Ya, but the difference between steroids and chicken, is the chicken might actually help by giving them a valuable source of protein.
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- RichardInBigD - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:31 PM
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I’VE GOT SUCH TIRED HEAD!! MY BRAIN IS ABOUT TO EXPLODE!! Whether or not this crap helps you hit home runs, or harms your health, is irrelevant. Same as it’s irrelevant whether or not a corked bat helps you hit more home runs, or a spitball makes your pitches more unhittable, or you can steal more homeruns from over the fence by using a jet pack to get to them and bring them back in. It’s irrelevant because they are against the rules, and therefore those achieved while using them are, in fact, tainted. Period. End of discussion, OK?
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- ben s - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:33 PM
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Another thing, during the home run boom a bunch of young studs were maturing into home run hitters, a much larger percentage than previous years. That, combined with home run friendly ballparks and inferior pitching due to expansion should account for a lot of the home runs hit.
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- SadPandaRevolt - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:36 PM
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Will you also say that about all the players in the 80s doing coke?
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- John_Michael - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:37 PM
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AdamK- I like your passion. Please re-read my 2nd sentence. Compare it with my 3rd, and see if your sarcasm radar starts going bizerk. If not, I still like your passion. If it does, hopefully I when some ignoramus posts that line of reasoning down somewhere near post #42, we can all say, ‘You’re an idiot and John_Michael called you out on it before you even posted.’
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- onemilemore - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:41 PM
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This is what I ave been telling people for years in response to Bonds. PEDs don’t give you a perfect swing, and that’s what Bonds had. Did they help push a couple balls an extra few feet every now and then? Probably. But you don’t hit the way he did without pure talent.
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- Sam Lee - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:42 PM
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Poz is a whore. I’m sick of his worship of LaRussa and Pujols and all around crappy writing. This probably means that its finally going to come out that the skinny guy who now looks like a cartoon character, Albert Pujols, is going to finally reveal that he “unknowingly” took steroids.
Ah, but steroid use isn’t helpful in increasing muscle mass and strength is irrelevant to hitting baseballs far.
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- JBerardi - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:47 PM
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Steroids weren’t against the rules during the steroid era. Amazing coincidence, that…
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- Chris Fiorentino - Aug 6, 2010 at 12:57 PM
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I love Joe Pos, but I’ll say I thought he and Eric are totally off-base with their takes on steroids. I don’t feel like typing up a new comment, so I’ll copy and paste mine from over on Joe’s blog…
Here’s the main problem with Eric’s Story and your blog entry, Joe…NOBODY IS SAYING THAT EVERYONE DID STEROIDS!!! You are quoting league-wide #’s from different eras when what you need to look at is specific players and THEIR INDIVIDUAL #s.
Look, I could take all the steroids in the world and it isn’t going to help me hit a 90 MPH fastball anywhere. But when BARRY BONDS, a great baseball player already, takes steroids, he goes from hitting 40 HRs 3 times from 86-99 to AVERAGING 55 HRs the next 5 years. If Eric and you are going to tell me steroids didn’t help Barry Bonds, then I am going to call BS on you. Sure, the TOTAL LEAGUE-WIDE #’s may not have been abnormal, but nobody is saying that EVERYONE took steroids. Only some guys, like Brady Anderson, who DEFINITELY TOOK STEROIDS, were helped.
Most of the INDIVIDUAL GUYS hitting those home runs were steroid users…Bonds, McGwire, Sosa, Luis Gonzalez, A-Rod, Big Papi, Brady Anderson, Albert Belle. Some of the guy hitting the home runs haven’t been proven to be steroid users, like Griffey, Thomas, Andruw Jones, Thome, etc. But who’s to say they didn’t use them either to gain the strength needed to put those Doubles over the wall?
To summarize, the total league numbers of home runs are MEANINGLESS to the argument of whether steroids help someone hit home runs. Unless you are going to assume that EVERY SINGLE PLAYER used steroids, which is ludicrous. Maybe 50%, but not EVERY PLAYER.
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- Bearwin - Aug 6, 2010 at 1:00 PM
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Faye Fincent released a memo to all teams in 1991 stating that steroids were added to the banned substances list. There was no testing or punishments in place, so using them was against the rules, but there was no way to enforce the rules. The federal government had deemed steroids illegal in 1988 and further so in 1990, so the were breaking baseball’s rules and commiting a crime.
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- DiamondDuq - Aug 6, 2010 at 1:12 PM
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That’s all well and good, but could someone please do an analysis of the “juicing” level of 1998-2001 baseballs and 2007-2010 baseballs because outside of the balls, the ballparks are essentially the same, the only thing, presumably, that has changed is PED use and magically we haven’t seen anyone threaten 60 homeruns in a season (A-Roid with 57 in 2007 was closest), let alone surpass that mark 6 times in 4 seasons with 2 of those hitting 70+ homeruns! In fact, in the past 3 years only twice did a player hit 50+ homeruns, both in 2007, and it’s not likely it will happen this year either with only about 1/3 of the season remaining and the league leader only having 33 homeruns to date. Puzzling?
