I’m steppin to da stump
to bounce da chump,
back to ’54
kickin and swearin, yeah
say goodbye Hank Aaron,
and if its all the same
share the shame of exile
from the Hall of Fame
with Roger and Barry.
but don’t worry, we
keep your careers on file
to compare and compile
reference and revile.
compare and compile
reference and revile.

And Babe Ruth did plenty of barnstorming, hitting against black pitching, and doing quite well, so the stupid claims of how he benefitted from there not being black pitchers in the majors is vastly overblown.

Not only that… Babe Ruth was a known Coca Cola drinker – he supposedly drank Coca Cola throughout games. At the time he did so Coca Cola featured REAL coke – and I don’t mean soda. Would that have given him a jolt? What if Albert Pujols takes a shot of Coke on a tired starter in the 8th inning every game?

I’m not saying cheaters should be rewarded – but I AM saying the game was different when they were juicing, and if everyone was doing it – oh well. It’s an era – just like the era of all whites was an era.

(with apologies to Jonathan Richman)

Steroids allow you to work out harder, certainly, but the body and strength alteration are almost predominantly in the upper body (I think it’s something like 80/20 in that regard). Both home-run and pitching power is generated in the legs. Just because guys look bigger doesn’t mean they can necessarily hit the ball farther.

As for Bonds, yeah, he used, and I’ve had no problems presuming that for quite some time. What I still refuse to acknowledge is that his usage makes him any dirtier than any other cheater in baseball’s history, including the many cheaters currently in the HOF.

Actually, baseball wasn’t way better when half a dozen shortstops were banging 35+ homers a season, because that never happened. In fact, only twice did even two shortstops hit at least 35 homers in a season, and A-Rod is the only post-strike shortstop to do it more than once. But hey, wild exaggeration never hurt anybody’s point, right?

I guess baseball was awful in 1971, when Hank Aaron had his career year at the tender age of 37, right? Or when he had a personal top-five season two years later, at age 39? Players have always had anomalous spikes at times we wouldn’t expect them. Obviously, those recent ones came under greater scrutiny because of the flagellation applied to the steroid era, but does it make sense to simply chalk all of those up to steroids when we know that tighter balls, tighter walls and tighter strike zones were all having noticeable effects on offense as well? And I don’t know about you, but I actually think it’s awesome when somebody who by all rights should be done puts together an incredible season late in his career. Randomness makes things more exciting.

Nah, Davidoff and Craig and the other Bonds apologists are totally correct. Baseball was way better when guys had absurd career years @ 39 and half a dozen shortstops were banging 35+ HR a season.

…moron…to much coffee.

Teehee

Oh, and those aren’t accusations. Aaron’s admitted to taking greenies.

Should read; … now we’re taking the SATs?

See what I mkean?

Hey, lets try sticking to the baseball arguments. I’m all for grammar, punctuation, proper spelling and all that but if I can discern the point that somebody is trying to get to then I try and stick with just addressing their point. Granted, that is due largely to the fact that I’m a terrible typist, even worse speller and rarely proof read what I post. So there is that whole people in glass houses thing.

Unless somebody is being a complete pompous ass, lets stick to baseball. Otherwise, we risk spiraling into one monkey poop throwing event after another.

By the way, I agree completely with Davidoff, if you are going to hang guys for steroid use than there are a bunch of guys that took uppers, which were institutionalized and generally provided by the team, for decades that need to be outted, figuratively and literally. Also, keep in mind that percentage wise there were likely just as many pitchers taking steroids as hitters so there could be an argument made that it was a wash.

The point of all this is that it is not possible to separate the effect of roids from that of the other stuff since they were concurrent. Anyone claiming to be able to do so speaks from their arse. In point of fact, the one thing you CAN conclusively say is that altering the ball itself alters its performance in a measurable and predictable fashion and was always illegal under the rules as stated since Adam was a pup. And yet, many august members of the BBWAA have no problem with the provable cheaters. Either get off the ‘roiders or get on all the cheaters. Anything else lacks integrity.