July 4th, 2006 → 1:29 pm @ Seth Mnookin
In the year and a half since Jose Canseco published Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant ‘Roids, Smash Hits, and How Baseball Got Big, Madonna’s former paramour has served as a punching bag for those within baseball’s protective fraternity. During last March’s Congressional hearings, Curt Schilling, Rafael Palmeiro, Sammy Sosa, and Mark McGwire refused to be sworn in en masse because they didn’t want to be pictured with the greased-up, perma-tanned slugger. McGwire referred to Canseco as a “convicted criminal who would do or say anything to solve [his] own personal problems.” Schilling warned of “glorifying the so-called author” or “indirectly assisting him to sell more books.”
Canseco—who, at age 42, is attempting a comeback with the San Diego Surf Dogs (the same team for which the 47-year old Rickey Henderson put up a .456 OBP last year)—is back in the news, and it’s not because of his three strikeouts in his Surf Dogs debut last night. Before yesterday’s game, he had this to say: “They’re mafia, point blank, they’re mafia. I don’t think Major League Baseball is enthused about finding out the truth. There needs to be a major cleanup in Major League Baseball. I think they are treading on very thin ice, and [commissioner] Bud Selig has to be very careful what he’s doing because his job is on the line.” Has the new testing program solved the sports steroid problem? “The policy sounds great, but that’s not the problem,” Canseco said. “There are major problems not with the policies but the individuals who are instituting this policy. For example, and this is theoretical, if Roger Clemens gets tested and he gets tested positive and it comes back, what do these individuals do with this policy? I think it’s going to depend on a case-to-case, player-to-player basis.”
Canseco’s comments were treated with what must be by now a familiar brand of condescending disregard. At first, a baseball spokesman wouldn’t even deign to address Canseco’s allegations: “We wouldn’t comment on anything he said.” Later, an MLB official amended this statement, telling the Associated Press, “His allegations are complete nonsense.”
Of course they are. Just like his allegation that Rafael Palmeiro was a steroid user was complete nonsense. Canseco, after all, is the guy who embarrassed himself on national TV, the boob with the awful track record when it comes to telling the truth. Just look at the testimony!
Jose Canseco: “MLB did nothing to take it out of the sport. Baseball owners and the players union … turned a blind eye to the clear evidence of steroid use in baseball.”
ESPN The Magazine Special Report on Steroids, November 2005: “Who knew? We all knew: the trainers who looked the other way as they were treating a whole new class of injuries; the players who saw teammates inject themselves but kept the clubhouse code of silence; the journalists who ‘buried the lead’ and told jokes among themselves about the newly muscled; the GMs who wittingly acquired players on steroids; and, yes, owners and players, who openly applauded the home run boom and moved at glacial speed to address the problem that fueled the explosion.”
Mark McGwire: “I’m not going to go into the past or talk about my past. I’m here to make a positive influence on this.”
“My lawyers have advised me that I cannot answer these questions without jeopardizing my friends, my family and myself.”
“I will use whatever influence and popularity that I have to discourage young athletes from taking any drug that is not recommended by a doctor. What I will not do, however, is participate in naming names and implicating my friends and teammates.”
McGwire, described at the hearings by the Washington Post as a “shrunken, lonely, evasive figure,” has not, to date, been involved in public efforts to discourage young athletes from taking performance enhancing drugs.
Sammy Sosa: “Everything I have heard about steroids and human growth hormones is that they are very bad for you, even lethal. I would never put anything dangerous like that in my body. Nor would I encourage other people to use illegal performance-enhancing drugs.”
Sosa averaged 48 home runs a year in the five years preceding MLB’s new testing program. Last year, he hit 14. He is no longer on a major league roster.
Rafael Palmeiro: “I have never used steroids. Period. I do not know how to say it any more clearly than that.”
“I am against the use of steroids. I don’t think athletes should use steroids and I don’t
think our kids should use them.”
“To the degree an individual player can be helpful, perhaps as an advocate to young people about the dangers of steroids, I hope you will call on us. I, for one, am ready to heed that call.”
Palmeiro was suspended last August after testing positive for steroids. He is no longer on a major league roster.
Baseball commissioner Bud Selig: “Major League Baseball has always recognized the influence that our stars can have on the youth of America. As such, we are concerned that recent revelations and allegations of steroid use have sent a terrible message to young people.”
“Baseball’s policy on performance enhancing substances is as good as any in professional sports.”
In February 2005, after reports that Jason Giambi had told the BALCO grand jury that he knowingly used steroids, Giambi apologized in a much-ridiculed press conference. In October, MLB awarded Giambi its Comeback Player of the Year Award. (The award is sponsored by Viagra, for which Palmeiro formerly served as a spokesman.)
Baseball’s drug policy is so porous magazine articles give maps on how to beat it. Testing administered by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, the organization responsible for testing U.S. Olympic athletes, is far more stringent than the testing done by Major League Baseball.
What’s that old Sun Ra saying? Ah, yes: “A prophet is not without honor except among his own people.” (Fine, fine: Jesus came up with it first. But could Jesis have pulled this off?)
Post Categories: Baseball & Bob Dylan & Bud Selig & Jason Giambi & Jose Canseco & Rafael Palmeiro & Steroids & Sun Ra
July 2nd, 2006 → 3:09 pm @ Seth Mnookin
“You know the other two Red Sox catchers, Doug Mirabellity, Doug Mirabelli and Josh Bard, have 19 passed balls between them.”
— Florida Marlins broadcaster in the bottom of the sixth after Jason Varitek’s second passed ball of the year. (The scorer changed his decision to a wild pitch in between innings.) Josh Bard was traded to the Padres on May 2.
Post Categories: Broadcasting
July 2nd, 2006 → 1:59 pm @ Seth Mnookin
It’s Sunday, I haven’t brushed my teeth yet, and the superballs got me poking around for some great ads. The first one I sought out was “The Showdown” (click on McDonalds in the left-hand menu). Speaking of Jordan, I’m partial to the “Jordan 21” ad. There’s also, of course, some obligatory World Series ads: the funny one and the dusty one.
Once you start poking around for videos, it’s hard to stop. For anyone who hasn’t turned on their TV in the past 24 hours, you can compare Gary Matthews to Coco Crisp. (I know Crisp’s catch was a game-saver, but I don’t see any way Matthews doesn’t come out on top.) I couldn’t find video of Pedro’s 99 All-Star game performance, but here’s a nice tribute (I’d forgotten about the time he offered his glove to an ump and told him to pitch). And then there’s this weirdly touching super-fan remix throw-down, the battle of the Dream Ons, with the Sox going old school and Larry Legend getting the Eminem treatment.
(Apologies to Bill Simmons for the blatant appropriation. And when you go to the Simmons column, check out Will Leitch‘s picks in a sidebar on the right.)
Post Categories: 2004 Playoffs & Ben Cohen & Coco Crisp & Deadspin & Gary Matthews & Larry Bird & Michael Jordan & Red Sox
July 2nd, 2006 → 11:53 am @ Seth Mnookin
Watch this. It’ll be the coolest thing you’ll see all weekend. Fireworks included.
Post Categories: super bouncy balls
July 1st, 2006 → 6:30 pm @ Seth Mnookin
…but I anticipate there’ll be lots of sleeping and reading for the next couple of days. Getting ready for a book tour is hard! In the meantime, read the Keys (and Jose, I’m counting on you not taking the weekend off), prepared to be awed as grown men flame each other at SoSH, marvel at the mysteries of Photoshop at Dirt Dogs, and get the official news from the engine that keeps MLB flush with dough. I have a bunch of outtakes fired up and ready to go, and they’ll be parceled out in the coming days. And please, safety first. You can’t read my site if you poke out your eye with a bottle rocket.
Post Categories: July 4
June 30th, 2006 → 9:29 am @ Seth Mnookin
“It’s OK to say it. Don’t worry about jinxing them. The 2005 Red Sox are going to win the American League East. By a landslide…. Stop worrying about the Yankees, Orioles, and Jays. It’s not even going to be close.”
— Dan Shaughnessy, June 26, 2005
“The Sox have not made an error since the Nixon Administration (actually it’s June 11, 16 games, which ties a major league record) and they lead the Yankees by four games. It’s almost beginning to look like Secretariat in the Belmont around here…”
— Dan Shaughnessy, June 30, 2006
Ah, the unbridled optimism that comes with interleague play.
Post Categories: Dan Shaughnessy & Red Sox
June 30th, 2006 → 12:34 am @ Seth Mnookin
This is the fourth in an occasional series of Sneak Peeks from Feeding the Monster. The section below–which is running in honor of Curt Schilling’s tenth win of the season–takes place on November 26 and 28, 2003, the span during which the Red Sox were allowed to negotiate a contract with Schilling. Here, CEO Larry Lucchino, general manager Theo Epstein, and assistant to the general manager Jed Hoyer are at Schilling’s house outside of Phoenix, Arizona, trying to convince the big righthander to agree to a trade that would send him to Boston. (Schilling had initially said he would only agree to trades that would send him to either the Phillies or the Yankees.)
Schilling’s initial wariness was noticeably softening. “The preperation they did in getting ready was big for me,” he says. “It was impressive. It was clear, they’re a very forward-thinking group of guys, and I knew that was going to mesh with what I was trying to do. There was just a lot of common ground.” That night, the Sox made their initial proposal—three years with a club option for a fourth year or four guaranteed years at less money.
Schilling contemplated the offer, pointedly playing with his gaudy World Series ring. “Look,” he said. “You guys are bringing me here for one reason. It’s not to make the playoffs. It’s to get beyond where you were last year and win the World Series. Let’s make that very clear.” Since that was the case, Schilling said, why not build in a World Series clause into his contract: If the team won the championship while he was in Boston, he’d get a raise for every year remaining on the deal. “I don’t want a clause that says, ‘If we make the World Series,'” Schilling said. “This is about winning the World Series. That’s all I care about. That’s what I’d be there for.”
As Hoyer says, “We were like, ‘Yeah, that’s pretty cool.'”
…
As the Red Sox executives were heading back to Schilling’s house on Friday afternoon, they were hopeful they could seal the deal, but they knew that if Schilling didn’t agree to their new offer, they’d have almost no time to renegotiate. When they arrived at Schilling’s house, they presented him with their latest offer. Schilling took the piece of paper on which they had written out all of the specifics–the World Series clause, the award bonuses, the club option–and was silent for several minutes. Finally, he looked up…
What was Schilling’s response to Boston’s initial offer? What was it that sealed the deal? And what were the big righthander’s first impressions of playing in Fenway? Find out the answers to these questions, along with much more about Schilling’s tenure in Boston, in Feeding the Monster, out July 11 from Simon & Schuster.
Post Categories: Baseball & Curt Schilling & Feeding the Monster Sneak Peeks & Larry Lucchino & Red Sox & Theo Epstein
