Time to come clean
03/11/2008
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When Nolan Ryan talks, I usually listen.
The Hall of Fame pitcher had this to say at his first public appearance since the Texas Rangers named him their new team president:
"Baseball turned its back on the problem and ignored it. Anytime you realize you have a problem, the longer you go without addressing that problem, then when you do decide to address it, the tougher it is to do. I think that's where we are with baseball."
That problem Ryan is referring to is steroids. Or HGH, or performance-enhancing drugs, or whatever else ballplayers are taking to get an edge on the field. And he’s right when he says baseball turned its back on the problem.
I’m going to try and get a little philosophical here, but it’s not my forte, so I apologize in advance.
Whether you’re a man, woman, adult, child or sea otter (okay, so maybe not sea otter), we’ve all been confronted with a situation that tests our morals. And when a situation tests our morals, we can either hide from it and hope it goes away, or accept the challenge head on and do the right thing.
Now, many of us at some point in our lives have elected to take the easy way out. We knew better, but it was too damn easy to ignore the problem, so instead we hoped it would go away.
At first, everything was fine. We knew about the moral ambiguity, but on the surface everything was status quo and, in a small way, we even benefited and possibly profited by turning our backs.
But that’s exactly when the problem started to fester, isn’t it? It grew bigger and bigger until it started to affect who we were. Then, once the problem took on a life of its own and we couldn’t take it anymore, we had to admit to other people that we didn’t do the right thing. We had to hope that not only would other people forgive us, but that we could forgive ourselves, too.
Funny thing is, if we just would have admitted that there was a problem in the beginning and worked on doing the right thing, it would have been easier to get past the issue and move on.
Major League Baseball has a moral dilemma. It has actually had this moral dilemma for years now, but instead of just owning up to it from the start, it chose the easy way out and did nothing. The problem grew. Then other people found out. And now those people (i.e. the fans) are pissed and want the problem eradicated immediately.
Baseball has had a problem with performance-enhancing drugs for more than a decade and it wasn’t until this past year that it finally decided to do something about it. And actually, it didn’t decide to do anything about it until the problem festered into a Titanic-sized issue. Commissioner Bud Selig has taken steps to put a stronger testing policy in place. He wants players and owners to be held accountable for their actions. He wants baseball to get its name back.
But all of that isn’t enough.
The NFL has an issue with performance-enhancing drugs, too. It’s no secret some players break the rules to gain an edge on the gridiron, but the difference is that football doesn’t hide from the problem. Every year, players are suspended if caught with illegal substances, and they’re heavily fined and suspended (four games to be exact, or 25% of the regular season).
Baseball not only needs to follow in football’s steps, but go even further. MLB not only needs to punish those who cheated and show fans that it really does care about cleaning up its image, but it also needs to embrace the fact that it hid from the issue in the first place.
No more hiding from the problem. No more profiting from the problem. Admit that the problem existed for years and finally fix it before somebody else turns their backs – we fans.
At the same press conference, Ryan also said that the league is trying to make amends and fix the issue.
"It's painful to go through. But I feel like we are headed in the right direction. We will get a handle on it. How soon will that be? I don't know. But I think it will be in the near future and (performance-enhancing drugs) will be something in our history.”
Ryan hit on something important, and I’m not talking about the league heading in the right direction. He said performance-enhancing drugs would be something in the game’s history. That’s right – because the fans won’t forget and neither should baseball.
MLB needs to admit that it had an issue – hell, call it the “steroids era” if they want. Everyone else already is. But they need to admit that there was a problem. Just glossing over the issue and saying, “we’re moving forward and not looking back” is going to alienate fans. We’re not stupid and quite frankly, many of us are pissed that the problem has been allowed to fester for so long. Baseball waited until the absolute last second before finally admitting what fans knew all along.
Baseball must have thought that fans are stupid. Either that, or that we’re all kids pressing our noses up to a glass tank at Sea World trying to get a better look at Flipper. Baseball is so worried that we’re not going to fill up the stadiums if we don’t see three or four 580-foot home runs. They think that’s the only thing we want.
I think I speak for all true baseball fans when I say, give me a guy who’ll lay down a late-game bunt to move a runner into scoring position. Give me a player who takes a 15-pitch at-bat and turns it into a walk or a double down the line. We don’t need the long ball – just stop turning it into pro wrestling.
Ryan’s right – baseball turned Its back on its moral issue. It ignored the problem, wound up profiting from it, but now the problem is too big to ignore. The league appears to be taking the necessary steps to solve the issue but I worry it won’t be enough. I worry that in the end, they’ll try to pull another fast one on us and the issue won’t be resolved at all.
With Opening Day less than a month away, I hope I’m wrong. I hope Ryan is right and baseball has finally accepted the challenge of doing the right thing. Hey, we’ve all been there. We’ll understand and maybe eventually forgive baseball if it just admits the problem and finally does the right thing.
Questions or comments? Send them to astalter@bullz-eye.com.