THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

Steroids are dangerous for your body and mind, greenies are not.

Strike that!
This chart was an eye-opener for me:
http://tinyurl.com/2qet4c
Note the relative location of amphetamines and anabolic steroids.

This could have been in the article as well, to really drive it home.

I guess it’s more that steroids are (incorrectly) *perceived* as more dangerous and people don’t want their kids doing ‘roids, but amphetamines for ADD is okay.

Interesting chart—shows alcohol is about as harmful as anabolic steroids.  Wouldn’t have guessed that, nor do I think most people would.

Compare weed and steroids to tobacco/nicotine and alcohol. We didn’t even need a fancy chart for that.

If one looks back to some of the reasons why steroids became illegal in the first place, one will find some very high profile situations involve “roid rage” and rape. The rhetoric fueled beliefs that people wanted to believe ... steroids cause athletes (already an aggressive group) to turn into the incredible hulk and lose control of his mind. Never mind that it has largely been debunked by the medical profession.

Thankfully, alcohol use never leads to anything of that sport, especially among teenagers. *cough*

I think it is simply about steroids having a more profound influence on performance than other things. Even though some in baseball disagree, IMO, steroids are a game-changer. They work as intended, and work very well. The difference with baseball is the skill required. But when skilled players take PEDs, it’s over.

Olympians aren’t using greenies to break world records or for middle-of-the-pack pro to Gold medal. I do think they should be viewed equally in terms of the HoF and suspensions, etc. But in terms of what works better, no contest.

I’m incredibly against cheating. I’m a “1-strike and you’re out” kind of guy. But, I also favor legalization of steroids.

The problem is that there is inconsistency in how the illegal substances are treated by BBWA, and they assign a consequence that is not defined by the agreement.

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Then you get to the other side of the question, and it really is about fear ... fear of the influence on children.

Well, then, you point out that more kids use steroids because they don’t like their build than those that use PEDs for sports performance ... and the cat’s already out of the bag on PEDs and sports.

The problem is that we’ve used so many scare tactics with weed and steroids, that we can’t just say “Aw hell, none of that was based on medical research, fact, or compared to similar substances.”

If people knew the truth about steroids. If they knew the lowish amount of risk. If they knew that the side effects were simply minor and temporary ... well then, people might *gasp* use them. What kind of world would we have if people used steroids? Oh em gee.

It’s all about fear.

cool chart. i’d like to see a third axis added labeled “fun”.

I always assumed steroids were less harmful than alcohol. I knew some guys in high school and college who “juiced” (no idea exactly what the took) and they got terrible acne and stuff but nothing like what I’ve seen happen (or have had happen to me) to people who drink a lot. i’d imagine it’s pretty tough to black out and asphyxiate on vomit the first time you took a bunch of roids. i do think you have a greater cultural stigma in most of the world on steroids than alcohol though, so I agree with you there.

I applaud Rob’s effort to push some folks in the “Zero Tolerance Camp” beyond simplistic “steroids are bad” arguments.  But I hardly agree with assertion: “the only thing that matters is intent” [to cheat].  Intent is certainly relevant-- to the extent that we can make an educated guess about it.  And even then, it is not a binary (yes/no).

Here are some other factors that I would submit are quite relevant to the PED discussion (and there are almost certainly more that I’m missing):

(a) What was the magnitude of the unfair advantage gained?
This is probably the factor that “Zero Tolerance” writers most widely cite.  We obviously don’t have controlled scientific studies on performance benefits of steroids to baseball players.  But the anecdotal evidence is rather compelling.  I’m not aware of any player who suddenly put up career high HR rates in their mid-to-late 30’s coinciding with admissions or evidence of greenie usage.

(b) What are the health risks and side effects?
This is relevant to me not so much out of concern for the early adopter cheaters, but more out of concern for their fellow players who are pressured to take risks to cheat if they want to keep up.

I’m no an expert on the medical effects, but I’d hazard to say that this speaks in favor to taking a harder line on amphetamines, which are physically addictive and prone to catastrophic overdosing.

(c) How widespread is usage?
If 95% are guilty of a form of cheating, then taking a hard line against that seems quaint and futile (though perhaps rewarding the honest minority has some merit).  If 5% are guilty, then a hard line stance seems much more appropriate. 

We can’t know with certainty, but the 2003 survey testing suggests that steroid users were a distinct minority (even if we assume that most of them found a way to beat the test).

I’m not sure we have enough hard information to compare that with amphetamine usage in the 70s or 80s.

There’s also the related question of how do we even measure usage.  Do we count a player who used amphetamines on a small number of occasions (with very temporary effects) the same as a player who used steroids on the same number of occasions (but with long-lasting effects)?  I would say probably not.

(d) How clear and convincing is our evidence for identifying the guilty?
I think we’d all agree that it’s much fairer to hold PED usage against someone when we have pretty clear evidence as opposed to merely “suspicions.”

For better or worse, many more individual players were caught red-handed in the steroids era than in the greenies era.

So far, IMO, the use of steroids has been tempered by the fear of detection and sanction; remove that, and you will have the mother of all pharmacological arms races. 

This could lead to some distinctly undesirable consequences: 

- first, new physical problems brought about by dangerous combinations of PED’s and/or “bleeding edge” chemicals not subjected to any safety testing.  Abolishing the no-steroids rule is going to hugely encourage and incentivize experimentation

- next, liability issues: when a rookie can’t afford the really good $%^&, is his team going to forego that benefit (if benefit it is), or will they supply it to him?  If they do and he has health problems, what happens?  What about minor leaguers off the 40 man roster, do they get the same $%^& as the big-leaguers?

- long-term issues: what if it becomes known that certain PED’s promote huge performance increases, but shorten careers?  Do we really want 500-post threads on BTF about whether Player X is going to survive the 6-year contract he just signed?

My two cents.  Your mileage may vary…

2/mettle:
Where is the scientific evidence behind this chart?

What is the methodology for putting completely unrelated effects of completely unrelated substances on the same scale?  How is dosage factored in?

I have no interest in exaggerating the risks posed by steroids but it seems to me that anyone can concoct their own methodology to produce a similar-style competing chart to support almost any conceivable agenda.

The link in my name should direct you to the source that supplied it to wikipedia.

“The data in the paper is obtained solely from questionnaire results obtained from two groups of people: the first comprised people from the UK national group of consultant psychiatrists who were on the Royal College of Psychiatrists’ register as specialists in addiction, while the second comprised of people with experience in one of the many areas of addiction, ranging from chemistry, pharmacology, and forensic science, through psychiatry and other medical specialties, including epidemiology, as well as the legal and police services; the experts are not named and were chosen by the authors. “

I’m with Ken, i’d like to see this paired with a heat map for effectiveness.

Rob made a very specific point, and I don’t want to go off that tangent please.

His point is:
1. Are we talking about stealing?
2. If we are talking about stealing, do we care if someone actually stole the money, or just intended to steal the money?

Say that we are talking about cheating.  Now, say that you can “prove” that steroids improve performance but greenies don’t.  But in both cases, you did it because you intended to improve performance.  And in both cases, the league determines that if you do it, it’s considered cheating.

So, Rob’s argument goes: what’s the difference?

Do we really care if you stole the money, or just that you intended to steal the money.

Please, don’t continue your above thread-tangent until you’ve resolved Rob’s specific point.

Tangotiger, if we use the stealing analogy, I submit that it is about stealing, but the details matter:

The scope of the stealing (e.g. $ value).

The physical danger to the public posed by the stealing (e.g. was the thief carrying a dangerous/deadly weapon?  did he use it?)

How sure are we that we caught the real thief?

Is this occurring in a relatively law-abiding society or in an anarchy where nearly everyone is a thief?

i would think it all depends on how the players and owners perceived the crimes (greenies and roids), and from what I can gather (from reading people like Neyer and other sources), it sounds like they weren’t distinguished all that much, ie despite their differences in reality, both were known to be illegal and “wrong” yet both were tolerated by owners and players alike as a way help them compete.

so my take on the stealing analogy would be that both sides turned a blind eye to the employees stealing pens from the office supply cabinet. but now, after the fact, the office manager has decided that they don’t care about the ballpoint pens that were taken but the highlighters cost too much money to replace and so now anyone in the last 15 years that stole highlighters or was suspected of stealing them will have their pension withheld, though the implementation of this policy is often arbitrary.

8/
The chart is from:
Nutt, D; King, LA; Saulsbury, W; Blakemore, C (2007). “Development of a rational scale to assess the harm of drugs of potential misuse.”. Lancet 369 (9566): 1047–53. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(07)60464-4.

Some of the observations surprised me (alcohol dependence being so high? I seem to know too many casual drinkers for that), but the source’s level of expertise is far beyond my limited observation capacity.

Re: keeping on topic, I really don’t think it’s about cheating for most people - has anyone actually said that? - but really about cheating with ‘roids. That’s why spitballs and corked bats mean nothing for the Hall. Spitballs don’t shrink your nuts and make you go ape on people.

When we look back on the “Steroid Era”, I think we’ll see the Big Mac & Sosa season as the beginning of the end.  Do voters really care about the illegality/against-the-rules nature of steroid use?  I don’t think so.

Rather, the issue is that steroids broke the illusion of purity.  Of a remembered, perhaps imagined time of innocence when players did things “the right way”. 

Did people cheat in generations passed?  Of course they did.  Did people abuse substances, including those which could be deemed performance enhancing?  Of course they did.  But are those actions believed to have led to record breaking performances?  Did they force themselves in to our consciousness by being associated with the tainted eclipsing of one of most, if not the most, hallowed of sports records—multiple times?  Can they be associated with a meteoric rise in offensive performance?  Nope. 

I think we’re over-complicating this.  The truth about the impact of steroids is irrelevant.  It’s more visceral than logical.  Baseball is no longer the imagined sport of yore, the sport of childhood heroes and apple pie.  It’s not guys who look like your dad out there giving it everything they have.

The antipathy towards any player associated (fairly or not) is more of a general association with feeling robbed.  The appropriate comp is not amphetemine use or cocaine.  Those were never seen as threats to an imagined better time.  The better comp is Bouton writing Ball Four.  At heart, it’s not about the reality of how much further steroids let you hit the ball or breaking the rules.  It’s a moral outrage against a perceived theft of innocence.  And anybody who can be associated with that perceived theft will pay the price.

There’s a reason while those who are sabermetrically inclined, objective thinkers by nature, are also those more likely to include McGwire and company on their ballot.

There’s also a little thing called “context” to the situation.

Amphetamine usage in the 70s and 80s was not specific to just athletes, it’s usage was considerably more widespread amongst the public compared to anabolic steroid usage in the 90’s and 00’s, which let’s face it, not many were taking them recreationally. I am thinking here of Jim Bouton talking about amphetamine usage in the 70’s and the drug lulling you into thinking everything was great “then you get clobbered.”

I know this may not target the specific point Tango wants addressed here, but let’s not leave out the different cultural environments when it’s easier to just say everyone was cheating who took drugs to improve their performance (if we can even do that, which it doesn’t really seem like we can).

How many seasonal records, oh let’s take the HR record for example, were broken during the Greenies Era? Now let’s compare that to the post-94/95 Strike/Lockout Era where lo and behold baseball suffered through some serious bad PR with lost fans, revenue, etc.

Remembering the Hulk-like visages of Big Mac and Sosa smashing balls out of the park really helped draw fans back to the game somehow is a bit different than Keith Hernandez (name picked at random although his involvement with the Bolivian Marching Powder might have helped pick him) popping some Greenies so he could man first base at Busch after a bender the evening before.

"Do we really care if you stole the money, or just that you intended to steal the money.”

I depends on what we are judging. If it is “morality” and consequently invoking the morality clause in the HOF criteria, then intent establishes morality.  From a morality standpoint, there is no difference between a bank robber who gets away and one who is caught.

Then again, there are levels of immorality.  And those levels could reasonably be tied to the the consequences.  For example, if taking greenies does not significantly enhance performance and steroids do, then one could reasonably argue that taking greenies is a less immoral thing to do, and use that accordingly when making a HOF decision or judgment.

IOW, if I say, “I will vote for no player who has acted immorally,” then I can’t vote for any player who took greenies or steroids.  Then again, if that is my argument, then I can’t vote for any player who did ANYTHING immoral, which obviously is a quagmire.

I can say, “I will not vote for anyone who did anything immoral in the context of baseball,” in which case I can’t vote for anyone who took greenies, steroids, scuffed a ball, corked a bat, etc.  I might even restrict my “immorality exception” to cheating in baseball only, in which case, the results are the same (greenie and steroid use are bars, and so it scuffing, corking, etc.).

Now, if your argument for barring players based on PED use is not the immorality or even the cheating argument, but is the enhances performance argument, then you can reasonably ignore greenie use but not steroid use, I think.  That depends a little on if you are invoking a zero-tolerance standard to your “performance enhancement argument” or not.  If you are, then you probably have to bar greenie users also, since they probably do enhance performance to a small degree.  If you have a sliding scale to your “performance enhancement argument” then you are free to allow greenie users into the Hall, but not some of the steroid users.  Basically, you can use your own judgment (which is probably not going to be very good - but that is another story) to determine who got what level of enhancement from the drugs they took, and what their level of performance might have been had they not taken any (banned) drugs.

It is a complex issue and anyone who makes it into a simple one, such as many of the BWAA writers, is small-minded.  I suppose a reasonable and smart person can simply ignore the whole thing and perhaps not be small-minded.  I guess I am asking that people submit reasonable and consistent arguments, regardless of their ultimate conclusions or decisions.

"Rather, the issue is that steroids broke the illusion of purity.”

*BINGO*

I had this discussion with another the other day.

There’s this idea that baseball players are men playing a boys game. Fellas, that idea died when Stan Musial retired.

Pro baseball is a “boy’s game” like a bank shootout is “playing cops and robbers”. It ain’t.

In the previous discussion on the topic, I simply stated in a blunt way “These guys ain’t F%$^ing around”. Baseball players jumped into strength training and PEDs with both feet.

What PED-using players did that killed the fans, was to remove the idea that baseball was somehow “above” the other sports, or that the nature of baseball was such that skill was paramount to everything, including PEDs.

If the arguments against roids or greenies were logical, then yes, I think that all that should matter is that the player had an intent to cheat.

I don’t think that those making the argument that taking roids is a larger offense than taking greenies care at all for logic. It isn’t necessarily that I think that they aren’t capable of making logical arguments, I just think that those people beleive that the ends justify the means.

Professional sports leagues attempt to make their players out to be role models. I assume this is for monetary gain. Steroids, whether justly or not, have a lot of negative connotations in society today. That is all that matters to those that beleive that players should be role models; they are making arguments that are impactful given the imperfections of the reality that people perceive. One of those imperfections is the ability of people to hear a convicing argument and take it as fact, regardless of what may actually be the case.

The question then becomes: why does society perceive steroids as being more harmful than greenies?

Like mettle mentioned right above me, it is very specifically about roids, not the intent to cheat.

I type slowly.

RMR, KDR, MGL, and CircleChange11 all have done a better job of making the points I was trying to make.

Also, mettle’s comment is definetly not “right above me” anymore.

Great stuff guys.  I particularly liked Michael/11’s analogy, but all the rest flowed through great.

So, the first question I had, is it really about cheating or stealing, can lead you down a different path.  From the players’ standpoint, MLB is solely about money.  They are there to make as much money as fast as possible and make sure they are not sent down to the minors.  To players, “if you are not cheating, you are not trying”.  I like the analogy to going home with the office pen and paper.  That is what it is for them, even if the BBWAA sees things through beer goggles.

So, you have to first establish that, if we are really talking about that, or we are talkign about something “unnatural”.

Then, as MGL points out, there are different levels of cheating and stealing, with and without intent.  One can easily argue that amphetamines does more for performance then hGH, and so, this absolves Pettitte earlier than it would absolve anyone else (presuming of course he didn’t take greenies).

And, yeah, it’s a complex topic, with complex questions.

The Holy Writers however don’t want to think like that.  500HR?  3000 hits?  Non-Roids?  That’s their triple crown yes/no.

It would be interesting to see what a survey of NFL fans would present to the following question ...

If it made your team’s best player better, leading to more team success, would you want him to take steroids?

A) Yes
B) No

We almost expect steroid use in other sports, but not our baseball. 

Here’s the part that cracks me up .... People look back on the greats of the past and assume “Oh, they’d never use steroids.”, and I see generation of generation of player that would consume all sorts of performance-decreasing substances just to have a good time, and whose brains were controlled by their cock.

Give these guys some muscle candy, and watch out.

I’m not saying any specific player before the 1980s would have most certainly used steroids, but I can see quite a few that darn near abused their bodies with other things, that did NOT improve performance or keep them healthy. This idea that athletes treat their bodies as if the were a cathedral is ridiculous.

[1] It’s often worth the risk to the athlete. [2] they’re always looking for a competitive edge. [3] it could mean more money for the player. [4] it could mean more money for the league. [5] fans love the performances.

If I keep going I might find something that the players/league won’t find appealing.

Basically, I have to get to “social stigma” to find something.

"To players, “if you are not cheating, you are not trying”.”

I think you need to add managers, coaches, owners, and even fans to the list of people that think “if you ain’t cheatin, you ain’t tryin’ “

I notice not too many fans say “If you ain’t cheatin you ain’t tryin” anymore. *wink*

Also, usggn the term “The Steroid Era” implies that all or most of the offensive explosion of the 1990’s was due to PEDs, with the poster boys McGwire and Sosa, while ignoring other possible causes - smaller ballparks, baseballs thrown out of the game after hitting the dirt once, expansion, 12 or 13 man pitching staffs.

Brian, you’re certainly right that steroids were only a part of the equation - a part whose relative size is up for debate.

But for the purposes of this discussion, perception rules.  Given the Bagwell vote, it seems that “The Steroid Era” is a pretty accurate description of how many people viewed that ~15 year period.

If this were truly an argument in which facts mattered and influenced voters, it wouldn’t be much of an argument.

But it’s a biased, preconceived perception. People are saying they won’t vote for Bagwell because he hit a lot of homeruns at the same time other players were taking PEDs, when there are several other reasons for increases in homeruns and scoring in general that they don’t want to be bothered with.

Sticking with the original question, on one hand I could say that the current writers are considering intent to cheat, as we don’t know how much PEDs help, but then again, they seem to be convinced that PEDs are the only thing that caused increases in HRs - so I guess they are looking at results.

Re: bagwell

It’s not just home runs, but the change in physique, followed by the explosion of a power hitter. I’ve never really considered Bagwell’s possibility of using PEDs. So, I just looked into him.

Geez, 6 HR in 859 MiLB PA’s.

Looking at his early pics, his physique change is not overwhelming, but if one wanted to find evidence for possible PED use, it would likely suffice.

In terms of MLB batters that have 400+ career HR’s, I wonder if any of them showed LESS power in the minors than Bagwell did?

I guess I did not pay much attention to bagwell and any steroid rumors that may have surfaced during his playing days. But, if one wants to believe he did, there’s probably enough reasons to feel reasonable in that idea, given the time period.

I have no problem stating that MLB physiques transformed greatly in the early 90s. That has nothing to do with home run rates, just looking at builds.

When you watch games from the 80s on ESPN classic, it jumps out at you. Baseball Physiques: early 80s v. early 90s. Wow.

I remember seeing a photo of a beefed up Brett Boone, and my first thought was “Oh, so that’s the purpose of the baggy uniform.”

It’s not just home run rates, and as much as I’d love to tout the benefits of serious strength training, well ... it ain’t just that.

Significant records of the “greenie” era: season and career stolen base record, all-time hits record.  Not accusing Rickey or Rose, by any means, but it’s not like no records were broken.  We also had a ton of guys getting to 300 wins when we hadn’t had any for decades.  Not accusing Gaylord, Seaver, Ryan, Carlton or Niekro.  But the question was asked, and all of those records are just the sort of thing that a little extra energy would help you to stay in a lineup for.  When you start looking at everyone in an era for steroids, don’t you have to apply the same standard to the drug of choice of the previous era?  Or, as Neyer, Tango and MGL are suggesting, just shut up?

To answer the “intent or success” question, we have a case going on here in Seattle where a guy is facing life without parole for having answered a fake Craigslist ad for an sexual experience with an underage girl, where the person on the other was actually a male, adult sheriff’s deputy.  I have no sympathy for the guy (he’s facing life because of a prior conviction of sexual assault on a minor and we have ‘two strikes’ for that), but that’s a real life consequence of your intent being far, far removed from your reality.  Maybe greenies or steroids were like Dumbo’s magic feather for some, maybe it kept some guys in the majors who didn’t belong and maybe it gave some guys ten extra feet on line drives that would otherwise have been caught.  You don’t know and I don’t know.  This guy, on the other hand, is likely to have a long time in prison contemplating the consequences of a sick fantasy he took too far and didn’t even get to fulfill.

I think we more or less have to “shut up”, rather than play “maybe he did, maybe he didn’t”, to which we’ll never know unless they admit so. In short, be consistent.

I’m a strongly “one strike and your out” guy when it comes to using PEDs. I feel this way because I don’t think people accidently take steroids or that there are all these B-12 shots just going around that teammates inject each other with.

I know that’s how it happens at my work. We just give each other flu shots, and share medication ... just in case we might come down with something or we’re feeling a little “off” that day.

But, on a serious note. I just wanted to point out, with my previous post, that the people discussing PED use in “the era” are looking at more than just home runs. Drastic physique changes, completely abnormal career paths or changes, player admissions and estimations, etc.

It’s not “just one thing” as people like to frame it. Each individual thing taken on its own can have cast a reasonable doubt upon as if one were a defense lawyer. Frankly that’s how the debate often goes ... a “magic bullet” theory that incorporates a whole slew of possible alternatives that create an alternate reality where baseball and baseball players are somehow different than the athletes of other sports.

But all things combined, and what we know of PEDs and performance from other sports ... leads to a reasonable conclusion that there was a problem and PEDs did affect performances, perhaps some very greatly, and that’s that.

What the bulk of the discussion/confusion is in regards to what to do about it. At this point, I don;t think there can be any real serious doubt about the PED use. 

Voters acting as judge and jury in an inconsistent manner is hardly desirable. Maybe voters are using a “waiting period” as a type of suspension, or perhaps they let the veterans committee deal with it, who knows?

Really, I just wanted to point out that those describing the PED use are examining more than just HRs.

I think a good analogy for the difference between greenies and steroids is this:

Steroids - robbing a bank once a year

Greenies - robbing a corner store once a week

Both are wrong, both are illegal, but the bank job gets all the headlines.

I sympathize with those who want to hold off on voting for someone for a few years based on “suspicions.” But absent credible evidence, I think we ultimately need to give such players the benefit of the doubt.

However, when we have clear evidence of PED usage, and especially when it coincides with a very unusual career trajectory spike (e.g. McGwire) then that’s an entirely different story.  I can’t imagine giving players much benefit of the doubt on the legitimacy of seasons played completely under the influence of PED’s.  Especially when those are the player’s outlier productive seasons.

There is surely plenty of gray area in between McGwire and Bagwell, but I would apply the same standard to any PED.  If anything, I would be slightly tougher in the case of greenies, all else being equal, because of their documented short-term dangers.

The real consistency crisis will arrive when clear evidence of someone’s extensive PED use comes to light only after they are already in the HOF.

Why is corticosteroid not considered “cheating”?  (Think Kirk Gibson and Curt Schilling.)

Sudafed + coffee = banned by IOC = cheating

Why is that not cheating in MLB?

***

I love the bank v corner store analogy.  You can include corked bats, emery boards, vaseline, etc to a spectrum of such an analogy.

"Why is corticosteroid not considered “cheating”?”

Or, alternatively, why is Tommy John surgery not considered cheating?  At some level, we give some deference to doctors operating under their profession’s Hippocratic oath.  At least in theory, since they have sworn to do no harm to their patients, these types of interventions under a doctor’s care are not supposed to put anyone in danger.  (Granted, Bill Walton might legitimately argue with that)

“Sudafed + coffee = banned by IOC = cheating”

Someone correct me if this is not the case here, but sometimes a test can’t easily distinguish between an active ingredient that entered the body in a safe amount from a normal OTC dose, or that entered the body earlier from an illicit source.  These are some of the difficult lines that need to be drawn one way or another.

Where does “stealing marble rye from a little old lady if you absolutely needed that bread because you are dying of starvation” fit in the whole spectrum?

These are questions for philosophers not Holy Writers.

I would love to see George Costanza’s HoF ballot and explanation.

Where does “stealing marble rye from a little old lady if your friend needs to replace a different marble rye that he took back after dinner with his fiance’s parents because the mother forgot to put on the table and that little old lady had already refused to sell the marble rye for any price” fit in the whole spectrum?

Some combinations may be banned because they are used solely to mask a different compound in the body. Seriously, who would take sudafed + coffee for a cold?

With some of these questions I cannot tell if one is joking or not.

I think a point can be made for cortizone shots, TJ surgery, etc. Heck, why not throw Lasik surgery, asthma medication, ADD medicine, etc into the mix.

We could have the Darwin Baseball League. *grin*

----------------------------

In the end, not agreeing with the rules is not permission to break them.

CC, you find it unusual that someone would take Sudafed and then drink some coffee? The two don’t have to be linked in purpose, just in timing.

A couple hours ago I took two Benadryl and washed it down with Pepsi. I’m not sure if that violates someone’s list.

Baseball players cn get a prescription medicine waiver, but the percentage of baseball players who have waivers to take ADD medicine is about twice as high as the general population (where some think it is already over diagnosed and prescribed). Are baseball players more prone to ADD, or are some cheating and gaming the system?

As a side note, I think it’s pretty cool that the average ‘murkin is talking about and being forced to think about things like ethics and morality, chemical enhancement, fairness and so on, with respect to the hall.
The shades of gray of ethics is usually reserved for philosophy or law classes, but baseball is forcing people to confront new realities that they wouldn’t otherwise be inclined to discuss. Seems to me that baseball tends to do that (e.g., integration, the labor movement) and while some of you don’t like that type of discussion in your sports, I think it’s great.

Even in the spectrum of cheating, MLB has rules in place for that spectrum (50 games for PED, 8 or whatever for corking). 

It seems therefore that the Holy Writers have decided to not follow MLB’s lead on the severity, and have upgraded the robbing the local bank to robbing the federal reserve.

"CC, you find it unusual that someone would take Sudafed and then drink some coffee? The two don’t have to be linked in purpose, just in timing.

A couple hours ago I took two Benadryl and washed it down with Pepsi. I’m not sure if that violates someone’s list. “

As silly as it sounds, I didn’t even think about the “timing” aspect. I looked up Sudafed to make sure I knew what was being discussed (I didn’t). I was thinking it was cold medicine that might make one drowsy. It’s actually a stimulant ... and that’s where coffee comes in.

Any nicotine user can attest to the effective combination of caffeine and nicotine in regards to alertness. Caffeine works as a stimulant that also increase the rate and amount of nicotine that is absorbed. Same thing with Sudafed and coffee.

I also wonder if it’s used to create a stimulant spike to mask other, perhaps more potent (and dangerous) stimulant use.

But, in my previous post on was on the completely wrong track of what i was thinking.

#40 It’s 3rd offense and a lifetime ban, right?  So sure, MLB *will* ban players from the HOF for PED usage.  However, retroactively giving someone 3 strikes is wrong.

For the writers, that would be like a newspaper trying to improve its image by requiring reporters to double-source any stories going forward.  And they implement a 3-strikes policy (warning, suspension, fired).  But then the editor of the sports-department, decides to fire a few guys, because he *suspects* some of them may have not always fully sourced their articles.  He doesn’t have proof, but a lady from the entertainment section gossiped…

42/
Right or wrong, I think the reason that everyone in the 2000s essentially starts with 2 strikes in the minds of Hall voters is because of the inadequate testing in the past.

This includes the findings of the Mitchell report, which pointed to a number of players in violation that never got punished. Also, players were tested according to an arcane set of rules limiting how often and when they were tested.

So, it’s not unreasonable to surmise that if Clemens tested positive for doping in 2002, he probably did it at least 2 more times, which should result in the permanent ban.

I, of course, realize that it isn’t fair that Clemens didn’t get his two warnings, but in light of the fact that it is, and will continue to be, easy to hide the use of ‘roids, it makes the results of one positive test difficult to interpret, especially if it occurred right before the onset of rigorous testing and punishment.

Fair or not, laws are sometimes made with retroactive effects to account for the fact that criminals can be one step ahead of the justice system.

The more you guys talk, the more it’s clear that a hodge-podge “baseball justice” via Holy Writers doesn’t work, and why the “three strikes” process that corporate America enacts is preferred.

This is like Lord of the Flies.

To echo 39/mettle:
It occurs to me that once you get past the objective information and analysis—basically all the stuff that Murray Chass would dismissively say we could program computers to do for us—then isn’t the rest of the discussion almost entirely about philosophy?  Big hall vs. small hall, peak vs. career value, postseason moments, luck vs. clutch, positional adjustments, military service, the color barrier, etc…

Is there an association of unholy philosophers willing to take this on?

The chart in #2 is laughable. LSD is physically dependent? Since when? And physically harmful? The effective dose is tiny. I don’t buy it.

46/Dr. Paradise
Well, if you can definitively challenge the work here:
Nutt, D; King, LA; Saulsbury, W; Blakemore, C (2007). “Development of a rational scale to assess the harm of drugs of potential misuse.”. Lancet 369 (9566): 1047–53. 
you’re a far better neuropharmacologist than I.

44/Dr. Tiger
And your alternative is? It’s not life or death, but shouldn’t we, on balance, try to take this seriously and think all the issues through, rather than just deride and ignore the complicated issues? Just because the answer to ethical puzzles aren’t easy doesn’t mean they should be abandoned.

Seems to me the best solution is to establish a nice pristine, anodyne Hall of WAR that won’t be troubled by issues of “ethics” or “character.”

Seriously… One Hall can debate the impact of steroids and segregation, the meaning of fair, and the importance of true character, personability and media suck-up-dom, while the other can debate true talent vs. on-field productivity, clutch vs. peripherals and fielding metrics.

Both are important.

#43 - correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t the penalties for the use of greenies the same (now) as the use of steriods?  So this goes back to what Neyer originally started with - what’s the difference?  The penalty for using them is the same.  We have evidence some guys in the past used at least once, so we can imagine they used at least two other times, so shouldn’t we just give them 3 strikes to make up for the fact they escaped punishment previously?

And you bring up fair or not with laws, and yeah, I think many here would be railing against a new law that had new penalties, applied retroactively.  It’s not that you *can’t* justify doing so, just that the burden of proof should be on the person applying the penalties, for why this is better than the alternative.