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Breaking News
Sunday, October 1, 2006
10:52:00 AM EDT
As many of you have undoubtedly heard, the Los Angeles Times is reporting this morning that it has received a partially unredacted version of the Jason Grimsley affidavit from earlier this year in which the names of some high-profile players had been identified as having taken performance-enhancing drugs. Most of the speculation in May and June was about Albert Pujols, but according to the Times, the biggest name is Roger Clemens. Five other players are named, including Andy Pettitte, Miguel Tejada and Brian Roberts.
There's not much to say about the new revelations, except that when this story broke in May, it promised not to go away and the new revelations appear to be bearing that promise out. All of this remains highly speculative stuff, especially since Grimsley has been telling people for months that whatever he told investigators has been distorted and taken out of context.
In any event, it was noteworthy to me that on the Sports Reporters this morning, the discussion of the issue was as sober as it was. One of the beneficial consequences of the new drug testing policy in baseball is that the positive tests of the past two years have blown up our simplistic ideas about who would take performance enhancing drugs. As Albom, Lupica and Ryan made clear this morning, we now know that it's not just big boppers who ingest the stuff, but utility players (Marvin Benard, Alex Sanchez), pitchers, including middling relief guys like Juan Rincon and Grimsley) and, perhaps, front line starters. We now better understand that the drugs can be used for endurance, for recovering from injuries, as well as for adding strength (which helps in any athletic endeavor, not just hitting homeruns).
CNN also reported this morning on the new revelations, and featured a much less well-informed exchange about how baseball's testing policy was obviously flawed and that they needed to do something about it. Of course, the testing policy is flawed, just like it is for all sports, but what sports journalists have come to learn, just in the past year, is how widespread performance enhancing drugs are in all major athletics. If today's sports reporters is any indication, one effect of our evolving understanding of these issues is a little less fulminating moralism about the problem, and a little more realism about the nature of the sporting enterprise.
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10:52:00 AM EDT
Breaking News
As many of you have undoubtedly heard, the Los Angeles Times is reporting this morning that it has received a partially unredacted version of the Jason Grimsley affidavit from earlier this year in which the names of some high-profile players had been identified as having taken performance-enhancing drugs. Most of the speculation in May and June was about Albert Pujols, but according to the Times, the biggest name is Roger Clemens. Five other players are named, including Andy Pettitte, Miguel Tejada and Brian Roberts.
There's not much to say about the new revelations, except that when this story broke in May, it promised not to go away and the new revelations appear to be bearing that promise out. All of this remains highly speculative stuff, especially since Grimsley has been telling people for months that whatever he told investigators has been distorted and taken out of context.
In any event, it was noteworthy to me that on the Sports Reporters this morning, the discussion of the issue was as sober as it was. One of the beneficial consequences of the new drug testing policy in baseball is that the positive tests of the past two years have blown up our simplistic ideas about who would take performance enhancing drugs. As Albom, Lupica and Ryan made clear this morning, we now know that it's not just big boppers who ingest the stuff, but utility players (Marvin Benard, Alex Sanchez), pitchers, including middling relief guys like Juan Rincon and Grimsley) and, perhaps, front line starters. We now better understand that the drugs can be used for endurance, for recovering from injuries, as well as for adding strength (which helps in any athletic endeavor, not just hitting homeruns).
CNN also reported this morning on the new revelations, and featured a much less well-informed exchange about how baseball's testing policy was obviously flawed and that they needed to do something about it. Of course, the testing policy is flawed, just like it is for all sports, but what sports journalists have come to learn, just in the past year, is how widespread performance enhancing drugs are in all major athletics. If today's sports reporters is any indication, one effect of our evolving understanding of these issues is a little less fulminating moralism about the problem, and a little more realism about the nature of the sporting enterprise.
Written by sportsmediaguy Blog about this entry |
Add to del.icio.us | digg this
