Opening Day

It’s baseball’s opening day, and the winter wait is finally over. I can’t help but comment on MLB’s newly hatched investigation of steroids. Even Commissioner Selig admits it is largely in response to the book Game of Shadows, which I recently ordered but haven’t received yet (yes, I have the right to read trashy books every once in a while). But last year, I read a very good book called Juicing the Game, by Howard Bryant, which colors my view of the current situation.

Bryant’s main thesis is that MLB—and even Selig himself—launched the steroid era by consciously looking the other way as the massively bulked up Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa made baseball popular again with their home run race in 1998. MLB knew what was going on, but loved the PR boost. Now things have soured, so MLB is suddenly shocked to learn that the steroids issue hasn’t gone away (despite new punishments imposed last year) and launched an investigation headed by George Mitchell, a respected former politician, but someone very close to the owners. The bottom line is that the “holier than thou” line coming from Selig is tough to swallow. As sportswriter Buster Olney writes, “Summon the hounds. Sound the horn. Let the hunt for scapegoats begin.”