'Roids: They're All The Rage

Major League Baseball once again flexed its anti-steroid muscle by suspending 41 more players since Monday. Wow: Four days, 42 players. At this rate, every player in organized ball will have a suspension by the end of the season.

Well, probably not. Honestly, I don't think that, regardless of the number of tests performed, the number of suspensions will exceed 100. "Why," you ask? Because it's bad business.

When a players' strike caused the cancellation of the 1994 World Series, the fans responded in kind by not showing up for games the next year. And this went on until the 1998 Home Run Derby by Sosa and McQwire got people interested in baseball again. (It's ironic that two men credited with saving baseball are also two men whose names have been linked to steroid use.) Since then, baseball has been doing alright. But a rash of high profile steroid suspensions could put an end to that.

In order to get people to watch baseball, MLB has to present an interesting product. And in order to present an interesting product, it needs great players to do incredible things. And in order for some players to do great, incredible things (and this applies to all sports, not just baseball), they have to take steroids. (That may sound like bullshit, but peep this: Last year, three former MVPs admitted to steroid use during their MVP seasons; reality bites sometimes.)

What would happen to baseball if suddenly everyones' favorite players got busted for steroids and (worst case scenario) got banned from the game? Seventy home runs is exciting; 25 is not. Leading the league with 12 home runs may have been exciting in Ty Cobb's day, but the stakes are much higher now, and people have come to expect waaay more from players. With all of our (possibly) performance enhanced players on suspension, people would stop watching, regardless if it's now a "clean" game or not. The only reason there is a "new" steroid policy is because the Commissioner got so sick of hearing people bitch about steroids that he came up with this "steroid policy". But he's not stupid. He knows that busting suspect players like Bonds and Sosa would not only taint those players' accomplishments, but would taint baseball as well. And with as much trouble as baseball has had in the past with putting asses in seats, he's not going to jeopardize any good relations he's built with fans by fucking with their favorite players. People don't actually want these players to get suspended or thrown out of the game; they just want to know that what they suspect about them is true.

So, we'll get some more Bush Leaguer suspensions, maybe some B-list major leaguer sacrificial lambs, but the chances of big names like Bonds or Sosa getting busted are about as good as Pope JP2 coming back from the dead and curing cancer. I suspect that Bonds will become a decent, caring person before he ever gets busted for steroids. And that "decent/caring" thing isn't gonna happen anytime soon.