Thursday, December 13, 2007

Mitchell Report: Running Diary

When former Sen. George Mitchell releases his report on the use of steroids in baseball later today (2 p.m. Eastern), we'll see 20 months worth of poking, prodding and (according to some trainers) provoking. This is baseball. This is hallowed ground. And it's about to be dug up with heavy machinery. Not to state the obvious here, but this has the potential to completely turn the sport on its apparently watermelon-sized head.

Here is a running diary of thoughts and emotions as I take the pulse of the baseball world via the highly-trained experts around me (me and my roommates and friends).


12:34 p.m.
A friend shoots me some shocking info -- a source leaked to a Red Sox online forum has the following names included in the Report: Clemens, Pettitte, Pujols, Varitek, Nomar, Damon. Huge names.

Seriously, this could be the biggest sports news break of our time. And this raises the question -- what if the majority of players have been taking steroids? Does that make it more acceptable, since the playing field was level among them and hardly any of the stats and records aren't tainted? Do we just accept that this has become part of the game, accept this as the Steroid Era the way we accept that there was a Dead Ball Era?

1:10 p.m.
Peter Gammons just appeared for the first time on ESPN's special SportsCenter coverage, which began ten minutes ago and will be an exhausting six hours long today. Gammons looks older and more tired than ever. I can only picture him crying on camera later after this reports is publicly released. This isn't comedy. This is serious. I feel sorry for him. Baseball is like his golden child.

(Also, ESPN does a remarkable job of speculating on a day to day basis. This may break the record for most repetitive and speculative information presented during a one-hour TV special.)

1:16 p.m.
Breaking news! A source reports that Mr. Met is allegedly named in the Mitchell Report! (And really, who didn't see that coming?)

1:32 p.m.
According to the most popular Red Sox online forum, SonsofSamHorn.net:

I am told this is a partial list. I am a trader and I get news sent to me from a variety of people. This is allegedly confirmed and I have no reason to doubt it's veracity.

Brady Anderson, Manny Alexander, Rick Ankiel, Jeff Bagwell, Barry Bonds, Aaron Boone, Rafaeil Bettancourt, Bret Boone, Milton Bradley, David Bell, Dante Bichette, Albert Belle, Paul Byrd, Wil Cordero, Ken Caminiti, Mike Cameron, Ramon Castro, Jose and Ozzie Canseco, Roger Clemens, Paxton Crawford, Wilson Delgado, Lenny Dykstra, Johnny Damon, Carl Everett, Kyle Farnsoworth, Ryan Franklin, Troy Glaus, Rich Garces, Jason Grimsley, Troy Glaus, Juan Gonzalez, Eric Gagne, Nomar Garciaparra, Jason Giambi, JeremyGiambi, Jose Guillen, Jay Gibbons, Juan Gonzalez, Clay Hensley,Jerry Hairston, Felix Heredia, Jr., Darren Holmes, Wally Joyner, Darryl Kile, Matt Lawton, Raul Mondesi, Mark McGwire, Guillermo Mota, Robert Machado, Damian Moss.

I still don't think I'm ready for 2 p.m. to roll around...

2:02 p.m.
Here we go....

2:13 p.m.
Somebody informed me that Jose Canseco is attending this hearing. Karl Ravech: "officially making this a circus."

2:32 p.m.
ESPN has a pdf version of the Mitchell Report. We did a search for names. Coupled with SI.com, the following Yankees or former Yankees surfaced: Clemens, Pettitte, Mike Stanton, Chuck Knoblauch, Jason Grimsley, and David Justice.

2:37 p.m.
More Yanks/former Yanks: Gary Sheffield, Rondell White, Glenallen Hill, Denny Neagle, Ron Villone, Todd Williams, Kevin Brown, Dan Naulty, Josias Manzanillo, Hal Morris.

Conspicuously absent: Sammy Sosa, Jason Varitek (alleged to be on the list prior to its release), Albert Pujols (ditto), Nomar (ditto), Travis Hafner, Alfonso Soriano, Alex Rodriguez, and Barry Bonds.

Just kidding. Bonds is listed over 100 times. No one saw that coming...

2:53 p.m.
Now that Mitchell has stopped speaking, I have one name that disturbs me more than any (and I doubt I'm alone): Roger Clemens. The greatest pitcher of our time (perhaps of all time) used steroids? Oh God.

3:04 p.m.
How can you take records away from players? How can you decide which of these names in the Mitchell Report is actually an offender and which is still alleged? How can any of the voters for the Hall of Fame decide on a player's career now? (Keep in mind, pitchers with a proven history of cheating from years ago are in the Hall of Fame. Pitchers who had nail-files and such on their person.) Where does the sport go from here? And does this spill into other sports as heavily and as publicly?

3 Comments:

At 2:29 PM , Anonymous Alex said...

Thanks for the running diary...us people at work need it! I've already sent your link around...

 
At 5:50 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

dont assume all these guys are guilty. and dont assume other people haven't used it (david ortiz wasnt anything special until he went to the sox...miguel cabrera went from skinny to huge). i dont think this is over.

 
At 1:04 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

this report is crap. Things like "I gave him steroids 2-4 times", "I saw 6-8 shipments", or "this happened more than once"... if youre the trainer and you put the needle in the guys ass, you know how many times you did it. All the "hard" evidence is flimsy and meaningless since the guys Mitchell got it from are trying to stay out of jail.

 

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