Baseball: Now Featuring Capt. Obvious

This week, former St. Louis Cardinals player and new hitting coach, Mark McGwire, decided to finally come out of the closet and admit he took steroids during the 1990s and the ’98 single season home run chase. After all, what would a Big Mac be without its special sauce?

In his statement he said, “It's time for me to talk about the past and to confirm what people have suspected,” in response to his appearance on Capitol Hill 5 years ago when the only phrase we heard him say was “I’m not here to talk about the past.” Whoever drafted McGwire’s statement must have thought they were pretty clever, a real master of language with that little illusion. I found his new statement more of a joke than anything else, bringing back memories of Congressional inquisition and the inability of a man to contribute anything whatsoever to the conversation, except to take up space and use up oxygen.

Well I have to say, I’m so relieved Big Mac finally came clean. I was never sure about….

Yeah right.

The fact McGwire took roids is on the same level of common sense as “does a bear shit in the woods?” The door opened when he admitted to taking Andro during his playing career, though at the time it wasn’t a banned substance. So we were supposed to believe that a guy who admitted to taking one muscle-building drug wouldn’t have tried others?

Does McGwire and his representation really think the American people are so dumb that we couldn’t see right through him? We may be a lot of things; lazy, overweight, fantasy-loving and gun-toting, but when it comes to our celebrities and sports figures, don’t screw with us. We know what you’re doing, who you’re with, and who you’re going to marry before you do (aka Jeter – What’s the real story about that anyway?). While at Congress, he might as well have had a stamp on his forehead saying “I took them!”

So now that he has finally put it out there, most likely at the prodding at the Cardinals, McGwire may feel free, but nothing has changed for us baseball fans. We, or at least I, was always under the assumption he had. He was guilty in my eyes well before this confession (sorry, judiciary system).

Now we can finally end the conversation about whether or not he will make the Hall of Fame. He could barely get enough votes to stay on the ballot before this announcement, and this will effectively put a nail in his coffin. He may have hit over 500 home runs, but he had a low career batting average (.263) and didn’t really add a whole lot to the game as a first baseman.

Now this issue of making the Hall or not for admitted or caught steroid users becomes tricky, because not every case is as black and white as McGwire. For starters, you have to deal with Bonds. I don’t think he deserves it, period, but I know a lot of people argue he would have gone to the Hall anyway. That might be true, but we’ll never know, and I think the arrogance he showed in not only vehemently denying taking them, but also thinking we are all so naive as to believe him is enough for me. Plus, if everything about him wasn’t true, then he would have sued the authors of Game of Shadows for slander and libel.

Now it becomes harder when you start talking about current players, such as A-Rod and Manny. It is tough for me to bash Rodriguez since I am a die-hard Yankee fan. You could state the same case for Alex as for Bonds – he would have made it without help. He has a chance to become the home run king, but it would once again be by someone who had taken juice. He was supposed to be one of the clean ones, a savior of baseball who would clean the top of the home run leader board with purity.

So much for that.

Next we have Manny. What can I say? I really don’t like the guy, but he is a hitting machine, when he wants to be, and has over 500 home runs. He is an average fielder with a dozen All-Star games to his name, but I don’t know if that’s enough. The difference between him and A-Rod is Rodriguez is a complete player. He has Gold Gloves and runs the bases well all of the time, not just when it is convenient for him, on top of a great career average. I think the Gold Gloves and the base running are what really separate the two.

I think players who go to the Hall of Fame should be complete players. Not just excel at one aspect. But that’s just me.

Sorry, back to the topic at hand. Mark McGwire, ah ha!

Well thanks so much for clearing up all of that (non)debating we’ve been doing since you left the game. It’ll be interesting to see him back in baseball, and how effective he is as a coach.

Now Mark, you can get to teaching all those Cardinals how to hit the ball, though will you be able to, since you have to take daily injections out of their regiment?