Former Sen. George Mitchell released his report Thursday on the use of performance-enhancing drugs in Major League baseball. Here are some questions for you to ponder after you've digested the news:
In general, what's your reaction to the report? Are there any names mentioned that surprise you and why? Would it make more sense to legalize the use of performance-enhancing drugs and just accept them as part of the game?
My reaction to this report is this: “Who paid for this nonsense?” My guess is that it will ultimately turn out to be me.
Look, here’s the thing: I purely couldn’t give a damn one way or the other if a bunch of professional athletes take steroids, marijuana, sparkling soda or any other thing. It really doesn’t have a single thing to do with me, and the idea that such a topic should require heavily publicized reportage seems completely ridiculous.
It is a game, folks. The fact that some folks make truly fantastic livings playing that game is all attributable to…well, you, if you want to know the truth of it. Apparently it is a powerful enough force in some people’s lives that anything surrounding it ends up as big news.
Does it really bother you that some athletes use “performance enhancing drugs?” If so, why? What does it all have to do with you? But if this really sticks in your craw, here is the solution: stop being a part of the whole thing. Don’t watch the games, don’t fly the flags. Say “Until you guys go back to the way it was, I’m having nothing to do with you.” Withhold your dollar (as a great slavering, sports-mad group) and change is sure to come.
Or just find something better and more personally directed to do. Whatever.
mitchell report
Just as interesting as the players who were named in the report are the players who were not named, notably those who were tried and convicted in the court of uninformed opinion by all those armchair inquisitors and holier-than-thou sportswriters, especially Mark McGuire and Sammy Sosa. I am also glad that, finally, there will be other players who get to share the spotlight with everybody's favorite whipping boy, Barry Bonds, who, in my mind, will ultimately be deserving of apologies by a lot of people. By the way, how come nobody ever mentions the fact that six of Babe Ruth's famous 60 homers in 1927 were actually ground rule doubles by today's rules?. Does he deserve an asterisk too?