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Baseball & Steroids

Everyone needs to understand what an absolute joke the "new and improved" MBL drug testing program is (the new testing is posted at right (11/22/05)). This writer is a competitive powerlifter who competes in national competition and is regularly drug tested. I know about steroids. I used them in college, I've lived with numerous people that took them and I know people that currently take them.

There are three different types of drug tests that various organizations administer. Businesses and the NBA give employees a test that looks for marijuana and stimulants. The USA powerlifting organization (USAPL) on a local level will administer a steroid only test. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will test for everything. The IOC test is very expensive and it is cost prohibitive for most groups. The USAPL only administers the IOC type test at national competitions.

First let's discuss the drug testing that is done in other sporting organizations. I lift in the USAPL. If a lifter fails a steroid test they will be banned for three years and a second positive will result in a lifetime ban. This is truly Draconian and it serves as an excellent incentive to stay "clean". If a lifter wants to do steroids there are Professional meets where no drug testing occurs. The Arnold Classic is a place where the biggest pro-meet occurs.

The US Olympic Committee has the toughest testing procedures of any group we know of. E.G. Weightlifter Shane Hammons get random tested three times a month and if he tests positive he will be banned for two years and if he tests "hot" a second time he is banned for life.

The NBA has a fairly weak testing procedure. A first year player can be randomly tested one time during the pre-season and three times during the regular season. After that the player can be randomly tested only once during the pre-season. If a player tests positive for steroids he gets the massive five day suspension, a second positive tests results in a draconian suspension of ten days and if he test positive a third time he will be suspended for 25 days. If he tests positive for marijuana, look out, the player has to enter a "program". A second violation gets a $15,000 fine and another "program". A third positive gets a five day suspension and yet another re-entry into a "program" It seems to me that if a player has to go into a "program" for a third time maybe we should assume the "program" isn't working. It looks like the NBA doesn't care if its players are taking drugs. Finally, and I'm going out on a limb, but I don't think steroids use is a big problem in the NBA.

The NCAA completes random full blown testing on 18 football players on every team every year. This testing can occur anytime during the school year. Their test specifically looks for steroids, diuretics, peptide hormones & ephedrine. I couldn't find out the specific ban period but I don't think it's like the NBA.

The NFL is pretty tough. The tests are conducted on any one during the course of the year and these tests are random. Random typically means a one day notice. If a football player tests positive for steroids he is suspended for four games with out pay. If he test hot a second time he gets a six game suspension and a third time he gets a one year suspension. Recreational drugs are a different deal. A player gets advance warning of this test and thus he should never fail such a test. As we know though, the NFL is chock full of Mensa candidates and thus some still fail the recreational drug test. These tests do not leave out the stars, Dan Marino reports that he was tested eight times in one year. Given that the NFL is a professional league with a union, this testing procedure is quite tough.

Interestingly, the NHL doesn't publicize their testing procedures. This shouldn't surprise us as they keep player injuries a secret as well. Perhaps Stalin's ghost runs the NHL, who knows. We've read in other sources that the NHL has no testing procedures. Does anyone remember pro hockey anyway.

Now that you have an overview of what other organizations do regarding steroid testing lets look at the farce that MLB has produced. This is what they used to do: They tested all, roughly 1200 players with a pre-announced testing day during spring training. If 95% of the league tested "clean" then there would be no more testing all year. Surprise, Surprise they passed. Additionally, the players union agreed to do 240 random tests with a 60 day warning period. No joke is required as we suspect the readers jaw should have dropped already. The new testing procedure gives the player a guarantee that he will be tested randomly only one time a year and if the player tests "hot" for steroids he will get a 10 day suspension. If he tests hot a fifth time he will get a one year suspension. A ten day suspension in baseball is the equivalent of one game in football. Bug Selig has stated the he has a "zero tolerance policy". This sounds like a zero tolerance for suspensions policy to me.

I will concede that MLB has a very powerful union and this is what drives this farce of an anti-doping policy. In spite of this Bud Selig should not get up on a podium and tell the world about this piss poor drug testing policy they have put in force. He should tell the world the Players union refuses to allow a decent drug testing policy and this weak testing policy is all the union would agree to.

What is the reality of steroids in baseball? I think it doesn't amount to much. I see about 15 games a year and many on TV. I am also familiar with what a juiced up person looks like and very few of these types of bodies are playing baseball. I am certain that there are no juiced players on the Rockies team. I rarely see what I think is a truly muscular player. Very few come to mind. Sosa, Bonds, McGwire, Caminetti, (may he rest in peace) and there may be ten others, but I think that's it. Most people joke about how many out of shape players we see. Ortiz of Boston comes to mind, great hitter but no one would accuse of him of physical fitness. Larry Walker is a similar deal, when and if he plays an entire season he puts up ridiculous numbers and no one would ever accuse him of even exercising. The point is that with good skills and the proper swing anyone over 185 lbs can hit a lot of homers. Hank Aaron only weighed about 185lbs.

McGwire deserves some discussion and possible defense. My reading about him leads me to believe he had been working with weights for many years. His huge size is likely the result of hard work and many years of lifting. With all the good protein supplementation there is, including creatine, it isn't impossible that some one could gain five solid pounds a year and suddenly eight years go by and they've gained 40lbs. McGwire was also taking a product called Androsteindione. As all serious lifters now know, that product was relatively worthless and a genuine waste of money. I also speak from experience. Androsteindione is called a precursor to steroids but its effects are nothing like steroids. It will jack up your testosterone for about three hours and then testosterone levels returns to normal. I will concede that this product may work for absolute beginners, women or people over 45 but for an experienced weightlifter, this product is an absolute waste. When you hear that McGwire took steroids you are hearing references to "Andro". Mainstream sports reporters who have never seen the inside of gym have no idea what steroids do and their reporting on steroids is atrocious. The knowledge is so bad that they don't even know the questions to ask.

Finally, my explanation for the homerun increase is due to the large number of homerun hitting paradises like Coors Field. The league is now bigger and this means many more relatively poor pitchers are in the league and lastly the decreased strike zone makes hitting homers quite a bit easier. Pitchers don't pitch inside, hitters crowd the plate and thus homers increase. Home runs have decreased in the last two years and this decrease is directly related to the newly increased strike zone.

In closing, over the last ten years we've seen a dramatic increase in homers but no other hitting statistic has increased, (exception, most hits by Suzuki) the most notable shortage is RBI's. Hack Wilson's record of 190 RBI is as unapproachable as ever. Maybe we should put an asterisk by his name that signifies how awesome his RBI record is.

RC
"The Strongest Rockie Fan"

Front Office..
An everyday lineup that plays half its games at Coors Field (CF) needs to have a radically different makeup than any other Major league team. The main difference being that the manager must manage his attack completely opposite while at home as compared to road games. No other team has this kind of problem to the degree that the Rockies have. Most players at that level can adjust their games slightly to meet the different nuances of the different parks they play in but for the most part, managers make their moves based on their personal rather than the ballpark they are playing at. This is not the case for a manager at CF. He must not only think of his players ability's but he must also incorporate those strengths into his strategy while at home.

The amazing thing that happened early on in the Rockies short history was that the inexperienced new Owners hired a good combo right off the bat. Bob Gebhard doesn't get much recognition for the job he did early on for the ballclub because of all the mistakes he made later on but he did stumble into the perfect CF lineup. And he also hired the best skipper this team will probably ever have in Don Baylor. Geb started off with a tiny budget and a team to fill. Many of the players he drafted and signed in that original expansion phase made up the team that was to be the perfect blend for success at high altitude during the good years 1995-1997.

Dan O'Dowd took over in 1999 when the owners decided that Gebhard wasn't doing the job any more. I believe most fans were in agreement when the change was finally made with many of us feeling that the wrong man was fired a year earlier when Baylor was let go instead of Geb. As soon as O'Dowd sat down at the big desk on 20th and Blake, he began making changes. The team definitely needed some kind of turn over because they weren't improving while getting older. However, O'Dowd was trading players and prospects without proper experience that is baseball in Denver.

Someone once wrote that a man can only attain his highest freedom only when he understood the parameters of his behavior and the behavior of his surroundings. O'Dowd was given carte blanche to make trades from the outset without fully realizing how the game is played in Coors Field. He then went about the business of building the team through trades and the draft on a false premise that speed and defense was the key to success. This philosophy was, of course, wrong. We don't necessarily condone him for trying something different, but it's generally true that most GM's wouldn't have survived such a mistake. So he tore the team apart time and again trying to find the right combination of players which only frustrated not only the fans of the team but the players, too.

O'Dowd is now putting together a team made basically from scratch. The good thing about the new players on this team is that they seem to fit the profile of the teams that have succeeded here. All except the speed element which will keep this team from achieving the kind of heights many of us so want to see.

The amazing power of the media has raised its ugly head once again. They struggle hard to shape our minds into their way of thinking and bombard us with misperceptions and influences on a daily bases. With virtually no accounting on to themselves, they can throw out ideas, lies and theories to fit the subject they want to exploit without regard to the damage it causes.

For instance the "Wayne Hagin incident." The former Rockie broadcaster was chatting the other day on ESPN radio and casually told the audience that Todd Helton was a steroid user until Don Baylor told him to stop. Baylor happen to read something about the statement and quickly came to Helton's defense by correcting Hagin's stupidity. It turns out all Helton was using was Creatine, which is a far cry from any association to Steroids. But the damage was already done. ESPN had already played the broadcast, newspapers and television had already reported it and Helton was put into an uncomfortable position of being linked with not only steroid use, but he had to share headlines with Bonds, Sosa, McGwire and the almighty United States Congress.

Poor Helton was next seen staring wild eyed into microphones and TV cameras commenting on mlb.com between clinched teeth,

                "I've worked hard my whole life to get to where I am and it's amazing
                one guy can say something, not knowing what he's talking about,
                obviously making a mistake and now I have to defend myself. And
                that's very unfortunate but that's the way it works. But, like I said, I've
                never used steroids and I never need to."

Damage done. The media wins again. They get their headline and a jump in ratings at the expense of a stand up guy. The unsuspecting masses, who are mostly ignorant on the subject, will forever link Helton to steroids and there's not a damn thing he can do about it.

Another fun example of media influence occurred Saturday in the News. Plastered across the front page was, "Climate melts skiing's future." Reading on tells us that global warming will eventually rob Colorado of a $2 billion dollar ski industry. Now it's true this isn't a baseball related item, but the point here is about misperceptions and influences of media and this is such a classic issue. Unless you read deep into the article or have any common sense at all, then you won't know that this outrageous headline is just so false. However, again, the damage has been already done. Most people who causally look at the paper are now convinced that we evil humans and our destructive ways are ruining everything including our beloved ski areas.

Global warming and its effects on Colorado's ski areas will not ruin the industry. This is a plain fact that anyone can read up on. If anything, global warming, which by the way there is quite a bit of research contradicting its very existence, will actually help snow fall rather than hinder it here in the high elevations. This is basically true because it snows less when it's really cold out. Ever notice the different between cold wet snow and cold fluffy snow? The reason for the difference is the temperature. The colder it gets, the less it snows because its just too darn cold. In other words, let the temperature rise a little up there in the hills and watch the snow depth triple. But if you read the papers and watch the telly, then you won't hear that stuff because it doesn't fit their theory that all humans, especially Americans, are evil creatures.

As we shape our opinions about things around our lives and livelihoods, we must be careful about where our influences come from. Generally it's incredibly important to gather facts from many sources, to study them, analyze them, then make an intelligent choice based on the evidence gathered. But we don't always do that. We get so busy doing this or that, that most times we read something or hear something, then make a quick judgment right then and there. And the media knows this. They know they can influence you into their way of thinking so that you buy their newspapers or increase your viewership so they can charge more from the advertisers which, in turn, increases their bottom line.

Wayne Hagin didn't get up that morning to dog Todd Helton, but he does get up every single day of his life thinking of ways to make a name for himself and his station in order to increase ratings. The important thing we can do as baseball fans and as Americans, is to think about things before making judgments. Don't let the Rocky or the Post or the TV force us into being shallow minded conformists.

"THE THIN AIR CHALLENGE"

We've all heard that the Rockies will never produce a winner because of the altitude and the effects it has on the pitchers. We think that this kind of thinking is false and the evidence is that in the Rockies third year of existence, and with a very ordinary set of starters they were in the playoffs as a wild card entrant and they then gave the Braves a real run for their money. This was the year that the team fielded the best bullpen they have ever had. A bull pen that had one of the best road ERA's in baseball. The strength of the bullpen is the key to the Rockies success or lack there of. (They also could steal bases that year but that is fodder for another story). FYI, historically, the Rockies pitching staff has always produced relatively good road ERA's.

The problems with the thin air are a real challenge. Atlanta pitcher Maddox is reported to have said that after pitching in Coors Field he was shot and his next start was worthless. We've noticed that if a Rockie pitches nine innings or 130 pitches or more his next start will be worthless. In order to get the curve ball or sinker to move a pitcher has to throw the ball much harder than normal. This extra effort will quickly wear a pitcher out in a game and then over the course of a season. "Res ipsa locquiter", let the facts speak for themselves. When Hampton started his first season here he jumped out to a 10 win first half and made the all-star team. His season was done after that. In fact the hangover lasted into the next season. His arm was literally devastated in only half a season. Darryl Kyle, God Bless him, had a similar problem. Darryl had a nasty curve ball that disappeared after half a season as a Rockie.

Kevin Ritz won 17 games in one season and never pitched again. The laundry list of failed, injured and ruined pitchers is stunning. We challenge anyone to come up with the name of one Rockie pitcher who ever put together a good second half of the season. Chacon has won 11 games in one half and only one in the second half. So bad is this problem that we constantly joke about the impending injury and arm problem that must be getting ready to develop on any pitcher who begins to put a little string of wins together.

In addition to the obvious altitude problem there is the challenge of the large outfield. Yes, there is a home run problem but we think the size of the outfield is a bigger problem as singles and doubles are easier to hit. Coors Field is the largest outfield in the major leagues and the size of this outfield just adds more pressure on the pitcher. (see above comments on stealing bases and the pressure that must be put on the opposing pitchers)

We think there are solutions to this altitude problem. The first solution is to never ever, hire a free agent curve ball or sinker ball pitcher. We've already described that a curve baller or sinker baller will never succeed at Coors Field. We think it would be fun to find out if a knuckleballer could work here, at least we wouldn't have to worry about a rag arm. This writer can make a knuckle ball move so we think a real professional pitcher could throw a really good knuckleball. This writer has actually spoken Dan O'Dowd about the hiring of free agents and we come away convinced that they will never again hire a big money free agent starting pitcher.

Next, produce home grown pitchers that have grown up at altitude. They key is to develop strong arms and mentalities that are used to no other environment but a Coors Field environment. We also think that pitchers must be control pitchers and they must have an off speed pitch. It is amazing how often a walk will lead to a run at Coors Field and this is due to the size of the outfield. The following is a tiring line made by numerous TV commentators but we think it is true at Coors. The pitchers need to have very good control and be able to keep the ball low and away. The speed of the pitch isn't the priority but the location is. Since a pitcher can't keep a batter off balance with a curve, slider or sinker the only choice the pitcher has is an off speed pitch. Jim Bohannon had his best success as a pitcher at Coors Field and he would throw 88 mph fastball followed by a 65 mile per hour off speed pitch. A slow curve at 70 mph has the same effect.

A fast ball pitcher is also a bit of a waste at Coors and the following is an explanation why. Every fast ball pitcher has a fast ball that will move in some direction, either in or out, down or up. At Coors Field the fast ball doesn't move but runs relatively straight. Vinny Castilla made a career hitting so called nasty fast balls. We can't count how many 99 mph fastballs he and others jerked out over the fence.

Next, the pitchers absolutely must be limited to roughly 100 pitches per game and this must be a hard and fast rule. This translates to about six innings. We think that Clint Hurdle seems to have recognized this dimension. This 100 pitch limit is the only way to get a pitcher through a season. The table on The Rox page will follow the progress of this 100 pitch theory. Further, we would go so far as to recommend missing a start every fifth turn or so just to give the pitchers some rest. We again remind the reader that every pitcher, and this is an absolute, craps out in the second half of the season. There is no opposite example.

The next and last component to success is the development of a bullpen. This is the area where we would suggest spending free agent money. Closers and set up men don't seem to wear out and there is no example of that occurring. The formula is as follows; The starter goes six innings, set up man goes one or two and then the closer closes out the deal. We again notice that Mr. Hurdle has seemed to realize that this is successful formula. This article now comes full circle, develop a set of five pitchers who can give the team six innings and let the bull pen win the game. The bull pen is the key. There will never be a star pitcher at Coors Field but there can be a set of five tough guy (physically and mentally) starters who can keep the Rockies in a game. There can be, though, a star closer on the team and we include the set up man in that equation. So certain are we of this that we think this could be the first team in baseball history to have a star set up man.