The Major League Baseball appeals process worked in favor of New York Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez on Saturday, as the 211-game suspension that was handed to Rodriguez Aug. 5 for violating MLB’s Joint Drug Agreement ”“ for allegedly using performance-enhancing drugs ”“ was reduced to 162 games by arbitrator Frederic Horowitz.
The reduction is not a win, however, for Rodriguez, who, unless he can get his case to the U.S. Supreme Court and have it overturn the entire suspension, will have to sit out the entire 2014 regular season and postseason.
The ruling is a win, though, for Major League Baseball and the game of baseball in general. Unless a higher authority rules in favor of Rodriguez, he won’t be seen on the baseball diamond in any of MLB’s 30 parks.
And that is good for the game.
Rodriguez wasn’t the first baseball player to use performance-enhancing drugs, such as steroids, human-growth hormones or any of the countless other PEDs that MLB can’t keep up with, and he certainly won’t be the last. But more so than Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa or Roger Clemens, Rodriguez has become the face of PED use in baseball.
He used PEDs before MLB started issuing penalties for use, prior to the 2005 season. Rodriguez admitted in an interview with ESPN in 2009 that he used PEDs during the 2001-03 seasons while with the Texas Rangers.
But that wasn’t the end of Rodriguez’ use of PEDs, according to Anthony Bosch, the founder of Biogenesis, a now-closed anti-aging clinic in Coral Gables, Fla. Bosch was the key figure in a PED scandal that also included a dozen other MLB players. Bosch told MLB investigators, as well as a national television audience on CBS’ “60 Minutes” on Sunday night, that he provided Rodriguez, and sometimes injected him with, banned substances, including testosterone and HGH.
Through all of this, Rodriguez has been defiant, save for his admission to ESPN in 2009. No more so than now, since he was first linked to Biogenesis last summer. Rodriguez has repeatedly denied using any banned substances, even though the 12 other players associated with Biogenesis took their own 50-game suspensions last season and have moved on.
Rodriguez and his repeated use of banned substances hurt the game of baseball. Players who use performance-enhancing drugs cheat the game and cheat the players who vow to play clean.
Baseball fans were duped in the summer of 1998, when McGwire and Sosa battled it out to see who could break Roger Maris’ single-season record of 61 home runs. The nation was captivated as both men broke Maris’ record ”“ McGwire finished with 70, Sosa with 66. We were all captivated once again three years later when Bonds surpassed that total, with 73 home runs, and again in 2007, when Bonds broke Hank Aaron’s all-time record of 755.
By the time Bonds surpassed Aaron, many baseball fans had soured on the slugger, as he had long been linked to steroids. Another record had been achieved by an alleged cheater.
It was that same season that Rodriguez hit his 500th career home run, and baseball fans started to look to him to be the clean player who would surpass even Bonds’ total. But that was before the real Rodriguez, the PED-using Rodriguez, was uncovered.
Bosch said in his interview with “60 Minutes” that Rodriguez was obsessed with using PEDs to hit 800 career home runs. A season-long suspension for the 38-year-old slugger makes that milestone seem impossible now.
Rodriguez’ act has even soured among his peers, as Boston Red Sox pitcher Ryan Dempster showed in a game against the Yankees on Aug. 18. Rodriguez stepped to the plate in the second of the game, and Dempster threw the first three pitches precariously close to Rodriguez, and none of them even sniffed the strike zone. The fourth pitch finally drilled Rodriguez, and while Dempster denied intentionally trying to hit Rodriguez, it sent a message to Rodriguez about how other players feel about him.
Rodriguez’ battle with MLB over his original 211-game suspension that started last August took attention away from the actual play on the field. Major League Baseball is trying to distance itself farther away from the supposed “Steroid Era” and to a new, cleaner game, where athleticism takes the place of pure power.
A season without Alex Rodriguez would help MLB take another step away from that dark period in its history, and make the game of baseball better, for its fans and its future players.
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Today’s editorial was written by Sportswriter Wil Kramlich on behalf of the Journal Tribune Editorial Board. Questions? Comments? Contact Managing Editor Kristen Schulze Muszynski by calling 282-1535, ext. 322, or via email at kristenm@journaltribune.com.
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