I WEIGHED IN ON CAFTA LAST WEEK, AND SINCE THE CHINESE TOOK UNOCAL OFF THE LIST of burning issues, I will move on to another big-business controversy:
Steroids in baseball.
Apparently Rafael Palmeiro, despite his sworn protestation before Congress, hasn’t relied solely on natural reflexes and Viagra to post Hall of Fame-caliber numbers.
While the use of dangerous drugs is an awful example to set for the kids, I’m not sure that the sight of aging-but-buffer-than-ever athletes setting records and signing multimillion-dollar contracts is going to hurt the steroid trade.
Your thoughts, Gov. Arnold?
But I digress.
Right and wrong, good and bad, fair and cheating, legal and illegal,these are matters that could take organized baseball, the owners, the players and the public a long time to sort out.
Until integrity can be restored to the National Pastime, I propose a simple way to protect the sport’s legends and traditions, while still giving the modern game its due: Call in the asterisk.
The asterisk,widely blasted as unfair when Roger Maris was surpassing Babe Ruth’s cherished single-season homerun record back in 1961,turns out just to have been a concept ahead of its time.
What better way to reconcile past with present than by qualifying all modern records? Some may see the asterisk as a scarlet letter, so be it. I see it merely as an indication, “Things are different than they used to be.”
I suggest the asterisk be applied to all records from 1995 on. The mid-1990s is when ballplayers and homeruns began ballooning. And ’94 is when another modern phenomenon,every ballplayer a millionaire,led to the first cancellation of a season. When baseball resumed, the owners accurately gauged that a key way to win back the fans was to juice the offense.
Until recently few of us seemed to care if that meant juiced players, too.
Now, we do care. And superstars such as McGwire, Bonds and Palmeiro are fallen heroes, sad or ridiculous in what they say or don’t say.
But let’s not judge too harshly. Just give ’em an asterisk.
,Rick Reiff
