Manny’s Expecting!!

Proud Parent - Manny Ramirez

Ladies and gentlemen, our very own Manny Ramirez is trying to get preggers. Today it was made public that he tested positive for HCG – a female fertility drug. Will it be a boy? Will it be a girl? Will it be eight boys and girls? Octo-Manny … wouldn’t that be something special? But what I don’t understand is why Major League Baseball punished this baby lover with a 50 game suspension and partial salary forfeiture of $7.7 million for trying to get knocked up? I mean, the miraculousness of child birth is sacred and cherished, and for the MLB to deem HCG a banned substance is cruel and insensitive to Manny’s fatherly dreams.

HCG, which is known to be used by former steroid users, restarts the body’s testosterone cycle and boosts sperm count. By the way, this is the only statistic that Manny is trying inflate by using this substance. But back to the important issue not to be ignored. Manny is trying to be a father, people. Yes, 2 boys have already been born from the fruit of his juiced loins, but he wants more. He needs more. He just wants a baby girl in the Ramirez clan – just a daughter to push on the swings, jump rope with, and teach how to dreadlock her own hair like his. Is that so criminal of him? Are we, the people of America, so cold and short sighted as to dismiss him as a liar and a cheat for one positive test of a fertility drug? Who are we to cast a judging eye onto a good man who just wants to be a papi. I for one will not condemn him for yearning to experience the joys of childbirth yet again. I mean, he sacrificed his reputation and $7.7 million for another offspring. Is he not allowed his happiness, America?

Also, the MLB’s punishing of Manny brings up an incredibly important social issue. Professional male athletes sometimes get a bad rap as being philanderers and womanizers who seek to spread their seeds and have love children with loose and tawdry women. Its dealing with Ramirez is obviously a case of the MLB banning HCG and the like to prohibit players from becoming illegitimate baby daddies. Yeah, the testosterone part is important too. But what’s paramount here is that the MLB is taking a stand against unplanned childbirth. And I call that being a responsible organization with family values. Furthermore, it’s quite amazing how the MLB has family values in mind while still being so anti-children in Manny’s case.

Now trusty Juan's gotta pick up the pieces ... as usual.

In a related topic, in celebration of Cinco de Mayo, the Dodgers organization promoted their newly named section of seats in left field – Mannywood, in honor of former fan favorite Manny Ramirez. Little did those fans (and the rest of the baseball world) know that the slogan on the promotional shirts that were printed and sold in Mannywood that night would forebode the Dodger fan’s worst fear. The shirts read “I was in Mannywood” in Spanish. “Was” being the painful word. Unfortunately for the Dodgers, the Mayor of Mannywood will be perennial under-performer Juan Pierre for the next 50 games. And even more unfortunately for Mannywood is that it doesn’t exist anymore. The Dodgers felt it appropriate to rename this section “Dodgertown.” That beat out “Juanwood” in the emergency brainstorm session? Boooring.

Estoy viendo los Lakers.

Hey Mexico, Get Your Act Together

Who’s getting sick of talking about the economy? Everybody, especially those in the media. In fact, we’re so desensitized with all of this economic talk about about Tim Geithner’s inability to be relevant, AIG and Goldman Sach’s crooked idiocy galvanizing the country into a unified outrage, and how to good ole days are over. I mean, yes America’s economy and perhaps the world’s economic order is steadily sprinting towards the cliff for total financial doom…yada yada yada. But after hearing about this crisis non-stop for the last few months, it’s really starting to make Americans sad.  So, those “liberal media elites” are giving their boy, Barack, some slack on the inital (and hopefully temporary) shortcomings of his economy recovery plan by diverting attention to a less depressing topic – Mexican Armageddon.

Mexico is dying. It’s rotten and diseased. And while everybody knows what’s wrong with it, no one can do a thing to help it out of its existential cesspool. It’s the Rush Limbaugh of countries right now…except that we kind of care about Mexico. Its troubles are twofold.  America’s controversial war on drugs allows drug lords to flourish should they be industrious enough (which they are) to traffic their product into the States for deep-pocketed consumers. Also, Mexico’s failure to provide its citizens with security for so many years has given these cartels free reign over las ciudades as political assassinations and corruption are regular and rampant. The police force is underwhelming and serves as target practice for the bad guys as its officers are inadequately trained, shockingly undermanned, and easily corrupted. But what can be done to alleviate this madness? The U.S. could decriminalize all drugs and regulate their sale in this country while taxing all transactions and profits made from them. That would bring in a constant revenue stream and might even serve as a Heimlich thrust for this choking economy. But the key is regulation, which is always difficult to achieve effectively on a national scale. “I want to control it as a business. I don’t want it near schools. I don’t want it sold to children. That’s an infamnia,” as one portly mafioso once said. But it’s not as easy as saying words with conviction, as we’ve seen with the unfortunate rise of underage alcoholism and smoker’s lung. Legalization of at least some drugs should be allowed, though, like marijuana. I personally have never tried it; but it seems to me that it’s the one drug that never killed anybody. Plus, if there’s anything that Michael Phelps has taught us, it’s that you can smoke the mary jane and still win 14 gold medals by the age of 23, rise to international super-stardom, and also enjoy Lil’ Wayne’s music without people ridiculing you for it. Taking another pull out of Phelps’ stroke, you can also eat 10,000 calories a day as long as you swim 10,000 yards every day. This guy really reaches for the extremes when following the adage, “balance is everything.” What a role model. Be like Mike.

Back to Mexico. The new found attention that this flavor-of-the-week news story has garnered will buy President Obama some time wherein his economic plan can begin to take effect and the stock market can clutch onto any vine to pull itself out of this recessional quicksand. Take people’s minds off of the economy is the subtle agenda. Obama has just wrapped up a media blitzkrieg by appearing on The Tonight Show and 60 Minutes and by holding a nationally-televised press conference trying to give us a little peace of mind as he tries to assure us that he’s the steady hand on the rudder of recovery. A bit of levity and some charisma go a long way in getting everybody to breathe easier for a moment about financial ruin so that brainiac Barack can have some time to get us back on track.

But really, the crap-fest in Mexico reminds Americans that even though we’re going through rough times, other people have got it rougher. Murder, crime, drugs, beheadings, kidnappings, political assassinations, watching this on TV. So let’s all count to ten and chill out a little bit regarding our financial woes. At least we’re not living in Mexico.

If You Twitter, They Will Follow (Continued)

Below are some pretend tweets that I’d like to see.

If You Twitter, They Will Follow

Yesterday, Twitter – the now ubiquitous social networking medium created about 3 years ago – burrowed its way through my instinctive aversion to it when a good friend sent me the link to his new Twitter page. He’s the first person, out of the literally dozens of people that I’ve ever met, to join Twitter Nation. After looking at his page and those of a few random people, I can understand its appeal while realizing that it just doesn’t appeal to me. At least, not yet.

Twittering will let you type messages of 140 characters or less on your personal Twitter page in order to broadcast a message to the world while also communicating with specific people. Each person’s page is essentially a bunch of Facebook-like status updates organized as a blog page. Each page can be updated by entering a new tweet through a computer or cell phone. Twitter’s main stream popularity really sky-rocketed after President Obama’s first address to Congress where several congressmen and senators twittered not about the historic speech that they were witnessing, but about trivial things. At one point during Obama’s speech, Texas representative Joe Barton issued a snarky tweet, “Aggie basketball game is about to start on espn2 for those of you that aren’t going to bother watching pelosi smirk for the next hour,” referring to House Speaker, Nancy, who was sitting in plain view directly behind the president during his address. Since then, Twitter has been blowin’ up with media attention. Now, most people are amused by it or just don’t get it; some have even gone so far as to deride it with put-downs and nasty words. Similar in that regard to the crime against humanity called Crocs, Twittering is sometimes perceived as being loud and unnecessary, but won’t fizzle into irrelevancy because it’s being pervaded into our lives with such rude and unrelenting persistence.

But from the way Twitter markets itself though its demo video, it’s supposed to invite your family, friends, and acquaintances into your life, your real life that apparently happens between emails and phone calls and blog posts. So actually, the really important stuff in your life isn’t what you deem worthy of the extra effort to type a thought-out and purposeful email. Rather the important stuff lies with those little things you should choose to tweet about whimsically, such as: i am drinking root beer, my dog is flatulent, at work … bored, in class … bored, at dinner … very excited, don’t know where my phone is, can someone tweet it? Needless to say the tweets end up being just random thoughts or brief opinions about occurrences that other people are supposed to be amused by. Twittering seems like it’s for any of us who has concise thoughts to divulge, but no one immediate nearby to divulge them to. Twitter is almost like an imaginary friend who’s always there to listen. This begs the question: do we really need to be saying something all the time? Apparently we absolutely do.

For example, take senior U.S. senator and national disappointment – John McCain. All I know is that his Twitter page better be connected directly to his Blackberry. Because if I’ve been refreshing his page every 5 minutes, checking for updates, to read the John McCain’s authentically dry, snide, coma-inducing remarks and it turns out to be somebody else’s maverickiness that I’m absorbing, that would be quite angering. I need my daily dose of bitter-old-man hatefulness  from this adorable Vietnam war veteran. I crave that frequent sensation of apathy and disinterest whenever he tweets about pork barrel spending and earmark reform. Let’s examine 3 particular tweets from March 10. Prefacing these 3 posts, McCain lists, in his noble opinion, the top 10 pieces of pork for that day. Who knows if he’s actually researched and looked closely at all of this so-called pork; but some of them don’t sound like pork, at face value at least. Like this $50,000 worth of spending for the City of Charlotte for gang prevention – maybe gang prevention is defined as pork from McCain’s senile disposition, but it sounds alright at first glance. Now, other particular spending doesn’t seem so sound, like $1,284,525 for Rolls Royce; that seems no bueno, especially with the added gravity of it being on his Twitter page. And I just gave myself that rush of apathy and disinterest! Who needs John McCain after all? Anyways, back to those 3 special tweets. From what I can piece together, he was gleefully frustrated with other members defending their porky earmarks. And due to the awkward pause he himself created through his statement about the increase in earmarks from 1991 until now, Mr. McCain felt it appropriate to tweet a link to a 4-second-long YouTube clip of crickets chirping.

Perusing John’s tweets got me thinking about what Twitter pages would have to be created for me to take the plunge into this unappealing network. Not that the doyerfan doesn’t keep me chomping at the bit for more fresh updates, but the following would really make Twitter entertaining. And until these are created, I don’t see it happening. I’ll share those later. Until then, watch Adolf share his thoughts and enamorments of Twitter.

“Pools of Sorrow, Waves of Joy”

The Los Angeles Clippers played a basketball game earlier this week, and I know you don’t care. But Chris Kaman did make his first start since late November, meaning that all of the Clippers’ big name players were suited up and ready to go. Still not doin’ it for ya? Well, the game was played at Staples Center – home of the Lakers? Even the mention of the Lakers isn’t enough to elicit a favorable reaction for the Clippers, is it? Ok, what if I told you that they played LeBron James and the Cavaliers? Is that something you might be interested in?

The King posted his 22nd career triple-double versus the Clippers.

On Tuesday night, we witnessed one of the most dynamic and well-performing teams in the league visit one of the most poorly run and blatantly wretched franchises in the history of athletic competition. The Cleveland Cavaliers and King James entered Staples Center to face the floundering Clippers with a chance to claim a share of the league’s best record thus far, while the Clip Show came into the game tied for the 2nd worst record in the Association. But until it dawned on the Cavs how much humiliation a loss to the Clippers would mean for their friends and families, we observed two very contrasting teams play equally poorly for 36 brief minutes, only to have them regress to their rightful roles in the end. Or as the always eloquent voice of the Clippers – Ralph Lawler solemnly proclaimed, “the Clippers get their heart breaken again.” Bingo, Ralph.

The Clippers showcased a surprising starting lineup, in that the oft-injured Chris Kaman played his first minutes since 48 games ago. Baron Davis, Al Thornton and Eric Gordon also started with Marcus Camby playing 6th man, while Zach Randolph and his groundswell of lethargy rounded out the starting 5. On paper, this roster doesn’t look completely pathetic. But the inability to keep players healthy, a doofus for a head coach and an owner with Barack-ish patience (that prevents him from firing the general manager/coach) have earned this squad of losers its current hole in the ground at the bottom of the league.

Bron, snapshotting his Cavs' flyness

The Cavaliers’ offense crippled itself with poor shooting throughout the first 3 quarters. Mo Williams, Delonte West, and even LeBron James uncharacteristically failed to see their shots touch net during this span. It appeared to be one of those nights where a great team just can’t buy a bucket. Following a rousing pep talk from the King during the half-time break, the Cavs descended even further into embarrassment throughout the 3rd quarter. The Clippers had built their lead up to an almost untouchable 19 points; but when a team as regrettable as the Clippers are out in front of one as sound as the Cavs, evidently no lead is insurmountable. LeBron took over in the 4th with his versatile onslaught of making shots, sinking free throws and dishing to fellow Cavs for open looks. He finished with an impressive stat line, garnering a triple-double in his 2nd straight game. His 32 points, 13 boards, 11 assists, 2 steals, 2 rejections and 12 of 16 makes from the stripe as the spearhead of his squad’s destruction of a 19-point deficit only proved that the Cleveland Cavaliers are f’real.

Making Los Angeles’ 4th favorite basketball team look foolish in all departments, from game play to general management to fan base to a broad business model, were those Cleveland Cavs. Led by an authentic superstar and coupled by a general manager who nurtures a winning attitude, the Cavs needed only 4 seasons with BronBron at the helm to reach the NBA finals. And in an effort to retain the future of basketball in a Cavs jersey after his contract expires in 2010 and in order to prime the franchise for another title shot, the management further complemented its basketball Jesus with role players and play makers, the most catalyzing of whom being Mo Williams aka Bron’s Scottie. The Cavalier front office seemingly has the foresight and good judgment to complete the right deals and pursue the most fitting talent to put its team in a winning position. In contrast, the Clippers franchise has won only 3 playoff games since 1993 and just one playoff series in the past 20 years. And this explosion of accomplishments all occurred in just one post-season – 2006. How long can this franchise continue to coast on the overstated achievements of this lone, at best satisfactory season? Hopefully forever, because that’s all it has going for it, aside from those offensively entertaining commercials featuring Baron Davis and Marcus Camby urging us to “play loud.”

From its lifeless acting to its listless play on the hardwood, the forlorn Los Angeles Clippers is an entire organization of losers. Beginning at the top, owner Donald Sterling doesn’t know how to get the most bang for his buck. I mean, Elton Brand, Corey Maggette, Chris Kaman, Baron Davis, Marcus Camby, Zach Randolph, Michael Olowokandi? Be assured that these are players who have accomplished next to nothing with regards to individual accolades and even less when it comes to team achievements. The Kandi Man excluded, they all played integral roles for their respective former teams and had to scratch and claw to secure even an 8th seed in the playoffs. And Clipper management thought it a sound investment to unite these underachieving, overrated ne’er-do-well despondents to contend for a championship? I’m beginning to suspect that this is just a ruse in Donald Sterling’s nefarious design to re-create some hoops-version of the Cleveland Indians a la Charlie Sheen’s cult classic Major League. But there probably won’t be a Disney ending to this Clipper script if they continue to bungle and botch 19 point leads in the 4th quarter at home.

Mike Dunleavy Sr., seen here with his openly incestuous perv of a son, Mike Dunleavy Jr.

But most of the blame for the toilet bowl that is the Clippers has to fall to Mike Dunleavy Sr., who serves as head coach and general manager. In a rare position to fill both roles, Dunleavy wouldn’t be criticized if his team didn’t fail at such intense levels. And despite twice taking his former team, the Portland Trailblazers, to the Western Conference finals in the late-’90s, Dunleavy is failing his current team. Through 474 games at his current posts, the Clippers have amassed 284 losses and only 190 wins. Sure, numerous player injuries exacerbated the Clippers’ woes. But at some point Sterling has to say enough is enough and cut Dunleavy off. His contract expires in 2011; so maybe Clipper nation can breathe new life then. Or, Dunleavy could spare his unborn grandchildren any further associational humiliation, based purely on their familial ties, and retire from basketball immediately.

That game was a snapshot of the Good, and also the Bad and the Ugly. The Good: Cavs owner Dan Gilbert, GM Danny Ferry and head coach LeBron James. This organization has willed itself into fighting form through good judgment and sound planning across the board. However, this franchise’s one downer is still the god-awful name of the place that they call home in downtown Cleveland – Quicken Loans Arena. Compared to Portland’s Rose Garden, Detroit’s Palace of Auburn Hills, or even the old Great Western Forum in Inglewood, saying the words “Quicken Loans Arena” makes my tongue contemplate suicide. I can see why Clevelanders have dubbed the QLA, “the Q,” for short. Much snazzier. Meanwhile in Palookaville, the Clippers demonstrated The Bad, like really really bad … bad ownership, bad management, bad coaching, bad playing, bad shooting, bad passing, bad defense, bad attitude, bad doing, bad saying, bad thinking, bad being, bad wanting to being. You get the idea. And symmetrically enough, the one glimmer of positivity for the Clippers is the place that they call home in downtown L.A. – Staples Center. The Ugly: Zach Randolph.

Really, in that single game the Clippers instructed the world on how to drive a basketball franchise into the ground, while the Cavaliers demonstrated how to embed feelings of existential angst and everlasting envy in an opponent. With under 20 games remaining in this regular season and seemingly no winds of change to be signaled for at least another year, these two ball clubs will continue to align with their respective paths, so long as the Cavs retain LeBron James and the Clips continue to employ Mike Dunleavy Sr.

Dominant, Dynamic, Diesel: The Big Legendary.

This weekend’s NBA All-Star Game showcased the talents and personality of a goliath among men – Shaquille O’Neal. Well into the twilight years of his Hall of Fame career, he shifted into vintage-Shaq-mode and created some parting memories to remind us of why we like him so much. Despite his dissing of Kobe Bryant in a freestyle rap last summer, his current membership in the Phoenix Suns organization or however else this friendly giant chooses to publically embarrass himself, he will forever be lauded as one of the game’s most unstoppable players; and we admire him for that.

Aside from performing a viciously sexy pop-n-lock routine with America’s best dance crew, O’Neal lit up the hardwood every time he touched the rock. His highlight of the night was most certainly his pass between Dwight Howard’s legs to Chris Paul to preface a Shaq-sized all-handed slam. And after accepting the co-MVP trophy with Kobe, he even assigned new nicknames for himself and his former first mate – The Big Legendaries. How poignant. He’s as wise as he is large. This adds to a several other titles self-proclaimed by Shaq, signifying his playful relationship with the media. Such notables include: Shaq Fu, The Big Aristotle, The Big Baryshnikov, The Big Deporter and Superman. (We’re lucky that Shaq didn’t let Kobe pick out another nickname. “Wilt Chamberneezy” is, frankly, just lazy.) On a side note, how did Dwight Howard get away with so arrogantly claiming the nickname “Superman” from Shaq? After all, the Superman logo and the words “Man of Steel” were tattooed on Shaq’s arm long before Howard donned the red cape for last year’s Slam Dunk Contest. I guess when your name is Dwight, like Schrute, you want all of the aliases you can get, only Howard’s nickname should be the Man of Steal because he has verbal larceny in his heart.

While we’re on the topic of nicknames for NBA players, Man of Steal would be apt for Chris Paul, especially since CP3 isn’t much of a nickname at all. And like Paul, Kobe is one of the few superstars in the league without a cool go-to moniker; Black Mamba is still not cool. Also, putting the first letter of a player’s first name in front of the first syllable of his last name does not constitute a nickname, prime examples being T-Mac, D-Wade, D-Will, D-Rose, K-Dur, B-Roy, J-Rich, D-Fish. Practically every player’s name can be made to sound catchy by employing this generic formula. Let’s pack a new lunch. We can start with some of the more hilarious names currently in use around the league: The Machine – Sasha Vujacic, Ason Kidd which humorously notes Jason Kidd’s lack of a Jump shot, DaWhite Howard – David Lee, The Goods – Lamar Odom, and Veal – Brian Scalabrine. But the most B.A. nicknames in the Association are still Allen Iverson’s The Answer, Shawn Marion’s The Matrix, and LeBron James’ King James. And as homage to how spectacular of a player ‘Bron will be, all of us now have nicknames just for saying “present” at the dawn of the LeBron James era.  Apparently we are all witnesses.

Back to the co-MVP award… Did anybody else get goose bumps seeing Kobe and Shaq hoist a trophy together over their heads? Standing side by side again as winners, those two were nostalgia personified for Laker fans everywhere. No matter which team or players you root for, you have to give pause and respect to one of the greatest tandems in sports history.

Shaq’s playing days won’t be soon forgotten by the game of basketball or by the world of sports. And let’s not overlook his titanic impact on the music and film industries with critically acclaimed albums such as You Can’t Stop the Reign and Oscar-contenders such as Kazaam. Perhaps he’ll rediscover those endeavors, continue business ventures, serve and protect as a police officer, seek political office, or just linger as a sports analyst or special commentator. But once he hangs up those size 23 sneaks, the game just won’t be the same. For so long, his childish smile and contagious enthusiasm buttressed by his lioning dominance on the court solidified him as the most instantly charismatic personality in sports. We’ll miss him as he passes the baton of likeability to LeBron. But as King James is still a work in progress to achieve that ultimate strata of magnetism, we’ll have to make do with his SNL hostings, Dwight Howard’s one-trick-ponied Soulja Boy dance, and Jeff Van Gundy.

Can we move on?

Recent sports history highlights a favorable strategy for athletes tied to performance enhancing drugs. This history tells us that once you’ve been cornered by relatively damning evidence suggesting your drug usage, you’re better off fessing up to that wrongdoing rather than denying it. Two of the most storied ball players of this generation, Roger Clemens and Mark McGuire, chose the latter avenue. They fought their accusers in court and in the press to vindicate their reputations and legacies of doping allegations. Going one step further, Barry Bonds’ former strength trainer, who is suspected of having intimate knowledge of the home run king’s steroid use, refuses to cooperate with federal prosecutors (perhaps at Barry’s behest) and is sitting in a jail cell on contempt of court charges. But in 2009 after a public circus of investigations, federal indictments, congressional hearings, and solemn testimonies, Clemens, McGwire and Bonds remain convicted in the public’s eyes. So, as he too was staring down the barrel of public scrutiny in response to Sports Illustrated’s allegations of steroid abuse, Alex Rodriguez faced the music and admitted to using a banned substance from 2001 to 2003.

Going the way of former teammates Andy Pettitte and Jason Giambi, Alex confessed to using performance enhancers, but only after the facts had already come out and public finger pointing had begun. Both Andy and Jason publicly apologized to everybody on Earth for roiding and were widely forgiven but forgotten; Rodriguez is hoping to be forgiven for his negatives and remembered for only his positives. But A-Rod is in a completely different stratosphere than any other big leaguer who has admitted to steroid use as he is a full-blown superstar, a 3-time MVP, the highest-paid player in history and the presumptive future home run king. Moreover, Rodriguez was, until this week, widely considered to be the savior of baseball – a white knight unofficially appointed to rescue the game from the shame and shadows of the steroid era. And although his hulking physique suggested that he had been juicing for years, A-Rod vehemently insisted on his all-naturalness and never failed a drug test. Therefore, we all desperately wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt and believe that he was legit. But he’s not. And it’s important to examine why he fell from grace.

As part of its business model to achieve lucrative sponsorships, record-highs in viewership and increased interest in the sport, Major League Baseball has been trying to cash in on the true belief that entertainment value sells better than the subtle nuances of the game and that fans want to see homeruns instead of a pitchers’ duel. By approving the construction of more hitter-friendly ballparks, its business plan came to fruition as Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and A-Rod broke records and sold admission tickets. Eventually, greed for fame and fortune flourished as players yearned to sign mammoth-sized contracts, rewrite the hallowed record books and achieve baseball immortality. So, they juiced. They knew it was essentially cheating and must have found it as easy as cow hunting while the MLB turned a blind eye to the practice by not imposing restrictions, regular testing or punishments. In similar fashion the Players Union protected its players from being tested, claiming that it would be a violation of their civil liberties, which is bunk. Therefore, it’s all for the money and the accolades. And since an overwhelming majority of baseball fans don’t know what it’s like to be salaried at $25 mil per year, it’s somewhat unfair to forever condemn these athletes who command such a jarring plethora of riches. You can blame the hyper-capitalistic environment or the nature of the beast. But, honestly, you can’t be that surprised at what all of these parties did. Too much green was injected into the equation. It’s as simple as that.

What must be realized from baseball’s tainting is that we should decrease our vested interest in the game and cut back on our preoccupation with records and statistics. We should avoid the sainting of ball players as heroes as they are of no special pedigree of moral justness and they lay victim to the same curiosities and temptations that itches at the minds and hearts of the rest of us. Really , we should simply take from the game what it gives us – healthy entertainment and mild interest. We are, after all, fans not obsessors.

As for the records and asterisks that are often committed to memory, I propose that two main sets of record books should now exist. One book should house the still-coveted records of the game’s undeniable giants who were probably not on steroids – Babe, Jackie, Hank, Mickey, Lou, Ted. And since it’s hasty and irrational to strike all suspected cheaters’ stats from record (since each juicer’s numbers affects every clean player’s and vice versa), this entire steroid generation will make up the separate and unequal book of juicers and juicers by association – headlined by Bonds, Rodriguez, Clemens. This way all stats can be accounted for and recognized as different, which they clearly are.

The only way to progress beyond this steroid era is for the MLB to clear the air as much as possible. A-Rod’s transcendent demise was rooted in the now publicized MLB survey from 2003 which simply sought to discover how many players were enhanced. 103 of A-Rod’s peers tested positive as well. Despite the MLB’s intention to keep these results anonymous and secret, A-Rod’s name and positive test results were leaked, perhaps by federal investigators. But let’s not stop there. As Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis once proclaimed, “sunlight is the best disinfectant.” To Bud Selig: get baseball out from behind the eight ball and release the other 103 names. Sprinkle some sunlight on the game and be done with it because we’re all sick of hearing about steroids.