M-Day Looms

[Guest Edgy DC]

The George Mitchell report is expected to be published tomorrow, with a spillage of 50 to 80 names of current and former users. In anticipation of its release, Devid Segui has come out and fessed up more fully, and Steve J. Rogers has already penned a screed protraying us as hypocrites.

The worst reflection on the Mets is probably already out, when you think about it, that Kirk Radomski operated right under their noses for so long.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I think the worst part is the "whispers" that Steve has been hearing for years. Of course, those can probably be easily treated with medication.

[Guest Kid Carsey]

Certainly vodka hasn't been doing the trick.

I'm expecting a whole lot of Mets dirt when it's released. Can't wait.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

What a complete clusterfuck this will be. If mlb & the players association had an ounce of common sense they'd have declared amnesty for all PED users to the point at which the new cba took effect, admitted there was an epidemic and asked for forgiveness and a fresh start.

They'll have to do that now anyway, but only after getting their names dragged through the mud and being made to look like complete fools.

[metirish]

I've had myself programmed for some time to expect some Mets favorites to be named, that way I won't be all that shocked.

[Benjamin Grimm]

The two Mets I'm most suspicious of are Hundley and Dykstra.

[metirish]

A dumb question, will the probe go back that far?

[Frayed Knot]

There's a lengthy preview (worth reading) over on ESPN.com by Howard Bryant - a guy who once wrote a book on steroids in sports, or steroids in baseball really since no one seems to care about its use anywhere else.


Will Carroll at Baseball Prospectus gave a quickie take on it as well:
The Mitchell Report has been delivered to the Office of the Commissioner. That is in line with things that I’ve been hearing about the release of the document, which many are targeting for Thursday. I’m hearing from various independent sources that press conferences are being arranged for the release, but that these will come on Friday. We’ll wait for MLB to make official announcements on these.

The delivery of the final report can also start the clock on the leak of the document. Draft reports have been known to be in the hands of some writers for better than a month, with some versions focused on the ending recommendations and others as more of a chronology. It’s possible, even likely, that various versions will be ‘merged’ into the final document. Estimates on names - and let’s face it, the coverage and interest in this document is only in the names it will name, especially if they’re big names - go anywhere from a low of 40 to a high of 200. My guess? Just under 100. That number would indicate the the Mitchell Report did *not* have the Quest list that the government seized as part of the BALCO investigation, or at least did not publish it. (I’m told that Mitchell has called it “fruit of the poison tree” and argued against its inclusion.)

Howard Bryant's breakdown of the document at ESPN is well worth reading. He’s absolutely right that trainers and conditioning coaches seemed to bear a stronger burden during the investigation, one that will likely be carried over to the final report. I’ll admit an affinity for them but they’re an easy target, one that many will wrongly think are replaceable.

It’s a day that many have been waiting for and now it’s at hand. How dark a day or how bright the disinfecting sunlight is will be known soon.


I agree with Carroll in that most of the interest around this will be in what names are named although personally that aspect has only a passing interest to me. After all, it's not like I'm going to treat players NOT on the report as if they've been proven clean. And, at the same time, I'm not going to automatically disown all those who are fingered since not only are there different degrees of guilt (something that's almost sure to get lost in all the breathless gossip) but it's going to be tough to publicly flog someone for competing in a legue where 20%?, 40%?, maybe 60% of his competitors were too.

I don't want to sweep this whole thing under the rug, but I'm much more interested in the future of this topic than I am in trying to 'un-ring the bell' so to speak while pretending we can correct the past.

[soupcan]

="Benjamin Grimm"]The two Mets I'm most suspicious of are Hundley and Dykstra.

I'll add Gilkey, Piazza and Ventura as my suspects.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

I'd be surprised if this report doesn't ultimately serve to muddy up the whodunnit question even more by giving the impression that those ballplayers whose names don't appear as necessarily "clean."

[HahnSolo]

50 to 80 names? Seems like they spent an awfully long time and effort to come up with such small numbers. I don't believe this will "close the book" on the steroids era, rather we'll still have almost as many questions as before. Because there must be other Kurt Radomskis out there.

[smg58]

Not only is an incomplete list of names unfair and potentially misleading, but there's also a chance that some of players who do get named don't actually belong there. I'm not sure what positive thing is supposed to be accomplished by this exercise.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Well, a complete list of users is impossible.

[smg58]

Of course. I think a reasonably accurate estimate of how many people were juicing in the 90's -- and, more importantly, how many are doing it now -- would be beneficial, but digging up the dirt on some of the guilty players from ten years ago strikes me as pointless and counterproductive.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Well, suppose thatthey have a list of customers from 1996 that includes Greg Maddux and Roger Clemens. Should Maddux's disgrace be public because he's active and Clemens be buried because he's not?

[Frayed Knot]

MLB should be more interested in;
- finding what kinds of organizational flaws (both league-wide and within individual teams) led them to miss and/or dismiss this issue for so long in the first place
- continuing to improve the fractured mgmt/player relationship which kept testing from being on the bargaining table for so many years
- and in working to stay on top of the testing/treatment programs as they move forward
then in finding scapegoats and dishing dirt while pretending that this investigation puts the issue behind them.