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Mark McGwire's Contribution to Baseball

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Dag Hammarsjkold
Emissary

Mon Jan 11, 2010 6:46 pm

In the spirit of sport as understood by Tom, Mark McGwire was simply doing what he had to do in order to win. It was the WUA, the MLB and probably the DEA who were at fault for not having caught him sooner.

Mark's contributions to baseball are numerous.

He restored faith in the magic of baseball for the entire nation after its pathetic strike, he made multi millions for the St. Louis Cardinals, himself, McDonalds and all the major networks, he sparked renewed interest in the art of baseball card collecting, he ignited the imagination of kids across the country, in Japan and the Dominican Republic and he instilled new life into an otherwise depressed city parading down Market Street as one of it's finest sons on more than one occassion.

All of it, based on a lie.

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Guapo
Dignitary

Tue Jan 12, 2010 6:52 am

Dag Hammarsjkold wrote:

In the spirit of sport as understood by Tom, Mark Maguire was simply doing what he had to do in order to win. It was the WUA, the MLB and probably the DEA who were at fault for not having caught him sooner.

Mark's contributions to baseball are numerous.

He restored faith in the magic of baseball for the entire nation after its pathetic strike, he made multi millions for the St. Louis Cardinals, himself, McDonalds and all the major networks, he sparked renewed interest in the art of baseball card collecting, he ignited the imagination of kids across the country, in Japan and the Dominican Republic and he instilled new life into an otherwise depressed city parading down Market Street as one of it's finest sons on more than one occassion.

All of it, based on a lie.

Great example, terrible spelling. Razz

I would say that, yes, it was "baseball's" fault for not catching him sooner. In fact, I think that it was quite obvious that he was juicing and anyone who denies this is either being coy, or a complete dolt. Baseball allowed it while the money was rolling in. They didn't pursue anything until the pressure was heaped onto them. The Giambis, etc., of the baseball world paid the price for McGwire's free pass.

However, I must disagree that he was helping his team win. Juicing, and focusing on HRs is about self, not the team. Compare him to Pujols. Albert is a class act and a truly great player. He hits his share of HRs, but it's not all about that.

On another topic, I think that this crusade against steroids is absurd. We grant a woman the power of life and death over a fetus, another organism which will eventually and necessarily leave her body, but a man can't medicate his own body, when no such departure will occur at any future time? Talk about double standards...

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Sassenach
Emissary

Tue Jan 12, 2010 8:18 am

Quote:

We grant a woman the power of life and death over a fetus, another organism which will eventually and necessarily leave her body, but a man can't medicate his own body, when no such departure will occur at any future time? Talk about double standards...

Having an abortion doesn't give a woman an unfair competitive advantage in a sporting contest, so no double standard exists. You're not comparing like with like.

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Guapo
Dignitary

Tue Jan 12, 2010 9:23 am

it wasn't a comparison. it was my commentary on the absurdity of society and its rules.

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Sassenach
Emissary

Tue Jan 12, 2010 10:55 am

So you think it's absurd that people are banned from taking performance enhancing drugs to give them an unfair advantage ? Not sure I'd agree with you there. Sure, it's an argument you could make, and I've flirted with the idea of just advocating open season on any and all kinds of chemical enhancements in the sporting field in the past, but ultimately I came to the view that it would be a bad thing. The way I see it, either you adopt a zero tolerance approach and do your best to tackle drugs in sport, imperfect though that is, or you turn sport into a battle of the chemists and take away the soul of the thing. You only need to look at the damage done to sports like cycling and athletics to see the danger. People have lost all faith in those sports and almost every record or great champion is regarded with suspicion. If we allow performance enhancing drugs then in effect we'd force everybody to take them whether they want to or not in order to be competitive, and the public would react with understandable disgust.

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Guapo
Dignitary

Tue Jan 12, 2010 11:11 am

anyone can take PEDs. just like anyone can wear performance enhancing equipment. were the pioneers of modern basketball shoes cheating when they wore specialized shoes? It's their body, let every man decide for himself what is right or wrong for them to do. If anything is clear, these PEDs are a tradeoff of instant gratification. Their careers are shortened. That's their prerogative.

But the topic is whether HE is wrong or baseball. I say it is baseball.

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Sassenach
Emissary

Tue Jan 12, 2010 11:33 am

The idea that anybody can take performance enhancing drugs is simply not true. You need to know the right people who can put you in touch with the right chemists and then in order to stay competitive you need to keep in touch with all the latest innovations in the field to make certain that your rivals aren't injecting some new wonderdrug that's better than what you're pumping into your own veins....

Tell me Jeff, does that sound like your idea of a sporting contest ?

Also, it's a little naive to just say that everybody should be free to decide on whether they take drugs or not. That's not how it would work. Legalise drugs in sport and overnight you'd drive out clean athletes from elite professional sport. In order to compete you'd have to be taking what the other guys are taking, and then in order to break into the sport at junior level you'd want to be doing the same thing. Give it a few years and you'd have highschool kids under pressure from their coaches to get doped up and chemists would be earning as much as sports stars.

Don't get me wrong, I have no objection to people choosing to take steroids or human growth hormone or whatever and I don't think they should be illegal, I just don't think they should be allowed to do it while competing in sporting events.

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Pigmalia
Dignitary

Tue Jan 12, 2010 2:59 pm

Guapo, do you mean that steroids should be legal in terms of not being restricted by government? I would think you would support different sports associations having rules of their choosing since they are voluntary associations.

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deburgh
Ambassador

Tue Jan 12, 2010 10:36 pm

"all of it, based on a lie"

How melodramatic - i love it!

For the real story of drug-enhanced performance, you need to see this. I'm sure it will give many of you the most delightful frisson of disapproval - others will just dig it, man:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vUhSYLRw14

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Guapo
Dignitary

Wed Jan 13, 2010 8:42 am

Pigmalia wrote:

Of course, but I think it's more about congress and Mitchell than baseball. Like I said, anyone who denies that it was obvious that McGwire was juicing is a dolt. Baseball knew. They didn't care. That's their business.

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Ozymandias
Emissary

Wed Jan 27, 2010 7:47 am

Guapo wrote:

it wasn't a comparison. it was my commentary on the absurdity of society and its rules.

Of course, women aren't competing for who can miscarry the most children or anything, so its a horrendous analogy and a pointless waste of space. Steroids are banned in baseball because, as the name Performance Enhancing Drug implies, they destroy the legitimacy of the competition. There are plenty of other moral and ethical reasons abortion is not even a comparable topic to PEDs.

Secondly, McGwire was great for baseball. He and Sosa and Bonds resuscitated the sport, almost by themselves. They brought in legions of new fans, and Selig absolutely knew what was going on. I'm sure it was encouraged. They took a dying sport, on the verge of being eclipsed by basketball, and made it popular again. However, he also deserves a lifetime ban. Selig should merely say that all is forgiven, but any player caught henceforth will be banned permanently from the sport.

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Guapo
Dignitary

Tue Feb 02, 2010 1:59 pm

Ozymandias wrote:

Guapo wrote:

it wasn't a comparison. it was my commentary on the absurdity of society and its rules.

I don't believe for a minute that it's about competitive advantage. Michael Phelps' swimsuit is. Where's the outrage there? So are these new stadia with mini-porches. Where's the regulation there?

PEDs are about hitting more home runs and making more money. 75 home runs aren't going to change a teams status that much, and you can't demonstrate that steroids led to any team winning anything. The ring total for Bonds, Giambi, Sosa, and McGwire (since using PEDs) is still ZERO. If fact, I guarantee that if any of us used steroids, it would not increase our chances of making a professional baseball team one iota.

No player has helped his team win anything significant with PEDs. It's about "morals" and the fact that steroids are "bad for you." That's why I brought up abortion. The argument for abortion is, "It's my body." Well, it's CERTAINLY Mark McGwire's body. He can do as he damn well pleases with it.

The list of banned substances in baseball is taken from the federal government's controlled substance list, and is not based on an data that shows that these steroids produce "wins."

As I said before, the issue didn't become a concern for baseball until the media and congress stepped in.

Just for S and G's, here's the list of players who have been suspended for PEDs. What a bunch of hall-of-famers, eh?

Rolling Eyes

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Dag Hammarsjkold
Emissary

Tue Mar 02, 2010 8:39 pm

The Missouri legislature voted today to rename McGwire highway in downtown St. Louis. As a result, this particular section of highway will no longer embarass the city.

posts: 955 | location: New York | joined: 15 Oct 2002

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