...it's probably best to keep your suspicions about PED usage in the Major Leagues to yourself. Former Major Leaguer Jack Clark learned that one the hard way last week, when he used his St. Louis radio show as a forum to announce that he "knew" Albert Pujols and Justin Verlander were both using. Pujols immediately threatened legal action, Clark's "source" told him he was dead wrong, and Clark was promptly fired. And this entire issue shed light on a much larger problem: when it comes to Major League Baseball players it's guilty until proven innocent, even if you just suspect a guy is on something.
Of course, Clark's comments went above and beyond suspicion. He flat-out accused Pujols of using PEDs, and the only "proof" he offered was a vague recollection of a conversation he had with a Cardinals trainer a decade ago. (He didn't even have that much to support his claims about Verlander.) Sadly, this is allowed to pass as "evidence" in today's society, at least when it comes to PEDs. The fact that Clark was dead wrong doesn't even seem to matter. He planted the seed in people's minds. Now, if Pujols ever does test positive for anything, we'll get the inevitable "I told you so" from all these new-found doubters.
The radio station is doing all the right things. They made the necessary move of showing Clark the door and, in an attempt to clean house, cancelled his show entirely. As a result, his co-host was also fired, although he's now saying that he'll sue the station, I'm guessing for wrongful termination (although that case has just as much a chance of being successful as the FanFest volunteer lawsuit). Regardless of what happens with that lawsuit, the station had no choice. They couldn't keep them on the air. Doing so would've implied they condone what Clark said.
I'm more interested in the lawsuit Pujols plans to file against Clark, though. It could be dangerous ground, as we found out with Roger Clemens vs. Brian McNamee, which is why some people are suggesting Pujols just let it go. But I also kind of admire the fact that he's willing to take a stand against this new "everybody's juicing" attitude. Slander is a very serious thing. Whether it can be legally proven (which is incredibly difficult) is another story altogether, but Jack Clark definitely slandered Albert Pujols' name. And the suspicion that he raised will now follow Pujols for the rest of his career.
We hear it all the time about players like Jose Bautista and Chris Davis, who came out of nowhere to suddenly become 40-home run guys and are immediately suspected of juicing as a result. But suspicion and direct accusations are completely different things.
Michael Kay addressed the topic during the Yankees-Tigers game on Saturday. Before becoming a broadcaster, Kay was a sportswriter. He was working for one of the New York newspapers during the McGwire-Sosa home run race in 1998. Kay told a story about how certain people had their suspicions back then, but no one really wanted to go near it. When people would ask him why nobody did, he pointed out that you couldn't just print something without any sort of proof because that's an immediate slander lawsuit.
That's the difference between what Jack Clark said and the Biogenesis situation. Yes, the Biogenesis stuff started because of a report in the Miami New Times. But that report was based on documents that were eventually turned over to MLB and led to the suspensions. And that evidence was obviously pretty strong, judging by how quickly Ryan Braun and most of the others accepted their bans. All Jack Clark did was drag Albert Pujols through the mud. Unlike Biogenesis, though, there's nothing to backup Clark's claims.
This has become our sad new reality. We can't just appreciate great players for being great. The stigma of steroids is inevitably attached to virtually everybody, even if it's just suspicion. Maybe I'm naïve. Maybe I'm an optimist. But I'm still going to adhere to the American system I've known and loved my whole life. Guys are innocent until proven guilty. Not the other way around.
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