It's been a couple days since A-Rod's reduced suspension was handed down and Tony Bosch/Baseball took that ridiculous victory lap on 60 Minutes. Of course, it's not over. A-Rod filed suit against, well, basically anyone you can think of, trying to get the suspension overturned, and has vowed to show up in Tampa for Yankees Spring Training. There's so much to process here, but the bottom line is a sad one. A-Rod had the talent to be one of the all-time greats. Instead, he's going to go down as one of Baseball's all-time biggest jokes.
When they originally announced the suspensions and A-Rod immediately announced he was going to appeal, my prediction was that it would ultimately be reduced to 162. I don't want to say "I told you so," but... My rationale was this: chop off the games he played during his appeal, treat this as his first and second offenses, make him serve the 50 (first offense) and 100 (second offense) consecutively, then, because no team in their right mind is going to activate a guy who was suspended all year in mid-September, add on the remaining 12 games to make it a whole season. Of course, Frederic Horowitz got to that number a different way than I did, but the result was the same. And I happen to agree with the number.
The most interesting part of the entire circus surrounding the suspension to me was the news that ESPN's Buster Olney broke on Monday. A-Rod had a chance to put this whole thing behind him during Spring Training last year and declined. He would've been given the standard 50-game suspension, that he could've served at the start of the season, when he was on the DL anyway. Hindsight might be 20-20, but why wouldn't he just accept 50 games then and be done with it? He already knew he was going to miss the first three months of last season anyway.
Actually, I know exactly why. His ego. That and because he probably thought he'd actually be able to get off with nothing. A-Rod's become the new Lance Armstrong. He's told so many lies that he believes them himself. And surrounding himself with Yes Men isn't helping either. Of course his lawyers are going to tell him to keep fighting a losing battle. The longer he fights, the more money in their pockets.
I doubt there's a single person who doesn't think A-Rod's guilty of taking PEDs. Except for maybe A-Rod himself. If there actually was any doubt left in anybody's mind, 60 Minutes took care of that. The evidence against him seems pretty strong, and there's so much of it that A-Rod's team can't possibly "justify" it all in any believable way. Horowitz certainly didn't believe those explanations.
60 Minutes also confirmed another thing I've long suspected--Tony Bosch is among the lowest of the low. I couldn't tell if he was making stuff up on the spot or what, but the one thing that was made clear is that the guy is absolute scum. He flat-out admitted that he'd still be doing it if he can't gotten caught! (I also loved the "everyone's doing it, so I was leveling the playing field" rationale.) Plus, he's changed his story so many times, his credibility is zero. Remember when this all started and he said he was just A-Rod's "nutritionist?"
It's rare that I agree with Scott Boras, but what he said yesterday was spot-on. Everybody's spending all this time trying to catch the "cheaters," but guys like Bosch get off scot-free? How is that right? Bosch was engaged in some pretty serious illegal activity, and he knew exactly what he was doing. Yet he's not even going to face prosecution. All because he agreed to help "catch the bad guys?" Well, I've got news for ya, Tony Bosch is one of the "bad guys."
And Bosch willing to flip sure made things easy for MLB. This guy goes from having a lawsuit against him by MLB to MLB's star witness. With the lawsuit dropped, his legal fees paid (as well as covered in any future proceedings), and protection. Why wouldn't he tell them what he wanted to hear? A known liar is your star witness.
A-Rod made a couple of valid points during his appeal, and that was by far the most significant one. MLB paid for Bosch's testimony. There's no other way to look at it. Sure, many people will find a way to justify it, but Bosch wasn't willing to cooperate until it became beneficial to him. And since MLB was the one hooking him up, why wouldn't he want to hook them up in return? However believable his testimony may have been, you have to take it with a grain of salt.
The whole "he's obstructing with the investigation" thing was laughable too. The way you went about getting this evidence wasn't exactly the most ethical. Whether or not it was even legal is questionable. Can you blame him for trying to prevent those documents from becoming public? Besides, he was trying to do the same thing you did. Why would anyone want to get their hands on evidence that might incriminate them of something? It's so shocking that he would do that!
Likewise, I've agreed with A-Rod from Day One that he was singled out. Bud Selig hates A-Rod. He won't admit it, but it's clear to everyone. The original 211-game suspension proved that. He wanted to make an example of somebody, so why not the guy he dislikes the most? If A-Rod had been treated the same way as everyone else, he wouldn't have received a suspension more than three times the length of the next longest one (which went to a guy who failed a test and got off, yet was lying the whole time). Well, mission accomplished, Bud. You have your Lance Armstrong.
Bud Selig is the most hypocritical one in all of this. He's walking around with his chest puffed out, proud of his "victory." They even made sure to end the 60 Minutes piece by pointing out that Baseball has the "best" drug program in all of sports. But this is also the guy responsible for the abundance of PEDs in Baseball in the first place. He turned a blind eye during the Steroid Era in the late 90s/early 2000s. Yeah Bud, great job doing something about it 20 years later!
No comments:
Post a Comment