Yes

by Chris Torgersen

Created on: July 01, 2009

The various steroids scandals that have hit baseball over the past several years have rocked the sport and reshaped public perception of it. The 1990s and early 2000s have begun to become known as baseball's "steroids era". Each time we think we have heard the worst of it, some new superstar is outed as a user or former user, to the point where many fans now look upon all players who played during those years with suspicion.

And rightly so. Some of the most convincing denials - most notably those of Alex Rodriguez - have come from players later revealed as users. It is impossible to tell with any real confidence whether any particular player was clean, just as it is impossible to tell what the exact effect of steroid use was.

Baseball, in truth, has a long history of performance-enhancing drugs. For a good forty or fifty years now - nearly half of what is considered baseball's modern era - numerous players have dabbled in or become regular users. From the days of greenies, when players popped speed pills in the hopes of improving their reaction times (arguably a more potent way of improving one's chances in baseball than bulking up with steroids), players have sought any edge to get ahead.

The world of a baseball player is a fiercely competitive one. The threat of losing one's place in the starting lineup or rotation, or even one's roster spot, is a constant one for most players. With owners and upper management willfully turning a collective blind eye to what was going on in the locker rooms, players faced no major consequences and had much to gain (or so it seemed) if they used. Those who chose not to use could feel proud of their moral high ground while relaxing on the dugout bench or a flight back to Triple-A - or so it must have seemed to players faced with the choice.

Ultimately, the Hallworthiness of those superstars who used steroids will be decided upon by the Hall of Fame voters. They seem to have passed judgment on Mark McGwire already. It appears that the once-certain Hall of Famer's chances of getting in are approaching zero. Ten years ago, he was famous enough to make guest appearances on sitcoms. Nowadays, he keeps himself far from the spotlight and his name, along with the names of Barry Bonds and now Alex Rodriguez, has come to represent a tarnished era of baseball history.

The truth, however, is that very little of baseball's history is unblemished. For most of the first half of the twentieth century, an entire segment of the population was completely unrepresented in Major League Baseball. Despite their greatness, black stars like Josh Gibson were never able to compete against major leaguers in games that mattered. How can we recognize the legitimacy of statistics from that era when some of the very best in the game were kept out of it? And what of the numerous issues in the early days with players being paid to throw games? Then, in the sixties, the greenies came. Players were able to pop a pill and perk up. Quicker reactions would mean better chances at the plate and on the field, though how much difference the pills made will never truly be known.

Eventually greenies gave way to steroids, which seem to have caused a somewhat overzealous reaction from the media. Many seem to believe that the cheating started with steroids. In truth, it has always been there. Players have always looked for ways to get ahead, and they have generally been willing to venture outside of the realms of good sense and sportsmanship in order to do it. We should not pretend that there was some pure era in which everyone was just playing for fun. As long as there has been money in baseball, there have been players thinking up ways to use the game to make more of it, either by shooting drugs or by taking bribes.

When, in a system, a large number of individuals are found to be consistently operating outside of established guidelines, one does not fault the individuals, but the system that allows them to do so. People are devious and will do what they can to get ahead. Many who cry foul now about steroids have done equally questionable things to get ahead in their own fields. It is human nature. The system in baseball was permissive. Between the Players' Union and the owners, no one wanted to step up and do anything.

It would not be right to single out individuals who participated in one method of enhancement as being unworthy of Hall induction. Too many players have done essentially the same thing throughout the history of the game, and we have no way of knowing who they all were or how much advantage they actually gained.

In fifty years, after numerous biotechnological breakthroughs have allowed us to fashion the human body in ways yet undreamt of, people will look back on the outrage expressed over steroids with chuckles and shaking heads. For those who believe that the new rules have put an end to - or at least sharply reduced - issues with performance enhancement in baseball, bringing us back to some purer test of skill, I'm afraid that just isn't the case. Technological growth moves blindingly fast, and in no time there will be new ways of getting ahead, and players will take them, and we will be faced with the same kinds of issues.

Baseball should not act as though the steroid era did not exist, the way owners and the Players' Association acted as though steroid use did not exist. Rather than block Hall entry for those who played in the era, Hall voters should vote in the very best of the era, regardless of how they got there. After all, the system itself allowed them to do what they did, and the players did not cheat any more egregiously than past players did.

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