TERRE HAUTE — If cynicism and distrust are simply a necessary way of life nowadays, then the decisions made by Mark McGwire and other major-leaguers to use steroids don’t really matter.
Neither does McGwire’s claim that he took performance-enhancing drugs only to overcome injuries and continue his career. Nor does his insistence that the steroids he used weren’t the reason he hit 70 home runs in 1998, at the age of 35. McGwire made those rationalizations last week, when he revealed that he used PEDs for a decade.
In the absence of honor, Americans just come to the ballpark to find gratification in the moment. Are the best players down on the field really the best players? Did they outwork the others or possess greater doses of God-given skill? Or did they sneak ahead of their peers by crossing a line of deceit others would not cross?
Who knows? Who cares? But, man, look at that guy’s home run sailing 500 feet into the upper deck!
McGwire and Sammy Sosa were credited for saving baseball with their duel of mammoth long-balls in 1998, four seasons after a strike canceled the World Series and soured loyal fans. The Big Mac & Sammy Show swept millions of instant admirers off their feet. McGwire looked superhuman. The outnumbered skeptics quietly questioned how the once-lean slugger had transformed into a gigantic baseball destroyer, stuffed into a St. Louis Cardinals uniform. But the euphoria drowned out the doubts. Meanwhile, McGwire and Sosa clubbed away, leaving in the dust the late Roger Maris’ single-season record of 61 in 1961. Mac hit 70 dingers, edging Sammy’s 66. They hugged. America swooned. Baseball lived the lie.
Nothing was saved. The game profited, but it now lives with the consequences of its culture of accepted deception. Baseball sacrificed its history, integrity and respect.
In a telephone interview last week, Bob Ibach — co-author of the definitive book on sports cheating, 1982’s “Caught In The Net” — rattled off the names of some recent baseball greats whose stats (and neck and hat sizes) didn’t inexplicably balloon in mid-career: Greg Maddux, Frank Thomas and Fred McGriff. “It looks like they did it right,” Ibach said.
His seven-word comment sums up the baggage left by “the past” that McGwire refused to admit, until he had to this month. (McGwire is returning to baseball as the Cardinals’ hitting coach, and realized he wouldn’t be able to avoid those questions any longer.) “It looks like they did it right,” Ibach said of McGwire’s less-bulging contemporaries.
Sadly, the honest players also must endure the shadow of doubt cast by the dishonest. The steroid users hurt more than their own images.
“If I was a ballplayer who did it right in that era, I would be angry,” Ibach said, “and a lot of the guys are.”
Ibach spent 10 years covering the Orioles as the baseball beat writer for the Baltimore Sun. He spent another 10 years as the Chicago Cubs public relations director, and is now co-owner of the independent Continental Baseball League, based in Florida. He also helped Tates Locke write “Caught In The Net.”
The book detailed the cheating scandal while Locke coached the Clemson University basketball team from 1970 to ’75. It exposed breathtakingly brazen recruiting violations, such as a phony black fraternity intended to impress top prospects on visits to a campus that, in reality, had few minority students. Pressure on Locke and his staff to find a way for Clemson to compete with the upper-echelon teams of the Atlantic Coast Conference drove the rule breaking, according to the book. It worked, for awhile. The Tigers’ win totals climbed. The campus buzzed with excitement. Fans filled the arena. But, eventually, the NCAA cracked down and put the school on probation. They got caught. Locke got fired.
“Caught In The Net” opened up scrutiny of big-time college basketball, overall.
Locke told the sordid Clemson story because, Ibach said, “he wanted to kind of cleanse his soul, and come clean.” In it, Locke — who later served as head coach at Jacksonville and Indiana State universities — admitted his wrongs in full detail and described a culture of accepted deception.
“I laugh when coaches tell me, ‘I won’t get caught. No one will find out,’” Locke wrote. “That’s all very good. Don’t get caught. But if you do, then what? If you have a conscience and get caught, what then? I had a conscience. That was my problem. Some coaches can cheat, day in and day out, and it never bothers them. God bless them, but it bothered me. It tore me apart, wrecked my life, both socially and professionally.”
Is big-league baseball exhibiting signs of a bothered conscience?
Admitting the obvious, that steroids were used, is not “coming clean.” Really, what should be done, baseball won’t do. McGwire’s admission should also make it clear that steroids did give him an unfair advantage.
Yes, only an elite few hundred people alive can hit a major-league slider over a stadium fence, and McGwire proved himself, even as a rookie, to rate near the top of that list. McGwire is right; that’s a God-given gift. But when honest ballplayers age and the injuries take a toll, they either soldier on with diminished ability or retire. Steroids allowed McGwire to delay that inevitability, break Maris’ record, and reach the once-rare 500-career-homers club. He circled the bases 583 times, the eighth-highest total ever.
Honest players, past and present, got cheated. McGwire, along with the others who turned to steroids, and Commissioner Bud Selig should admit that.
McGwire had the chance to fess up in 2005, when he and others were called to testify before Congress. But fears about the painful impact on his friends and family, and the advice of attorneys, led him to keep the secret and say, “I’m not here to talk about the past.”
Telling the truth at that moment would have been a big step toward baseball regaining its honor. “I think he would’ve been a shining beacon, because there were so many others who were prevaricating and covering up,” said David Hein, a professor of religion and philosophy at Hood College, a Maryland school known for its honor system for students.
Instead, baseball perpetuates its honor problem. With every big achievement and every Hall of Fame vote, doubts will arise. Maybe it would help if Selig restored the stolen records of Maris and Hank Aaron, whose 755 career homers were eclipsed by Barry Bonds. Maybe baseball should release its hidden list of 103 players known to have tested positive for performance-enhancers. Maybe Selig should resign. Maybe all of the above.
Maybe baseball should prove honor still has place in the game.
Mark Bennett can be reached at (812) 231-4377 or mark.bennett@tribstar.com.
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