Juice or no juice, A-Rod deserves props

Juice or no juice, A-Rod deserves props

Whether you love him or hate him, you have to acknowledge Alex Rodriguez’s natural, God-given abilities as a baseball player.

Only a moron would suggest otherwise.

With that said, ESPN’s Buster Olney is a moron. Olney appeared on SportsCenter yesterday in the aftermath of A-Rod blasting his 600th career home run earlier that afternoon and stated definitively that Rodriguez will not make it to the Hall of Fame because he admitted last season that he used performance-enhancing drugs for at least three years in the mid-2000s.

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I have no problem with anyone who thinks A-Rod doesn’t deserve to be in the Hall of Fame because he cheated. Although I vehemently disagree with this premise, I will defend someone’s right to say it. My problem with Olney’s argument is a.) he’s flat-out wrong and b.) his reasoning makes no sense.

Like it or not, the “Steroid Era” is part of the game’s history and should be treated as such, just like the “Dead-Ball Era” in the early 1900s and the “Raised-Mound Era” of the mid ‘60s. You can’t erase the past. The bottom line is for approximately two decades between the mid-‘80s and mid-2000s – for argument’s sake, let’s mark the official end of the “Steroid Era” as 2005 since that’s the season before Major League Baseball began aggressively implementing its drug policy – a large majority of players used performance-enhancing drugs.

The problem is we don’t know how many, nor do we know exactly what they used and for how long they used it. All we know for sure is commissioner Bud Selig sent Sen. George Mitchell on a two-year witch-hunt that unearthed approximately 89 names of former and – at the time – current players who are believed to have used steroids or other performance-enhancing drugs.

On top of that, we know there is a court-ordered sealed document with names of 103 players who failed a drug test in 2003. Some of the names have been leaked to the press already, including A-Rod and Yankees pitcher Andy Pettitte, both of whom admitted they used performance-enhancing drugs.

We also know Jose Canseco claims 85 percent of the league used steroids, a figure we initially laughed at, but one that now makes a little more sense since most of the players Canseco originally outed have either have been busted for drug use or have since admitted they used steroids.

Unfortunately, we don’t have cold, hard facts, but we’ve got enough evidence – and, hopefully, enough common sense among all of us – to conclude they were far more players using drugs than those who were clean during the “Steroid Era.”

Of all the players linked to the “Steroid Era,” whether with legitimate proof to back it up or just pure speculation, only three have reached 600 career home runs – A-Rod, Barry Bonds and Sammy Sosa. Aren’t we intelligent and mature enough to admit those players would be pretty damn good without having to use steroids?

Bonds was a three-time National League MVP before any of us thought he used steroids. In the 11 seasons before his 73-homer outburst in 2003, Bonds hit at least 25 home runs each year, including 46 in 1993 and 49 in 2000. He also stole 52 bases in 1990 and in 1998 became the first player in baseball history to reach the 400-400 club, which means at least 400 career home runs and 400 stolen bases. The guy was a great player. Period. No performance-enhancing drug created in any laboratory on the planet could turn a career minor-league slap-hitter into Barry Bonds.

The same goes for A-Rod, who hit 36 home runs in his first full season with Seattle in 1996 – again, long before anyone had the urge to suggest he was using performance-enhancing drugs. He’s never hit fewer than 20 home runs in a full season (one in which he’s played more than 124 games) and will reach 15 consecutive seasons with 20 or more home runs as soon as he hits his 20th this year; he’s currently stuck on 17 with two months to go.

Throughout his career, A-Rod has been as steady as they come, unlike Sosa, Mark McGwire or others (Brady Anderson and Luis Gonzalez, for example) whose numbers spiked dramatically during the “Steroid Era.” We’ll never know how long he took performance-enhancing drugs for – he says it was between 2001 and 2003 – and it’s impossible to tell because his power numbers have never strayed too far from the norm. Even in ’01 and ’02 when he produced back-to-back seasons of 50 or more home runs, his previous high before that was 42. By comparison, when Sosa blasted 66 home runs in ’98, that total marked an increase of 26 home runs from his previous high set in 1996. Of the three aforementioned players who’ve hit 600 or more career home runs primarily in the height of the “Steroid Era,” Sosa stands out as the one who benefited the most from his alleged drug use, and yet cranking 600+ homers still stands as a remarkable feat regardless of the steroid link.

When you consider that pitchers have been busted for steroid use, too (among them Andy Pettitte and Ryan Franklin), it’s hypocritical to suggest the offensive numbers accrued during the “Steroid Era” should count less since we can safely assume the playing field was more level than we originally thought. Juiced-up batters hit monster home runs off juiced-up pitchers. These are facts. Deal with them and acknowledge those who stood out above the rest regardless of who had Winstrol or Dianabol flowing through their veins.

Olney suggests that the number of players who’ve admitted their steroid use in recent years will somehow be forgotten by the time A-Rod is eligible for the Hall of Fame. That makes zero sense. If anything, most of the players who thrived in the “Steroid Era” will be retired by then, which means they’ll be more likely to admit what they did or didn’t do since they’ll no longer live in fear of repercussions. This will only help A-Rod’s cause, not hurt his chances.

The numbers you think are tainted are signs of greatness. A-Rod is an amazing player and should be regarded as such. You don’t have to like him, but to think for a second he won’t make the Hall of Fame is absurd.