The politically correct, wannabe baseball fans are whining again after Dodgers leftfielder Manny Ramirez was suspended for 50-games due to having a subscription for a women’s fertility drug and submitting a urine sample back in spring training that showed that he had abnormally-high testosterone levels compared to that of a prototypical male, which could only be attributed to using banned supplements or steroids.
Until it is otherwise noted by a medical expert as to why Ramirez would need a prescription for a female fertility drug and whether he could have theoretically had high testosterone levels without taking steroids, it looks like ManRam is guilty, no ands, ifs or buts about it.
However, with that said Ramirez is still a Hall of Famer, and more importantly, baseball fans, reporters, players and analysts who rail against good players who have admitted to, tested positive for or been suspected of using steroids need to realize that the substances do not determine a good baseball player and that worst forms of cheating have occurred in the past.
Ramirez is a great hitter because of his ability to keep his weight back on pitches until he figures out what they are and consistently uncork a smooth, level swing that keeps the barrel of his bat in the zone for as long as possible.
He should and would have gone to Cooperstown regardless of whether or not he used steroids, as he has comfortably surpassed 500 home runs (he has 533 homers up to this point), drove in 1’745 runs and maintained a career .315 batting average and .412 on-base percentage at the same time, which is more than enough stat-padding to get him enshrined.
Even if Ramirez had the body of Juan Pierre he still would be a Hall of Famer because of the fundamentals of his swing. Put a steroids-free Ramirez in the leadoff spot with Pierre’s stature and Ramirez’s speed and you would get a ManRam with a higher batting average than the real one since he wouldn’t be as concerned with the situational hitting that he deals with as a middle-of-the-order hitter while concurrently stealing enough bases and scoring enough runs to get enough writers to vote him into the hall.
Sure, steroids could help Ramirez have a quicker swing and thus allow him to wait on pitches longer, but only to an extremely minimum extent in my opinion, as quick wrists are born, not made.
The steroids-obsessed fans who rail against great players like Ramirez miss this point, and make themselves out to be even bigger buffoons when they state that any player who has been caught or acknowledged using steroids or merely just suspected of using it does not belong in the Hall of Fame and should be removed from the record books or have an asterisk next to his name in the books at the very least. If that is the case, then you must punish players in past eras that cheated just as much as a player in today’s era of steroids and religious weightlifting. That list would include Ted Williams, Don Sutton, Gaylord Perry, Whitey Ford and many more.
ESPN’s Peter Gammons reported that a former teammate of Williams had told him that the Red Sox Hall of Famer said that he used a corked bat during his last season in the big leagues in order to make up for lost bat speed, the New York Giants allegedly won the 1951 Pennant while using a telescope in centerfield to see opposing teams signs, and Don Sutton, Gaylord Perry and Whitey Ford said that they spit on balls during their careers.
Stealing signs via a telescope is much worst than steroids, as it allows a hitter to time his swing better and thus increase his chances of hitting the ball whereas steroids may help you hit the ball farther but won’t help you make contact with it, a corked bat is essentially based on the same concept as steroids, as it gives you more pop, and a pitcher smearing foreign substances on a baseball before throwing a pitch may directly impact its movement.
We do not know how many teams had spies in the bleachers back in the days of Babe Ruth and Ted Williams when the media and commissioners office did not have the technology to scrutinize every player, call on the field and stadium’s resources like it does today, nor do we know how many Hall of Fame hitters or pitchers used a corked bat or a corrupted ball to boost their average or strikeout totals, but we don’t penalize them for this.
However, we are now penalizing players for using steroids in today’s era despite the fact that they are probably less advantageous as the aforementioned other forms of cheating. That’s about as smart as sailing a yacht along the Somali coast without a couple of Uzis, rocket-propelled grenades and AK’s.
Don’t get me wrong, steroids should be completely banned from baseball with strict consequences for those who stray or allowed with few restrictions. However, they do not create a great player and never will, and those who want to keep suspected or known steroid users out of the Hall of Fame or the record books will only be able to justifiably do so if they look into every other form of cheating that took place in the past. It is time for fans who whine about steroids to either recognize this fact, or watch another sport like WNBA basketball so real fans won’t have to hear their repetitive, fraudulent arguments every day.
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