Best. Excuse. Ever. (Dallas Cowboys Edition)

So this happened today:

Cowboys  DB Orlando Scandrick got suspended 4 games for violating the NFL's performance-enhancing drugs policy. Scandrick tested positive for amphetamines, which he contritely claims got into his system because he took some bad ecstasy while on vacation in Mexico with an ex-girlfriend. 

Let's stop here a minute and count up all the mind-blowing things in that statement:

Riddle Me This, Batman

Alex Rodriguez with his PED of choice

GIVEN THAT:

We know that steroids are supposed to enhance performance by increasing muscle growth

AND

We know pretty well how long it takes muscle tissue to grow

AND THAT

Noted upright fellow Anthony Bosch is claiming that he gave Alex Rodriguez "gummy" steroids before a game that helped him play better

AND THAT

Bosch also claimed that his steroids were undetectable and would be flushed out of ARod's system after the game

WE MUST CONCLUDE THAT

The steroids Bosch gave Rodriguez  grew him bigger muscles during the game that then shrank back to pre-game levels by the time of the locker room interviews. Alternately, we can go back over game footage and watch ARod's biceps inflate and deflate like Popeye eating spinach puff hors d'oeuvres. 

Alternately, we can assume that Anthony Bosch is full of crap, Alex Rodriguez is a grade-A sucker, and the WADA types collapsing onto their fainting couches about the supposed sophistication of Bosch's regimen are in fact publicity hounds taking advantage of the news cycle to gain some visibility to drum up business.

None of this absolves Rodriguez if he did or thought he was taking PEDs. However, it does mean that you can pretty much take the 60 Minutes interview in its credulous, lazy, agenda-driven entirety and flush it. 

Our Last Post On Alex Rodriguez Until The Next Post On Alex Rodriguez

Bud Selig, Working His Way Through College

Perhaps the most important thing about the ongoing Alex Rodriguez saga is this: nobody is going to change their mind. If you think Rodriguez is the lyingest, cheating-est dirtbag that ever bagged dirt and he shoulda been fed to rabid weasels, then you're going to think that no matter what happens from here on in. If you're a tinfoil ballcap type who thinks that the whole thing was trumped up to give the Yankees payroll relief (so they could free up money for Tanaka, who would then be on the stage in the US's biggest media market - see? It plays!) you will always think that the whole thing was a setup and that this was done for the Steinbrennerbros' benefit. And if you believe that the entire hootenanny was Bud Selig's witch hunt against a player who made him look bad - imagine Bud as Thunderbolt Ross and Rodriguez as the Hulk and you're getting there - then you are never going to change your mind. Further debate at this point is a waste of perfectly good hot air that could be better spent debating if the Yankees are really chasing Logan Forsythe for a third base platoon, or if they're just drunk.

Your Weekly PED Nonsense Panic, Jhonny Peralta Division

If you are upset that the Cardinals gave Jhonny Peralta a 4 year deal in free agency and thus "rewarded" a known PED user, you're not paying attention.

You're not paying attention to Dave Cameron's work over at FanGraphs, where he points out that a guy like Peralta should maybe have gotten more than he actually signed for, based on comparable players and a thin market for shortstops.

The Official Sportsthodoxy Position On the Alex Rodriguez Arbitration Hearing

Be it resolved that we at Sportsthodoxy feel that:

Alex Rodriguez storming out of his arbitration hearing may have been a product of genuine anger upon hearing that Commissioner Selig would not be compelled to testify, but his filmed radio appearance with Mike Francesca was bad amateur theater of the sort that would get laughed out of most 3-day LARPs;

Peraltasaurus Rex

As per Peter Gammons, Red Sox players are privately kvetching that Jase Robertson failed to properly inflate their raft when they were going muskrat hunting and...no, wait, that's not it. They're kvetching that Tigers SS Johnny Peralta, having served his 50 game suspension for PEDs, is now allowed to play. The concern is apparently that they don't know what residual steroids are still in his body, making them wonder if at any moment he could completely Hulk out and turn on a Craig Breslow slider with gamma-irradiated fury.

It Doesn't End Here

Here's the sequence of events:

• St. Louis radio jock and ex-player Jack Clark goes on-air and claims that Albert Pujols' trainer told him Pujols shoots up with PEDs.
• Pujols' trainer says, "Wait a minute, I haven't talked with that guy in ten years and I never said that."
• Pujols says, "I'm suing you."
• The radio station that employs Clark and his partner fires both of them.
• Clark's partner makes some noise about how the radio station hung them out to dry,

End of story. Right?
Wrong.

Pete Rose Said What?

Pete Rose has advised the Biogenesis 13 to "come clean". This is laughable, for any number of reasons, not the least of which being that it took literally decades for Rose to admit he'd lied, and lied about lying, and lied about lying about lying. Rose's story is too long and too sad to go into here; I'd advise anyone who still thinks he's a victim in all this to go back and read the actual report that lays out in damning detail who Rose was running with, what he did, and how he lied about it.

Denny McLain's weighing in, too. Denny's not as famous as Pete is, of course. He had some great years for the Tigers, was the last guy to win 30 in a single season, and got his toes broken by mobsters over a gambling debt while his team was in the thick of a pennant race. McLain later would indulge in such activities as embezzlement, mail fraud, racketeering, drug dealing, and flying a wanted felon out of the country. And Denny is disappointed in Tigers shortstop Jhonny Peralta for not appealing his suspension, what with his team in a pennant race and all.

Who are the Biogenesis Thirteen?

So here's the list of players suspended on Monday by MLB for their part in the Biogenesis affair:

• Alex Rodriguez
• Nelson Cruz
• Jhonny Peralta
• Everth Cabrera
• Antonio Bastardo
• Jordanny Valdespin
• Jesus Montero
• Francisco Cervelli
• Cesar Puello
• Fernando Martinez
• Sergio Escalona
• Fautino De Los Santos
• Jordan Norberto

If you're not a baseball fan, you've heard of one of these guys: A-Rod. If you're a casual fan, you may have heard of a couple more. Cruz was an All-Star this year, and has shown up on endless blooper reels for the way he played outfield in the World Series a couple of years ago. Peralta and Cabrera were also All-Stars, middle infielders with a bit of sock and a lot of speed, respectively. But one played in Detroit, where he was overshadowed by Miggy and Prince and Verlander, and the other played in San Diego, where no national reporter has dared set foot since Tony Gwynn retired. So, semi-famous at best.

What Can Michael Jordan's Retirement Teach Us About A-Rod?

So here's the difference between baseball and basketball.

If you believe the investigative journalists, when basketball's most transcendent talent got caught dead to rights doing something he ought not to have, he "retired". In response, the NBA dropped its investigation into Michael Jordan's gambling, one that it hardly trumpeted prior to Jordan's "retirement". There were no talks of a bargain, no targeted leaks of evidence, no long and drawn out public cha-cha with the evidence. Today, barely anyone remembers that there had been an investigation into Jordan's gambling, or that Jordan had written a massive check to a convicted drug dealer to cover gambling debts, or, well, you get the idea.

Your Handy-Dandy Guide To What People Are Saying About Ryan Braun

• "Ryan Braun owes the fans an apology" = "Ryan Braun owes me an apology"
• "Ryan Braun owes the kids an apology" = "Ryan Braun owes ME an apology"
• "We should remove the statistics of players caught using PEDs from the record books" = "I am angry and don't understand interconnected systems. What do you mean there were pitchers involved in all those home runs?"
• "Ryan Braun gets the worst of this because he will always be known as a cheater" = "I don't understand that for $100M, you can buy a big fat jug of Don't Give A Crap"
• "Ryan Braun is the Lance Armstrong of baseball" = "I just skimmed the whole Lance Armstrong thing because, you know, cycling, so I have no idea what Lance Armstrong actually did."
• "The Brewers are better off without Braun this season" = "I understand that the Brewers are in fact better off not paying another $3M and change to a guy who's going to be at 60% the rest of the way. Also, I believe they've manufactured a ton of Caleb Gindl jerseys"
• "I pay their salaries" = "I pay a tiny fraction of their salaries, and am attempting to use that fact to claim moral standing so I can rant" 
• "I'm as angry about this as anybody" = "My producer suggests it would be a really good idea if I were angry about this"
• "We should let team void the contracts of steroid users" = "I firmly believe players will lie and cheat to earn multi-million dollar contracts, but that owners - whose ranks include a war profiteer, guys with ties to Bernie Madoff, and Jeff Loria - would never lie or cheat or spike someone's Gatorade to keep from paying them. I also believe that Smurfs are real."
• "Alex Rodriguez is the Lance Armstrong of baseball" = "OK, the Ryan-Braun-is-Lance-Armstrong thing didn't work"
• "Alex Rodriguez is going to claim he's injured and can't play so he doesn't get suspended so the Yankees can have insurance cover his salary" = "I have never actually dealt with an insurance company"
• "I feel bad for all the clean players" = "I wrote a lot of stuff cheering on McGwire and Sosa in the 90s"
• "I look at Chris Davis and I know he has to be doing steroids" = "I have the mutant ability to detect steroid use with my eyes"
• "I see 300 pound linemen doing 4.9 40s and know they have to be doing steroids" = "I have the mutant ability to detect steroid use with my eyes"
• "We don't actually know what PEDs do to help baseball players" = "I have actually read the literature on the subject, and will now get hammered as a steroid apologist"
• "Players who shoot up make it unfair for the other guys" = "Except the guys on my favorite team, who should be getting tattooed with cortisone shots so they get back on the field as soon as possible"
• "First time steroid users should be banned for life" = "I have conveniently forgotten that I own three Andy Pettite jerseys"
• "What do you think this means for baseball?" = "Please tell me this will be bad for baseball"
• "Why don't people care about PEDs in football?" = "I am still dealing with having gotten picked last for kickball in elementary school, and have not yet come to grips with the fact that where the popular kids are concerned, nobody gives a crap if they break the rules."
• "This is proof baseball's drug testing program doesn't work" = "I don't understand that the drug program that catches people is working, and the drug program that doesn't catch people isn't"
• "Alex Rodriguez is the Whitey Bulger of baseball" = "I have no idea who Whitey Bulger actually is or what he did, but his name came up on my Twitter feed"

Rick Reilly Is On Drugs

I am certain Rick Reilly is on something.
I have no proof for this. But I look at his columns today and they're much, much longer than they used to be. You can't tell me he's writing this much without stimulants. I mean, you look at his back page pieces for SI back in the day versus his longer-form essays for ESPN.com now and he's producing way more words than he ever did before. It's not like he's suddenly going to acquire a larger vocabulary, not at his age, so he's got to be on something.

Great Moments In People Who Have Never Had To Talk To A Lawyer Yammering About Sports

"Sources: Braun Didn't Answer PED Questions"
That's the headline in ESPN.com.  Faced with a possible suspension, which he will certainly fight in court, Ryan Braun refused to answer questions about PEDs from reporters.
Now, there are two types of people in America. There are the people who will read that and immediately think "AHA! HE'S GUILTY!" Because, you know, he didn't answer questions and stuff.
And then there are the people who have ever dealt with a lawyer. Because if you are involved in a legal case, one that potentially has millions of dollars' worth of personal repercussions on the line, the first thing your lawyer tells you to do is shut the hell up. Because, to be blunt, it is the smart thing to do. You don't talk, you don't say things that can be taken out of context and used to beat your head in when you get to trial.
Of course, if you don't say anything on something like this, they'll paint you as guilty anyway. But it's way less quotable. And all the chowderheads who think that Braun's first responsibility is to satisfy their curiosity - or more accurately, provide them with ammunition for their preconceived conclusions - as opposed to seeing to his own legal defense and welfare, well, I wish them joy of any future run-ins with the legal system.
I think they might change their minds about talking.

An Open Letter To Baseball On the Bosch Deal

"So if A-Rod OPSes the same as a duck, he's made of wood"

Dear Baseball:

Please stop being so fucking stupid about the way you handle PEDs.

A Curt Assessment

Not Actually Curt Schilling

So Curt Schilling is now claiming that an unnamed Red Sox staffer suggested he start taking PEDs.
And that he refused to name the staffer.
And that certain people were aware of this.
And that it was dealt with in 2008.
And the person involved was fired by the Red Sox.
And that he wasn't bringing it up now to get attention.
And that the person responsible for bringing him the suggestion may in fact have been Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chaffee.
And that the Red Sox staffer may have instead suggested that Schilling's Tauren shaman take virtual PEDs, also known as "buffing", rather than suggesting that Schilling take them.
And that the PEDs in question were actually magical beans which, when Schilling threw them out the window, grew into a giant beanstalk.

Some of these things are false. At this point, I'm not sure Curt Schilling knows which ones.

The Buzz on the Latest Steroid News

There's something comical about the sort of indignation shown by baseball writers whenever the topic of performance enhancing drugs comes up. At once determined to root out even the faintest whiff of steroidiana while being overcome with the vapors should they indeed discover it, they resemble nothing so much as a bunch of teenagers who've gone rooting through their parents' drawers hoping to find Dad's Playboys, and being traumatized when they find Mom's vibrator instead. They are shocked, shocked to discover gambling in this establishment, even as they howl that they're determined to find out that gambling's going on here.
Football writers, by comparison, have a much more relaxed approach to things. When a football player is accused of steroid use, they generally roll their eyes and say "Duh", or, in rare cases, break into pretzel-factory-having-sex-with-a-taffy-puller-in-a-tornado levels of illogic to try to deny that any football players have taken steroids, ever. (See, for example, the case of Brian Cushing, whose defenders think "cycling" is something you do with two wheels and a discounted Lance Armstrong spandex jersey).
But right now it's the baseball guys' turn again, as the Biogenesis investigation - which any sane individual would view as proof that baseball's ongoing vigilance about PEDs is actually working - has the Danny Knoblers of the world ready for the fainting couch. Look, kids, it's simple: the odds of BALCO being the only shop cooking up steroids for pro athletes, particularly in this day and age when HGH gets advertised next to lawn sasquatches in  in-flight magazines, were roughly zero. The chances that there would still be baseball players foolish or greedy enough to risk getting caught and suspended - as well as other athletes willing to take those same risks - for fame and fortune - were basically 100%. The fact that many of the high-profile names on the Biogenesis lists had already been dinged demonstrates that baseball's testing process is working. And the odds that not every individual who made contact with the place was immediately taking SCUD missiles' worth of deca durabolin right where  Mrs. Clemens reputedly got McNameedled are actually pretty good, if the actual lists being quoted are to be believed.
So to all the writers in a tizzy over this, I offer some advice: Close the drawer. Calm the hell down. Cease demanding we throw out the entire American system of jurisprudence in order to satisfy your lust for column inch filler. And go cover football for a while. You might find it relaxing.