Mitchell Report Conclusions

I disagree with your "move on" attitude. Much like gambling effects on the sport in early 20th century- and writers taking the "what's the big deal mentality" which lead to 1919 WS.  I believe this was and is a serious threat to the credibility of the sport. I agree with many of the conclusions but not all. I see no evidence there is a minority of players- considering Mitchell found these players w/o subpoena power and almost not leverege and several players not talking. There is more analysis and investigation to do.

I agree most with the shared responsibility of players and league (the most telling revelation I have heard is the SF GM was told about Bonds and "dealing" in the clubhouse in 2002-that's an amazing piece of information) I don't think it went far enough

management

players

 media

and our general population mentality of ends justifies the means-instant gratification all are responsible for this saga.

I'm sorry if way overdue validation of what was obvious to most fans is inconvienant for you and as someone who thrives on the analysis of numbers you especially should be outraged as those numbers were rigged and flawed baseball research of this era.

Put me firmly down as not there yet- dig deeper.

the thing that i really dont want to know is the ENTIRE list of players who use performance enhancing drugs.  if this is as wide spread as people like jose canseco would have us believe, then there is no way that MLB could recover.  the initial list is out.  what MLB needs to do is have a grace period where any player who has used in the past may come forward, without penalty and in COMPLETE confidenciality, for re-education and counseling. 

maybe a fan should file a class action lawsuit against MLB for fraudulent representation.  or players who could prove that they are clean could file some kind of suit against teams who looked the other way and allowed the steroid use to continue.  maybe then MLB and the public will see the seriousness of the issue.

to blame the media is convenient and misguided.  no one forced any of these MEN to ingest any of these illicit drugs into their system.  no one put a gun to their heads and told them that if they did not take the drugs, they or their families would be harmed.   the responsibility rests solely on the players themselves.  look at the list of players.  with a couple of rare exceptions, they are marginal players, who, without the aid of performance enhancing drugs, would have been and probably should have been replaced with younger, better players.  they have been coddled their whole lives and when they saw that their lifestyle may change in anyway, they took the opportunity to lie and cheat so that they may hang on to their dream a little longer than it was supposed to last. 

we are the real fools.  those of us who paid money to watch these cheaters perform a game, a pasttime, and thought that the playing field was level.