Sports Illustrated’s Tom Verducci gives some insight into the thought processes involved in deciding whether or not an anabolic steroid user should be voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Unfortunately, it only reveals the confusion among sports writers when it comes to the topic of steroids.
The Baseball Writers Association of America (BWAA) is an association of baseball journalists whose most public function involves electing players to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. BWAA members with at least 10 years’ membership are eligible to vote for up to ten players from a ballot of players considered qualified by a screening committee.
An ongoing debate among the BWAA membership has involved the use of anabolic steroids and performance-enhancing drugs by baseball players during the so-called “Steroid Era”. Should admitted or even suspected steroid users be allowed entry into Cooperstown?
BWAA members often feel compelled to explain the reasoning behind their votes. Usually, this amounts to grandstanding about the immorality of steroids in sports and the destruction of the integrity of the game by doped athletes.
Verducci doesn’t believe the use of steroids is necessarily a moral issue. His main objection is that the performance-enhancing benefits of steroids. They create an unfair advantage over athletes who choose to be “clean.” Steroid users corrupted the “fairness of the game” by improving their performance too much (using PEDs) thus creating an unfair playing field according to Verducci.
“That’s my issue: It’s not a “moral” one, it’s a performance issue,” according to Verducci. “The only “character” issues that matter to me in Hall of Fame voting regard how somebody played the game.”
Verducci goes on to say that he doesn’t believe that steroid users have any place in the Hall of Fame.
In practically the next sentence, Verducci explains why he decided to vote for an admitted steroid user anyway.
Verducci voted for Jeff Bagwell. Bagwell admitted using the anabolic steroid “androstenedione”. Of course, androstenedione wasn’t legally classified as an “anabolic steroid” until Congress passed the Anabolic Steroid Control Act of 2004. Now, it’s a Controlled Substance.
So maybe it’s just a matter of semantics for Verducci. After all, androstenedione wasn’t really an anabolic steroid when Bagwell used it – at least not according to the law. So, it was ok.
But it has technically always been considered an anabolic-androgenic steroid by chemists and other scientists.
Or maybe it’s simply a legal issue with Verducci? Maybe Verducci isn’t really against anabolic steroids? Perhaps he is only against anabolic steroids that are illegal in the United States?
Even though Verducci claimed his “issue” with steroids was a “performance” issue and not a “moral” issue, he still voted for Bagwell while scoffing at Bagwell’s assertion that androstenedione didn’t improve his performance (while helping him get “freakishly big”).
“Bagwell instructed a trainer to make him as big as he could possibly be (he did get freakishly big), took the steroid precursor andro and gave the hackneyed disclaimer that andro didn’t help him hit home runs but only helped him work out.”
Okay, maybe the performance issue doesn’t really matter to Verducci?
It sounds like it really is just a moral issue where right and wrong is determine by an arbitrary and capricious rule or law after all. Steroids, at least certain steroids, are evil because they are against the rules or illegal but not because they are intrinsically bad for the game.
Photo credit: Sports Illustrated
Source:
Verducci, T. (January 6, 2012). Explaining my Hall of Fame ballot. Retrieved from http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2012/writers/tom_verducci/01/06/hall.of.fame.ballot/
