Bud, Bonds and Balls

More big time trouble for the MLB. The very first round of drug testing in 2003 was to be confidential; hence all players willingly gave samples without fear of penalty exposure. After three years of wrangling, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that investigators can use the names and urine samples of about 100 players that tested positive in 2003.

Here's the sequence of events;
1.)the player is promised confidentiality and gives a sample.
2.)instead of destroying samples and records, the IRS raids the labs and seizes the goods.
3.)more than 5% of the MLB tested positive resulting in the now "drug testing program".
4.) the feds are now using this evidence to bolster ongoing investigations or other creative persecution-prosecution techniques.

We all know the big names, Bonds, Sheff, Giambi, but there are 100 total. That means a hell of a lot of other big names tested positive. What is Bud going to do now.

The morality of steroids aside, i must agree with the players on this one. This is the reason the union didn't want testing in the first place, they felt it would overstep and lead to other gateway drugs. The players were given their word that the tests were confidential, but now they are not. The union was correct, why negotiate with people like this.

Here's where things get really interesting, most expect this to further the Bonds perjury case, right? Wrong, if Bonds was tested in 2003, he was already with BALCO and Arnold of U of I. They were in the business of creating undetectable juice. This means that a revelation of the Bonds test would be negative and actually prove his "innocence". Could this steroid mess get any more fucked up?

Like everyone else, i'm so sick of this steroids mess and MLB. It's time for Bud to do a mea culpa? "I, we, everyone fucked up, we'll admit it and lets just move on". Do what you want with the records because no one is going to believe them in 20 years anyway. By not takcling the issue head on, Bud is digging the biggest ditch on Earth. How will he ever get out from under this? He won't, not until he leaves in 08.

The bottom line is that this is a scandal, and like all scandals we yearn for more 'juicey' details. The details in this one involve the names-the proof positive. No non-denial denials in this one, if you test positive creativity won't work. No "tainted sample" Merriman's here. Baseball, fans, and media are piling on right now. So what names will the samples reveal. I look most forward not to the muscle heads, but to which pitchers names pop up. Clemens, Petite, etc? They don't look like juicers, but they recover at an astounding rate.

Bud, Mitchell and the owners haven't done anything so far-simply hoped the problem will go away. This may be the event that finally forces their hand.