“The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism. But under the name of ‘liberalism’ they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program, until one day America will be a Socialist nation, without knowing how it happened.”

Socialist Party presidential candidate Norman Thomas


Friday, December 14, 2007

It's Friday!

Sorry about the light posting today folks. Darned employment requirements compell me to actually accomplish something while at work....what're you gonna do?

Check in over the weekend, I'll be putting a few things up. Until then, consider this an open thread and discuss anything you want. I'll give you a topic: In light of the Mitchell report on the rampant use of illegal steroids in baseball, should Clemens, Petitt, etc have asterisks by their names in the record books, and should they be allowed in the HoF? Should players who used steriods before they were officially illegal be banned? Was it wrong to use anabolic steroids even if there was no prohibition of it in baseball...like before 1998?

And for astute reader Kevin, do steroids necessarily make you a better baseball player, given that muscles can't help you to hit a speeding round object with a round stick, arguably the hardest thing in sports?

Discuss...

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Lets look at it this way, there are a substantial amount of men who took steroids in the MLB according to the Mitchell Report. I think we should punish the players, fines, suspensions, etc, maybe put an asterisk next to their name in record books. But lets look at the bigger picture, which is your second question. For a batter, what do steroids really do for him? Muscles get in the way when you are trying to swing. To some extent they may give you an edge if batting in tee-ball, but to have the coordination and timing to hit both 98 mph fastballs and 82 mph changeups, and 75 mph curveballs, takes practice and talent. That is a simple fact you cannot deny. Its similar to corking a bat. You may get a small increase in power, around 1%. Barry Bonds and Jason Giambi can hit the ball 450 feet, without steroids. So with steroids they can now hit the ball 455 feet roughly. Not very significant. These guys could take placebos and do the same thing. Its not about enhancing performance, its about enhancing confidence when it comes to batting. Batting requires no endurance, and doesn't require muscle, and too much muscle actually harms them. As for pitchers, I am disgusted with pitchers that use it because it can actually help them, in terms of endurance. But again too much muscle will actually get in the way of creating a lot of torque on the body, which is essential for throwing a ball at high speeds.

Anonymous said...

All that aside, it's cheating. And cheating is for loosers.

Anonymous said...

Why is there not a steroid scandal in Professional Bowling? It is the trus pasttime of Americans, plus a participant can sip on a jack & cike while playing, or step out for a quick nicotine hit between frames. Gtta love it !!!