I hate this BS that we are to blame, or MLB is to blame. Yes, we love to see homeruns, and yes, MLB allowed players to get away with murder for years, but nobody personally injected or fed these guys steroids. The blame lies solely on the player that MADE THE DECISION to take steroids to try to gain a competitive edge.

These players have no excuse in my opinion, and deflecting blame is cowardly and juvenile.

I lost a lot of respect for him..

I won’t be surprised one bit when Jeter tells the world that he used them too after all the media gathers in Spring Training… he’ll then go down as a savior, because he’ll be the first to give himself up for “the good of the game”

I was just too slow..

BACK TO BASEBALL,

I have to agree with Geoff that this is a microcosm of our society, I see it in my small town where the highschool football team is the most important thing, we have a saying “bleachers, not teachers”. The players get away with stuff that other students are punished for, they are treated like gods or something. When kids are getting passes at that level just because they play a sport, it’s creating someone who expects that kind of treatment the rest of his life.

And one of the more ridiculous things going on right now is the Michael Phelps bong-gate. They have arrested eight people who were at the party, smoking the dreaded ganja, and the cops are now in possession of the infamous bong, as the owner tried to sell it on e-bay for $100,000. Obviously not a PED (unless you’re having a food eating contest), who gives a diddly crap if he was smoking weed?

I think that the post-Strike Shortned Season should be known as “THE STEROID ERA” and all the records should still stand, and all the players that played in this era should be included in the Hall of Fame, and the record-books, etc..

I don’t feel bad for A-Rod, he cheated the game, and probably didn’t need to… he was THAT good before the steroids, but he’ll forever has this held against him.. same way that Barry Bonds will.. to me, it doesn’t change the fact that they are some of the best baseball players of all time. They cheated, they should have that on their permanent records, and let people think of them what they want.

Pete Rose should be in the Hall of Fame.. Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, etc.. should be in there too.. and there should be explanations as to what happened OFF the field with all of these players because it is now part of the History of Baseball..

I’m not trying to say this makes what he did right or that he isn’t still very much to blame for his own actions, I’m just saying that we’re all human – and considering the amount of pressure to perform, it can push people do to things they normally wouldn’t do.

We see the same thing in the business world. There is tons of pressure on businesses to perform well and meet investor expectations. When they don’t, they sometimes make very risky decisions to make up for it.

If you are truly 100% sure you wouldn’t take PED’s in his exact situation, then your definitely more ethical and mentally tough than most, including me. I’d like to think I’d make the right decision, but I’m not so sure.