← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · xmetalhead
Thread ID: 7182 | Posts: 28 | Started: 2003-06-06
2003-06-06 19:33 | User Profile
Sammy Sosa, good ballplayer. What do you all think about it? I don't dislike him but I don't believe him. Why use a corked bat for BP in the first place?? There's no place for cheating in Major League Baseball, period. They did tests on Sammy's other bats and the tests were negative for corking. It could've been an accident I guess. Thing is, I'm just amazed at the rush of folks defending Sosa to the fullest extent. Excuses, excuses. I mean, if Mark McGuire had made the same "mistake" I'm sure he'd be a lonely, lonely White man right 'bout now. Didn't Pete Rose make a "mistake" too?? However, I just heard Sosa will be suspened for 8 games starting today.
[u]Sosa to be honored for 500th homer at Wrigley[/u] Associated Press
WASHINGTON -- Several Illinois congressmen are expected to visit Wrigley Field on Friday to honor Sammy Sosa, even though the star is facing a suspension for playing with a juiced bat.
The U.S. House voted 372-0 Monday to congratulate the Chicago Cubs slugger on his 500th home run and praise him as a role model. Friday's ceremony is to present him with a copy of the House resolution.
A day after the House vote, Sosa was found to be hitting with an illegal bat.
Sosa said he used the corked bat by accident, and tests of the remaining bats in his locker -- as well as the five he'd given the Baseball Hall of Fame -- came up clean.
Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., who sponsored the House resolution, said Thursday he never considered canceling the Friday event.
Had another corked bat been found in Sosa's locker, however, Gutierrez would've taken a different approach.
"I would have rolled up the resolution and sent it to him in the mail,'' he said.
Gutierrez, who represents a largely Hispanic district on Chicago's Northwest Side, said he expects several of his colleagues to be at Wrigley to join in honoring Sosa, including Rep. Bill Lipinski, a die-hard Chicago White Sox fan.
Lipinski declined to join those who would criticize Sosa.
"The poor Cubs have had enough trouble over the course of the years. I don't have to heap any more problems upon them,'' Lipinski said.
[u]Corked-bat mistake happened to me once[/u]
By Joe Morgan Special to ESPN.com
For all those who jumped to conclusions after Sammy Sosa was caught with a corked bat, it looks like Sosa's explanation was more correct than their accusations.
Sosa said he used the corked bat only for batting practice and picked it up by mistake in Tuesday night's game. Since then, all 76 of Sosa's bats that were confiscated after the incident have been X-rayed and found to be completely cork-free.
The five bats Sosa has given to the Hall of Fame also were found to be clean.
Moreover, the five bats Sosa has given to the Baseball Hall of Fame were X-rayed by us at the Hall (I'm the vice chairman of the Hall) and also found to be clean. These are the bats he used in achieving milestones such as his 500th home run.
Sosa's accomplishments should not be tarnished by this one incident, according to the statement released Thursday by the Hall. Some writers have suggested that Sosa's Hall credentials should now be questioned. I disagree with that. Sosa should be punished, but it hasn't been proved that this is anything more than an isolated incident. [color=red][why should he be punished if it's proved to be a mistake?-xmet][/color]
Since Sosa's bats were demonstrated to be clean, I accept his explanation. In fact, I understand how a batter could use a corked bat by mistake -- because it happened to me once.
I had two or three corked bats, made for me by a carpenter, that I used for batting practice when I played with the San Francisco Giants in 1981. We used them because the cold conditions made our hands hurt during BP. The corked bat would soften the sting and protect your hands. I also used aluminum bats during batting practice, for the same reason.
One day, I forgot to take the corked bats back to my clubhouse locker after BP. During the game, one of my bats broke, and the bat boy brought a couple of other bats to me. I just grabbed one, because all my bats were the same. After I hit a fly ball to right field, I thought, "That didn't feel right." I went back to look at the bat, and sure enough -- it was the corked bat I had used in BP and forgotten to put away.
I had two or three corked bats that I used for batting practice in San Francisco in 1981.
What bothered me was that I could have used it accidentally that one time and it could have broken in two, as happened with Sosa. To me, the consequences were too great. So after that, I went back to using my regular bats for BP. As I recall, the clubhouse guy threw the corked bats away for me.
By the way, there's a debate about whether a corked bat actually causes a batted ball to travel farther. My experience was that corked bats did not make the ball go farther -- at least they didn't help me. I agree with ESPN analyst Bobby Valentine on this issue.
I also agree with ESPN analyst Harold Reynolds that it's possible that a corked-bat event like Sosa's could simply be a mistake. It isn't probable, but it's possible. I know, because it happened to me.
[url=http://espn.go.com/mlb/columns/morgan_joe/1563765.html]http://espn.go.com/mlb/columns/morgan_joe/1563765.html[/url]
Interesting times in 2003 Amerikwa!
2003-06-07 03:53 | User Profile
The U.S. House voted 372-0 Monday to congratulate the Chicago Cubs slugger on his 500th home run and praise him as a role model. Friday's ceremony is to present him with a copy of the House resolution.
Why in the Hell are politicians wasting time congratulating a ball player and a cheating one at that!? Is there any doubt why the people are apathetic when it comes to voting, when they see such ridiculous actions as this? While on the topic of useless politicians, the ruckus over political action being taken against Spam is another waste of time. Can we at least bring back ââ¬Ëtar and featheringââ¬â¢ if it's too early to shoot the bastards?
2003-06-07 04:02 | User Profile
It's a plausible explanation that Joe Morgan gave about the use of corked bats, but at the same time, it dawned on me that both Morgan and Sosa should have made some kind of special mark or a spot of paint or something on the practice bat so as to avoid these kinds of mix-ups.
As for the X-rays of the 76-plus bats, the House resolution, it seems this society will stop at nothing in terms of the allocation of economic and political resources toward sports. It's been said by some that the American fixation on television sports is one deliberately fostered as a way of providing a distraction from other things more valuable. I'm inclined to agree.
2003-06-07 04:30 | User Profile
You're right PA. Bread and circuses.
2003-06-07 05:16 | User Profile
Paging Roger Bannister....paging Roger Bannister to the front desk....
2003-06-07 05:22 | User Profile
Didn't McGwire endure a ton of heat for his 'steroid abuse' during his 70-hr season?
Not to mention the snickering of the Jew/black status quo that the home run race was 'fixed' for McGwire so as to give white America a white hr champ?
It's a friggin' joke to begin with. THE BALL IS JUICED, folks, and has been since the end of the 94/95 strike. Or am I supposed to believe that hitters ordinarily set slugging totals at 37 & 38 years of age that were beyond their physical capabilities at 27 & 28??
Wake up.
2003-06-07 14:13 | User Profile
I never was much of a sports fan. It has turned negroes into gods, worshiped by Whites.
2003-06-07 14:50 | User Profile
I don't really understand this game but here's one thing I don't get that someone may be able to explain...
In cricket the big powerful players use a HEAVIER bat to enable them to score boundaries.
Why would lightening a bat - by putting cork in the middle help a player to score home runs?
Surely if you are strong enough - as Sosa presumably is - you need a heavy bat to whack the ball out of the ground.
2003-06-07 17:53 | User Profile
Answer my question, Yanks.
:D
2003-06-07 18:57 | User Profile
JJ, a corked bat probably DOESN'T help. Springy cork doesn't allow a very efficient energy transfer between the bat and the ball, as the stiffer wood bat is able to transfer energy much faster than the cork. A corked bat just allows you to swing faster, which probably doesn't make up for the loss of energy..but hey, if they THINK it helps, they'll do it.
2003-06-07 19:01 | User Profile
Originally posted by 2600@Jun 7 2003, 12:57 ** JJ, a corked bat probably DOESN'T help. Springy cork doesn't allow a very efficient energy transfer between the bat and the ball, as the stiffer wood bat is able to transfer energy much faster than the cork. A corked bat just allows you to swing faster, which probably doesn't make up for the loss of energy..but hey, if they THINK it helps, they'll do it. **
Thanks for the explanation.
Maybe it gives them a psychological advantage, rather than an actual one.
2003-06-07 19:55 | User Profile
Originally posted by Cracker of the Whip@Jun 6 2003, 21:53 ** Why in the Hell are politicians wasting time congratulating a ball player and a cheating one at that!? Is there any doubt why the people are apathetic when it comes to voting, when they see such ridiculous actions as this? **
While the lemmings are occupied with drinking beer and watching whateverball, Congress will be busy stabbing the rest of us in the back. :sleep:
But hey, they like Sosa, so they can't be all bad, right? Yeah, that's it.
2003-06-07 20:57 | User Profile
Take a week off and OD falls to this. Right up my alley. Where do I start?
Does a corked bat help? Not really. Back in the early 90's I worked on a piece in which we had a physicist and an engineer explain the theory behind corking a bat, and why or why not it would work. It doesn't really help a player hit the ball farther. It does help him swing the bat faster, being lighter. This is simplifying it, but that's how it turned out. It wasn't any surprise, I didn't see how a lighter bat would make the ball travel farther. If you are a blown out steroid filled player like Sosa, you have the strength, mass, speed of swing to overcome any lightness or less density in the bat anyway.
Take a look at Sosa from about pre 1998 or 1997. He weighed about 175 - 180. He hit the juice and was up to 220 in four months. You can buy steroids over the counter in the Dominican, Mexico, just about anywhere in Latin America. He then started belting the ball out of the park at more than double his old rate.
Same for Barry Bonds. He gained 45 lbs. of muscle in four months, and belts 73 home runs. I'm not going to get into the other rumors behind that whole mess again, with Selig wanting a black player to have the hr record thinking it would boost black interest. Anything to get rid of a white record holder is probably more like it the way things really are. But that gets a big argument started that I don't think most OD members would be interested in.
McGwire admitted using Androstene, an over the counter pro-hormone supplement that does seem to help build and maintain muscle tissue. It also can give a positive test result for the steroid Nandrolone if the athlete is asked to whiz in a bottle. He also admitted using creatine, which does work in helping build muscle and increasing the strength of muscle contraction. BUT, tests on creatine show that the results are more dramatic on skinny guys than on guys with muscle in the first place. The British first started using it with sprinters with great results. Despite all the bad press, there are no bad side effects, other than the pharmaceutical companies wishing that they could make it something that is prescribed by doctors. Too late. McGwire caught a lot of hell, while Sammy was given a free pass. Sammy was given a free pass while he had gained an enormous amount of muscle in nothing flat. McGwire was known for hitting homeruns anyway. His problem was staying away from injuries. Throughout his career, his ratio of homeruns to at bats was fairly steady. Not so for Bonds or Sosa. Bonds improved so much in his late 30's that you'd have to say this sullen azzhole is the poster boy for better performance through chemistry.
BTW, if anyone is interested, the USOC is now admitting that athletes like Carl Lewis turned up positive in drug tests in the late 80's, but were let compete anyway. Every athlete listed that was caught and let compete so far has been black. The only athletes I remember being caught and suspended back then were some white shot putters and discus throwers. Also, those Kenyans I've mentioned that have using EPO under the supervision of a couple of jewish doctors and others yet always get play as if they are all natural, have had some hard luck the last two months. Chepchumba, one of the top female runners was popped for EPO (she's handled by the jew Dr. Gabriele Rosa and his sons) [url=http://www.eurosport.com/home/pages/V3/L0/S6/sport_Lng0_Spo6_Sto438343.shtml]http://www.eurosport.com/home/pages/V3/L0/...Sto438343.shtml[/url]. The article mentions John Ngugi who said he refused a test because the testers didn't identify themselves. He was not cleared as the article says. He quit running. Never ran again after that incident. Since his suspension years ago, whenever field testers show up in Kenya or Ethiopia, they are told the runner is away, in some other village or city, out of the country, every time! American and European runners do not have the luxury or location to be able to avoid spot tests. The Africans are never spot tested during the off season, their location giving them the excuse. Testing during the season rarely catches anyone. The effects from using the drugs and training last for months. Finally, two top Kenyan 'natural' distance runners have died in the last 6 weeks. The symptoms all pointing to EPO abuse. Too much of the drug without being monitored correctly will make the blood as thick as maple syrup. One of these was Daniel Kimani, the former NCAA cross country champ. He was a freshman at 23, so he already had a leg up on 18 and 19 yr. old Americans. He dropped dead while having lunch. The school has been awfully quiet, and the press has buried the story. However, when any white male has had this happen, it's been trumpeted to infer that whites have to cheat.
Finally, Sosa is a head case like a lot of other players from Latin America. I could take up a lot of bandwidth with stories about how simple minded and self centered to the point of being dangerous these guys are.
2003-06-07 21:25 | User Profile
Great information, Roger. Basically, you seem to be saying that Sosa probably didn't cheat with the corky bat but cheated with steroids instead.
I was pleased to see Lewis be exposed for the hypocrite and cheat he is. He was always whining about Ben Johnson but it turns out that he was up to similar tricks himself - even if he was a superior athlete.
There's an argument for confiscating the Gold medal he won in 1988 (after Johnson was disqualified) and awarding it to Linford Christie.
Although, there have been some doubts about Christie's improvements which occurred in his late 20s, an age when some athletes are ready for retirement.
2003-06-07 21:46 | User Profile
JJ, did you notice how the IAAF tried to make itself look like it was going after cheats by attacking older, over the hill athletes? I remember when they popped Christie, well past his prime, and then went after Dieter Bauman of Germany. Bauman's crime was having the temerity to win the Olympic 5 k over a field of Africans, and then state that the IAAF wasn't going after (certain) drug cheats. Bauman kept pushing the issue, and gets nailed at the same time as Christie. Bauman said he had been set up by someone injecting 'roids into his food or something else, and people laughed. But the fact was an investigation showed the toothpaste in Bauman's hotel room had been injected with Nandrolone, and Bauman's wife, a non-athlete also tested positive. What a mess.
Back to Christie. He was one of the first sprinters that used creatine. Lewis is the biggest hypocrite the sport has ever seen. He took a year off once, saying he needed the rest. The rumor was that he was going to get plastic surgery because of the acromegaly from mixing HgH and steroids was becoming more and more evident. Sure enough, a year later he looked like the bones in his brow ridge and jaw had been shaved or something. About that 1988 race where Johnson was dq'd. Johnson did use drugs, but the drug he tested positive for was not one that he or even his doctors claimed they had given him. Many people suspect his sample was tampered with in order to push Lewis back up. There was a lot of money and sponsors behind Lewis, while Johnson irritated people with his attitude. The doctors that did the testing on the athletes after that race said not one of the finalists had a normal endocrine profile.
American sprinters point fingers all the time, but are the biggest hypocrites. Evelyin Ashford used to accuse everyone else of using drugs, yet she was known in track circles as Mrs. Dianabol. Same for Ed Moses and others too numerous to list. I really should put a post together with some of these stories, but this board is supposed to be on politics. On second thought, a lot of the dirty dealings in sports are due to politics.
One more note, I mentioned the African distance runners avoiding testing. I know of two other incidents, for a fact, where Kenyans were caught using EPO. One of these was last summer. The IAAF decided to look the other way, because these runners come from poor countries, and support extended families and a bunch of other b.s. reasons.
I know enough about some athletes using drugs to say that Sebastian Coe ought to ask for Wilson Kipketer's and Noah Ngeny's records in the 800 and 1k to be nullified. No joke. Have to get going, but I'll post some more on this later.
2003-06-07 22:05 | User Profile
As you say, it's appropriate to post this stuff on a political board because it is about politics in sport.
Coe might be an irritating bore outside of the track but I would say he seemed to be one of the more natural track athletes the world has produced.
I didn't even know someone had cracked his 800m record. That was an amazing performance and lasted for years.
Personally, I don't have a problem with athletes taking steroids. If they want to screw up their bodies, good luck to them. In Formula One they use all sorts of tricks to tinker with the cars. Why shouldn't they be able to tinker with human machines?
Johnson raised the bar in the 100m. His races in the 1987 (or was it 85?) World Championship and the 1988 Olympics were phenomenal to watch. I think Dwain Chambers could win a gold for Britain soon. He's beaten the American guy a lot of times.
2003-06-07 22:37 | User Profile
The success of black athlets is similar to the success that Jews claim in science or business -- to a large degree it's due to the system of nepotism, chroniism and favoritism.
2003-06-08 00:55 | User Profile
With all the other crap I wrote, I did fail to mention that Sosa's coloring is letting him get off lightly in this situation. Of course. Some are even trying to make it a racial issue. The fact is, the majority of athletes caught cheating in pro sports in the US are black, as they are in international track and field.
Madrussian is right in many ways. Blacks are favored over whites even when whites demonstrate more ability. This is blatant in American football. No matter how great or how fast a white prospect might be at certain positions, he will not be recruited by a major program. In many cases, he will not be recruited at all. This happens in track also. Casey Combest was a white HS kid who was running the black off the nation's best prep sprinters and was thinly recruited. While on the team in his first season at Kentucky the coaching staff concentrated on black sprinters that he was beating. He quit, came back this season and ran one of the fastest times in the nation on a month's training. If he were black, he would be coddled and treated like a god. This site has some info on what happens in the NFL and college football ranks. [url=http://www.castefootball.us/]http://www.castefootball.us/[/url] It's a pay site, but the info on the opening page mentions a lot of what I've written about. No, I'm not advertising. You can visit it to see that others do know what's going on. While blacks do have a high percentage of individuals with the make up to excel in certain sports, there are whites with the same or better abilities, and they are not encouraged. While blacks and mestizos have an advantage in boxing, namely their much thicker skulls, the last thing boxing wants is white champions. The hunt for a white hope is mostly myth. They don't want white champions.
Whites are discouraged from many sports with conditioning that begins from the time they hit kindergarten. The media does their best to enforce the feeling that whites can't compete. Look at the USA's 2000 Olympic basketball team. Stuffed with NBA stars. Then it took the referees to save the US from a loss to Lithuania in the semifinals. The US won 85 - 83 on the refs calling foul after foul on the Lithuanians while letting the Americans get away with every infraction. A last second desperation 3 pointer almost won it for Lithuania anyway. In the final, France, yes those guys, were within four points of the NBA boonsketballers with less than 5 minutes to go. Since it looked shaky, the refs once again started working the whistles while letting the Africans do whatever they pleased. The sports writers and media all sang about the US reasserting itself in the final minutes to win by 10 points. Last year, the NBA idiots were spanked by 3 different European teams. Silence from the media. Don't doubt the money being coughed up to make sure the NBA - not the USA - wins the gold in Athens next year. Maybe it won't be fixed. Don't bet on it though.
I don't think Sosa is getting that much attention. That much attention compared to what you would have seen showered on a white player if he had done the same. Maybe they'll select a white player to be the sacrifice, and we'll see one caught corking his bat, putting vaseline on his pitches. Who knows?
JJ, yeah Coe's a windbag. But he was one hell of a runner when healthy. His father was his coach, did a brilliant job in putting different systems together and devising a training plan. His book is the bible for many of today's top runners. His 800 record was beaten in '97. It had stood since '81. He had set the earlier record in '79, so he held the record for a total of 19 years which is totally outrageous. I was in Oslo a week and a half later when he set his first record in the mile. He psyched out a lot of runners with his apperance after that and other races. He would cross the line, and look like he would need only a minute or so to do it again. Ovett was more of a regular bloke though. Supernatural talent. The guy that broke Coe's record in the 800 is Wilson Kipketer, a Kenyan who lives in Denmark. He was very sick the year after he broke the record, claiming it was malaria. All the symptoms pointed to problems with blood doping and EPO. He grabbed the silver medal in the 2000 Olympics behind a kid from Germany. Kipketer's coach is known for his shady background regarding drugs. Same goes for Jos Hermens and Dr. Elstre with the Ethiopians, and Dr.Rosa with the Kenyans. Kim MacDonald, the big sports agent was suspected of obtaining drugs for his distance athletes (all from Africa, where they could avoid spot tests) and it was known that his power in the sport and with sponsors kept him from being investigated. He died of a heart attack a couple of years ago while in his 40's. I joked with other runners in wondering if it was EPO related. A bad joke, but he was a bad guy.
[img]http://cbs.sportsline.com/u/photos/ap/2000/sep/vince4m100100.jpg[/img]
2003-06-08 17:23 | User Profile
Those were great days when Ovett and Coe were racing. It's a shame they avoided each other so often.
Ovett was a much nicer person though he came across as the baddie.
2003-06-08 21:22 | User Profile
Originally posted by Roger Bannister@Jun 7 2003, 19:55 **The fact is, the majority of athletes caught cheating in pro sports in the US are black, as they are in international track and field. **
Roger,
Are the majority of participants in pro sports now black? If so that would explain this increase.
I wouldn't argue with many of your points, especially Sosa and Bonds getting juiced up as that was quite obvious. But with regards to cheating in baseball, you know as well as I do that plenty of white pitchers have been caught scuffing, greasing and cutting the ball for as long as we've had baseball. It's certainly not a black thing.
2003-06-09 04:54 | User Profile
I don't think cheating is just a "black" thing.
It's all about the money.
In athletics too, as Roger will confirm, lots of white athletes have been caught pumping themselves up with steroids. The worst offenders used to be the Eastern Europeans.
2003-06-09 06:27 | User Profile
It's against the rules to use corked bats and we don't know that Sosa made a mistake. And, many players believe that tampering with the bat will help their hitting. I'm sure someone has done careful tests.
Why did all his other bats test okay? Simple, cheaters don't need to leave a lot of evidence laying around. Sosa could be thinking that he'll just use a corked bat occasionally to boost his stats (they were down). The first time he's caught he can just claim he mixed up his bats. If I were a professional ball player, I wouldn't own any corked bats. BTW, if he uses corked bats in practice, where are his other corked practice bats?
McGwire did get raked over the coals for using a legal enhancer. When McGwire and Sosa were in the race to break the land-standing homerun record, Sosa often got as much praise as McGwire even though McGwire handily won the race while the only thing Sosa had more of than anyone else was strikeouts. That praise McGwire received was often shadowed in a cloud of racial accusations -- as if Sosa's problem wasn't losing the race but was being black in a racist society. But, who is it that got all the ad revenue?
Suspend Sosa for 8 games and put an asterisk in the book.
2003-06-10 02:14 | User Profile
It was easy for Sosa's other bats to pass tests when the league office lets the team know they're coming to check them.
Cheating isn't necessarily a black thing, but the majority of those caught the last few years have been black. The overwhelming majority of athletes caught in the NFL using steroids, using drugs period have been black. It isn't only due to the numbers of blacks in pro sports. American blacks are a minority in baseball. They don't get the headlines a white player would when caught cheating. Sosa is a superstar, that's the reason he is still in the news. That idiot Albert Belle was caught doing the same thing and it was dropped quickly. They should check old murders and see if any of his bats were involved. It wouldn't surprise anyone if there were positive results. Most of the athletes caught using steroids in the NFL are black offensive linemen. But the majority of offensive linemen in the NFL are white. The blacks use them to try and match the strength of the whites. Some whites will use them to increase their strength or try to gain more speed.
In track and field, the Eastern Europeans were notorius, but their doctors and athletes claim much of their knowledge and techniques for using drugs came from Americans. The Eastern Europeans were dominating weightlifting at the Olympics in the late 40's and early 50's. To counteract this, Dr. John Ziegler of the USA, no he was not jewish, created dianabol. Then Americans began to do better and win some divisions. The Russians and the rest got hold of dianabol and began to knock off the Americans again. The Americans began to use it on sprinters in the late 60's. By the early 70's, everybody was using steroids. A lot of other steroids have come along, but none of them work as well to build muscle as dianabol. It's hard on the liver, so it has to be cycled. Drugs have exaggerated the differences between blacks and whites in a some sports. The sprints wouldn't be so heavily black if it weren't for the fact that steroids combined with human growth hormone have a greater effect on blacks than on whites. Despite use of steroids, very few blacks can even make it beyond the first round in Olympic weightlifting or Strongman contests. The few black weightlifters that have medaled the last few years were from Cuba, and all were caught sooner of later juicing heavily. A huge black American lifter named Mark Henry was getting all sorts of attention in the early to mid 90's, with claims he was the world's strongest man, he was drug free, all sorts of things. In real life, the contests in Northern and Eastern Europe had droves of lifters with no support, no real training facilities, no backing, no sponsors who couldn't crack the top 20 in their national meets to go to the Olympics. But they were all much better than Mark Henry. And weighed 100 to 150 pounds less. Henry was clobbered at the Olympics and the World Championships.
The most drugged up athletes today are American sprinters and E. African distance runners. The American sprinters get the shoe contracts and TV money. The American Federation covers for them. The big scandal right now in track is about how Carl Lewis and every other top US sprinter was turning up positive year after year in drug tests in the 1980's and 1990's. The American Federation (USTAF) would keep the results secret. They would let the athlete know and give them a chance to adjust and clean up before international meets. The Africans are protected by location and political correctness. When caught, they have been let off like I mentioned earlier, or people like their coach Dr. Rosa scream it's racism. Or anti-semitism when the finger is pointed at Rosa himself.
The American throwers and throwers around the world are doping, but they run the risk of having to face suspension when caught. Look at the athletes who were actually punished the last 15 years. Almost every one a white thrower. I should add that white women get off quite easily in the distance running dept. when caught. It's only white men that have to pay. Probably because they dominated distance running until EPO was introduced. There is a direct correlation with the introduction of EPO and the failure of the US to have three runners in each distance event reach the "A" standards necessary to compete in the World Championships. Yet, since Dr. Rosa ran away from an investigation in the sport of cycling, and took his show to Africa, their numbers of runners making the standards increased by a factor of 10. At least a few have finally been caught. More excuses for them will be made by the people at the top. Just like you see in the NBA, MLB, NFL. If you're black, it isn't your fault. If you're white, you are a scum of the earth cheater.
If you want to see the difference drugs can make, look at pictures of Barry Bonds or Sammy Sosa from 6 and 7 years ago. Or go ahead and watch ESPN Classic when they run baseball games from the 70's, 80's, and early 90's. The players look very skinny compared to some of the Mastodons playing today.
2003-06-10 14:16 | User Profile
de only sus'pedded him cus dem is raccists!
2003-06-10 14:29 | User Profile
Hmmm. I wonder if Lance Armstrong is on the juice? The French think so, but they've got a vested interest in saying so. Normally, I would dismiss such claims, but the fact that he got cancer says that something ain't right. Granted, it could be totally unrelated to steroid use, but synthetic hormones can have a hell of an effect on rapidly-dividing tissue.
Heard anything, Roger?
2003-06-10 18:23 | User Profile
Roger: or look at pictures of Ben Johnson when he didn't have bulging eyes and muscles.
Wasn't there also some suspicion that a lot of the Chinese women distance athletes were cheating too?
I can understand why they do it with so much money at stake. It's that old "everybody does it" argument.
There was a Russian 400m/800m runner (Kratocvilova?) some years ago who broke a bunch of records who looked like a man. I can't believe she wasn't on something. If she was born like that then you have to feel sorry for her!
2003-06-10 18:44 | User Profile
The boo-hooying of unfair treatment towards Sosa continues! Non-white rule breakers get appeals, Whites get penalized just for being White.
Sosa's appeal to be heard today in Baltimore
ESPN.com news services
Sammy Sosa's appeal of his eight-game suspension for using a corked bat will be heard Tuesday in Baltimore an an undisclosed location, the Chicago Cubs announced..
Major League Baseball's chief operating oficer, Bob DuPuy, will hear the appeal. The Cubs said that a decision regarding the appeal is not expected on Tuesday.
The Cubs begin a three-game series against the Orioles at Camden Yards starting Tuesday night. Sosa will read a statement about his appeal at 4 p.m. ET at Camden Yards. The Cubs said it is the only time he will comments during the series.
Sosa was suspended for eight games Friday by Bob Watson, baseball's vice president in charge of discipline, but the appeal allows him to play until he has a hearing and a ruling is made.
He was ejected from a game against Tampa Bay on June 3 when his bat shattered after hitting a ground ball and umpires discovered cork halfway up the handle of the bat.
Tests on 76 bats taken from Sosa's locker and five more of his at the Hall of Fame found no foreign substances. Sosa claims he mistakenly grabbed a bat he uses for batting practice and used it in the game.
"We support him in his appeal," Cubs general manager Jim Hendry said. "We have no reason to believe it was anything more than a one-time incident as he described it. We will support him and his rights that he exercises to appeal, and hopefully have his suspension reduced."
Sosa's agent, Tom Reich, told ESPN.com's Jayson Stark that while the eight-game suspension was within range of previous suspensions for this offense, Sosa decided to appeal because they believe the penalty to be "on the high side" of that range. So they will try to get the suspension reduced by a game or two, which would bring it even with most of the other bat-tampering suspensions of the last 15 years.
"But this is not a hostile proceeding," Reich said. "We do believe some of the treatment of Sammy has been hostile -- not just by the media, but in the court of public opinion. But this is not going to be a hostile process. It's simply an opportunity for the union and Sammy to present a fair defense. And that's all we ask."
Reich said Sosa acknowledges that "a mistake was made, and a rule was broken," that there was "no question there was going to be a suspension" and that once a decision is made on the appeal, "everybody will abide by it."
It's likely that in Sosa's apeal, his agents and the union will attempt to contrast his behavior with the behavior of Albert Belle, who was suspended for only six days (but seven games) after having his bat confiscated in 1994. Belle's teammate, Jason Grimsley, has admitted crawling through the ceiling of Jacobs Field to the umpire's room and switching the corked bat with another bat.
Sosa's side will certainly be pointing out that at least Sosa immediately admitted he'd broken a rule and apologized, even though he contended he'd picked up the corked bat by mistake.
"We just want to make sure that everybody is on the same page with the evidence," Reich said, "and we want to make sure the evidence is viewed in context with previous (bat-tampering) incidents."
[url=http://espn.go.com/mlb/news/2003/0609/1565699.html]http://espn.go.com/mlb/news/2003/0609/1565699.html[/url]
2003-06-10 23:15 | User Profile
**you know as well as I do that plenty of white pitchers have been caught scuffing, greasing and cutting the ball for as long as we've had baseball. It's certainly not a black thing. **
No your right it's not a black thing. What is remarkable however is the response to the incident, which I think was the point of the post.
Just as Matthew Shepard getting killed generated 4,560 stories, the little kid who was raped and murdered by two homosexuals generated not 1/10 of the media coverage, even though the incidents happened within weeks of one another. The point is the way the selective "politically correct" media chooses to cover and thus influence public opinon that is galling.
I for one think Sammy's a hell of a good ball player and appears to be a nice guy. He also is obviously a cheat. It's impossible to pick up a corked bat, especially for a professional ball player, and not know youve got it in your hand.
Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., who sponsored the House resolution, said Thursday he never considered canceling the Friday event.
This is the other thing. The Hispanic Cacus, La Raza, MeCha, etc. if any of these groups were comprised of white men they would be attacked as racist and would no doubt be under investigation by the FBI for sedition.
Its just another example of where we are, blatant racial preferences and lobbying for groups on the basis of their race, or simply because they are illegally in the country, is perfectly acceptable, hell encouraged most of those groups get tax monies to promote their racist views, but if a white man was to do it.....
I for one am proud to be a xenophobe, protectionist, and nationalist, all synonymous with patriot in my view.