In an article in the Chronicle today, JJO reports even Lance Berkman knows the baseball fan cannot accept that baseball is clean. Even after instituting rules where there is actual punishment.
Says Lance:
“The problem with this whole sordid mess (is) now everybody (is questioned). Even today all of a sudden my name gets brought up in an article about steroids, and I’ve never even been anywhere close to that. What happens is you get a few guys basically throwing a taint over the game and the rest of us are suffering for it.
“Nobody’s going to be believed anymore. I can sit here and crow and say I’ve never done steroids or never done anything illegal from a standpoint of performance-enhancing drugs. But who’s going to believe me? The point’s well made because we’re all guilty by association."
+1 to Lance for using the word "taint" in a quote. But seriously, Lance, like myself, would like to see the other 103 names on the Naughty List come out.
I’d like to know who took performance-enhancing drugs. You see these guys and they do freakish things and you feel like, 'man.' If you’re not measuring up to what they’re able to accomplish you sit there and you say, 'well, who’s on the juice and who’s naturally just heads and shoulders above everybody else and who’s artificially enhanced.'
Personally, it's a question of total accountability. I do not appreciate the willingness of the government or of Major League Baseball to go after Barry Bonds, A-Rod, Clemens and a bunch of minor leaguers.
We didn't come out here to play tiddlywinks, son.
-Hal Smith
