For a month or so now, the recitation of Red Sox on the disabled list has taken a bit of time. Sage Stossel had a great op-ed drawing in last Sunday’s Boston Globe.
Now they are coming back. Matsuzaka, Martinez, Lowrie, Cameron, Buchholtz. Veriteck and Pedroia are still practicing fielding even with broken feet. This morning’s Globe headline:
Was last night a sign that things are turning around?
Back in April in one of my last posts, I wrote about the Supreme Court. Today, nominee Elena Kagan responded to questions about Chief Justice John Roberts’ metaphor that being judges is like being umpires.
According to Political.com
Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan on Wednesday gently criticized Chief Justice John Roberts’s hotly debated assertion that a Supreme Court justice’s job is “to call balls and strikes” like an umpire, suggesting the description may have misled the public about the work judges do.
“The metaphor might suggest to some people that law is a kind of robotic enterprise, that there’s a kind of automatic quality to it, that it’s easy, that we just sort of stand there and, you know, we go ball and strike, and everything is clear-cut, and that there is no judgment in the process. And I do think that that’s not right,” Kagan said in response to a question from Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) “It’s especially not right at the Supreme Court level where the hardest cases go and the cases that have been the subject of most dispute go.”
Kagan went on to imply that Roberts may have downplayed the degree to which judging requires perspective.
“Judges do, in many of these cases, have to exercise judgment. They’re not easy calls. That doesn’t mean that they’re doing anything other than applying law,” Kagan said. “But we do know that not every case is decided 9-0, and that’s not because anybody’s acting in bad faith. It’s because those legal judgments are ones in which reasonable people can reasonably disagree sometimes. And so in that sense, law — law does require a kind of judgment, a kind of wisdom.”
Her mild criticism of Roberts was a notable departure for Kagan, who has studiously declined senators’ repeated invitations to discuss her opinions on previous Supreme Court’s decisions or to cast aspersions on the motivations or analytical techniques of the justices.
The hearings have turned into a discussion about what an activist judge looks like. Is it Justice Thurgood Marshall as some Republicans tried to say an activist judge? And if he is Elana Kagan will be the same because she clerked for him and will somehow channel him.
Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan has come under an unusual line of attack from Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee. The Senators are going after Kagan’s 1988 clerkship for former Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, the first-ever African American justice, who retired in 1991 after helping to bring the court through some of the biggest civil-rights cases in its history. Some Republicans are taking this as an opportunity not only to put Marshall on trial but also make Kagan the chief witness. Here’s what’s happening, why, and what it means.
- Going After Thurgood Marshall The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank reports, “‘Justice Marshall’s judicial philosophy,’ said Sen. Jon Kyl (Ariz.), the No. 2 Republican in the Senate, ‘is not what I would consider to be mainstream.’ Kyl — the lone member of the panel in shirtsleeves for the big event — was ready for a scrap. Marshall ‘might be the epitome of a results-oriented judge,’ he said. Sen. Jeff Sessions (Ala.), the ranking Republican on the panel, branded Marshall a ‘well-known activist.’ Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said Marshall’s legal view ‘does not comport with the proper role of a judge or judicial method.’ Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) pronounced Marshall ‘a judicial activist’ with a ‘judicial philosophy that concerns me.'”
- Making Everything About Marshall Talking Points Memo’s Christina Bellantoni reports, “Ranking member Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) criticized Kagan for having ‘associated herself with well-known activist judges who have used their power to redefine the meaning of our constitution and have the result of advancing that judge’s preferred social policies,’ citing Marshall as his son, Thurgood Marshall Jr., sat in the audience of the Judiciary Committee hearings. In an example of how much the GOP focused on Marshall, his name came up 35 times.”
Of course, I think, along with Senators Al Franken, Patrick Leahy and many others that actually the Roberts’ Court is the activist court.
When Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy called on Franken, Minnesota’s junior Senator got right to his criticism that the current Supreme Court has been favoring powerful corporate interests over the rights of individuals.
Franken talked about how he believes that mandatory arbitration clauses strip Americans of the right to have grievances heard in a neutral court.
“Do you still agree … that one of the glorious things about courts is that they provide a level playing field in all circumstances?” he asked Kagan.
She replied that she agreed “very strongly” with Franken.
Democrats have accused the court — led by Chief Justice John Roberts — of overstepping its role by establishing policy rather than interpreting the law. Franken has been outspoken on the issue. In his time with Kagan, Franken was sharply critical of Chief Justice Roberts.
He accused Roberts and other justices of judicial activism that contradicted their own stated tenets. Franken cited the campaign finance case “Citizens United” as an example of the Robert’s court going beyond specific questions before it.
The landmark ruling this year determined that corporate funding of political broadcasts cannot be limited. It stemmed from a case of a non-profit corporation airing a film critical of Hillary Clinton.
The New York Times reported
Indeed, Ms. Kagan was unusually expansive when talking about matters in which she is already on record. She volunteered that she is not morally opposed to the death penalty, a position she took when she was confirmed as solicitor general. And she spoke freely about this year’s ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, in which the conservative bloc on the court ruled against her, striking down legal limits on corporate spending to influence elections.
Democrats have portrayed that ruling as “conservative judicial activism.” Ms. Kagan — who as solicitor general argued in defense of the campaign finance rules — said she convinced herself in preparing that “we had extremely strong arguments.”
Ms. Kagan also displayed a bit of her law professor side, talking more extensively about abstract issues like how constitutional law develops over time. In a mild challenge to the conservative view that the Constitution can be interpreted based only on the original meaning of its text, she said there were also instances in which the Supreme Court had applied a principle embedded in the Constitution in a new way.
She cited the 1954 case of Brown v. Board of Education, which struck down segregation in schools. The case relied upon the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection of the laws, yet Ms. Kagan noted that the amendment’s drafters thought it “perfectly consistent with segregated schools.”
Justice Thurgood Marshall, who as a lawyer argued the Brown case, has emerged as a dominant figure in the hearings. Ms. Kagan clerked for him, and Republicans, led by Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona, have attacked Justice Marshall as a liberal “activist” and expressed concerns about Ms. Kagan’s association with him.
On Tuesday, Ms. Kagan told Mr. Kyl that she was not her former boss. “I love Justice Marshall,” she said. “He did an enormous amount for me, but if you confirm me to this position, you’ll get Justice Kagan, you won’t get Justice Marshall. And that’s an important thing.”
I think that Elena Kagan is doing her best to criticize the Republicans and the current conservatives on the Supreme Court as she can without antagonizing her future colleagues. She isn’t a “progressive activist” (whatever that is), but I think she is smart enough and diplomatic enough to get Justice Kennedy’s vote and maybe even Justice Alito’s vote.
The Red Sox are really, really bad. No pitching, no hitting, no defense. Just losses. Who would have thought just a week ago that the Sox would go into last night’s game 4-9. 4-9!
How bad is it? Look at this from the Boston Globe Extra Bases. Sox batting with men on base.
0 for 7: Jeremy Hermida
0 for 5: Adrian Beltre, Marco Scutaro
0 for 3: Victor Martinez, Kevin Youkilis
0 for 2: Bill Hall, David Ortiz
0 for 1: Mike Cameron, J.D. Drew, Mike Lowell, Dustin Pedroia, Jason Varitek
That’s everybody on the roster, except for Jacoby Ellsbury and he hasn’t played since April 11. The last player to get a hit with a runner in scoring position was Hermida, who had a three-run double against the Twins on April 14.
As a team this season, the Red Sox are 16 for 99 (.162) with runners in scoring position including 1 for 8 with the bases loaded. Of the 15 home runs the Sox have hit, eight have come with the bases empty.
So what to do? Put Jacoby Ellsbury and Mike Cameron on the DL and bring up Josh Reddick and Darnell McDonald. Reddick we know about, but who is McDonald? We will soon find out. Amalie Benjamin writes in the Globe
McDonald, who began the day not on the team’s 40-man roster and the game on the bench, did what the Red Sox have failed to do so often this season. With Jason Varitek having doubled his way ahead of McDonald, the pinch hitter slammed a 2-2 pitch into the seats above the Green Monster, pulling the Red Sox even with the Rangers at 6, inciting that crowd, and helping erase the memory of the nine stolen bases the Sox had given up earlier in the game
And those fans certainly knew his name by the time he came to bat in the ninth, with the bases loaded and two outs. They stood for him then, hoping and praying he could halt Boston’s five-game losing streak, and six-game skid at home. He did. McDonald’s high drive scraped the wall, sending Kevin Youkilis home for a much-needed 7-6 win
Sox win!
Peter Abraham writes in his wrap up in the Globe
There are 100 reasons we all love baseball. Guys like Darnell McDonald and nights like tonight are right up there, aren’t they?McDonald was in a hotel in Boston this afternoon, waiting for a call he wasn’t sure was going to come. But when Jacoby Ellsbury had a painful round of batting practice, he was put on the disabled list and McDonald was summoned.
He joked before the game about being in an undisclosed location and that he had saved his receipts to bill the Red Sox for the snacks he had while waiting.
McDonald came off the bench in the eighth inning to pinch hit for Josh Reddick and cracked a two-run homer to tie the score. Then in the ninth, he delivered a two-out RBI single off the wall with the bases loaded. How cool is that?
His excited teammates — some who barely knew his name — chased him out to left field in their celebration.
…
McDonald is 31 and the Red Sox are his seventh organization since 2004. A former first-round pick of the Orioles in 1997, he has been kicking around pro ball for 13 years. The Sox invited him to spring training as a minor-league free agent. McDonald pulled an oblique muscle and ended up with only 17 at-bats.
It is just like the movies. Veteran minor leaguer gets his chance and comes through. Maybe he’s broken the evil spell on the Sox.
So let’s end this happy story with a this interesting factoid
* The Sox have won 100 of the 123 games Hideki Okajima and Jonathan Papelbon have both appeared in.
The realist in me says one win does not a season make. Can they win again tonight? And who will Dice-K play replace when he arrives from rehab?
Oh, yeah. the Celtics also won last night to take a 2-1 lead in their playoff series.
The NCAA basketball tournaments are over. We can only hope that UConn is not so dominent next year and someone else has a shot at the women’s championship. I did have Duke in the men’s final which salvaged something although not as much as Reggie Love, President Obama’s assistant and former Duke player, who had Duke winning it all.
I planted my spring pots of pansies for the front steps, started some herbs and played with all the indoor plants this weekend. All signs of spring.
The Yankee’s opened at Fenway on Sunday night. (I really dislike opening night. One is supposed to skip school and work on opening day!) The Sox took opening day, but lost last night. Here is Wiley Miller’s take in Non Sequitur
There was the Easter Egg Roll at the White House where the President tried to help this poor bewildered child who was having trouble starting.
It’s gonna be 80 today!
I woke up this morning to two surprising pieces of baseball news. First, Nomar Garciaparra signed a one day contract with the Red Sox so he could retire from baseball as a member of the team. Then, news that Willie Davis, Dodger centerfielder had died. Both were great ballplayers who were also complex personalities.
The Boston Globe story describes what happened.
Nomar Garciaparra, who for the better part of seven years was the face of the franchise before his shocking trade in 2004, has come home to the Red Sox.
At his request, the Red Sox today signed the 36-year-old to a minor-league contract at which point he announced his retirement from baseball during a press conference held at City of Palms Park. He was accompanied by his wife, Mia Hamm, and their twin daughters along with his father, Ramon.
“I was getting choked up then, I’m choked up now, and I’ve got the chills,” Garciaparra said.
“But to be able to have that dream come true, I just can’t put it into words what this organization has always meant to me,” an emotional Garciaparra said. “It’s my family, the fans — I always tell people Red Sox Nation is bigger than any nation out there. I came back home, and to be part of Red Sox Nation is truly a thrill.”
During his prime, all the young women I worked with wanted to meet him. He was “Nomah”. I don’t know which was more devastating: His trade or his marriage to Mia Hamm.
Tony Massarotti has a great piece on Garciaparra.
Most people who follow the Red Sox and the Boston media know much of the history that existed between Garciaparra and reporters, so let’s get this out there: I got along with him better than most, which is hardly to suggest that we’re best friends. We’re not. Garciaparra could be cold enough to walk right past you at a public appearance without acknowledging your existence, kind enough to walk across the room and shake your hand in the same setting. Most of the mistakes he made in Boston were because he did not know how to act, what to say, what to do. In many ways, he was a terrible fit for a place like Boston, where we ask a lot more questions than they do in Dodgertown, Wrigleyville or the Bay Area.
Why do you swing at the first pitch so much, Nomah? What happened on that throw, Nomah? Do you really like it here, Nomah?
Those of us who have always lived here and worked here accept that all as part of the deal. You take the bad with the good. For Garciaparra, it was all a needless reminder of everything that can go wrong, of the things Garciaparra spent far too much of his time thinking about.
As a result, most people saw him as a divisive force when he really wasn’t. Many remember the malcontent at the end of Garciaparra’s time in Boston more than the unbridled enthusiasm of his earlier years. Some see him as part of the problem more than part of the solution.
Remember: the Red Sox were a different team then and Fenway Park was a different place. Frustration had been building for more than 80 years. Lucchino and Co. were learning about Boston as much as we were learning about them, and, along with Pedro Martinez, Garciaparra was the biggest holdover and greatest symbol of a troubled, dysfunctional franchise that just couldn’t seem to get it completely right.
Ever.
Maybe Nomar was just as frustrated with all of that as you were.
Presumably, Garciaparra knows now that there are certain things he will never escape: the rejection of a four-year, $60 million deal that ultimately cost him about $25 million; the injuries to his wrist, legs and Achilles; the disputes with team doctor Arthur Pappas and, later, Lucchino; the never-ending suspicion of steroid use regardless of whether he ever failed any tests; the perpetual feud with the media; the trade that led to a world title; the fact that Alex Rodriguez and Derek Jeter, once regarded as his peers, essentially went on to bigger things without him.
In the wake of all that, some of us choose to remember Garciaparra as a fascinatingly complex ballplayer who was probably in the wrong place at the wrong time, as someone who had trouble coping with relatively ordinary distractions, as someone whose intentions were generally good. At his best, he was a great baseball player. At his worst, he came off as ungrateful and impossible.
In the middle, he really wasn’t much different from anyone else.
And then there was Willie Davis who died at 69. To be honest, I didn’t know he was that close to my age when I was such a fan. That Dodger team: Koufax, Drysdale, Podres, Gilliam, Wills and Davis. I loved that team. That was back when I was a loyal Dodger fam – even after they left Brooklyn. That team won with pitching and speed.
The New York Times has his obituary today.
Frank McCourt, the owner of the Dodgers, said in a statement that Davis was “one of the most talented players ever to wear a Dodgers uniform.” Davis played 14 seasons for the Dodgers, on teams that were almost immediately the stuff of legend. Among his teammates were Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale and Maury Wills. His 31-game hitting streak in 1969 is still a team record. It was the longest streak in the majors since Dom DiMaggio’s 34 games in 1949 for the Boston Red Sox.
Davis holds six other Los Angeles Dodgers records, including hits (2,091), extra-base hits (585), at-bats (7,495), runs (1,004), triples (110) and total bases (3,094).
Davis lifetime batting average was .279, and he had a total of 398 stolen bases. He made it to the major leagues in 1960 and retired after the 1979 season.
Over his career, he played more than 2,200 games in center field, was a two-time All-Star and a three-time Gold Glove winner for his defense. He won World Series rings in 1963 and 1965, stealing three bases in Game 5 of the 1965 Series. On one steal, he had to crawl into second base after stumbling and falling.
…
William Henry Davis was born on April 15, 1940, in Mineral Springs, Ark. His family moved to Los Angeles, where he became a world-class track star at Roosevelt High School. He once ran a 9.5-second 100-yard dash and set a city record in the long jump.
The Dodgers signed him after he graduated in 1958. Playing the next year for the Reno Silver Sox, a Class C minor league team, he scored from first base on a single nine times in one season.
He made his debut with the Dodgers in 1960, and combined with Wills to dazzle the National League with speed. Some called Davis the second coming of Willie Mays. He had a career-high 42 stolen bases in 1964. Dodgers fans loved how his hat flew off when he ran.
He was, in many ways, like Nomar. Not a media favorite.
But he was a loner who sometimes chanted Buddhist mantras before and after games.
For all his speed and obvious ability, sportswriters sometimes questioned why Davis was not even better. Jim Murray, the syndicated sports columnist for The Los Angeles Times, suggested that Davis had tinkered with his batting stance too much.
“Willie, you see, did imitations,” Murray wrote. “The only way you could tell it wasn’t Stan Musial was when he popped up.”
I will remember Willie in centerfield and Nomar at short. Different teams and different eras, but two ballplayers who played hard, played well, and in the end just wanted to be known for their game. And it doesn’t really matter what other teams they played for because Willie is always a Dodger and Nomar is now always a Red Sox.
With the aging Celtics fading into an average team and snow on the ground outside my window, it is time to think about the Red Sox.
This was Wiley Miller’s Non Sequitur (which is set in Maine) from February 12. Truck Day is when the equipment trucks load up at Fenway and head south. People actually go watch and cheer.
The Boston Globe wrote
Sorry Punxsutawney Phil and your six-more-weeks-of-winter prediction, but if you live in New England and are a fan of Red Sox, a sure sign of spring has arrived — Truck Day!
But today is the day pitchers and catchers report which is yet another sign of spring to come. A new season is always hopeful with new players and changes. I understand that the Sox are going to be more defensive this year. Just another thing to watch for as the season unfolds.
Will Dice-K stay healthy? Do we have a shortstop? Can Jacoby play left field? What will happen to Mike Lowell? Can Clay learn to pitch? Will Pap get his groove back? The answer to these questions and more as the season unfolds, but for now all things are possible.
So the Phillies are off to a good start and I’ll be pulling for Pedro (the former Red Sox ace) to help the Phillies win tonight. There is a theory that Sox fans are watching the series hoping that the Phillies can beat the Yankees, that if the Phillies were playing the Angels we wouldn’t care so much. Could be true. But as Tony Mazzarotti wrote in today’s Boston Globe
The transformation of Rasheed Wallace is complete, the enemy of the people now serving as the man of the hour. As seamlessly as Wallace has joined the Celtics on the floor this season, he made a similarly fluid entry last night in his first home game at TD Garden.
In Boston, Rasheed now dresses in white.
“I didn’t know if the fans wanted to keep it personal and still call me those names or what,” Wallace mused in the wake of the Celtics’ 92-59 annihilation of the outmanned, overmatched and outclassed Charlotte Bobcats. “It was cool though.”
Cool, indeed. Cool as Wallace entered the game to chants of Sheeeeeeeeeeeeed with 4:06 remaining in the first quarter, cool as Wallace drilled his first two shots, both 3–pointers, helping the Celtics build a 22-11 lead in the opening quarter. Cool even as Wallace dressed in front of his locker following the game, when he donned a black sweat jacket bearing the name and logo of the Philadelphia Phillies, as sure a sign as any that he has embraced Boston as firmly as Boston already has embraced him.
‘Sheed, it seems, plays by the same rules many of you do. If he is not necessarily rooting for the Red Sox, he is at least rooting for whoever is playing the Yankees.
The Celtics, by the way, are 2-0.
So to Red Sox fans, the New York Yankees are still the evil empire.
But why is today October 29 and just the 2nd game of the Series is being played tonight? The answer is in provided by Tyler Kepner in a New York Times story from last Sunday. Some of the reasons are:
¶When baseball scheduled the World Baseball Classic for March 2009, the players wanted two more weeks of spring training games after its conclusion. So pushing the Classic later would have further delayed the start of the regular season, and the players would not have been ready if it had started sooner.
¶The calendar did not help. Except for the Sunday night opener, the schedule always begins on a Monday, and the first Monday of April 2009 was the sixth. Teams do not want to start the season with a weekend series, because they already draw well on weekends. Opening on a Monday allows teams to sell out a weekday game that would otherwise be a hard sell.
¶The idea of starting the regular season in late March and playing only in warm-weather cities and domes is considered too problematic to be realistic. If both teams in New York and Chicago open on the road, that means overlapping home dates later. And the teams in warm-weather cities and domes would complain about losing dates for later in the season, when they can sell more tickets than they can in late March and early April.
¶The idea of shortening the regular season from 162 games is unrealistic, because teams would not willingly give away moneymaking home dates.
So you have a combination of greed and the quirks of the calendar that will have fans in New York and Philadelphia freezing in their seats. And another thing: Why no day games?
I’m probably being snarky because the Red Sox aren’t still playing and the Yankees are, but it appears that the New Yankee Stadium has issues.
According to an article in the New York Times
The concrete pedestrian ramps at the brand-new $1.5 billion city-subsidized Yankee Stadium have been troubled by cracks, and the team is seeking to determine whether the problems were caused by the installation, the design, the concrete or other factors, according to several people briefed on the problems.
The Yankees have hired an engineering company to take samples from the ramps — they ascend from field level to the stadium’s upper tiers, carrying thousands of people each game — to determine the cause and the extent of the problems as the team finishes its first season in the new stadium and prepares for what could be its first World Series there.
A spokeswoman for the team, Alice McGillion, called the cracks “cosmetic,” saying that they posed no safety issues because they did not affect the structural integrity of the ramps. She characterized the work to repair the problems as “routine remediation,” which she said was “usual in this kind of building or in any other building.”
“There is no evidence that there is any issue or problem with concrete or any material in the building,” she said.
Several people briefed on the problems said, however, that they would cost several million dollars to fix. The cracks, some as much as an inch wide and several feet long, are visible on the slate-gray walkways. Those with knowledge of the defects spoke on the condition of anonymity, as did others, because they were not authorized to discuss the matter.
Sorry, Alice. I don’t think I want to be around when a fan stubs a toe in a crack, falls and gets injured.
This being New York, there are questions about mob involvement and all, but the bottom line is
The Testwell [the company that tested the concrete] indictment, unsealed last October, charged that the company failed to perform some strength tests and billed clients for work that was never done at the stadium and roughly 100 other projects, including the Freedom Tower. When the charges were announced by the Manhattan district attorney, Robert M. Morgenthau, city officials said the structures were believed to be safe, but might deteriorate sooner than expected.
Not built to last.
Not like Fenway which was built in 1912.
In 2002 the Red Sox were sold to John Henry, Tom Werner and Larry Lucchino. Prior to the sale of the team, there had been discussion of building a new Fenway Park. This ballpark was planned to have the same distinct features of Fenway Park, but with more modern and up to date amenities. However, the current owners of the Red Sox are committed to preserving and improving Fenway Park for the foreseeable future.
I can’t find the quote, but the team announced this spring they were done with renovation fro now and that Fenway should be good now for another hundred years. Doesn’t sound like the New Yankee Stadium will make it that long.
Ever since BALCo, Barry Bonds, Mark McGuire, Sammny Sosa, Roger Clemons et al we have all thought that we knew that “everyone” was using illegally and that there was a mythical list of players who tested positive. Today, that is not so clear.
David Ortiz, Big Pappi, was outed by the New York Times which is in the strange situation of being both a part owner of the Red Sox and the hometown paper for the Yankees.
The New York Times reported 10 days ago that Ortiz and Manny Ramirez were among the roughly 100 major league baseball players who tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs in 2003.
At a press conference today during which Ortiz denied buying or using steroids, we learned, for the first time, from the Player’s Union more about the list.
“I definitely was a little bit careless back in those days when I was buying supplements and vitamins over the counter — legal supplements, legal vitamins over the counter — but I never buy steroids or used steroids,” said Ortiz, who revealed he had been tested 15 times and two more times in the World Baseball Classic since 2003 with no positive result.
…
While the government list is alleged to have 104 names on it, the Harvard-educated Weiner [from the Player’s Union} said there could be no more than a maximum of 96 positive tests or no fewer than 83 positive tests, based on the 5 percent threshold of players who needed to test positive in the 2003 testing, which triggered a stiff performance-enhancing policy by Major League Baseball and the union.
Weiner reiterated that no one at the union or the commissioner’s office knew specifically who had tested positive, but that players were notified in August or September of 2004 that they were on the government list. Weiner said no further information was given. Ortiz confirmed that he was never informed of a positive test.
Weiner explained in detail the testing process.
“Part of survey testing in 2003 was that every test consisted of a pair of collections. Every single player — the first sample was taken at random — he didn’t know it was coming — and the second one — and I wasn’t there — but David Ortiz was probably told by the collectors not to take any supplements and it would be collected again roughly seven days later. Those two collections together constituted a single test. Every single player who was tested in 2003 had that paired test and when I say there were other players who were tested twice, they would have had two paired collections because every test was paired.”
Weiner said it was done this way by the doping agency in an effort to determine which players were taking hard steroids and which were testing positive for supplements. Weiner also explained that in 2003, many supplements that were later banned were legal to use. He cited androstenedione. I asked Ortiz whether he had taken andro, made famous by Mark McGwire, and Ortiz couldn’t answer whether he had.
Weiner said that if a player tested positive in one collection and negative in another, the final result of that test would be negative.
While the general feeling is that the union has not explained things well during the process, Weiner pointed out that the same things he’s outlined in his statement before today’s press conference were the same points he made in a letter to Congressmen Tom Davis and Henry Waxman and in a separate letter to Sen. George Mitchell. He said the letter to the congressmen were public knowledge, but conceded that perhaps the message didn’t get out as well as he’d hoped.
Weiner was also asked to reconcile the difference between the union’s involvement with Yankees star Alex Rodriguez, who elected to reveal what he took, as opposed to Ortiz, who said he never took steroids and may be guilty of taking supplements that he didn’t know contained banned substances.
“We talked to each of the players involved in this and again each player made his own determination as to what he wanted to say,” Weiner said. “The fact we decided to issue our statement today was a function of the fact the message had not been gotten out about the unfairness in which this story has been reported. We would have issued that statement no matter who the player and where ever in the country he was. The fact that David decided to make a statement is what drove me to come here. It would be wrong to suggest that our view is any different with any of our players.”
Are you as confused as I am? David Ortiz may have used some illegal substances back in 2003 that were in some vitamins and other supplements he admits he took but didn’t know everything that was in them. No one knows if he is on “The List” because he test positive because maybe he isn’t really on “The List”. The only thing we really know is that he has been test 15 times since with negative results.
Baseball needs to figure out how to handle this situation. It isn’t enough to say that different players want to handle it differently. I know there is a court order about “The List”. Major League Baseball, the Courts, and Congress need to resolve this situation right now. I would propose an amnesty for all players who actually tested positive in 2003 and stiff penalties for anyone who tests positive now. Do what Pappi suggested and suspend for a year. This does not include players like Bonds and Clemens for whom there appears to be evidence of useage. If there is evidence, they get punished, if for nothing else for lying to Congress and law enforcement. If no evidence is ever found, they get amnesty, too. Something has to happen or the players on “The List” will be forever tained and left with no defense.
Of course, this will do nothing about things players may be taking now that are not currently illegal and for which a test is developed in a few years. I guess that’s a question for another day.
Sometimes pictures tell the story. Pictures from the Boston Globe.
Jim Rice with his placque.
Jim and Rickey Henderson.
From his speech
You always feel that after every great once-in-a-lifetime moment, there could not be anything else to top it. You find your life-long partner, that one true love. You have your first child and you spend hours wondering at the perfection of tiny little fingers and toes. You rejoice and cry through pre-elementary, middle and high school and, if you’re lucky, college graduation. You marvel at how sanity endures. Right when you thought it couldn’t get any better, you have grandchildren and a new astonishing love blossoms.
And then after 15 years, you get a phone call that you thought you’d never get. Your aspiration’s realized. Your tears overflow. Because you know now that the highest honor of your career means so much more than you ever thought it would mean before. Because what it feels like most is being welcomed at home plate and after hitting a walk off home run. You find yourself repeating the same phrases over and over:
“We made it, we made it. We made it.”
Just think about it. Jim Rice spent his entire career with the Sox. Is there anyone playing right now you will be able to say that about 10 or 15 years from now? Jon Lester? Dustin Pedroia? Hard to say and probably not.
I look forward to the retirement of his number 14 at Fenway and to his return to the pregame show.
And by the way the John Smoltz experiment needs to end now. It was a good try – didn’t work.
FortLeft 