I’ve never really understood the uproar over steroid¹ use in baseball. Unlike some other sports baseball lacked any actual rule banning steroids or performance enhancing drugs before 2004. True there was a policy (without any penalties) generally banning any baseball player from using or possessing any illegal drug or controlled substance but it’s also a MLB policy now that players can’t drink in their clubhouse. Surely you don’t feel that someone who snuck a beer into the clubhouse after a game would be a cheater do you? What about the players who bummed a valium for a plane flight? Sleep helps you play so it’s giving you an advantage on the field. Remember in the baseball culture of that time the use of steroids wasn’t considered a big deal. Besides, the substances used by the more sophisticated users very well might not have been scheduled, and thus not illegal², at the time.

Taking a broader perspective on the attitude we take to cheating in baseball it’s simply absurd to try and hang your the outrage at steroid use on the notion that it’s cheating. When a pitcher is caught scuffing the ball or applying spit it’s not a big issue the way it would be if they were found to be using steroids. Of course some would argue that steroid use by a player undermines the validity of their records by making it impossible to compare them to the past greats and thus damages the game. Why anyone would think that violating a policy that everyone understood wasn’t a genuine rule of the game should undermine the validity of your record but actually cheating during the game doesn’t count for that much totally baffles me but it doesn’t matter as the whole notion that tis nonsensical. As people have throughly documented past players have unfairly benefited from evils like segregation and rule changes to such a degree that the notion of comparing players from one era to another simply by examining the numbers doesn’t make any sense.

Finally, when pushed on these two arguments the people making a fuss about about steroids usage retreat to the argument that these players are role models and setting a bad example for children. Even if so where is the outrage over players who spend the night carousing, who leave their wives or don’t save enough money? Children see baseball players publicly flaunt all kinds of bad behavior all the time but they only hear about the steroid use because moralizing fans and prosecutors insisting on digging it up. Moreover, while these players certainly take some risk they aren’t desperate body builders, even with the steroids they live a healthier lifestyle than most public figures. In my view we should simply take the use of performance enhancing drugs as just another evolution in the long series of changes to the game.

So if the revelations about baseball players past steroid use hasn’t upset me what has? Government prosecutors threatening to prosecute a man’s wife and mother in law for tax violations just to pressure him into spilling the beans on Barry Bonds.** As I’ve said previously I think it should be illegal (frankly I would add it to the constitution) to threaten someone’s family to secure their testimonty. Even if the practice itself doesn’t seem repugnant to you if the defense can’t (openly) pay witnesses to testify for fear it would bias their testimony why should the prosecution be able to threaten their family with jail time? But even if you accept the practice is sometimes nencessery is the Barry Bonds case really that important?

I can’t believe that the government is threatening to screw over a man’s family just so he will help them prove Barry Bonds lied. That really is a new low.