MLB Commissioner Bud Selig is contemplating suspending Alex Rodriguez for admitted he used performance enhancing substances while with the Texas Rangers.
This proposition is totally ridiculous.
MLB began testing players in 2003 and 104 players including A-Rod tested positive. This was done through the Commissioner's office. Is Selig telling us he never knew which players tested positive in 2003?
The only reason A-Rod made these admissions was because someone leaked his name. Remember that MLB and the MLBPA agreed that the results would be confidential. Someone breached that confidence. Perhaps someone from Commissioner Selig's office. If anyone deserves punishment it is that individual.
If Selig does suspend A-Rod he is effectively discouraging other players from coming forward.
He would also apply arbitrary standards. When A-Rod's former teammate Jason Giambi came forward he was not punished due to his communications with former Senator George Mitchell.
Hopefully some lawyer in the Commissioner's office will tell Selig that if he suspends A-Rod than an arbitrator would overturn the ruling in a heartbeat. The MLBPA would not take such an infringement for a nanosecond.
However, the MLBPA is also coming under scrutiny. A-Rod has received a letter from Maryland Democratic Congressman Elijah Cummings, a ranking member of the House Government Oversight and Reform Committee. Cummings has asked A-Rod to meet with hima and Committee staff to discuss performance enhancing drugs and whether Gene Orza, the Chief Operating Officer of MLB gave any players a heads up on testing since the end of the 2004 season.
New York Yankees General Manager Brian Cashman has said the team with deal with A-Rod's admission.
So much for the truth setting one free.
Here's a prediction. Because of chain reaction of events I think A-Rod will sit out the 2009 season.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
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The 2003 tests were anonymous and the results were supposed to be confidential. The agreement between the Commissioner's Office and the Player's Union was that the tests would carry no penalty, but would give the league an idea of how rampant the problem was.
Well, the anonymous and confidential conditions were both broken, so if Selig actually does carry out a sentence on A-Rod, I could only see the player's union wreaking havoc on everything.
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