Major league baseball is supposed to announce numerous suspensions today. Yankees Alex Rodriguez is expected to be hit with a very long suspension (to a possible life time ban). A-Rod has vowed an appeal. The Yankees hope he will just go away.
The fall out of the drug suspensions will affect several pennant races. But this round of discipline is different because of one critical change in the baseball landscape: the players union told its members it will not defend players caught with PEDs. It is apparent that union leadership has heard a growing roar from players not taking PEDs that enough is enough. The drug cheaters are ruining the reputation of non-cheaters.
The reason why players take PEDs is simple: money. A minor league baseball player may make thousands of dollars. A player who makes it to the majors can make millions of dollars. If a player is in the top tier of the majors he can make hundreds of millions of dollars. Each step can raise one's economic circumstances by ten fold.
So there is a great temptation for players to use anything edge in order to perform at peak levels, even if the substance is banned by the league. But an entire underground business of creating designer drugs and beating drug tests has flourished for decades. This illegal operation has been funded by star athletes who want to get their edge and maintain it.
Bud Selig wants to have the legacy of cleaning up his sport. That is why the Rodriguez case was investigated by means of dubious league conduct. It has been alleged that the MLB purchased player medical records (which would have been a violation of federal and state privacy laws). It has been alleged that the league has sued and indemnified seedy operatives in these drug circles in order to get information. All these sleazy investigative techniques would run afoul of criminal laws, but MLB is not a government agency so state criminal laws do not apply. Just as the players thought the means justified the results, so did major league baseball investigators.
So any arbitration appeal will get messy. Major league baseball does not have clean hands in the matter. After the strike, it was the McGwire-Sosa home run record circus that got fans back into the stands. Since then baseball has prospered and ownership has made billions in dollars.
Some may consider a player from a poor family who will lose all salary for a suspension of 50 to 100 games unreasonable. But that is all part of the CBA and major league charter. Ignorance is no defense under the PED test program.
Many believe that the teams of suspended players do not have any accountability in the scandal. The only detriment is that the team will lose a star player for a long period of time. But the team can replace him on the roster. It get the payroll benefit of no salary obligations to the suspended player. But one must realize that everyone including the commissioner and the players work for the team owners. So within the realm of the baseball world, owners set most of the rules for their benefit.
But there is something else that is driving ownership to clean up the game. Congress came down hard on the league during the steroid era. America's pastime of taking steroids to improve performance had trickled down from pros to college and high school athletes. The alarm was that baseball had to clean up its own sport or Congress would. No sane person would want Congress to run their business, let alone walk their dog.
And there is another unmentioned issue that could adversely impact ownership during these drug scandals. If their employees (trainers, coaches, etc.) are enablers who help players juice then the federal prosecutors could try to make the case that the teams were running illegal criminal enterprises (the distribution and sale of illegal controlled substances) and under the RICO laws, owners could be subject to penalty forfeiture of the criminal enterprise . . . i.e. their franchises. No one has brought up in public this nuclear fall out event. But baseball's aggressive stance during this latest scandal has to have been made because of a far worse fate on the horizon.
In order for everyone to be accountable for illegal cheating, teams included, some have proposed that if a player is suspended for PED use, the team could not replace him on the 25 man roster. As a result, the team would suddenly be at a competitive disadvantage. Clean players would then have a personal stake in making sure the clubhouse is clean. Now, critics will say that will upset team chemistry. It will make teammates informants. But there is probably a majority of current players who do not want cheaters in the game so it really should not create that much conflict on teams. Teams would have to police their squads more thoroughly in order to maintain a competitive team to keep fan support via ticket sales. Instead of pocketing the saved salary from a suspended player, a team could have forfeit that money back into the league's drug prevention programs. Also, the teams would still have to carry the unpaid salary on the luxury cap spending books.
Baseball has taken the Biogenesis matter to the aggressive cliff of contractual accountability. But there is something that the national media has failed to catch. The clinic did not specialize in just baseball players. There are probably players from other major sports in those records. However, other sports such as football, soccer, etc. have had no indication that they would aggressively pursue any independent investigation of the clinic customers. These other sports would rather hide under a pillow until a positive drug test hits than be pro-active.
And the final nail in this coffin is the federal criminal investigation into Biogenesis. Investigators will comb through the clinic records, find out which athletes were customers, and try to trace the drug distribution network so it can be shut down. Again, the feds primary focus is to take down drug dealers and not users. But it a user interferes or obstructs an investigation, the government will go after the athlete hard (like in the Bonds case).
Selig may try to make the ultimate statement with a lifetime ban for A-Rod if it can be proven that Rodriguez interfered with baseball's investigation, destroyed records, lied to investigators, or tampered with witnesses. Baseball lifetime bans are not new. Pete Rose was banned for life because he violated the cardinal sin of the game: gambling on baseball. Selig is at the same crossroad today.
