Rangers’ Massacred In Boston, And Thoughts On MLB’s Ensuing Suspensions

I don’t care to write much about last night’s game, but I will say that I missed it, luckily, because I was a half-hour away from a television. Awesome. It’s a lot like what I call “fast-food karma” — I’ve waited in long lines At McDonalds and Del Taco so many times without bitching, that now I get short lines most of the time. It doesn’t matter what time of the day, I hardly ever have to wait in drive-through lines.

In baseball, I look at it the same way. I don’t freak out and call for everyone’s head each time the team goes through a rough patch, so the universe rewards me by saving me the shitty, depressing blowout losses. I guess you can say I’m philosophical with how baseball works. On night’s where I’m not available to watch the Rangers, which isn’t often, they tend to lose convincingly. And I love that.

We can’t win every game. I can’t watch every game. But you roll with the punches, don’t overreact, wait patiently. The trends manifest themselves.

Oh yeah, Texas lost last night, 17-5.

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In the blockbuster news of the day, per everyone, baseball is apparently going to drop the hammer on roughly 20 Major Leaguers who were allegedly involved in a PED scandal at a Miami clinic; by this point you should obviously be familiar with the story, so I won’t dive too far into it.

As it relates to the Rangers, Nelson Cruz is facing one of those suspensions, though I’m not counting on it;

Here’s the thing: Even if 5 minutes from now MLB decides to lay down 100-game suspensions on 20 players, then what? Every player appeals, gets their lawyer, takes the case to court. Both sides could be tied up in litigation for months, or even years, as we’ve seen before the arduous process PED scandals can become.

Baseball’s evidence against the players is sketchy, at best, deplorable at worst. In reality, what’s happening is MLB has corrupted an already corrupted human being; they are making a snitch out of a doctor — who is supposed to be bound to confidentiality vis a vis his clients — and furthering their own hypocrisy when it comes to Performance-Enhancing Drugs.

Steroids, those little injections that went a big, big way in revitalizing the sport’s popularity in the late 90’s — the drugs baseball sneezed at, ignored during that time — and this most recent episode in Miami is the latest in their sanctimonious stranglehold over the athletes people pay to come see.

There is certainly an argument to be made for the other side, because at the end of the day there are rules, and players should be held accountable for the choices they make. However, in this specific situation, the problem is the process. Whether the players cheated or not isn’t relevant to me. If the process was clean, if the information was being obtained without needing a veritable gun pointed at the source’s head, then this article might have a different tone.

As it stands, we’re dealing with an immensely flawed MLB brain-trust ordained to make appropriate, responsible decisions, and they continue to show us utter incompetence.

It’s sad, but witch-hunts are great ways to stir up polarizing controversies within the mass of sports’ fans, so we shouldn’t expect this depressing phenomena to cease anytime soon.