Does it Shock You Anymore?

News broke earlier this week of another former MLB star who managed to cheat his way into the record books. Sammy Sosa, whose home run hitting prowess helped save baseball, tested positive for steroids in 2003. He was involved in the same drug test as Alex Rodriquez.

One year ago this news would have meant so much more and it would have stung a lot deeper. Now, however, baseball fans are immune to these kind of headlines. Two of the games biggest stars (A-Rod and Manny Ramirez) have gone done within the last six moths with steroids that a name like Sosa just does not shock you to the core anymore. In fact it was more a matter of time for Sosa's name to be officially linked to steroids; he had been caught with a corked bat earlier in his career.

I for one hate the idea of performance-enhancing drugs. One thing that makes baseball so special is the fact that you can compare players across generations of athletes. No sport is soaked in history like America's pass-time. Every time a player takes steroids he spits on that tradition and it makes me cringe. Well it used to...

Now it has gotten to the point where I'm just not surprised anymore. There does not seem to be a star-veteran out there who has not been linked at some point in their career and it has come time that we put this issue to rest. It was a part of the culture. Accept it and move on.

You know who really dropped the ball on this one? Major League Baseball. We should be blaming them for the mess in the game. Steroids were rampant in the 90s and even the early 2000s and everybody knew it. Major League Baseball, however, was not about to step in and take away their biggest attraction; the home run. It is not the players fault. They were competing for their jobs in many aspects. The pressure to succeed was immense and these guys cracked. Their careers should be tarnished, without a doubt. They cheated and they have to accept the consequences but they are not real villain here; it is the MLB.

So when do we escape steroids and officially put this era to rest? In my mind it is over the day some player (clean of course) breaks Barry Bonds home run record. When that day comes baseball will be healed.