[Triad]

Originally Posted by Grandstander

The stronger you are, the greater your bat speed. The greater your bat speed, the longer you can wait to swing and the more time you may devote to recognizing the type and location of the pitch.

But, Grandstander, this goes against conventional knowledge. The faster you swing, the less often you make contact, and the more you strike out.

Originally Posted by Grandstander

Part of one's ranking on the all time lists is composed of how well the player sustained his excellence into the later years of his career. We are denied the true picture for Bonds and Clemens.

We've always been denied a true picture of anyone in history. We don't know what anyone did to help their performance, other than what we're told about. We know Gaylord Perry was a cheater, but he was a good cheater. He was better than Joe Niekro. Still, this doesn't mean that we know that Tom Seaver or Jim Palmer didn't cheat. For all we know, Gaylord Perry also took steroids and bet on his team, but we don't know that. He might have admitted some incidental wrongdoing (which was breaking the rules) to mask greater indiscretions. Maybe he was also a serial killer and was trying to distract people from that fact. You can't judge a player based on what you're told.

Originally Posted by Grandstander

The steroid users have crapped on the stats. They have crapped on all those discussions.

You could substitute "steroid users" with other designations throughout history and say basically the same thing. In fact, it's safe to say that the owners have done far more damage to the game than anyone else. They've done things throughout history to muck up the game. And recently, the juiced ball and smaller stadiums has had a greater impact than steroids. Do you think it's the steroid users' fault that pitchers have trouble getting into the 8th and 9th innings any more, and there are 3-4 relievers in most every game? What does that do to the stats? Greg Maddux could have easily won 400 games if he'd pitched in the '60s and '70s. Honus Wagner was hindered by the dead ball his whole career. Hardly any casual fan looks at him as one of the top ten greatest players. That's because he had no flashy records. Mike Schmidt was hindered by playing in the '70s and '80s — one of the worst times since the 1920s for hitting home runs. Schmidt would have flirted with 700 HR in today's environment.

What I don't understand is how people think Griffey and ARod were not helped by the era they play in, but Bonds, McGwire, Sosa, Palmeiro, etc., were helped. Was Mike Piazza not helped? Most career HR by a catcher. Was Jeff Kent not helped? Most career HR by a 2nd baseman. McGwire's got 1B covered. ARod's got his side of the field. Bonds has LF. So are we to believe that among these players, some of them were not legitimate and some were, and we can tell which? Isn't it a little coincidental that ARod and Griffey would come along the same time as Bonds, McGwire & Sosa, but they somehow had no statistical benefit from the time period they played in?

See the attached chart, and notice the difference before '95 and then after.

Originally Posted by Grandstander

Further, they are thieves, aren't they? How many of them were able to parlay their artificial performances into larger contracts because they appeared to be legitimate stars? How many who refused to go along with the cheating suffered lower value contracts as a consequence because their performances no longer seemed up to par? How many who did not use, failed to make it to the bigs at all because they were beaten out by the steroid using sluggers?

The answer to the "how many" is the key: we don't know if it's a lot or a little. Plus, we don't know who. And not armed with such knowledge, that's why we have to err on the side of caution. Unless you have a steroid-o-meter to gauge the effect of the drug on certain players' performance.

And if we're talking about using performance enhancing drugs to extend one's career, then I think somebody needs to lift a suspicious eye toward Julio Franco.