Thursday, December 13, 2007

The Mitchell Report

Yeah, that's right, I read it. The whole damn thing until he got to the recommendations, which are obviously not my concern, because I am neither a member of the MLBPA nor a person of any authority. But I did read the entire scandal sheet, including the history (which was particularly enjoyable to resurrect memories of Pascual Perez).

My conclusions:
1) If you're a light-hitting catcher, you've been identified as purchasing steroids. It's a shame Tim Spehr didn't hang on longer, he could certainly have joined Tim Laker, Todd Pratt, Gary Bennett, Greg Zaun, Cody McKay, Ryan Jorgensen, Bobby Estelella...and so on.
2) There's very few surprises, the Clemens thing is considerably more explicit than the others, but generally the people aren't huge surprises, collections of players who weren't there long enough to make an impact or people who were repeatedly broken down (Kevin Brown, Rondell White).
3) No Red Sox. At all. Brendan Donnelly is mentioned (although they non-tendered him), so is Eric Gagne (who they cast away a few weeks ago) but aside from Clemens and Mark Carreon, nearly no one who's ever been associated with the Red Sox seems to show up on the list.
4) Selig ignoring the recommendation not to punish players is hubris to the nth degree. Yes, players have broken the rules, but to punish only those people who were dumb enough to pay with checks or buy from one of two designated sources is ridiculous and arbitrary. As much as I'd love to see Andy Pettitte, Gary Sheffield, and Paul Lo Duca get exiled for a while, it's ridiculous to do it unless you're going to launch a full-scale investigation that would implicate people on the Red Sox too.
5) Man, white people love steroids. This is one really white list of players, considering the ethnic background of the Major Leagues.
6) The Dodgers' organization sure knew what was up. While there's no other documentation of teams indicating that their players were on the juice, the Dodgers' discussion of Kevin Brown and Paul Lo Duca show absolute complicity. Theo Epstein is the only other person who inquired about it, but then he ignored the advice he received and picked up Eric Gagne anyway.

The following people are all named in the Mitchell Report, although several are only mentioned as people who had been identified in the media as receiving HGH or steroids:

Manny Alexander
Chad Allen
Rick Ankiel
David Bell
Mike Bell
Marvin Benard
Gary Bennett
Larry Bigbie
Barry Bonds
Ricky Bones
Kevin Brown
Paul Byrd
Alex Cabrera
Ken Caminiti
Mark Carreon
Jason Christiansen
Howie Clark
Roger Clemens
Paxton Crawford
Jack Cust
Brendan Donnelly
Chris Donnels
Len Dykstra
Bobby Estelella
Matt Franco
Ryan Franklin
Eric Gagne
Jason Giambi
Jeremy Giambi
Jay Gibbons
Troy Glaus
Juan Gonzalez
Jason Grimsley
Jose Guillen
Jerry Hairston Jr.
Matt Herges
Phil Hiatt
Glenallen Hill
Darren Holmes
Todd Hundley
Ryan Jorgensen
Wally Joyner
David Justice
Chuck Knoblauch
Tim Laker
Mike Lansing
Paul LoDuca
Nook Logan
Josias Manzanillo
Gary Matthews Jr.
Mark McGwire
Cody McKay
Kent Mercker
Bart Miadich
Hal Morris
Dan Naulty
Denny Neagle
Rafael Palmeiro
Jim Parque
Andy Pettitte
Adam Piatt
Todd Pratt
Stephen Randolph
Adam Riggs
Armando Rios
Brian Roberts
John Rocker
F.P. Santangelo
Benito Santiago
Scott Schoeneweis
Gary Sheffield
Mike Spinelli
Mike Stanton
Miguel Tejada
Derrick Turnbow
Ismael Valdez
Mo Vaughn
Randy Velarde
Ron Villone
Fernando Vina
Rondell White
Jeff Williams
Matt Williams
Todd Williams
Steve Woodard
Kevin Young
Gregg Zaun

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